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Earthworm

Dear academics in this thread:

This 'flying scientist worried about emissions' dilemma is to me a perfect case where we could move away from guilt-driven individual action aiming to reduce our carbon footprint to become aware of our handprint to achieve collective/administrative changes [1].

We organize the conferences, we have access to the administrations that pay our travel costs and we know the community.

There are definitely alternatives:

"A straightforward way of cutting emissions therefore could just be reducing the number of meetings, e.g. organizing recurring annual meetings only every other year. This could also have other benefits such as more available time for research, teaching, or mentoring. In addition, it would impose less pressure to be away from home for the sake of visibility for researchers with families, which is a phenomenon that female scientists encounter more often than their male colleagues.

As humans, we find it easiest to network in person, but by solely relying on in-person meetings, certain groups of people can be excluded from the global science community. In order to allow for both an in-person experience as well as accessibility, an approach could be a hybrid format in which the visibility and networking opportunities for online attendants are prioritized. For large meetings, a hub format including virtual participation could be considered." [2]

We can do this! The benefits regarding inclusion, decolonization and, of course, emission reduction would be impressive.
:anarchoheart3:

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Further info:

A comprehensive toolbox to achieve flight reduction in academic institutions:
nature.com/articles/s44168-023

List of specific measures:
ethz.ch/content/dam/ethz/assoc

[1] Here's the concept of the handprint:
kolektiva.social/@earthworm/11

[2] i love this article: academic.oup.com/pnasnexus/art

@jatkinson1000 @steve @Ruth_Mottram

NatureAn evidence-based approach to accelerate flight reduction in academia - npj Climate ActionOn the path towards net zero emissions in academia, reducing flight emissions is of high importance, yet particularly difficult to achieve. Flight emissions have a major share of the total greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions of research institutions but reducing them is challenging, because flying has become an essential part of academic culture. While there is a large amount of literature on the relevance of flight reduction in academia, very little data and hands-on experience exists on what a successful reduction process might entail. This paper contributes to closing this gap by presenting data from interviews and surveys from eight academic institutions on reasons for air travel and alternatives, showing how a transdisciplinary approach can support a transformation from a high to a low flying culture, and suggesting a practical path forward with the aid of an open-access toolbox on how to reduce flight emissions in academia.