Environmental Energy Sustainability at Universities

Abstract

The use of renewable energies and energy saving and efficiency are needs of global society and universities. Universities have a large responsibility and social impact, as they are an example and engine of social change. Universities, in the European context, must be at the forefront of sustainability progress, seeking to be at the same level, and preferably higher than the rest of society, seeking the goal of 20% in renewable energy for 2020 and, in the longer term, greater energy efficiency based on a diverse use of renewable energy and studying the feasibility of other energy processes (cogeneration, trigeneration, etc.). The application of renewable energies and efficiency allow universities to make significant savings in their costs and contribute to sustainable development and the fight against climate change. Actions on these aspects in addition to the objective of saving should seek to promote research and form an example for the university community. This Special Issue aims to advance the contribution of energy saving and the use of renewable energies in order to achieve more sustainable universities.

1. Introduction

Efficient energy consumption has now become one of the most important points on which society must raise awareness and work on it, because it is today, more than ever, when natural resources are scarcer and scientists are showing more evidence of climate change. Energy consumption is one of the main sources of environmental impact at the University, and also represents a significant economic expense. Likewise, from the environmental point of view, it is worth noting that through the energy savings, we will be contributing to a good use of energy and, in turn, we will be providing solutions that minimize the impact or energy footprint on society. In this sense, a lower use of resources and the promotion of renewable energies will result in an important contribution to reduce the evolution towards a negative climate change.

This Special Issue aims to advance the contribution of energy saving and the use of renewable energies in order to achieve more sustainable universities. This Special Issue seeks contributions spanning a broad range of topics related but not limited to:

• Solar energy

• The use of rooftops for energy generation

• Energy conversion from urban biomass or residues

• Energy management for sewage water

• Bioclimatic architecture and green buildings

• Wind energy cogeneration

• Public and private urban energy saving

• Policy for urban energy saving

• Electric meters

• Zero-energy buildings

2. Publication Statistics

The publication statistics of the call of papers for this Special Issue, regarding the articles published or rejected with respect to the total number of articles submitted, were:

• -. 14 articles submitted (100%)

• -. 4 articles rejected (28.6%)

• -. 10 articles published (71.4%)

The regional distribution of authors by countries for the published articles is presented in Table 1, in which it is possible to observe 24 authors from three countries. Note that it is usual for an item to be signed by more than one author and for authors to collaborate with others from different countries.

3. First Affiliation and Country of the Special Issue Authors

Table 2 shows the affiliations of the authors who have participated in this Special Issue.

4. Topics of Environmental Energy Sustainability at Universities

The research carried out by the different authors is classified according to the topics of the Special Issue in Table 3. It was noted that one “Environmental Energy Sustainability at Universities” topic dominated the rest: “Sustainability”.

Author Contributions

The authors all made equal contributions to this article. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.

Funding

This research received no external funding.

Conflicts of Interest

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Tables

Table 1

Authors’ countries.

Country	Authors
Spain	12
Mexico	9
Colombia	3
Total	24

Table 2

Authors’ affiliations of this Special Issue.

Author	First Affiliation	Country	Reference
Garrido-Yserte, R.	University of Alcalá	Spain	[1]
Gallo-Rivera, M.-T.	University of Alcalá	Spain	[1]
Perea-Moreno, M.-A.	Universidad Internacional de La Rioja (UNIR)	Spain	[2,3,4]
Hernandez-Escobedo, Q.	Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México	Mexico	[2,3,4,5]
Rueda-Martinez, F.	Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México	Mexico	[2]
Perea-Moreno, A.-J.	University of Cordoba	Spain	[2,3,4]
Ramirez-Jimenez, A.	University of Almeria	Spain	[3]
Dorador-Gonzalez, J.M.	Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México	Mexico	[3]
Grisales-Noreña, L.F.	Instituto Tecnológico Metropolitano	Colombia	[5]
Ramos-Paja, C.	Universidad Nacional de Colombia	Colombia	[5]
Gonzalez-Montoya, D.	Instituto Tecnológico Metropolitano	Colombia	[5]
Alcalá, G.	Universidad Veracruzana	Mexico	[5]
Manzano-Agugliaro, F.	University of Almeria	Spain	[4,6,7,8]
Chihib, M.	University of Almeria	Spain	[6,7]
Salmerón-Manzano, E.	Universidad Internacional de La Rioja (UNIR)	Spain	[6,7,8]
Novas, N.	University of Almeria	Spain	[7]
Leon, I.	University of the Basque Country UPV/EHU	Spain	[9]
Oregi, X.	University of the Basque Country UPV/EHU	Spain	[9]
Marieta, C.	University of the Basque Country UPV/EHU	Spain	[9]
Chavero-Navarrete, E.	Universidad Autónoma de Querétaro	Mexico	[10]
Trejo-Perea, M.	Universidad Autónoma de Querétaro	Mexico	[10]
Jáuregui-Correa, J.-C.	Universidad Autónoma de Querétaro	Mexico	[10]
Carrillo-Serrano, R.-V.	Universidad Autónoma de Querétaro	Mexico	[10]
Rios-Moreno, J.-G.	Universidad Autónoma de Querétaro	Mexico	[10]

Table 3

Topics of Environmental Energy Sustainability at Universities.

Topics	Number of Manuscripts	Reference
Energy efficiency	2	[1,6]
Energy conversion from urban biomass or residues	2	[2,4]
Solar energy	2	[3,5]
Sustainability	3	[7,8,9]
Wind energy	1	[10]