Delhi: Students are new green warriors

NEW DELHI: How much waste does your school recycle? How much energy does your school consume? What is the percentage of green area in your school? How eco-friendly are the vehicles in your school?

These and many other ���green' queries are what the city school students will soon be busy answering, under the state government's Green School Programme (GSP). "GSP is a self-assessment programme. It helps schools audit their use of resources and map their consumption and wastage. The exercise involves collection of information about natural resources such as water, air, land, energy and waste," said Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) director Sunita Narain. CSE is implementing the project in collaboration with the environment department of the state government.

The project in the form of a manual - "How Green is my school: A do-it-yourself manual" - is designed in a way so that schools have tasks to rate their own performance.

Each step provides the criterion, its weightage and the method by which the students could become more aware about the steps they can take to save the earth from the threat of climate change.

"For us, this is not a rating programme for ranks, marks or awards. It is a learning programme for building a new generation of people who are prepared to change the future," said Narain.