‘Doing good science’: The impact of invisible energy policies on laboratory energy demand in higher education

Abstract

Education is the second largest consumer of energy in the service sector, however, little research to date has focused on the link between education policy and energy demand. Using a case study, this paper explores the role of invisible energy policies in Higher Education (HE). We make a distinctive contribution to debates about invisible energy policy by applying concepts from governmentality to show how different policies and technologies of governance come in to conflict in practice. And, we argue that although there are a number of institutional and national-level policies directly related to sustainability (including energy) there are also a number of conflicting priorities, most notably linked to the neoliberalisation of HE. Our case study focuses on teaching and research laboratories and empirically explores the impacts of both intentional and non-intentional energy policy in these spaces. Specifically this research highlights that the ability to 'do good science' has implications for demand management that go beyond research and teaching laboratory activities, and into the wider realm of HE institutions and policies.

The impact of COVID-19 on higher education building energy use and implications for future education building energy studies

“…Khoshbakht et al [9] investigated 80 university buildings in Australia and found that research buildings have the highest energy use intensity (EUI) while academic offices had the lowest EUI. These findings have been upheld by other studies in Australia [7] , the UK [10] , [11] and China [8] . The high EUI of research spaces might result from the long working hours [8] even during holidays [7] .…”

Incorporating Sustainability into the Academic Institution

“…Additionally, Participants 8 and 13 emphasised that Cardiff University is a researchintensive institution requiring a lot of equipment, which is not necessarily 'good' for the environment but is nevertheless seen as essential for research activities. The 20 research-intensive institutions that belong to the Russell Group collectively contribute to over half of the UK's university carbon emissions (Gormally et al, 2019). Being a Russell Group member, Cardiff University has departments whose research requires energy-consuming scienti c equipment.…”

“…These dialogues assert that Cardiff University could be seeking alternative technologies that will have less impact on the environment. Yet, often 'doing the science' overrules energy-related decisions (Gormally et al, 2019), suggesting that research excellence competes with sustainability in the higher-education context and potentially challenges the role of universities as leaders in this eld.…”

Governing energy in organisations: Energy management professionals, marginalised practices, and the limits to change

“…This echoes discourses about individualised responsibility for addressing global environmental crises, which have been widely debated elsewhere (for example, by Walker, 2015). As Gormally, O'Neill, Hazas, Bates, and Friday (2019) suggest, neoliberal narratives can have a powerful effect in steering how university researchers use energy; such narratives may also affect how energy management is understood by EMPs across sectors, and how they and their institutions understand the limits of legitimate intervention. Of course, these effects are not static.…”