Implicaciones de la emisión de gases de efecto invernadero en la sostenibilidad del Campus de Vegazana, Universidad de León

Abstract

In this work, we present the results obtained about the CO2 emissions, one of the most important greenhouse gases, due to the normal activity developed in the Campus of Vegazana of the University of León for the year 2006. This study is all part of a wider project for evaluating the Fingerprint ecological indicator (HE), initially developed for assessing if the sustainability objectives established by the University policies for the Campus of Vegazana have been achieved, as well as the development of proposals and ideas directed towards the reduction of the emissions of CO2. Results obtained showed that the biologically productive area necessary for absorbing all emissions are close to the 99% of the total value of HE. The majority of these emissions come from the energy consumed for producing electricity (38%) and heating (24%), followed by the transport (19%) and the constructions of the buildings and infrastructures of the University (16%), which related just for the year 2006, considering a living period of 27 years as it was inaugurated in 1979. Once analyzed qualitatively and quantitatively the emissions produced, it was developed a method for estimating the total area covered necessary for absorbing them by considering data available from the Third National Forestry Inventory of Spain (2003), related with the forest cover of the territory, and data provided by Bravo (2007), about the absorption rate of the tree species. As a conclusion, we estimated that form the total area covered by forests of the Province of León, a 0.46% is necessary as sink of the CO2 produced in the Campus of Vegazana (8.470.168 ton). This assessment has been achieved considering that forests are the only warehouse of CO2, when actually soil, water and crops are in nature.