The sun rises over the trees on Tappan Square.

Carbon Neutral 2025

We did it!

Photo credit: Walter Novak

Oberlin prepares its graduates to change the world for good. In 2025, we’re celebrating a milestone of change for our campus: We’ve achieved carbon neutrality!

This ambitious goal took shape more than 20 years ago. It began with a 2004 pledge of environmental stewardship by our Board of Trustees, followed two years later by Oberlin’s participation as an initial signatory on a university climate commitment that grew to include a network of some 900 U.S. institutions—the step that cemented our pledge to be carbon neutral by 2025.

Helping to build a more sustainable, respectful, and interconnected world for all is central to Oberlin’s mission, and today we are proud of our work to help preserve our planet for future generations by becoming a carbon-neutral campus.

Carmen Twillie Ambar, President of Oberlin College and Conservatory

Over the years, we’ve been busy:

  • We created the first certified net-zero commercial building in the U.S., a model for sustainable building practices everywhere.
  • We installed four solar arrays generating more than 3 megawatts of clean power—about 12 percent of our annual campus need.
  • We partnered with the city of Oberlin to buy clean, renewable electricity.
  • We implemented building controls and energy-monitoring systems to track our resource use in real time.
  • We’re transitioning our vehicle fleet and grounds equipment to all-electric power.
  • We’re engaging our campus and community to redouble our sustainability commitment through coursework, research, and student-led initiatives.
A sheep grazes in front of a large solar panel.

Munching mowers: Our 10-acre, 2.7-megawatt solar array is maintained by dozens of hungry sheep who visit three times a year. A form of agrivoltaics—using land for both agriculture and energy generation—the wooly landscapers help reduce our emissions and reliance on fossil fuel, as well as damage to our equipment.

Photo credit: Jacob Strauss

This year, we completed a monumental step: activation of a new geothermal energy system that replaces our century-old fossil-fuel-based system. Installed between 2021 and 2024, the new system will save 5 million gallons of water annually and improve energy efficiency by 30 percent. It also pushes us across the finish line to carbon neutrality for the first time in our almost 200-year history.

Aerial view of a dug-up quad where huge underground pipes are being placed.

Pipe dreams: Our four-year Sustainable Infrastructure Program included the installation of 13 miles of heating and cooling pipe, connecting 60 campus buildings to the new energy system.

Photo credit: William Bradford

There’s more where that came from.

We’ve achieved carbon neutrality for our campus. Now we’re envisioning exciting new ways to ensure Oberlin continues to lead worldwide sustainability efforts by example. We will eliminate our already minimal reliance on carbon offsets and implement new and increasingly energy-efficient systems and processes to move us beyond carbon neutrality and toward our ultimate objective: climate positivity.

Learn more about Oberlin’s sustainability efforts on the Office of Energy and Sustainability website.

Media: Connect with us at communications@oberlin.edu.

Four people all hold an electric torch in their hands, raised up in the center of the group.

Raising the torch: Ecolympics, Oberlin’s friendly campus/community competition to reduce electricity and water usage, isn’t just fun—it demonstrates how little changes can add up to a lot. “It might not seem like a big deal to turn off your lights or not run water when you're brushing your teeth,” says Sustainability Manager Heather Adelman, “but all of those resources are in our greenhouse gas inventory. And the less we use, the lower that is.”

Photo credit: Isabella Moss ’28

Celebrate with us!

It takes all of us to achieve carbon neutrality. That’s why we’re throwing a year-long celebration for all of us: Obies past and present, our faculty and staff, our local community, and Oberlin friends near and far. Watch for Carbon Neutral 2025 celebrations at Commencement, Homecoming, and other times throughout the year.

Exterior of a modern glass-and-brick building at twilight, its lit-up windows reflected in a retaining pond.

The green building that started it all: Lauded as “the most remarkable” of a new generation of environmentally responsible buildings by the New York Times, the Adam Joseph Lewis Center for Environmental Studies—the first certified net-zero commercial building in America—turns 25 in 2025.

Photo credit: courtesy of William McDonough + Partners

A machine in a torn up field.

Deep impact: Oberlin’s four-year transition from fossil fuels to geothermal energy involved the drilling of 850 wells—each one 600 feet deep—under athletic practice fields north of campus. Today, water is transferred from the wells to heat and cool our campus.

Photo credit: Mike Crupi

Outside of the bike co-op, a person works on their bike.

Please re-cycle: Heating and cooling are only part of the carbon-neutrality equation. Initiatives throughout our campus—including student-led efforts like the Oberlin Bike Co-op—are central to achieving our sustainability goals.

Photo credit: Matthew Lester

Environment & Sustainability at Oberlin

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