WashU was commended for the success of its Green Labs Program at the 2024 International Institute for Sustainable Laboratories (I2SL) conference, held this year in St. Louis. The conference convened architects, engineers and sustainability professionals to discuss energy efficiency and waste reduction in research laboratories.
The “honorable mention” award recognized the program’s rapid growth over the past year.
Delayed by the COVID-19 pandemic, the program has flourished since being relaunched in 2023. Nearly 50 labs are now certified participants, making a collective effort to reduce lab packaging waste, promote shut-the-sash behaviors, power down lab equipment, retire inefficient lab freezers, and more. View a full list of certified labs here.
To become certified, labs complete a checklist to evaluate their environmental impact. The checklist, designed by WashU sustainability staff specifically for WashU labs, collects data on equipment, researcher behavior and purchasing practices. It also includes a robust suite of resources which labs can use to make improvements. Both the creation of the checklist and overall growth of the program have been powered by a strong collaboration between the university’s Sustainability, Facilities and Environmental Health and Safety departments.
Conference speakers from universities like Stanford to experts from the National Institutes of Health emphasized that labs can simultaneously maintain safety protocols in their groundbreaking research and reduce their contribution to climate change. Attendees also had the opportunity to tour the Fort Neuroscience Research Building and learn about its sustainable design at a presentation by Steve Sobo, executive director of strategic projects at WashU School of Medicine.
In addition to the Green Labs awards, I2SL also recognized winners of the 2024 International Laboratory Freezer Challenge. In many labs, freezers are the second most energy intensive piece of equipment, surpassed only by fume hoods. The Freezer Challenge, which runs from January to July each year, is an international competition which scores labs on their efforts to reduce freezer energy use, improve sample accessibility and reduce risk through remote temperature monitoring. WashU labs who are interested in participating in the 2025 challenge can sign up to receive more information here.
Learn more about joining the Green Labs Program here.