The cash has been awarded as part of a £2.3 billion national strategy to develop "low-carbon" colleges, as part of the Building Colleges for the Future programme.

A new state-of-the-art environmentally friendly college block is being built on the Castle campus, close to the city centre.

The project is being funded by grants from the Government's Learning and Skills Council, along with proceeds from college sites which are no longer needed.

David Battell, the college's estates and services manager, said the Government money would pay for extra environmental elements on the Castle campus and cut carbon emissions generally.

Plans included roof-mounted wind turbines, solar panels, a rainwater recycling scheme, green roofs and extended connections to the refuse-fuelled combined heat and power system.

Mr Battell said: "We have an environmental policy which charges us to ensure we consider the environmental impact in all of our actions and decisions.

"We have an Environment Group which monitors and reports to our directors where decisions have had a negative or positive impact or where we could do more.

"For example, we have a travel plan and we're working hard to find ways to reduce our dependency on the car, and we have a new waste contract which specifically targets our recycling targets.

"And we have successfully run a trial composting our food waste and hope to roll this out across the college."

The college estimates buildings opened over the last 10 years have reduced carbon emissions by a fifth, and have cut vehicle mileage between sites by a similar amount.

The national strategy is seeking to ensure that all new colleges are environmentally sustainable and zero carbon by 2016, ahead of the Government's target for public sector buildings.

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