Environment

Soft music plays throughout the video in the background.

Opens with RMIT University logo and title of program Bachelor of Sustainability and Environment.

Wendy Steele, Professor in Sustainability and Critical Urban Governance, starts speaking.

Sustainability as a concept and as a practice is really critical because it's about future generations. It's about living within our limits.  It's about caring for and with the earth which we depend upon. Cities have been an interesting intervention in earth systems. They have brought a lot of joy and comfort to a lot of people, but they've also caused a lot of damage, which is something that we're really seeing in the climate crisis at the moment. 

Erica Fridell, ecologist at Environmental Resources Management Australia says, “I've always had an interest in the environment and the natural world since I was little. So, I think that's just something that I've always been interested in. So, it was kind of a natural pathway for me.”

Nooshin Torabi, lecturer and researcher speaks - We look at sustainability from multiple perspectives, not only environmental, but social and political. 

Patrick Mathers, a student in the program talks about his experience.

I think the course has essentially allowed me to understand the broader scope of works surrounding the sustainability discipline, whether it be through urban planning, infrastructure development, marketing.

Nooshin says, “And our teaching is informed by the research we do.  All of us are researchers here in the Center for Urban Research. So, I teach my students about climate change responses. At the same time, I am doing research and writing about transformative responses that we need to be doing right now in our cities.”

Tori Dunstan, another student, speaks. So, I think it really helped me understand where my passions and interests are because I was able to focus on areas like urban planning, social studies and environmental studies, and sustainability.

Patrick recollects, “I feel like this course prepared me by shifting my discourse and probably my bias towards sustainable initiatives. It's probably provided me the baseline understanding that I'll need going forward outside of uni.”

John Abaid, a past student and now a Program and Policy Officer at Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water, recalls, "If I could go back and take another class, I would take another policy class because I really enjoyed them and they're really handy in my career now.” 

Hannah Belbasis, Local Government Sustainable Design Officer, also talks about her experience with the program.

My career has always been about placemaking. Prior to my time at RMIT, I held a career as a designer in the housing construction industry for a number of years but I was always very curious about focusing more on sustainability in our planning and design practices.  RMIT was very fundamental in supporting and accelerating that journey for me.

Tori says, “The course is full of really passionate peers, and I think it's such a great learning environment. There's so much opportunity within the degree so I think it's so important to just say yes to everything, give everything a go.” 

John advices, “Follow your passions, whether that be policy or advocacy or on the ground work. Just follow whatever you're passionate in and remember that small gradual changes can lead to something bigger.”

Background narration goes on and eventually Nooshin comes to screen. 

I think what we are doing here in RMIT, we are training change agents. We are training students to have critical thinking skills to go out there and work in diversity of workplaces from not-for-profits to state governments to local governments to businesses. 

Wendy Steely wraps up by saying, “This is the critical climate decade.  There has never been a time when we need sustainability experts and particularly people focused on acting on climate change.  We need those people more than ever right now.  So what's great about RMIT is that you're looking at interdisciplinary ways of addressing this.  So it's not just about working as a scientist alone, it's working with planners, with engineers, with artists,  with policymakers,  with landscape architects,  and together  we find solutions to some of the pressing problems that we face.”

Closing screen with RMIT University logo.

If you condense the earth's life

span into 24 hours,

then modern human history

fits within a few seconds.

And in that few seconds

we've changed the world profoundly.

We've grown crops and raised livestock,

built cities to inhabit,

harnessed energy

to power new technologies,

and as a result,

our population has boomed.

But our actions have created

a new set of challenges

from biodiversity loss to global warming.

We've significantly altered the planet's

climate and ecosystems.

So how do we achieve a sustainable future

and become a species in balance

with nature?

Those who study our environment

seek to find that balance,

to protect our precious ecosystems

from the vast, untouched wilderness

to our local waterways, to explore

new methods of consumption and production,

to adapt and rethink approaches to urban

development and natural conservation.

And to secure a future

where both people and nature can thrive.

So what's next for our environment?

Find out at RMIT.

Welcome to Sustainability at RMIT. We are really excited to share with you some of our key features, highlights and achievements.

RMIT are on a journey to be carbon neutral by 2025. Some of the emissions reductions we have achieved in recent years have been their largest on-site reductions of any university in Australia.

At RMIT we have a range of green star rated buildings, by the Green Building Council of Australia. One of the best standouts is the garden building, it’s constructed from cross laminate timber, which is a really sustainable construction method, it’s fairly innovative and new in the market and it’s really quick and safe to build.

RMIT has a huge number of buildings, many of those are older and many of them are historic buildings. Our heritage listed buildings are very precious to us and we look after those carefully.

Biodiversity is the diversity of living things all around us and you may not think about RMIT City Campus as being a place that would be important for nature but actually nature is critically important for cities and cities are critically important for nature.

RMIT has installed over six hundred kilowatts of solar PV across our campuses, generating large volumes of renewable energy that is entirely consumed on-site.

RMIT’s committed to reducing our water intensity across our campuses through water efficient design promoting storm and rainwater capture and reuse. From an operations perspective, we’ve reduced our water intensity by sixty percent from our 2007 baseline.

What we do at the Circular Economy Hub is bring together different researchers from different disciplines across RMIT. The ultimate end is to achieve a sustainable outcome looking at clean energy, renewable resources, and an equitable society for all.

RMIT’s School of Fashion and Textiles is leading the way in sustainable innovation in the fashion and textile industry. All of RMIT’s fashion and textile programs are underpinned by the UN’s sustainable development goals.

RMIT supports sustainable transport, particularly cycling. We want to make it really easy and comfortable for our students and staff to cycle to uni. One of our highlights is Building 51 Bike Hub, it has parking for four hundred bikes with really high-quality change facilities.

The Ngarara Place Courtyard is unique indigenous landscape that illustrates the Kulin nation’s seven seasons. It has also brought colour and life to the heart of RMIT’s City Campus.

The RMIT Store is where you come for all your official RMIT apparel and products. Since 2019 the store has been on an ethical sourcing journey.

Engaging with our stakeholders is a really important aspect of sustainability and one way we’re doing this is through working with our retailers on adopting the sustainable retail framework which is a lens to look at their footprints through and look at ways where they can reduce their waste, their packaging but also coming at it from an angle of ethical sustainability and social impact.