Carbon Resilience of University Campuses in Response to Carbon Risks: Connotative Characteristics, Influencing Factors, and Optimization Strategies

With the increasing and intensifying effects of global climate change and the rapid development of higher education, energy and resource consumption at university campuses has been rising drastically. This shift has been worsened by campuses’ expanded role in addressing extreme weather hazards and taking on additional cultural and community functions. This article carries out a comprehensive literature review of the low-carbon measures and resilient behaviors implemented on university campuses based on publications published in two major databases, the China National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI) and Web of Science (WOS). Results show that: (1) most existing studies only focus on campus carbon emission reduction from a single perspective, without considering the correlation between carbon emissions in different dimensions on campuses and without analyzing the causes of excessive campus carbon emissions from the perspective of the built environment; (2) current studies have not constructed an assessment system for campus carbon resilience and lack the tools and methods for assessment. After summarizing and analyzing, this study proposes the concept of campus “carbon resilience”, which refers to the ability of campuses to cope with the risks of disasters and uncertainties caused by excessive carbon emissions. The research framework of this study is divided into three parts: connotative characteristics, influencing factors, and optimization strategy. Following this framework, the concept and critical features of campus carbon resilience “carbon minus resilience”, “carbon saving resilience”, “carbon reduction resilience”, and “carbon sequestration resilience” are analyzed and outlined. Next, an integrated impact factor system for campus carbon resilience is proposed. This system incorporates aspects such as land utilization, building operation, landscape creation, and energy regeneration from the perspective of the built environment. Finally, with the core objective of effectively reducing the dynamic range of carbon emissions when dealing with critical disturbances and improving the adaptability and resilience of campuses to cope with excessive carbon emissions, this study proposes an optimization strategy of “setting development goals–establishing an evaluation system–proposing improvement strategies–dynamic feedback and adjustment” to provide ideas and theoretical guidance for responding to university campus carbon risk and planning carbon resilience.