Anniversary: 25 years of the Environmental Campus Birkenfeld

In 1993, the state of Rhineland-Palatinate made the forward-looking decision to establish the Birkenfeld Environmental Campus in the municipality of Hoppstädten-Weiersbach in the Birkenfeld district as the new location of the then Rhineland-Palatinate University of Applied Sciences. The decision was also motivated by structural policy, because the loss of military facilities hit the already structurally weak Birkenfeld district hard. At the time, the local press ran the headline: "Campus spirit in the ghost hospital", referring to the previous use of the buildings as a reserve hospital for the US armed forces. Live, learn, work was the motto used by the founding fathers to describe the campus idea.

In October 1996, the Birkenfeld Environmental Campus of Trier University began teaching with 550 students in five degree programs. Today, approximately 2,400 students from over 80 countries are taught by 56 professors in 13 bachelor's, five dual bachelor's and 12 master's degree programs in basic natural sciences, technology, business administration, law and computer science. A real success story, not only in terms of student numbers.

In the renowned GreenMetric ranking, the environmental campus has shone for four years as the "greenest university in Germany" and is ranked 6th worldwide out of 912 participating universities. Sustainability, internationality, and applied research are writ large at Birkenfeld. In its anniversary year, the Environmental Campus has ten institutes and was able to attract more than 18 million euros in third-party funding in the research priorities "Applied Material Flow Management" and "Technologies for Sustainable Development" in 2019 and 2020 alone, which will create numerous, highly qualified jobs in the region.

With its teaching and research, the Environmental Campus sets impulses regionally, nationally and worldwide, and at the same time is an important factor for our future-strong region in the heart of Europe.

We look forward to the next 25 years and invite you to join us in shaping a sustainable future worth living.