Sustainable Operations

Erasmus University Rotterdam (EUR) has the ambition to develop one of the most sustainable campuses in the Netherlands. The university is working closely with the municipality and the central government to achieve its goals.

Sustainability goals

Current goals of Erasmus University Rotterdam in terms of sustainable operations are:

  • Becoming more energy-efficient;
  • Towards a vegan campus in 2030;
  • Providing sustainable catering on campus;
  • Increasing biodiversity on campus;
  • Promoting sustainable procurement and mobility;
  • Reducing, reusing and recycling waste; 
  • Contributing to the Climate Agreement of 2030.

Green campus

Sustainable mobility

fietsen op campus

Sustainable food

Sustainable procurement

Waste management

Sustainable Community

Energy and buildings

CO2 reports

All of EUR's activities result in CO2 emissions. The majority of these emissions comes from transportation, such as transportation to and from campus and business travel. We want to work towards a CO2-neutral campus in 2024. To monitor this goal, the university publishes a carbon footprint every year. You can download the report with the results for 2021 below. For 2021, the university's total CO2 emissions were determined to be 8,800 tons. This equals a footprint per student of 0.2 tons of CO2. 

To be CSRD-compliant, EUR has decided to create both the 2022 and 2023 carbon footprint reports in line with this legislation. This requires more data processing and therefore takes more time. As a result, these 2 reports are not yet visible on this page. In Q1 of 2024, the 2022 CO2 footprint report will be published. The one for 2023 will follow in Q2.

Sunny day on campus Woudestein.
Alexander Santos Lima

Portfolio Roadmap Energy Transition

As we continue to develop the campus, we take several measures to save energy and reduce CO2 emissions, including:

  • Heat recovery to sustainably heat spaces.
  • Application of intelligent lighting.
  • Application of LED lighting.
  • Smart cooling of data centers.
  • Installing solar panels.
  • Connecting buildings to thermal energy storage.

We strive to meet the targets for CO2 reduction in the Climate Agreement. The Climate Agreement (June 28, 2019) states that sectoral roadmaps should be drawn up for sectors within social real estate. These roadmaps analyze the existing real estate and how its CO2 emissions can be reduced to meet climate goals. We aim to reduce CO2 emissions by 49% in 2030 and 95% in 2050 (compared to 2021). We do this according to the trias energetica:

  1. limit energy demand
  2. use sustainable energy
  3. use fossil fuels as efficiently and cleanly as possible.

The aim of the Portfolio Roadmap for the period from 2022 to 2050 is to provide a short- and long-term plan for the real estate in question, indicating how adjustments will be made to this real estate in order to comply with the climate agreement.

Roadmap Sustainable Campus

In 2019 and 2020, the Roadmap Sustainable campus was drawn up. This roadmap to a CO2-neutral and Eco-positive campus outlines a number of actions with which the EUR can reduce CO2 emissions in the coming years. 

Erasmus University Rotterdam signs Rotterdam Climate Agreement

EUR is now a proud new partner of the Climate Alliance Sustainable Mobility

Partners klimaatalliantie duurzame mobiliteit

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