Travel & Transport

Background

Transport plays a crucial role in meeting the current challenges to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in the UK and sustainable travel initiatives offer an opportunity to make a real contribution by decarbonising transport. Sustainable travel initiatives play a key role in delivering local objectives around health, congestion, air quality, education, economic development and social inclusion. This TSN meets to share these ideas and offer support to those at all stages of the journey.

Topics which have been covered in the past include: tackling business travel flight emissions; strategies for promoting cycling as an alternative form of transport for local journeys; promoting safe and healthy journeys to college/university such as cycling, walking and public transport, and car sharing or car clubs.

If you would like to join the mailing list for this group please email scotland@eauc.org.uk.
 

Next Meeting

The next virtual Travel and Transport Topic Support Network meeting will be held in Autumn/Winter 2024.  

Contact Lara Fahey with future agenda items you wish to discuss or offer.
 

Other Relevant Meetings

The Post-16 Education Internationalisation and Sustainability: Challenges and Opportunities seminar on 16th October from 14:00 - 15:30 might be of interest to those working in this field, alongside Internationalisation Offices/Teams, Sustainability Practitioners and Senior Leaders. Please visit the event page for more details on how to sign up.

Travel and transport resources

Commuting Survey Guide and Tool

In August 2024, EAUC Scotland published the highly anticipated Commuting Survey Guide and Tool. This resource follows on from the Business Travel Guide for the Further and Higher Education Sector and The Domestic and International Student Relocation Travel Emissions Calculator Tool. Whilst developed by EAUC Scotland, this resource is relevant to UK and Ireland organisations. 

This resource package is aimed at creating a standard baseline for post-16 education sector organisations to report on their staff and student commuting emissions. Commuting emissions are those that are formed from the transportation of someone from their term-time (student) or full-time (staff) residence to their ordinary place of study or work. Organisations can choose to keep it simple and only report on these suggested areas or incorporate these questions into their pre-existing, longer surveys.

The resource package contains:

• Comprehensive guidance on conducting commuting surveys from initial inception to analysis and reporting.  
• A baseline commuting survey template in Microsoft Forms that can easily be duplicated and modified to your own organisation’s needs. 
• A commuting emissions calculator tool and user guide for automating the data analysis process and creating a simple and efficient results summary without the need for external consultants.  

These resources align with the statutory requirements for the Scottish Government’s Public Bodies Climate Change Duties (PBCCD) reports, the Standardised Carbon Emissions Framework (SCEF) and the Climate Action Roadmap for FE Colleges.  

This resource package is freely available to all Scottish colleges, universities and EAUC members only. Visit the Commuting Survey Guide and Tool publications page to find out more. 
 

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Reducing aviation emissions in the tertiary education and research sector - blog series

This blog series is composed of the following: 

• Reducing aviation emissions in the tertiary education & research sector briefing paper. Compiled by Lara Fahey and Matthew Woodthorpe at EAUC Scotland, this paper sets out the aviation decarbonisation challenge, current best practice, and present and future solutions to meet this part of the net zero challenge. 
• Reducing aviation emissions in the tertiary education and research sector series: Early Career Researchers. Written by Dr Katherine Ellsworth-Krebs, this opinion piece is a personal reflection on the need to fly as an early career researcher (ECR), responding to the often quoted ‘need’ for ECRs to fly to succeed in their academic career.
• Reducing aviation emissions in the tertiary education and research sector series: Final Call. Written by Dr Shona Russell, this is a personal reflection on the need to fly for academic conferences, whilst juggling caring responsibilities, via the medium of a poem. 
• Reducing aviation emissions in the tertiary education and research sector: International Education. Written by Ailsa Lamont, this informative blog explores how our institutions can reduce their aviation emissions related to international education, without compromising on global reach and impact.
• Reducing aviation emissions in the tertiary education and research sector: Oxford’s Flight Levy. Written by Joanne Murraybrown, this technical piece details the process behind how the University of Oxford implemented their flight levy – redistributing an internal charge from those that fly to the Oxford Sustainability Fund.   

If you have any questions about this series, please get in touch.
 

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Business Travel Guide for Further and Higher Education

Published in February 2023, EAUC Scotland’s Business Travel Guide for the Further and Higher Education sector highlights the Scottish policy and social drivers for addressing business travel emissions, and showcases best practice in strategies, reporting and reduction activities.

The guide features case studies from the University of Glasgow, University of Edinburgh, University of Oxford, ETH Zurich, Edinburgh College and West Lothian College, as well as an in-depth action plan section and significant section on Equality, Diversity and Inclusion. It also includes a thorough discussion on each travel mode and how an institution might take this information to significantly reduce their business travel emissions.  

This guide is tailored towards individuals and teams at colleges and universities looking to know where to start, or who want to expand their sustainable business travel measures. It contains links and resources that will enable you and your team to reduce emissions at your institution. Most of the guide will be applicable to non-Scottish institutions and we would highly recommend any UK or international institution to utilise the information relevant to them. 
 

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The Domestic and International Student Relocation Travel Emissions Calculator Tool

The "Domestic and International Student Relocation Travel Emissions Calculator Tool" provides UK FHE institutions with a user-friendly, prepopulated framework for reporting scope 3 domestic and international student travel at the start and end of the academic year.

Developed by the University of Aberdeen (Estrid Jonsson – Travel Emissions Intern, University of Aberdeen Net Zero Research; Roederer Rose Lyne – University of Aberdeen Net Zero & Emissions Manager), and in collaboration with EAUC Scotland to open the tool up to the UK FHE sector, the tool helps institutions fulfil the principles of emissions reporting under the Greenhouse Gas (GHG) Protocol, aligns with the sector’s Standardised Carbon Emissions Framework, and, for Scottish institutions, will help the sector meet the expectations set out in the latest public sector bodies guidance from Scottish Government.
 

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Travel Better Package

The Travel Better Package (2020) aims to support the reduction of air travel in the FHE sector, specifically amongst academics and staff. It also aims to support reflection on and reconfiguration of the FHE sector's relationship to air travel on an institutional and individual basis. Lastly, it hopes to encourage individuals to travel better, meaning, to be more knowledgeable about sustainable travel, actively choose sustainable travel options and encourage others to do the same, and create opportunities that would reduce air travel and advance sustainable travel. The package is also concerned with improving equity and diversity while reducing air travel in the sector and offers support in doing this.

 
The Travel Better Package includes:

• A Questions & Answers tool addressing concerns individuals may have about reducing air travel.
• The Travel Better Pledge Template used to inform individual behaviour change, as well as departmental and/or institutional policies, pledges and statements.
• The Air Travel Justification Tool, which is an extension of a decision tree - the tool supports individuals in justifying/reflecting on attending a conference, meeting and/or event that is only accessible through flying.

 

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Plane Talk: Reducing travel emissions in academia

EAUC Scotland, in collaboration with Wolfram Moebius at the University of Exeter and Jo Allatt from the Sustainability team at UK Research and Innovation (UKRI), are glad to introduce the Slack community "Plane Talk: Reducing travel emissions in academia”. This platform provides a platform for teaching, research and sustainability professionals who are interested in or working on reducing travel emissions in academia to ask questions and exchange knowledge. It is modelled on similar supportive communities already operating on Slack. Join the discussion now!


 

Previous Meetings

14th May 2024 - Car Clubs, EV Charging Funding, Decarbonising Business Travel, E-mobility Fire Risk and Insurance, Fieldtrip Emissions and Minibus Licences. For resources and video recording, please click here.

8th November 2023 - Calculating Internationalisation Emissions with the Climate Action Barometer for International Education (CABIE), Carpooling via WhatsApp with Ecopooling, and general transport discussion. For resources and video recording, please click here. 

26th April 2023 - Travel Surveys, Highway Code, EV Salary Sacrifice and Cycling Scotland Funding and Internships. For resources and video recording, please click here.

19th April 2023 - Special event: Calculating International Student Travel Emissions with Estrid Jonsson. For resources and video recording, please click here.

6th December 2022 - Travel Internships, Car Clubs, Commuting Emissions and Business Travel. For details and minutes please click here.

31st May 2022 (Behaviour Change for Sustainable Travel) - For details and minutes please click here.

2nd December 2021 (Travel Emissions Post Covid) - For details, presentations and minutes please click here.

28th April 2021 - For details, presentations and minutes please click here.

11th December 2019 - For details, presentations and minutes please click here.

2nd May 2019 - For details, presentations and minutes please click here.

12th December 2018 - For details, presentations and minutes, please click here.

12th June 2018 - For details, presentations and minutes, please click here.

24th August 2017 - For details, presentations and minutes, please click here

5th December 2016 - For details, presentations and minutes, please click here.

19th May 2016 - For details, presentations and minutes, please click here.

14th October 2015 - For details, presentations and minutes, please click here.

27th May 2015 - For details, presentations and minutes, please click here.

12th December 2014 - For details, presentations and minutes, please click here.

2nd May 2014 - For details, presentations and minutes, please click here.

8th October 2013 - For details, presentation and minutes, please click here.

15th April 2013 - For details and minutes please click here.

11th June 2012 - For details, presentations and minutes, please click here.

23rd January 2012 - For details, presentations and minutes, please click here.

29th August 2011 - For details, presentations and minutes, please click here.

Contact information

Convenor for the Travel & Transport TSN is:

Trudy Cunningham, University of Dundee
email: t.z.cunningham@dundee.ac.uk

To join the JiscMail Network for the Travel and Transport TSN and receive updates on meetings, please contact us.