IN TERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON - CIFBA 2020 TRANSFORMING TOWARD GREEN UNIVERSITIES-FINANCIAL CONSTRAINTS AND POLICY IMPLICATIONS Pham Vu Thang VNU University of Economics and Business, Vietnam National University ABSTRACT Universities have played important roles in sustainable development Universities have been consuming energies, releasing CO2 emissions and producing wastes In addition, universities take social responsibilities to be sustainable themselves, and train the young generation to be future leaders with a sustainability mindset In developed countries such as UK, in response to UK Climate Change Act universities have developed their carbon management plans to cut down carbon emission by 34% by 2020 and 80% reduction by 2050 from the 1990 baseline In Vietnam, universities have still played little roles in contributing the National Green Growth Strategy There have not been any specific policies on universities as an agent for implementing and promoting this goal This paper discusses opportunities and challenges when universities can apply renewable energy to use energy more efficiency and to cut down CO2 emissions Key factor to hinder the application of Vietnamese universities is financial constraint Policy recommendations are discussed Key words: Green university model, sustainable development, CO2 emissions, GHG emissions, energy saving company THE GLOBAL CONTEXT OF ENERGY CONSUMPTION AND PRODUCTION AND CO2 EMISSIONS According to BP Statistical Review of World Energy (2019), global energy consumption has increased rapidly for decades In 2018, the global energy consumption reached 145,953 TWh, over 1,5 times of the 1990 global energy consumption (87,397 TWh) * Corresponding author Email address: thangpv@vnu.edu.vn 372 VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY - UNIVERSITY OF ECONOMICS AND BUSINESS In which, Asia Pacific countries have contributed for nearly half of the global energy consumption in 2018 The region’s consumption was one third of the global energy consumption in 2000 In 1990, it was one fourth of the global energy consumption North America and Europe have shown the stable energy consumption over the last three decades The rest of the world such as Africa, South and Central America shows the decreasing shares in the global energy consumption In terms of global energy sources, the chart below shows the proportion of energy sources in the global energy consumption In 2018, oil accounted for 37%, whereas coal was 30%, gas was 26% Renewable energies such as wind, solar and other type of renewable energies accounted only 1.6 % of the global energy production 373 IN TERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON - CIFBA 2020 In terms of sources of CO2 emissions, according to International Energy Agency in 2014 electricity and heat production contributed 49% of the global CO2 emissions, transportation 20%, manufacturing industries and construction 20%, residential buildings, commercial and public services 9% and other sectors 2% Over the period of 1960 to 2014, the CO2 emissions of proportion of electricity and heat production have increased steadily suggesting that replacing polluted electricity production by renewable energies such as solar, win, biomass power play important roles in cutting down CO2 emissions Universities including plenty of flat roofs have suitable conditions for producing solar energies to reduce CO2 emissions THE ROLE OF UNIVERSITIES IN SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT A number of studies analyse the important role of universities in climate change and sustainable development Betts (2001) and Dahle and Neumayer (2001) point out waste and greenhouse gas emissions from operating activities of universities can affect directly with adverse impacts on the environment The rapid scaling of universities can increase the risk of deterioration of the natural ecosystems Waste, water, electricity and fuel for lighting, heating, cooling, the use of laboratories, operation of buildings, and transportation, all exert negative impacts on the environment (Alshuwaikhat and Abubakar, 2008) Dahle Neumayer (2001) point out universities also have indirect impacts on the environment through their consumption of energy, construction materials, paper and food These impacts can be compared with those of cities, however usually at smaller scale Therefore, the university’s operations are required to be efficient in order to bring a positive impact to the surrounding environment In practice, in the UK, Mazhar et al (2019) recorded that in 2012-2013, British universities consumed 7.9 billion kWh of energy and emitted 2.3 million tonnes of 374 VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY - UNIVERSITY OF ECONOMICS AND BUSINESS carbon emissions The higher education sector emitted only 0.5% of the national carbon emissions Under UK Climate Change Act, British universities have set a target to reduce 80% reduction by 2050 and 34% by 2020 from the 1990 baseline In US, Sinha et al (2010) estimated in 2005 US universities and institutions emitted 2% of total American GHG emissions Despite of the relatively low proportion of emission in these countries, universities have played important roles in society to be greener Viebahn (2002) studies the contribution of universities to the development of the society emphasizing that universities have an important social responsibility, especially related to training young generations and raising community awareness about sustainable development Universities also have the mission of research and teaching, thereby positively affecting the behaviors of lecturers and students as well as the communities through lessons on how to live and work effectively and environment- friendly A MODEL TO TRANSFORM INTO A GREEN UNIVERSITY There are various ways to transform universities to be greener Nguyen Thuy Anh and Pham Vu Thang (2017) have suggested the model of green universities includes four core elements namely governance and policies, operations, education research and extra-curricular activities and community involvement Other activities and stakeholders involved in these activities are displayed in Figure Figure 1: Green University Model (Source: Nguyen Thuy Anh and Pham Vu Thang (2017) The first column includes the core elements of a green university including governance and policies, operations, education, research and extra-curricular activities, and community involvement and social responsibility of a university The second column in the middle is the break-out of these four components The third column shows the involvement of various stakeholders or actors in the process of building and implementing a green university 375 IN TERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON - CIFBA 2020 Figure The component of Governance and Policies Source Nguyen Thuy Anh and Pham Vu Thang (2017 Figure shows the first component “Governance and polices” Firstly, a green university should have sustainable vision, mission and strategies, and they can be displayed in the university website It will lead to greater mission, objectives and strategies and be implemented in action plans of that university These strategies and plans are also needed for the monitoring and evaluating process A sustainability committee including leaders, managers, lecturers, staff members, students, even companies and other local organizations play a key role in developing a university’s vision, mission, targets, action plans as well as in the monitoring and evaluation of how these vision, mission, strategies and plans have been implemented in practice Figure The component of Operations Source: Nguyen Thuy Anh and Pham Vu Thang (2017 The second component of the model is operations which is also considered as the hard component or hardware of a green university (Figure 3) The component is related to facilities, buildings, campus, electricity and water usage, waste, even transportation and food or dining services and purchasing of a green university In this component, a sustainability team includes lectures, students, officers and staff from various departments and faculties The third category in the model is the academic component of a green university, which is also named as the soft component or software of a green university The education part includes compulsory courses, selective courses and extra-curricular activities The research part requires university to conduct research projects, release 376 VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY - UNIVERSITY OF ECONOMICS AND BUSINESS publications, figure out solutions and organize seminars/conferences on sustainable topics Extracurricular activities are not only for students but also for university staffs or even leaders and managers Via these activities, the awareness towards sustainable development of in-campus actors as well as local community will be increased Figure The component of Education, Research and Extracurricular Activity Source Nguyen Thuy Anh and Pham Vu Thang (2017 The final component is community involvement (Figure 4) University should be considered as a living lab, in which lecturers and students can make experiments and implement their ideas to solve environmental issues These ideas are brought into reality in the local community Stakeholders include government, NGOs, companies and other universities and research institutions The implementation process of the green university model needs awareness, action and the support from the government Besides, universities need networking with other organizations when conducting activities related to environment and sustainable development Figure The component of Community Involvement Source Nguyen Thuy Anh and Pham Vu Thang (2017) FINANCIAL CONSTRAINTS AND POLICY IMPLICATIONS In order to investigate financial challenges and policies Vietnamese universities have faced to develop solar panels in their campuses, we selected and conducted interviews of Vietnamese university leaders to discuss challenges when universities invest solar panel energy in their campuses Universities have advantages of using renewable energies in their campuses First of all, universities have flat roofs of the classroom buildings, library, students accommodations, and sport halls providing plenty of un-shaded areas for solar panel installations Therefore, the cost of installation and operation is also relatively cheaper Universities can save electricity bills or can sell to the national grid easily because universities often locate at cities or close to large cities so it is not expensive to invest the transmission line from the project to the national grid 377 IN TERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON - CIFBA 2020 Second, price of producing solar panels has reduced sharply The project cost is cheaper accordingly Recently one MW solar project will cost roughly one million USD1 Third, FIT (Feed in Tariff) is an important policy that helps universities/investors to enable to estimate the project size, investment cost and financial rate of return on investment for 10 years Vietnam has issued Decision 11/2017 to promote FIT with the price of buying Kwh is 9.35 US cent, which have attracted a number of large solar energy projects in Vietnam However, universities face challenges to invest in solar panel The main challenge is the electricity contracts are not accepted to international banks and investors According to Dapice (2018), in practice Vietnamese banks have higher interest rates and shorter terms than international banks Local banks often provide 10% of loan for 10 years compared to 6-8% for 15-20 years from commercial international financial institutions Table 1: Feed In Tariffs in Germany in the period of 2005-2012 2005 2010 July 2010 October 2010 2011 January 2012 up to 30 kWp 54.53 39.14 34.05 33.03 28.74 24.43 above 30 kWp 51.87 37.23 32.39 31.42 27.33 23.23 above 100 kWp 51.30 35.23 30.65 29.73 25.86 21.98 above 1000 kWp 51.30 29.37 25.55 24.79 21.56 18.33 conversion areas 43.40 28.43 26.16 25.37 22.07 18.76 agricultural fields 43.40 28.43 — — — — other 43.40 28.43 25.02 24.26 21.11 17.94 Type Rooftop-mounted Ground-mounted Source BMU (2010)" Renewable energy sources in figures-national and international development” https://news.energysage.com/solar-farms-start-one/ 378 VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY - UNIVERSITY OF ECONOMICS AND BUSINESS Second, the government should have soft loan programmes to finance renewable energy projects in universities, schools, and hospitals These programmes should offer low or zero interest rates and longer payback periods, and loan guarantees Third, FIT policy should have different tariffs depending on the project sizes, and rooftop or ground project For instance, Germany used to FIT policies in different project sizes to attract projects such as universities that can not reach the economy of scale Last but not least, energy services company (ESCO) and third party financing schemes should be encouraged to develop in Vietnam An ESCO is a business providing a broad range of energy solutions including designs and implementation of energy savings projects, energy infrastructure outsourcing, power generation and energy supply, and risk management Third party financing scheme will invest and take the financial risk Universities can save the cost by buying cheaper electricity cost from the third party and when the contract expires they will own the system REFERENCES [1] Betts, K (2001) Greening the campus Environmental Science & Technology, 198202 [2] Dahle, M., Neumayer, E (2001) Overcoming barriers to campus greening: a survey among higher educational institutions in London, UK International Journal of Sustainability in Higher Education, 2(2), 139-160 [3] Dapice, D (2018), Vietnam’s Crisis of Success in Electricity-Options for a Successful Clean Energy Mix, ASH Center, Harvard University or the Fulbright School of Public Policy and Management [4] Eagan, D.J., Keniry, J., Schott, J (2008) Higher education in a warming world: the business case for climate leadership on campus Available at: www.nwf.org [5] Habib M Alshuwaikhat, Ismaila Abubakar (2008) An integrated approach to achieving campus sustainability: assessment of the current campus environmental management practices Journal of Cleaner Production, 16, 1777-1785 [6] Jessica Finlay, J M (2012) Eco-campus: applying the ecocity model to develop green university and college campuses International Journal of Sustainability in Higher Education, 13(2), 150-165 [7] Mazhar M.U., Bull R., Lemon M and Ahmad S.B.S (2019) Carbon Management Planning in UK Universities: A Journey to Low Carbon Built Environment In: Leal Filho W., Leal-Arcas R (eds) University Initiatives in Climate Change Mitigation and Adaptation Springer, Cham [8] Sinha, P., Schew, W A., Sawant, A., Kolwaite, K J., & Strode, S A (2010). Greenhouse Gas Emissions from U.S Institutions of Higher Education Journal of the Air & Waste Management Association, 60(5), 568-573. doi:10.3155/1047-3289.60.5.568 [9] Velazquez L., Munguia N., Platt A., Taddei J (2006) Sustainable university: what can be the matter? Journal of Cleaner Production, 14, 810-819 [10] Viebahn, P (2002) An environmental management model for universities: from environmental guidelines to staff involvement Journal of Cleaner Production, 10, 3e12 379 ... the important role of universities in climate change and sustainable development Betts (2001) and Dahle and Neumayer (2001) point out waste and greenhouse gas emissions from operating activities... how to live and work effectively and environment- friendly A MODEL TO TRANSFORM INTO A GREEN UNIVERSITY There are various ways to transform universities to be greener Nguyen Thuy Anh and Pham Vu... of green universities includes four core elements namely governance and policies, operations, education research and extra-curricular activities and community involvement Other activities and