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Explore more about sustainable labs

Minimising the environmental footprint of research

How can we carry out scientific research in an environmentally sustainable way, while ensuring research safety, quality and impact?

We invited members of the chemical sciences community to share their views and experiences on this topic. Their responses form the basis of our new Sustainable laboratories report, and will inform our ongoing efforts to support the community in their efforts towards creating greener labs.

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1. Why is this work important?
2. Key findings from our sustainable laboratories report
3. Our action plan for the future

Why is this work important?

Science and technology are key to a more sustainable future – in everything from tackling disease to developing new technologies for clean energy generation.

Laboratories – found in universities, research institutes, hospitals and companies – are essential to research, analysis and teaching. They often bring together several disciplines and involve different configurations and scales of wet, dry and computational facilities.

However, laboratory buildings, processes and equipment, by their nature, can be resource and energy intensive. Safely carrying out high-quality research can require temperature control, ventilation or high sterility. And the sourcing, manufacture and disposal of specialised laboratory consumables and instruments also have an environmental footprint.

The key findings

More than 670 scientists in 70 countries participated in an online survey between December 2021 and January 2022. Their feedback, including more than 2,000 free-text responses, gives us individual perspectives on sustainable practices from within academia and industry. Along with desk research, we also gathered views from the community, including our subject community councils and their working groups, and our Science and Innovation Leadership Forum.

Scientists are taking steps to reduce research's environmental footprint

There is a huge appetite on the part of researchers to minimise the effects of their day-to-day scientific work on the environment, and the majority are already trying to do so:

• 79% agreed they know how their actions impact the environment
• 84% agreed they would like to do more to reduce the impact of their day-to-day scientific work on the environment
• 63% have made changes in the last two years to reduce the environmental impact of their research activities, or those of their research group, team or department

See our report highlights or read the full report to see more of our findings, including what scientists are doing already, the barriers and challenges, and what needs to happen next.

Our action plan

The Sustainable laboratories report is part of our long-term plan to help our community on its journey to sustainable labs.

We believe chemists can lead the way to embed sustainable practices across a range of disciplines. However, positive change will require the entire community to work together towards this goal.

We will be supporting the community with a programme of initiatives over the long term, and, as our initial contribution to these aims, we have committed to the following seven-point action plan: