Leeds Beckett University - City Campus,
Woodhouse Lane,
LS1 3HE
Student Sustainability Conference 2021
On 23 November 2021 we will be holding our annual Student Sustainability Conference which will be a TEDxLeedsBeckettUniversity COUNTDOWN event. This will be a half-day event that encourages the collaboration of disciplines and the development of sustainable practices.
Thank you to everyone who attended our TEDxLeedsBeckettUniversity COUNTDOWN event on November 23rd, 2021. We hope you enjoyed it!
It was really great to see students from across the university come together and use their interdisciplinary knowledge to discuss the climate crisis and generate ideas about how we can reduce our negative impact on the environment.
We would also like to thank all of the teams who supported the event, all of the speakers and the media production team.
TED x COUNTDOWN is a global initiative to champion and accelerate solutions to the climate crisis, turning ideas into action.
This event will have a range of speakers who will cover topics relevant to students from across the university.
We have now sold out of tickets!
You can read information about our speakers here:
TEDxLeeds Beckett University COUNTDOWN 23 November 2021
Citizens' Jury - Chris Till, Laura Davies, Kayleigh Curtis and Megan Faye Hanson
This year as part of our student sustainability conference, we will have a session run by our Citizens’ Jury Green Impact team. At the conference, they will be covering some of the research and topics which will be covered in the official LBU Citizens’ Jury. There will also be a taster session for the Citizens’ Jury to get everybody thinking about how Leeds Beckett University, on both an organisational and an individual level, can become more sustainable.
A Citizens’ Jury is usually built from a collection of people who will represent the community they are making recommendations for. This means that we are hoping for a well-balanced jury based on the make-up of our university community. The official Jury will hold multiple consulting sessions to try and develop ideas and plans for tackling sustainability-related issues. There will then be a report written with some main ideas discussed in detail and this will be sent to the managers of the university and out to further stakeholders who can make a difference.
We will also have a range of presenters at the conference who will be discussing pieces of work which they have completed and how this work can contribute towards a more sustainable future both in Leeds Beckett and the wider world.
Leeds Beckett Eco Soup - Fozia Iqbal & Eleanor Claxton
The presentation will address the following topics:
- How much food we waste as a country
- Amount of food we have diverted from landfill
- Employability skills gained through volunteering
- Effect on student outlook
- Pay as you feel profits
- Why volunteers get involved
- Impact, Scale, Long term goals
Leeds Beckett Zero Waste Store - Anna Crooks and Lucy MacDonald
The presentation will address the following topics:
- Why refilling is better for the environment
- Global change of opinion on waste reduction
- Supply chains and fair trade
- Leeds as an example to the UK – Our refill revolution
- Why every university should have a refill station
Impact, Scale, Long term goals
Leeds Beckett Allotment - Willem Kleinsmiede and Eva Mcquade
The presentation will address the following topics:
- How has the site been developed
- Challenges of starting from new
- The effects of growing your own
- The benefits of “living of the fat of the land”
- Tied in with Eco Soup
- Impact, Scale, Long term goals
Measuring whole house fabric performance - Mark Collett
Understanding how our buildings perform in terms of heat loss, significantly reduces the amount of energy needed to keep our homes warm, in turn reducing carbon emissions. Mark Collett explores a new measurement technique that can monitor a buildings performance literally over night! A technique that should radically change building standards in the construction sector.
A selection of TEDx Countdown short films will also be shown as the conference is part of the TEDx Countdown global movement. You can find out more about TED x Countdown here.
The TEDx COUNTDOWN videos which we will show are:
55GT Animation: Interstitial - Animation describing the sources of the 55 Gigatons (billion tons) of CO2-equivalent we put up in the atmosphere every year.
Clean Air Advocate - Rosamund Adoo-Kissi-Debrah video: My daughter was the first person in the world whose death certificate indicates the cause of death as "air pollution". We need to act.
Susan Graham video: Environmentalist, entrepreneur. Susan Graham works to restore biodiversity to Earth's natural ecosystems. A new way to restore Earth's biodiversity - From the air.
Thomas Crowther video: Ecosystem ecology professor. In collaboration with vast networks of ecologists around the world, Thomas Crowther works to address the global threats of biodiversity loss and climate change. Restor.eco Q&A + Demo.
TEDx COUNTDOWN artwork
TEDx COUNTDOWN photography collection
Eloise Butler
Hello, I am Eloise. I am currently a Level 6 BA(Hons) Business Studies student. I have previously undertaken a placement year working on the Sustainability team at Leeds Beckett University.
