How does it work?

Schools purchase a considerable amount of resources to help create an effective and stimulating learning environment. Paper and pens, tables and chairs, computers and white boards, sports equipment and more are purchased, used and ultimately disposed of as waste.

A school wishing to embody sustainable values must also be a model of sustainable purchasing. This means finding out about the environmental and ethical standards of suppliers, and choosing to do business with those whose standards are highest.

The carbon footprint of any product is affected by the origin and nature of its raw materials, the manufacturing processes involved, the packaging used and all associated transport costs. Using local sources wherever possible reduces some of these transport emissions, as well as supporting local businesses and therefore the local community.

There are increasingly exciting alternatives for purchasing items, such as chairs that have been specifically designed to have small carbon footprints. A learning space filled with resources selected under these criteria has a wonderful feeling of integrity, as well as creating an environment for discussion and generation of enterprising ideas.

The Carbon Detectives’ Kit selects a number of key items and focuses on the lifespan of goods purchased and quantity. This might seem simplistic, but there is no data widely available to compare the carbon footprints of all items that a school purchases.

Consideration of what to buy, where to source it and what to do with it once the original purpose has been fulfilled or exhausted offers a range of challenges and opportunities.

What data is needed?

To calculate the CO2 emissions from the things your school buys the Carbon Detectives Team will need to collect information about items in the school such as chairs, tables, computers and paper/card. Information collected should include the number of items in total, the number of new items purchased in the last 12 months and the average lifespan of each item.

Once the data has been entered it is multiplied by carbon conversion factors to give the impact in kilograms of CO2.

What individual pupils can do

  • Take good care of all resources to ensure that they last as long as possible, for example by looking after school equipment and preventing damage.

What a school community can do

  • Establish a policy of buying recycled products whenever possible and avoid items with excess packaging.
  • Purchase from companies whose products have low carbon footprints and/or are local.
  • Purchase robust products with a a long life span.

To influence government thinking and policy-making, pupils can:

  • Become a model of good practice in terms of waste management and sustainable purchasing, making good use of possible media coverage. Across the country this may begin to create new business opportunities, and send a message to the manufacturing sector. This in turn may have a knock on effect on government policy and the types of grants available to sustainably minded schools and businesses.