Our strategy at the Global Sustainability Institute

Sustainability is all about risk management. Tackling global challenges requires an integrated view of the world and an understanding of risk, leadership, resources, technology and societal response.

There is an increasing and urgent need to develop and deliver practical solutions to global sustainability challenges. While politicians attempt to put a sustainability framework in place, regions, organisations, cities and individuals are taking a lead in the response.

The Global Sustainability Institute (GSI) is a high-profile research institute at ARU, and has grown rapidly since its formation in early 2011. We are a dynamic group of researchers involved in an extremely wide variety of research projects, collaborating with numerous external partners as well as other universities around the world.

The GSI is particularly interested in applying methodologies and approaches from a wide range of different disciplines to better understand how transitions in society work. Whether this is modelling European energy transitions or local housing challenges we attempt to bring together the best techniques to tackle a problem while keeping our approach grounded academically. We are very interested in how academic disciplines are used in policy making and where these academic boundaries can sometimes lead to non-optimal advice.

We continue to look to expand our engagement across ARU to work with more departments and academics in all faculties on issues as diverse as business risk, health and wellbeing, behavioural psychology, conservation, education, technology and policy. We build on this research capability to equip our students with sustainability literacy right across our University through our Education for Sustainability activities. We work closely with colleagues in our estates team to aim for a zero carbon footprint for ARU to ensure that our research, education and estates activities are aligned and can find mutual benefit.

We look forward to working with you.

Prof Aled Jones
Director, Global Sustainability Institute