Sustainable labs

Labs only need to participate in one certification scheme - either LEAF or My Green Lab; there is no requirement to complete both. 

LEAF

The Laboratory Efficiency Assessment Framework (LEAF) is an environmental accreditation scheme designed to improve sustainability within higher education teaching and research. The framework enables individual lab managers (academic staff, technical staff, teaching lab managers) from all departments to quantify their environmental and financial impact. The LEAF programme comprises the following:

• Participating labs are given a list of environmental actions on an online platform broken down into Bronze, Silver and Gold categories to complete. Each action within the categories is clear and easy to implement.
• The categories include waste, travel, energy, water, procurement, and research quality. Each action is supported by a rationale as well as evidenced guidance to help implement it.
• Carbon calculators are included within the online toolkit enabling labs to estimate the current sustainability performance of their lab and track improvements as they implement changes.
• Labs can decide on bronze, silver or gold level award and have the opportunity in the following year to improve (if required).

How can I get involved?

Participating labs are asked to complete an online workbook that enables them to assess how individual items contribute to their carbon footprint in a thorough, wide-ranging, and organised manner.To get involved, please download the LEAF user guide via the link above or email z.rydz@imperial.ac.uk to help you create an account via the online portal and provide a step-by-step guide on how to register your lab. 

My Green Lab

The My Green Lab Certification program is designed to give laboratories actionable ways to improve their environmental performance through a continuous improvement process. The My Green Lab Certification programme comprises the following: 

• A 5 step programme: 
  • Baseline Assessment Survey - Using an online self-assessment survey, individual members of the participating lab are asked a series of questions. 
  • Implement Changes - Using My Green Lab recommendations as guidelines, lab personnel are encouraged to take some time (typically ~6 months) to make changes in their laboratory.
  • Certification - After a number of changes are made, members of the lab retake the online self-assessment survey. The extent of progress in adopting best practices in the lab through the responses provided to us is quantified. Subsequently, the lab receives an overall score (in percentage) and a certification level. 
  • Implement More Changes - After the initial certification, the lab must re-certify within two years to maintain their certified status. 
  • Re-Certification - When the lab is ready for re-certification, they retake the online self-assessment survey to see what best practices are still implemented and where they might make future changes. 
• The categories include community, recycling & waste reduction, resource management, purchasing, green chemistry and green biologics, water, plug load, fume hoods, cold storage, large equipment, infrastructure energy, field work, animal research and travel (each category is available where applicable).
• There are five levels of certification: bronze, silver, gold, platinum, and green.  The level of certification is determined by the score on the certification assessment.  It reflects both-- the percentage of possible green lab best practices that have been adopted and the extent to which they have been adopted by the lab. 

How can I get involved?

To get involved, please email z.rydz@imperial.ac.uk where you will be put in touch with our My Green Lab representative and be provided a step-by-step guide on how to register your lab. 

Check the example documents below to assist with your LEAF submissions. (Requires Imperial sign-in.)

• Dry lab - Bronze
• Semi-dry lab - Gold
• Wet lab - Gold
• Cleanroom lab - Gold

LEAF certifications are renewed on an annual basis. You will need to resubmit the LEAF toolkit each year; your previous responses are automatically carried over, making the process quick and straightforward. Please review and update your answers where necessary before clicking “Submit.” 

When renewing, you only need to submit the highest level previously achieved. For example, if your lab holds Gold, you only need to submit the Gold toolkit - there is no need to submit Bronze and Silver separately, as these are included automatically. 

Following submission, the next step depends on how recently your lab was assessed: 

• For awards less than 3 years old, a short Teams check-in call will be arranged with a LEAF assessor. 

• For awards 3 years and older, a full lab walkaround will be scheduled.

After the review, your LEAF certification will be extended for a further year. 

For more info check out the LEAF Process Flow. 

Unfortunately, LEAF has the rule that one person can only manage one lab at a time. The possible solutions we’ve used before: 

• Delegate LEAF application to someone else, you can still work with them on the toolkit, but their name will be in the system. 

• Include all the labs you manage in one application – even if the locations are different, if the operations and management of the labs are similar then that’s not a problem. It will save you time on filling out multiple applications.  

A lab is considered suitable for LEAF if it can meet at least 70% of the criteria within the toolkit. We recommend reviewing the criteria (see Imperial LEAF User Guide) to assess whether your lab is applicable. 

LEAF has been primarily designed for traditional wet laboratories, so it may not fully align with all lab types.  

LEAF was originally developed for wet labs, but work is ongoing to expand its applicability. UCL is currently developing additional toolkits tailored to other environments, including: 

• Semi-wet / dry labs (e.g. Engineering, Physics, Geography)  

• Animal facilities  

• Arts and Design spaces, including conservation labs and workshops  

• Teaching laboratories  

There are also areas where alternative frameworks already exist and won’t be covered by LEAF. For computational / dry labs the Green DiSC framework is available and free to use. 

We are also working with partners on developing guidance for physics and engineering laboratories. 

If your lab is not currently applicable to LEAF, we recommend staying in touch and looking out for updates as new frameworks are developed.