Within a year, the University of Passau managed to improve its recycled paper use for administrative purposes by 74.94 percentage points to attain 100 percent, posting the biggest increase among contenders in the Papieratlas 2021 university competition launched by the Intiative Pro Recyclingpapier (IPR) and earning the title “Rising Star of the Year”.
“Another achievement that the University of Passau has scored with the support of its students and committed administrators! Their initiative has transformed our administrative practices. We are thrilled by the recognition and endorsement for sustainability. Paper is a valuable material. We continue to be committed to making prudent use of it”, said President Ulrich Bartosch, who had the honour of accepting the prize at the Federal Ministry for the Environment in Berlin.
In using recycled paper, the University of Passau contributes substantially to climate action and resource efficiency: Compared to virgin paper, recycled paper production requires at least 60 percent less water and energy and generates considerably less CO2 emissions. Last year, this resulted in savings of over 300,000 litres of water and over 61,000 kilowatt hours.
Papieratlas has been monitoring paper consumption and the recycled paper share in German universities since 2016. Its partners are the Federal Ministry for the Environment, the German Federal Environment Agency (UBA) and the German Association of University Professors and Lecturers (DHV). In attracting 50 participants and achieving an average recycling paper share of 78 percent for the first time, the universities established two new records in one fell swoop this year. Further awards were presented to the University of Bremen as “Most Recycling-friendly University” and Osnabrück University as “Repeat Winner”. In addition to the competition for universities, Papieratlas has been holding a competition for cities since 2008 and one for Germany’s rural districts, or Landkreise, since 2018. This year’s distinctions went to the cities Leverkusen, Solingen and Oberhausen and to Landkreis Ebersberg as well as Unstrut-Hainich-Kreis.
All results of Papieratlas 2021 can be found at www.papieratlas.de.