by Robert Schreiber
Berlin, Germany (SPX) Nov 11, 2025
Scientists on the Institute of Science and Technology Austria evaluated the carbon footprint of travel to international nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) conferences, revealing {that a} single transcontinental journey by a European attendee generates 4 to 5 tons of CO2 emissions. This quantity surpasses the mixed footprint from six months of conducting experiments, making ready samples, and performing scientific computing in NMR on the institute.
The research workforce, led by ISTA Sustainability Manager Jeroen Dobbelaere and professors Paul Schanda and Georgios Katsaros, revealed their findings in Magnetic Resonance after launching a graduate course geared toward measuring the environmental impression of research practices. Their investigation analyzed travel choices from Vienna to a number of European cities, incorporating each direct journey emissions and the oblique prices of practice infrastructure. The mannequin confirmed that practice travel, even accounting for infrastructure, produces on common 85 % much less CO2 than flying for a similar journey, though this benefit diminishes for routes past 3,000 kilometers.
After the pandemic, bodily conferences have once more change into widespread in academia, ensuing within the resurgence of excessive travel-related emissions. While digital occasions have a a lot decrease environmental footprint, they lack some elements of non-public interplay. “In-person meetings have a quality that online conferences simply cannot provide,” mentioned Paul Schanda. “Many of us had brilliant ideas – or thought so at the time – while having a drink with a colleague after a poster session.”
The researchers additionally explored holding simultaneous, decentralized conferences throughout Europe, just about connecting native conferences. This method may cut back general carbon output from travel by as much as 25 %. The course continues to analyze sustainability subjects – together with commuting and the footprint of scientific computing – in future periods.
Research Report:Quantifying the carbon footprint of conference travel: the case of NMR meetings
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Institute of Science and Technology Austria
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