Conferences are necessary and productive means of communicating scientists’ work to their peers and the public. However, to attend conferences, scientists have to travel. Most traveling occurs by planes, cars, and trains: all release carbon in the atmosphere. How can we minimise scientists’ carbon emissions? Since attending conferences is desirable and unavoidable, scientists will continue to travel. Thus, in order to minimise the impact of our carbon emissions, we must offset them using credible carbon offsetting programmes run by trustworthy organisations.
What is the scale of the problem. Most of the travelling occurs via the most polluting means of transportation: air travel. I have calculated that I am personally responsible for over 4 tons of carbon emission per year! I am only a mild sufferer of eco-anxiety, but this number frightens me! Multiply this over the entire scientific community and it adds up to significant numbers. We owe to our children and the younger generation to invest in ways that will minimise our professional carbon footprint. This is why I would like to suggest the following simple measures (which could be immediately implemented) as a prelude to more extensive ones:
- All registrations to conferences, workshops and scientific meetings should include a way to facilitate carbon offsetting of speakers’ and participants’ travels.
- All travel agencies at Universities and other research organisations should make sure the travels they organise for their staff include an option to carbon offset.
Eventually, airlines should be requested by law to work out a pricing structure for their flights that include the costs of carbon emissions. A mechanism should be put in place that mandates Universities and research organisations to raise funds for offsetting the carbon emission of their staff during travel and research funding agencies should cover cost of offsetting the travel of the investigators they support.
Professor Gabriel Waksman, FRS, FMedSci, ML, MAE
Institute of Structural and Molecular Biology, UCL and Birkbeck Malet Street, WC1E 7HX, London, UK