Building a Sustainable Future of Education: An Investigation into the Sustainability of Digital Education Technologies in European Higher Education Institutions

The digitalization of European universities’ tool infrastructure has transformed how institutions operate and deliver education to students, from sharing content on learning management systems to hosting lectures on video-conferencing platforms. However, despite many new benefits of digital education technologies (DETs) and their contribution to...

Simulation of the Dutch electricity system: A software expansion for the Illuminator

The aim of this report is to discuss the design of the software that creates a simulation for the national electricity grid level of the Netherlands. This is done by further developing the open-source energy system integration development kit called the Illuminator. Where the goal of this software is to create an extra case, add a Graphical User...

Sustainability and Circularity Challenges in Aerospace Engineering Education: for the sustainability transition

The aerospace industry and TU Delft have set stringent climate goals for themselves and with each passing year, these goals seem all the more implausible. While sustainability in the aerospace industry is envisioned as futuristic, circular, net-zero aircraft, the change rarely comes from the grassroots. Although these technological solutions are...

What Does Building Green Mean in Port Cities?

This article explores the concept of ‘green’ in architecture and urban design through the lens of port cities. Due to global pressures such as climate change, energy transition and soil consumption the planning of port cities requires new scenarios for achieving equilibrium between nature and water systems. Despite the fact that the concept of...

Barilla Sustainable Farming: Implementing an educational framework to increase farmers’ application of sustainable practices

Dealing with agriculture is challenging for companies like Barilla because of several uncontrollable factors, such as climate change.<br/>Purchasing from the spot market constitutes a high economical risk for the company, which decided, in 2010, to launch the Barilla Sustainable Farming Projects.<br/><br/>Barilla Sustainable Farming projects...

Evaluation of Waste Management at the Hogeschool of Amsterdam

This report provides suggestions to improve the sustainability of the waste management of the Hogeschool van Amsterdam (HVA), a higher educational institute located in Amsterdam. The HVA as an institute has an outspoken ambition to improve their waste management with a focus on sustainability. They previously asked several student groups to...

Sustainable Product Design Education: Current Practice

Current production and consumption patterns are unsustainable, causing irreversible damage to the environment and human health and well-being. Designers play a vital role in resolving this problem—their decisions affect product manufacturing, distribution, use, and disposal—and hence they must be aware of the positive and negative impacts of...

Techno-economic assessment of energy retrofitting educational buildings: A case study in Saudi Arabia

The buildings and construction sector accounts for the majority of the energy consumption in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA). For a sustainable future, energy consumption in the sector should be reduced and existing buildings need to be energy retrofitted. A number of studies present energy retrofitting of residential buildings in KSA;...

Key competencies for design in a circular economy: Exploring gaps in design knowledge and skills for a circular economy

In a recent study, we identified seven key circular competencies for design: (1) Design for Multiple Use Cycles, (2) Design for Recovery, (3) Circular Impact Assessment, (4) Circular Business Models, (5) Circular User Engagement, (6) Circular Economy Collaboration, and (7) Circular Economy Communication. These were derived from small‐scale...

KaDer Gelderland Winter 2020 evaluatierapport

Progres report KaDEr research project.

Process intensification education contributes to sustainable development goals. Part 2

Achieving the United Nations sustainable development goals requires industry and society to develop tools and processes that work at all scales, enabling goods delivery, services, and technology to large conglomerates and remote regions. Process Intensification (PI) is a technological advance that promises to deliver means to reach these...

Biomimicry design education essentials

The emerging field of biomimicry and learning to design with and for nature has expanded in recent years through a diversity of educational programs. Inspiration following natural forms may give the appearance of being sustainable, but the question remains, how sustainable is it? Misunderstanding the function of these forms may leave...

Decomposing the Complexity of Value: Integration of Digital Transformation of Education with Circular Economy Transition

In this article, we highlight the pressing need for integrating the windows of opportunities that digital transformation of education opens up with circular economy education to accelerate the achievements of sustainability outcomes. Circular economy transition, as a multi-scalar process, relates to several contexts, e.g., product, firm,...

Quantification of the impact of the built environment: Project City-zen and HEREVEA as teaching tools

Several strategies are presented to teach university students and professionals in the sector how to reduce the environmental impact of our cities. First, the European City-zen project is summarized and its application to the city of Seville, more specifically to Tiro de Linea, a working class neighborhood, is described; the viability and...

Olli Play: A new modality in child-toy ownership

This project aims to plant a seed in the minds of children to develop sustainable behaviour now and inspire an attitude of environmental stewardship for the future. Children grow up in a take-make-dispose world driven by consumerism. This world is characterised by the continuous production of new consumer products. This has a significant...

Teaching sustainability to a broad audience through an entertainment game – The effect of Catan: Oil Springs

In order to attain a truly sustainable society it is necessary for people to make ‘the sustainable choice’ in daily life, business and governance. Instrumental in increasing the awareness and understanding about sustainability issues and improving people's behaviour regarding sustainability issues is sustainability education. However,...

What has to be learnt for sustainability? A comparison of bachelor engineering education competences at three European universities

In a period of harmonisation of the higher education system in Europe, a question is if also learning about sustainability at the universities is converging and what advantages this may have. This paper is an effort to present and advance the work on describing desired sustainability competences for engineering Bachelor graduates in three...