As the only Chinese delegation, the team of 8 Tongji students to theSustainable Developing CampusSub-forum of UN Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen sent back message on December 16th. They said that Tongji’s practices and achievements in constructing resource-efficient campus had attracted broad attention in the forum.
It was learned that this sub-forum was held in University of Copenhagen from December 13thto 14th. 15 delegations from 17 universities across the world demonstrated the students’ action programs of each team in the Auditorium of Copenhagen University, and made short speeches of 5 to 10 minutes to introduce their programs.
Tongji delegation made adequate preparation in the aspects of present situation summary, problem identification and project design in constructing sustainable campus. Cao Xiaojing and Philip were responsible for program demonstration and speech. They not only demonstrated experiences and achievements these years, but also proposed future plan of Green Campus for the next year.
In later discussion, some delegations showed keen interests in Tongji’s achievements in constructing green campus and altered their conception of developing countries after listening to the speech.
What Tongji delegates were proud of was that Tongji’s achievements were not only holding the leading position domestically, but also reached international advanced level. The solar system plan and the building energy-efficiency improving plan mentioned by some delegates had been implemented successfully in Tongji. They expressed that the western delegates had also proposed some creative ideas, especially changing students’ behavior, which gave them abundant enlightenment. For instance, the delegation of London University suggested sharing personal emission information so as to form group pressure and finally achieve good effect of behavioral change. The delegation of Switzerland ETH ZURICH suggested posting the cards about carbon emissions in dining-halls and cafes so as to persuade the students to change their eating habits and reduce carbon emissions.
At the end of the conference, panel of experts from Yale University, University of Copenhagen and Australian National University made summary for this activity and incisive comments on the plans from the perspectives of university’s developing strategy and sustainable development of campus.
