EcoMerit award for Milltown
The Milltown Park complex – Milltown Park Community, Cherryfield, Loyola Community, and the Irish Jesuit Provincialate – has been certified as a member of the EcoMerit Community, which is a Sustainable Energy Community registered with the Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland (SEIA).
EcoMerit helps businesses and institutions improve their environmental performance, reduce costs, and enhance their standing as an environmentally responsible organisation with the goal of creating an environmentally sustainable, just, and equitable world.
In order to qualify for the certificate the Milltown complex was vetted by EcoMerit supervisors who inspected recycling, water usage, heating, waste management, cleaning, pollution prevention, and biodiversity on the campus. The EcoMerit certificate is only issued when strict conditions of sustainable energy provision are guaranteed within an organisation or community.
Milltown Park Provincialate Facilities Manager Theresa Walshe was the project coordinator for the certificate with assistance from other Jesuits and colleagues on the campus. “We are delighted to get this certificate as the standard of awarding is high. In the Provincialate alone over the last six months, we have reduced our landfill rubbish by 90%, most of our waste is recycled or composted”, she says, adding that “It serves to underline the Jesuit commitment to caring for our common home, as Pope Francis has asked for in Laudato Sí » and more recently in Laudate Deum »
The award means that the Province can use the prestigious EcoMerit logo on its website and other publicity materials and Theresa points out that, “It’s good to spread the word of the importance of environmental awareness, and for others to know that we are aligned with environmental best practice and that we are taking sustainability and climate action seriously.”
The Milltown Park campus was chosen as a pilot scheme for the award by the Province ‘Caring for Our Common Home’ group led by Dr Ciara Murphy, Environmental Policy Advocate with the Irish Jesuit Centre for Faith and Justice. She says “The awarding of the certificate is a really important step in the ecological conversion of the entire Irish Province. Understanding what practical steps we can all take in this regard is really important in the lowering of our negative ecological footprint.”
The certificate is valid for five years on the condition that the Milltown campus continues to adhere to the requirements of the scheme and gets evaluated every year.
