It is important to consider your own routines
"Include’s overall goal is to contribute with knowledge on how we can achieve a low-carbon society in a socially inclusive way. When we started, we quickly realized it was necessary to develop guidelines to reduce the environmental impact of our own practice", says Head of the center Tanja Winther.
In our environmental strategy, Include primarily asks researchers to assess their need to travel. Subsequently, we expect that travelling in Northern Europe takes place on land, unless special reasons require the researcher to fly.
To motivate the researchers to reduce their carbon footprint, we developed an easy-to-fill-in travel form, that provides an accurate picture of the environmental impact of each journey.
Hege Westskog, the Programme Coordinator at Include, stands behind the design of our environmental strategy.
The goal of the strategy and the travel form is to provide our participants with readily accessible information on how to choose environmentally friendly solutions.
"For example, the calculations show us what a train trip to Bodø entails in terms of emissions when compared to a flight, including indirect emissions, information which we do not currently receive from the companies that book our trips", Westskog emphasizes.
"We also order sustainable food for meetings, which means that we serve a large proportion of vegetarian and local food, preferably also organically produced", explains Tanja Winther. She concludes by pointing out that an important side effect of these routines may be that the catering services providers may become increasingly aware of the environmental aspects of the products they deliver, and document these more closely.
Read and download the full version of our environmental strategy here.
For more information on the travel form that Include has developed, please contact the center.