Sustainability conference shows how it's done

A conference on minimising the unsustainable use of resources and reducing environmental harm is attempting to achieve that even before it opens.

While delegates will gather in Dunedin on Monday to attend the two-day forum, co-hosted by Otago Polytechnic and the University of Otago, hundreds more will participate from Invercargill, Christchurch, Wellington, Palmerston North, Auckland and Kerikeri via videoconferencing technology.

At least 400 participants were expected overall, saving 22 tonnes of CO2 emissions by "attending locally while participating nationally", conference creator Associate Prof Susan Krumdieck said.

Prof Krumdieck, from the University of Canterbury's department of mechanical engineering, said in a statement she was planning to attend an international conference on sustainability in Europe but thought it would be "the same old thing: we must reduce our emissions, we must switch to renewables, we must get new economic theories".

"I had the idea that with the funds I would have spent for me, one academic to go to a conference in Europe, I could host a national conference about a new direction."

New Zealanders who were already introducing sustainability in fields such as energy, transport, healthcare, waste management, agriculture, business, housing and community development, would give short presentations about their activities, she said.

The videoconferencing technology allowed participants in remote locations to ask questions and enter discussions as well as watch and listen to the presenters.

One of the aims of the conference was to monitor how well the virtual conference concept worked and write a research report to help others run similar conferences, Prof Krumdieck said.