Our future, our scope of action

Research leaves no doubt

For a long time, and thanks to sophisticated models, research has established with ever-greater accuracy and certainty that global warming is largely caused by human activity. To prevent immeasurable damage to nature and society, humankind must act quickly and decisively. However, science takes on a dual role in climate change: on the one hand, it provides the basis for a detailed understanding of the Earth's climate. On the other hand, it causes detrimental CO₂ emissions itself — like many other areas of life and work.

We can make a difference

It is evident that the climate crisis will change the way we conduct research, science and education. The fu­ture de­vel­op­ment of our re­search is one of our tasks, and we should code­termine it such that, in the long run, our work can and will be car­ried out in a sus­tain­able way. It is up to all of us to take on re­spons­ib­il­ity and to act ac­cord­ingly in our daily en­vir­on­ment.

Taskforce

The work­ing group, con­sist­ing of de­part­mental mem­bers from all in­sti­tutes and levels, met in spring and sum­mer 2020 to dis­cuss the cli­mate im­pact of our op­er­a­tions and to de­velop ideas for a sus­tain­able mode of re­search in the de­part­ment. Key as­pects are lis­ted in the next sec­tion. In par­tic­u­lar, video­con­fer­en­cing tools will as­sist in re­du­cing the need to travel. Even more, they will en­able ac­cess to the re­search com­munity in cases where travel would be dif­fi­cult or even im­possible due to fam­ily com­mit­ments, fin­an­cial con­di­tions or un­fa­vour­able polit­ical cir­cum­stances.

Results and measures

The result of this work is a detailed Download report (PDF, 510 KB) with a catalogue of measures, which was endorsed by 85% of the votes cast at the Department conference on 2 October 2020. The members of the Department of Physics will now gradually implement the measures developed:

• Our own con­fer­ences and work­shops will be held at least in a semi-​virtual mode in the fu­ture. This will allow participants and speakers to attend the event without having to travel. This will not only require fewer financial resources and broaden participation opportunities, but it will also provide us with valuable experience to raise the standard of scientific exchange and personal interaction at virtual events to a level comparable to established face-to-face events.
• For international conferences, especially when they take place on other continents, we consider participation via videoconferencing tools as a viable alternative that effectively avoids CO₂ emissions.
• Department members travel by train to conferences at nearby European countries.
• Online tools will assist in planning travel and balancing ecological and economic interests.
• We gain experience in the field of sustainability and we engage in networking at ETH Zurich and in the international scientific community to develop further ideas and to put them into practice.
• The research groups will initiate and implement further measures, taking their individual circumstances into account. Please share the experience gained by e-mail to so that it can be used to benefit the community on the associated website.