How we organised a sustainable international conference

Posted on by clare.tremlett

In June 2024 the MRC Integrative Epidemiology Unit welcomed 200 participants to Bristol and 60 participants online to our 6th Mendelian randomization conference, making this our biggest conference to date. A key innovation this year was a Hub in the MRC Unit in Uganda, where delegates gathered in a video-linked room to participate in the conference, also with networking and catering on-site.

Sustainability was a key theme, and we set a target to reduce the carbon footprint by 50% mainly through converting to a hybrid conference with a virtual Hub, and booking vegetarian/vegan catering. The total estimated tonnes CO2 (tCO2) for the conference (mostly due to travel) was 143.25 tCO2. The Hub and virtual attendance avoided 147.5 tCO2 (see table).

Carbon footprint

Attendance N people tCO2 (travel) tCO2 saved (by not travelling)
In person 198 135 0
Uganda hub 22 1 72
Virtual 40 1 73
Total 260 137 145

Total footprint 143.25 tCO2 – including travel, hotels (6.18 tCO2) and food (0.25 tCO2)

Total savings 147.5 tCO2 – including hotels (1.93 tCO2) and vegetarian food (0.5 tCO2).

What we did

At the UK conference site: We pledged to have no single-use items, and all catering was served using standard crockery and cutlery. We encouraged delegates to consider their travel to reduce their carbon footprint – 10 people travelling from Europe came by train rather than flying. We had new conference badges, which were collected for re-use.

Hybrid conference: The conference was fully hybrid, with all the sessions automatically recorded and available for a month after the conference. Sessions had between 20 and 80 participants online and there was good uptake of recordings. We received positive feedback on the hybrid approach, e.g. “It was good being able to watch videos afterwards”.

Virtual Hub: To promote sustainability and encourage global connections, we piloted a conference hub in collaboration with our colleagues at the MRC Unit in Uganda. Overall, 23 participants joined the Hub and we received very positive feedback.

What did we learn? Our colleagues in Uganda were enthusiastic to organise a successful, interactive Hub. As a result, attendees were located in a well-organised conference room with good connectivity and audio, and beverages and meals throughout the conference. Organisers in Bristol supported this Hub through a well-coordinated conference schedule (allowing for differences in time zone), and Zoom chairs for all sessions to enable virtual questions.

A lot of thought and effort goes into organising any conference, and the support we had from everyone to make this one more sustainable and inclusive was uplifting. We hope other organisers will be inspired by the idea of global hubs to take research to the world whilst minimising our environmental impact.

world map showing residential addresses for virtual attendees at MR conferenceMap showing residential addresses for virtual attendees at the MR conference. 145 tCO2 saved, compared to all those attendees flying to Bristol.

Did you know?

If you work at Bristol Medical School, you can do Carbon Literacy Training and make your own pledges to reduce carbon emissions in the workplace. If you’d like to take part, contact lucy.westover@bristol.ac.uk. If you’d like to find out more about carbon literacy, see the Carbon Literacy Project.

Authors (on behalf of the Organising Committee):

Amanda Chong, Segun Fatumo, Lindsey Gaunt, Moffat Nyirenda, Kate Tilling.

 

An Earth Day success

Posted on by clare.tremlett

phrc_logo

On 22nd April (Earth Day), the Planetary Health Report Card was published, detailing all of our efforts to drive forward sustainability this year. 139 medical schools across the globe took part and we are delighted to announce that Bristol Medical School scored not only 2nd in the UK, but 2nd in the world!

PHRC international rankings 2025

We have made enormous strides this year, soaring all the way from 13th in the country last year to a silver medal position. We also received a special kudos for our collaboration with the local organisation Facts4Life on a student choice project called “Healthy Planet, Healthy People”.

A lot has gone on behind the scenes to achieve this result, including the creation of our external website, internal SharePoint and this blog itself. We’ve also introduced Carbon Literacy training for the entire first-year cohort, shared weekly sustainability news in the bulletin and Galenicals newsletter, published our Year 1-3 sustainability lectures on the public platform MedAll, will soon be launching our new academy sustainability representatives initiative and much more.

Thank you so much to Lakshmi Aggarwal and Matthias Mitra (our two Medical School Sustainability Champions) for writing up such a detailed, 40-page report, to Professor Trevor Thompson, Professor Kate Tilling and Lucy Westover for being tireless proponents and supporters for this work, and Shandin Rickard-Hughes in the SU for leading the Sustainability Champion programme.

Check out the full Bristol Medical school report

Check out the full International Summary report

See you on Earth Day 2026!

Lakshmi Aggarwal – Bristol SU Sustainability Champion

Let’s Get Literate! Training our first year undergraduate Medical students in Carbon Literacy

Posted on by clare.tremlett

We are very excited to share the news that as of February 2025, 280 Year 1 undergraduate students have participated in Carbon Literacy Training!

What is Carbon Literacy Training?

Carbon Literacy training was developed by the Carbon Literacy Project; the aim of their work is to educate and empower individuals to reduce their carbon footprints and to encourage others around them to do the same. The training takes attendees through the basic science behind climate change, what we can do to prevent it and how to communicate what we know about it to others to encourage them to also change their behaviours. We consider this training a vital part of the sustainability work we do in the School and the training is increasingly recognised by NHS Trusts. 

What did we do?

The Year 1 students had three components to their training:

  • First, a lecture that covered the climate science headlines and introduced students to three senior professionals working in this space: an Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Senior Author and Climate Scientist, the founder of the NHS Sustainable Development Unit and a Consultant Anaesthetist who removed the gas desflurane from the NHS supply chain.  
  • Next, the students completed an online training session covering the basic science of climate change, what we can do to reduce our impact, what is already happening locally and nationally and how we can motivate others to take action.  
  • Last, students attended an in-person training session at Sparks in Bristol city centre in the week of 24th-28th February 2025. The face-to-face session took students through a revision of the online training, calculating their personal carbon footprints and the NHS footprint, discussing the health benefits of pro-sustainability actions, and planning their individual and group actions. The venue size also presented the perfect opportunity to play some penalty shoot out in the break! 

slideshow with presenter and audience group in discussion at a table

We are very pleased to say that the training was well received by students who said they found the training engaging and interesting. Here is what some of them said:

“No point being healthy if we’re going to be in such a sick world”

“If you want to be a doctor, why would you not care about people and the planet?”

“As we’re going into the NHS we’ll be needing to know what our effect on the planet is”

“I want to work abroad with my medical degree so an awareness of climate change is important to help those affected by climate disasters”

Bristol Medical School became the first Medical School to receive the Bronze Carbon Literate Educator Award in 2024 and we are working hard to achieve the Silver Award, so watch this space! 

Lucy Westover – Medical School Sustainability Officer

Trevor Thompson – School Sustainability Co-Lead

Lakshmi Aggarwal – Bristol SU Sustainability Champion