This spring, I was powered by the sun. Like a son of Krypton, my energy came from the yellow dwarf that rises each morning in the east and sets in the west.

It is not often I can be compared to a superhero. I was there when Pentland Centre Director Jan Bebbington was once gobsmackingly likened to Taylor Swift – whom many people might see as being the next best thing – but it is rare that someone tells me I’m a dead ringer for Superman.

Sadly, my solar powered self was unable to fly faster than a speeding bullet, stop a runaway train with one hand, nor send villains to the Phantom Zone. On the plus side, no-one had to see me in full body spandex.

For, while Kal-El is just about invincible thanks to the radiation from the sun, I was still sat at a desk in my office, recording a podcast in our on-campus studio, or generally pottering about the Management School bothering people. But we were both being fuelled only by that big blazing ball of fire in the sky.

In April, Lancaster University announced it was generating 100% of its own electricity for the first time, thanks to our new solar farm. The power coursing through machines across campus was coming to us via the panels that have sprung up just across the M6 over the last couple of years. We spoke to Alona Armstrong about the benefits of solar early on in our podcasting lives, and seeing those benefits come to life on our own doorstep in the two years since has been a fantastic experience.

And this is just the latest step in much hard work done by many people across many years.

We’ve had a giant wind turbine towering 100m above motorists zipping past since 2012. You can see it from across Morecambe Bay on a clear day – and, for those wondering, you don’t need one of those for solar panels to work – and alongside Bowland Tower it is one of the most distinctive landmarks we have.

The turbine is based at the same weather station at Hazelrigg where we have been told northern lights measurements were once interrupted by a lawn mower, sparking a frenzy that the aurora were about the blaze into action across the north of England. Thankfully, that same mower has not accidentally chopped down the turbine in an overzealous demonstration of pruning.

With the wind turbine and the solar farm online, we are among the leaders in the UK university sector when it comes to clean energy generation and use. We are generating less than half the emissions we were in 2005.

Added to this, we have the Net Zero Energy Centre. Work on this has dominated campus for the last few years. At times it has left me without a parking place, at others it has meant my old office was out of bounds as systems were installed. Most of all, it is taking us towards a place where, when complete, heat pumps will provide anywhere up to 95% of heating across our campus.

It was clear when we spoke to Anna Cockman about this – when we had finished grilling her on the role her hands played on old BBC2 channel idents – how this again has us as leading the way as an institution. We talk a lot about sustainability in our research and in our lectures, this is us putting our money where our mouth is. We are more than empty words; we are positive action.

With solar and wind power, combined with heat pump technologies keeping us warm in winter, we are working our way towards net zero by 2030. That’s 20 years ahead of the UK as a whole. There will always be more to do. For instance, we cannot forget about our Scope 3 emissions. But it makes you proud to be part of Lancaster.

There will always be critics. I do not mean right-wing extremists who would label us as woke for going green and would no doubt prefer we burned our textbooks to heat lecture theatres. I am sure they exist, but rather, I refer to colleagues who I have heard complaining about the university spending money on this project at a time when jobs have been cut.

I understand their point-of-view, but find it hard to agree on this – not just because the Net Zero Energy Centre and district heat network was co-funded by the Green Heat Network Fund. While there are areas I would love to see money saved instead of people leaving us (listing exact areas here may well lead to dismissal, so I’ll just leave that as it is), the net zero initiative will provide long-term benefits for all concerned. It will help the planet, make us more self-sufficient and less victim to the winds of international politics, conflicts, and fuel shortages, save us money once the original expenses have been covered. I tell them this as well.

This is not unnecessary investment. It is exactly the kind of leadership a university should display. I’m just sad it hasn’t given me x-ray vision.

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