Neil Jennings (26), United Kingdom

Background: When Neil started at CCC he was a student in his third year of PhD in climate change and also Assistant Editor for the journal Global Environmental Change.  Now he is a full time Student Switch Off/environmental entrepreneur guru!

The Project: His campaign is; 'The Student Switch Off; an initiative encouraging energy-efficient behaviour’ in Halls of Residence at U.K. Universities. Neil set up a competition to see which Hall of Residence can reduce their energy use by the greatest amount, using ice cream and other freebies as an incentive to encourage a positive rivalry. Neil recruited students to act as ‘Eco-Power Rangers’ – helping to drive change on the ground.

Campaign Results:
The pilot study at the University of East Anglia delivered reduction in electricity use of 10% equating to 92 tonnes of CO2 and over £19,000

Thereafter Neil rolled his winning formula out to 7 additional universities.  By November 2007 he’d already achieved an average of a 9% reduction in electricity usage equating to 138 tonnes of CO2 and over £28,000.

He’d also recruited over 2,700 number of Eco-Power Rangers to help him on his quest – over 13% of those living in Halls of Residence.

Media stardom beckoned, sparked in part from his eye-witness reporting from the North Pole and his daring wear of a green lycra Eco-Power Ranger suit to launch his campaign upon his return. 

Neil hopes to expand Student Switch Off to 24 new universities in 2008 and pay someone else to wear the green leotard in the future.

Proudest Moment:
Neil says “ My proudest moment was appearing on the front page of the BBC website clad in the lycra Eco-Power Ranger outfit– it doesn’t get better than that ;-)”

Click here to visit Neil’s Blog
Click here to visit StudentSwitchOff website