Children learn about climate change — Public building carbon emissions: Children at Argyle Primary School learn about climate change in workshops run by Actionaid. Photograph: Sarah Lee for the Guardian

Data reveals carbon footprint of public sector buildings

This article is more than 13 years old

Carbon emissions for public buildings are recorded every day. In fact, more than 40,000 schools, hospitals and government departments have had their energy performance mapped. See what the data says about the ones near you
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How green is your primary school? It can be very hard to tell. The information exists, but is rarely published.

Until now, that is. The Centre for Sustainable Energy has unearthed the energy efficiency details of more than 40,000 public buildings - including schools, hospitals and council offices - through a Freedom of Information Act request. And using this handy map, you can pinpoint buildings in your area to discover how efficient - or inefficient - they are.

Taking a few examples from London alone, it becomes obvious that energy efficiency is not being treated as a priority by public sector organisations. In east London, the Hackney Service Centre gets a mere G, and the Homerton Hospital an E and a G. And the University of London Union in central London gets only an E. Must try harder, students.

In fact, there are fewer than 200 A-rated buildings among the whole list, and thousands of G-rated. The CSE analysis reveals the extraordinary amount of public money being wasted because so many buildings are still operating well below reasonable standards of efficiency. True, large numbers of them are tricky to refurbish - from vast Victorian edifices to buildings erected in the 1980s when energy use was not a priority - but there are nearly always ways to make improvements. There is no excuse for neglecting energy efficiency to this extent.

Some arms of government have been performing better than others. For instance, the Department of Energy and Climate Change cut its carbon footprint by 20%, compared with 2009, through a variety of measures including heating adjustments and making better use of office space.

But the headquarters of the Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs in Westminster scores just an E.

Other key findings are:

• 40,146 public buildings are covered, including schools, government departments and council offices
• 119 buildings get more than 50% of their electrical energy from renewable power - 0.3%
• Only 568 buildings get 1% or more of their electrical energy from renewable energy sources - 1.4%
• A leisure centre in Surrey uses the most electricity proportionally of any building on this list. The Spectrum Leisure complex in Guildford, uses 475 kWh per year per square metre
• Manchester University has the highest carbon emissions on this list. It produced 51,601 tonnes of CO2 in 2008 - and, perhaps unsurprisingly, has an energy rating of E

With this map, you can tell where the inefficient public sector buildings are in your district. And then you can ask the building's owners and the local authority why their performance has not been improved. If you do, please post your queries and any responses below.

Go on - it's your money they're wasting.

this article was amended on 9 March 2011. The original said that the Spectrum Leisure complex in Guildford uses 475 kw per hour per square metre. This has been corrected.