Edu-leaders

Demand for water in even the smallest of campuses is more than 25,000 litres per day. Water is needed for the grounds, for students and staff, in the kitchen and dining areas, for cleaning and cooking, and for consumption.

Pearl Academy of Fashion set up its first full-fledged campus in 2005 in Jaipur, 12 years after the institute came into existence. Arindam Das, director, says, “Our intention was to make the best use of locally-available material and create a sustainable, aesthetic and harmonious campus.”

Which meant that the planners had to go green—all the way. Natural light was used extensively, traditional materials such as matkas were used to maintain a lower-ambient temperature within the building and rain water harvesting (RWH) was incorporated.

Today, the academy’s rain water harvesting plant comprises three large storage tanks, each with a capacity of storing 50,000 litres per day. With a student and staff strength of 400, the academy has a daily drinking water demand of about 25,000 litres, which is just half that of its storage capacity. For the toilets, landscaping and maintenance of water bodies, the academy uses recycled water that is treated in its in-house sewage treatment plant.

Tailored Solutions

In 2003, planners at IIM Kozhikode faced a unique challenge—to create a sustainable source of water on campus. Despite Kerala’s regular rains, the campus’s topography was such that the rainwater would run off into the sea. The area around the institute routinely faced a shortage.

Unless the rainwater was harvested the campus would have to be dependent on tanker-supplied water, running up a large bill. Planners felt that there was a need for a well-managed campus development programme that would ensure sensible consumption and also allow the campus a room for future expansion—in a sustainable and environmentally-friendly manner.

For RWH solutions to work, they had to be tailored to the peculiar topographical conditions of the campus. The institute’s 96-acre campus only had a single pond of 1.5 acre that dried up by February every year. Not to be daunted, the administration decided to build a catchment area in an adjoining piece of land near the pond to catch the run-off. In that area, an areca nut garden was planted along with a thick layer of weeds. And another smaller and older pond was dug up further to accelerate the rate of water percolation. A network of canals and structures were built alongside to help the water to percolate into the large pond.

However, the major challenge was the problem of soil erosion. Rajiv Varma, executive engineer, explains: “To tackle the issue we sought the help of a Coir Board that provided us with coconut geo-textile, which is a type of woven organic fabric that allows water to pass through, but holds the soil back. Nearly 35,000 square metres of geo-textile was spread across the surface. Seeds of Congo signal grass were planted through them. Over the years, the geo-textile have all but disappeared and the grass has formed a thick cover, preventing soil erosion.

Along with the institute’s sewage treatment plant, IIM Kozhikode is a self-reliant institute today, as far as water conservation is considered. The institute uses nearly 50,000 litres of treated water for irrigation. Its total daily demand for water is 200,000 litres. The capacity of the main water pond is 30,000 cubic meters.

The total cost of building the RWH system was Rs 8 million, whereas maintenance costs were almost negligible. Says Varma: “By creating a rechargeable and sustainable water source it’s a win-win situation. It helps meet our water requirements without depleting the water table.”

Says Das: “While the average cost of construction was around Rs 2,000 to Rs 2,200 per square feet, our innovative low-cost design helped us achieve the same results at just Rs 1,300 per square feet.” The positive outcomes impacted not just the campus, but the neighbourhood as well.

NIIT University’s efforts to conserve at its Neemrana campus near Gurgaon created a sustainable source of water not only for its own campus, but also for the hills upstream. The university’s bio-technology department started a project of making the hills green beyond their boundary. Native plants that required little water were planted. Rajeev Shorey, university president, explains: “It was a move from being a resource-consuming but beautiful landscape, to a more contextual landscape that the site could support.”

For TERI University, an environment-friendly campus helped “create a test bed for green initiatives” and served “as a model for others”. Not surprisingly, its 2-acre campus located at Vasant Kunj in New Delhi incorporated special measures to reduce energy consumption. Dr Rajiv Seth, registrar, TERI says, “Within the next two years, some 15 percent of our energy needs will be met by solar energy. We are also experimenting with wind and biomass-generated energy.” TERI has also instituted a RWH system to capture and store rainwater. Similarly, its water conservation and recycling efforts enable it to treat and reuse waste water for landscape maintenance.

Value Through Awareness

Sometimes, the main challenge faced by universities and colleges before adopting such initiatives is to convince stakeholders. Seth says: “Awareness has to be built from day one about the significance of these practices. It’s not just enough to send a message to shareholders, but its important to create an awareness among all.”

At TERI and Pearl, even students have been sensitised regarding the need to conserve water. At the time of construction, low-flow faucets were built into the design, enabling both campuses to wring out the maximum benefit.

Recognition of these efforts through awards and media coverage has helped boost awareness. Pearl won a clutch of international architecture awards (including the Best Learning Building of the World-2009). It won among 611 entries from 95 countries. “We routinely have visitors to our Academy, keen to incorporate some of the green solutions that we have.”

IIM Kozhikode’s Varma concurs, “We often receive visitors from NGOs and government agencies. But, we are not really sure if they actually incorporate the system once they go back.”

TERI, however, hopes to translate all this interest into concrete measures. It has set up a “green buildings division” that provides consultation to other campuses. It has also developed a “Green Rating for Integrated Habitat Assessment (GRIHA)” that prescribes norms needed for a building to be considered environmentally-friendly and sustainable. Seth says, “Until recently corporate social responsibility was considered a side activity. But, with consumers becoming more conscious, they prefer to exercise choice about products they buy. A similar wave is likely to happen with green buildings, as well. Once that happens green campuses could have a definite branding and marketing edge over their competitors.”