Prince Charles has opened a construction college in Dorset which hopes to become a Centre of Excellence in Sustainable Construction.

The Dorset Construction and Training Centre in Poundbury, part of Weymouth College, runs courses including roof thatching, stonemasonry, dry stone walling, architecture, conservation and building with lime, and has encouraged students to build mud huts on site.

Poundbury is part of the Prince of Wales’s land, built by the prince in 1993 as a model of sustainable living. The plans are to expand its population from the current 1,500 to 5,000 in the next 16 years.

Prince Charles visited the centre just one week before he is due to deliver the opening address for the high level segment of the UN climate change conference in Copenhagen.