Bournemouth University
Our approach to sustainable IT is delivering energy savings, creating student opportunities, and bringing external funding to support the digital futures of everyone at Bournemouth University
Finalist, Digital Futures
About
BU has designed and pursued a Sustainable IT strategy that has used commercial sector guidance to give a strong data foundation, clear governance and a project-based approach to reduce the total amount of energy consumed in BU data centres and comms rooms by 341,012kWh between 22/23 and 25/26 (YTD April 26) saving £116,716 in energy cost over this period. Projects have included physical data centre IT asset changes, passive cooling for comms rooms and replacement data centre cooling, website carbon reduction and digital screen edits. Education, community engagement and student participation have been fantastic additional benefits focusing on website carbon footprint, digital inclusion, circular economy and hackathons. The approach has helped BU secure external funding from the OFS in 2026 with the sustainable IT approach being applied to the bid and operations of the Cyber Competence Centre for which BU received £2.3m funding to support students and businesses to tackle the growing area of cyber-crime.
Top 3 learnings
1. We learned that by sharing the energy consumption data of IT equipment we can work together between estates and IT to identify improvements and implement them.
2. As Head of Sustainability, I learned that everyone has something to bring to the table. My focus may have been on energy reduction, but ideas came forward for new areas like digital screens, digital inclusion and website carbon reduction that I couldn’t have expected.
3. I have been thrilled by the student apps and games and their application of IT skills to engage users in sustainability topics.
SDGs
12. Responsible consumption and production
| 2026 | |
| Digital Futures | |
| Finalist, UK and Ireland |
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