27/07/17
Greg Anderson and Carlos Roncancio-Garica accepted the silver award on behalf of the department at the Annual Sustainability Awards by highlighting the importance of sustainability and the hard work of the Sustainability Champions i earlier this month.
Professor Edward Byrne, President & Principal of King’s College London, opened the ceremony by highlighting the importance of sustainability and the hard work of the Sustainability Champions in introducing sustainable practices into their workspaces over the course of the academic year.
Laboratories entail energy and waste footprints that are 3-10 times greater than comparably sized non-research spaces. Therefore, engaging with researchers and technical staff in the lab is integral to the university both achieving its carbon reduction targets and using resources more efficiently for biomedical research.
The silver award requires that - among other things - shut down processes are in place to ensure that all non-essential equipment is turned off, fume cupboards are set to low flow when not in use, cold storage is regularly maintained and its contents consolidated, equipment is serviced, resources are shared and waste streams have clear signage.
These are all simple actions but collectively they help ensure we reduce the environmental impacts of our research as much as possible, without comprising the quality our of research.
En route towards a Gold Award next year!
This is part of the Sustainable Labs program at King's.