Dear Reader, I hope you got exciting plans for New Year’s eve too!
2025 will already mark my 6th year in the sustainability space.
From advocacy to unearthing some questionable activities, espeically 2024 was quite a journey.
What shall we think going into 2025? Since many are concerned, I thought I write you some words that might help:
Today's Lesson: An Outlook For 2025
Some heartfelt words and ideas about next year.
Number Of The Day
Throughout this year, we have shared 39 lessons with each other—from how to convince colleagues to ideas for saving plastic in laboratories. I truly love exchanging these with you and am very grateful for all the positive feedback I have received. No doubt, next year we will continue to learn and make our science greener together!
39
Talking About 2025
High hopes for sustainability in 2025? For a revolutionary shift in society? Not really. For you personally? Yes!
A Development to Pay Attention To
I am very excited to see how the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD) will play out.
It remains the most comprehensive requirement for companies to report on and plan the reduction of their emissions. This is crucial because it is:
Obligatory
Cyclic / Repeated
Elevates sustainability reporting to the same importance as financial reporting.
The sheer volume of data generated due to the obligation of reporting on various data points has the potential to bring offer unique insights.
Without doubt, I believe the bureaucratic burden will lead to some resistance and even cheating. Nevertheless, we will also see how far top-down sustainability efforts are embraced by our economy.
New Innovations on the Horizon?
Looking back at this year, we’ve seen exciting innovations: biobased tubes from Eppendorf, MGL ACT label being recommended by the EPA, and advancements in gas generators, water dispensers, and HPLC systems.
What’s in store for 2025?
Let me glance into my crystal ball—ah, I see:
An amazing online summit called GreenLaboratoryWork, organized by … surprise, ReAdvance!
A weekly Green Education email delighting readers worldwide.
Jokes aside, what am I genuinely looking forward to?
I believe new tools to measure the environmental footprint of our research might become available in 2025. These will help tremendously with quantifying changes and convincing peers.
Thanks to the CSRD, obligatory reporting will drive the generation of data for Scope 3 emissions—which we’ll then be able to incorporate into our analyses.
More AI for Science
Additionally, am eagerly awaiting more broadly applicable AI models to aid in experiment design. As publishers sell papers to companies like Microsoft for training, I expect tools that can help us review literature and create impactful hypotheses. These could guide us on how to structure our research, refine interdisciplinary approaches, or even optime experimental designs.
This is an edited graphic, outlining the common adoption curve. To my mind, we are fairly early in using the full potential of AI - although its massive energy consumption.
Yes, these tools will consume energy, but their mainstream adoption is inevitable. Still, the savings in animals, plastics, and chemicals they enable will be tremendous.
And in Laboratories?
For laboratories, I am m keeping an eye on innovations in flow cytometry, microscopy, and other systems – they might offer advances similar to those in mass spectrometry which save millions of liters of nitrogen each year.
This graphic is summarizes the insight from an article I co-wrote with two colleagues from Waters—a huge shoutout to Gunnar Weibchen and Claudia Rathmann. This visual should drive home the significant savings possible - we estimated that in a academic research setting about 3 696 000L and 32 802 000 in an industrial setting are easily achievable. Terefore, make us realize that technological advances offer plenty of opportunities if we let go of the false belief that more sustainable equipment cannot also be cutting-edge in performance.
We’ve discussed challenges with innovations in plastic tips and gloves, but I remain hopeful. What will see larger adoption is miniaturization.
Testing more conditions with less material in less time could revolutionize workflows. Similarly, lighter materials will likely lead the way. Automated pipetting is another area where I expect significant progress.
Are We the Last Generation?
I’m fully aware that the ongoing issues of plastic pollution, climate change, and biodiversity loss are causing tremendous anxiety about our future. This is aggravated by certain political developments.
Indeed, a pivot back to fossil fuels began during the Ukrainian war, with several countries switching to coal (and nuclear, for better or worse). The staggering impact of the war itself—accounting for millions of kg of CO2e—has been largely forgotten.
Across the Atlantic, we see a shift as the US leaves the Paris Agreement.Painful? Yes. Unmanageable? No.
Your Attitude, Not Your Environment, Is Decisive
There’s no need for doomsday thinking. Remember, we were predicted to run out of oil and see the world go under multiple times. Yes, here we are. Surprisingly, there is a number of examples like acidic rain where we have been able to reduce our impacts significantly, although we were said to have initiated our demise.
My take: focus on yourself—you can’t single-handedly stop advances in AI, overconsumption, or war (unless your plan is to make a few billion dollars next year). But sustainability presents an opportunity.
As previously published, there are five dimensions of sustainability that I believe are crucial for every scientist. Each of them gives you another opportunity to optimize. Indeed, all too often, we focus on one while leaving the others aside—thus never really achieving a sustainable mode of action.
You can save time, money, and frustration, feel more connected to nature, and join a wonderful community. Don’t let the media drive you to despair, and don’t put too much faith in decision-makers. Together, we keep venturing. Together, we will be the change.
True to my positive attiutde, I would like to share a little Christmas sustainability story with you:
Applying The Knowledge
At the dawn of the 20th century, major cities faced an immense and seemingly unsolvable problem: horse manure (i.e., poop). In bustling metropolises like London and New York, where thousands of horses powered carriages, buses, and carts, streets were overrun with filth. Reports painted a grim picture—manure piled high, spreading disease and stench.
Urban planners, public health officials, and scientists convened at an infamous conference to discuss the crisis, only to abandon the effort in despair. Even after long discussions, no viable solution seemed possible. Everyone left, believing that doom was inevitable.
Then, as if by miracle, the problem vanished within decades. The automobile and electrified trams transformed urban transportation, rendering horse-drawn carriages obsolete and solving the manure crisis.
Moral of the story
The term “Great Horse Manure Crisis of 1894” was popularized in a 2004 article by Stephen Davies but wasn’t used in the 19th century. While the gist of the story is true, there’s little evidence about a single conference.
In essence, neither give up, nor believe in any story you hear. Instead, always ask me ;)
Just kidding—but I do believe our world is too complex for plans to reliably work. The best we can do is to keep up the attitude. The rest will follow.
A lot of change is coming—so stay tuned, and I wish you energy and success for 2025!
Upcoming Lesson:
How To Launch A No-Effort Sustainability Program
How We Feel Today
References
Penndorf, P., et al. J., 2023. A new approach to making scientific research more efficient – rethinking sustainability. doi:10.1002/1873-3468.14736
Bun, R., 2022. Tracking unaccounted greenhouse gas emissions due to the war in Ukraine. doi: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2024.169879 Greenfelt et al., 2019. Acid rain and air pollution: 50 years of progress in environmental science and policy. doi: 10.1007/s13280-019-01244-4
If you have a wish or a question, feel free to reply to this Email. Otherwise, wish you a beatiful week! See you again the 2nd : )
Personal Note from Patrick, the Editor Hi Reader, what do you associate with procurement? For many people, it’s a technical term linked to paperwork and frustration. However, my goal is to show that procurement is much more tangible, and often simpler, than it seems. Let’s start by exploring what more sustainable purchasing of lab equipment involves and why it matters to you: Today's Lesson: Understanding Procurement What sustainable purchasing means and why it matters Number of the Day...
Personal Note From Patrick, The Editor Hi Reader, ever thought about more sustainable laboratory instruments? Lower energy consumption, sample volumes, and reagent use - but how can this be achieved without compromising performance? To show you, today’s sponsor - Waters - shares some unique behind-the-scenes insights. Over the past two years, I’ve worked with them to create resources that help you reduce the footprint of research. Here, we explore how improvements in HPLC and MS systems can...
Personal Note from Patrick, the Editor Hi Reader, laboratories can save plastics, reagents, and time through robotic automation. We discussed these advantages last time, and I recently posted about how you might finance your purchase - but everything has a flip side. That means if we implement automation incorrectly, we might end up with a much higher footprint. So, how do we do it safely? Today's Lesson: The Risks of Automation The potential downsides of modernizing labs Number of the Day...
