Veolia have designed and built sophisticated renewable fuelled plant at no cost to the University. Veolia will, own, operate and maintain the infrastructure for 10 years. After this time, ownership of the infrastructure will transfer to the University of the Sunshine Coast (USC). USC in Queensland, Australia, has a target of achieving carbon neutrality by 2025. This project reduces the carbon footprint of the main campus by 42% by integrating 8.2MW cooling plant, 2.1MW rooftop solar with a 4.5ML chilled water storage tank and sophisticated controls. The projects aims at using renewable energy sources for cooling of the campus, delivered through existing cooling network. The key technical synergy is the integrated, monitoring and control of energy to determine, in real time, whether it is most beneficial to use electricity from the solar PV to create chilled water, reduce building energy use or export to the network. This project provides a living laboratory on-campus, enabling students to gain first-hand knowledge and experience of sustainability, innovation and energy efficiency as part of their studies. Ultimately it was the strength of the partnership between USC and Veolia that underpinned the entire project. It was the combination of the sophisticated engineering design, the close partnership, and the innovative ownership agreement that have delivered an ‘out-of-the-box’ industry-leading solution to reducing the University’s carbon footprint.
