Page 3 - TU Dresden Sustainability Strategy 2023-2030

Introduction

Dear members of our university community, dear readers,

Universities are important incubators for innovation and progress. Numerous research
findings shape the way we live together in society, such as in the development of new
technologies. Ongoing insights into medicine and nutritional science are strengthening the
foundations for a safer and healthier life; transportation, infrastructure, and communication
technologies have long been bringing the world ever closer together.

But at the same time, all our actions have consequences. The pursuit of innovation and
progress also means using available resources responsibly, facing up to global, human-
induced challenges, and developing alternative transformation approaches. The issue is
becoming ever more urgent, and at the same time it is not new. The Club of Rome report
The Limits to Growth – published more than 50 years ago – and the Brundtland Report formed
the basis for the first UN Conference on Environment and Development in 1992,
which was followed by other such conferences. In 2015, the UN finally developed the
Sustainable Development Goals of the 2030 Agenda – a common orientation framework
for globally sustainable development.

TUD Dresden University of Technology recognized the importance of these issues early on
and set out on a path toward sustainable development. Important steps in this process
include the founding of the student-led TU environmental initiative, the creation of the
Environment Commission, the establishment of an environmental management system, the
ingraining of sustainability as a strategic management task at Executive Board level, and the
setting-up of a Green Office. All these milestones have given further impetus to the topic
of sustainability at TUD.

Sustainable development is also becoming increasingly relevant as a research topic at
TU Dresden, as this brochure will illustrate using selected examples. Projects and alliances
focus on issues of economically successful as well as ecologically and socially compatible
long-term development, such as by researching into climate-friendly forms of energy supply
or models for future mobility from the point of view of transport ecology. The same can be
said for sustainability in teaching and teacher training.

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