At the University of Melbourne, campus living laboratories are teaching and research initiatives that leverage the environments of our campuses and precincts – both physical and virtual – as sites that enable sustainability research and applied learning in real-world settings by staff, students and partners. Potential sites include campus landscapes, buildings and infrastructure, data, systems and processes.
The Campus Living Lab Accelerator program (CLLAP) is one avenue to kick-start Campus Living Labs. CLLAP provides seed funding for academic and professional staff to develop their own sustainability-focused Campus Living Labs. Click the button below to learn more about how to set up your own Campus Living Lab, and how to apply for CLLAP funding.
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The Sustainability internship program has run for over 5 years, offering students the opportunity to tackle real-world sustainability challenges on our campuses. The Operational Sustainability team offers internships across the full spectrum of sustainability issues, including waste, water management, biodiversity, sustainability communications and engagement. For example, interns played a crucial role in the Biodiversity Baseline Data Project (2019-2024), with 22 students dedicating over 4,366 placement hours to support data collection and analysis.
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To achieve Climate Active-certified carbon neutrality by 2025, the University must first reduce emissions where possible, then purchase carbon offsets equivalent to the residual emissions. Complementary to our work on reducing emissions, the University has developed a Carbon Offset Procurement Framework, which outlines principles and a process to maximise our impact from carbon offset procurement. The Framework was developed by researchers in Melbourne Climate Futures (MCF), in partnership with the University’s Sustainability Strategy Team and the City of Melbourne.
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Launched in 2021, Melbourne Connect is a hub of climate and sustainability activity at the University. Located in Carlton alongside the Parkville campus, the precinct has achieved multiple 6-star Green Star ratings for its sustainable building design and is the first academic workplace in the world to achieve WELL certification, an international building standard for workplaces that enhance human health and wellbeing. The precinct is used by the Faculties of Engineering and Information Technology (FEIT) and Architecture, Building and Planning (ABP) as a living laboratory – a test-bed for innovative sustainability monitoring technologies and processes.
Have you created a Campus Living Lab project? The Sustainability Strategy team would like to hear about it! Upload details of your project via the form to have your project showcased on this website.