AT A GLANCE:
GOALS FOR 2030
CERN’s first environmental objectives for the period until the end of Run 3 were approved by the Enlarged Directorate in early 2020. While this report provides an update on progress with respect to these original objectives, it also presents the environmental objectives for 2030, which were approved by the CERN Enlarged Directorate in January 2024.
The objectives and commitments for the period until 2030 are summarised below:
CERN has committed to limiting its electricity consumption to 1.5 TWh/year, which equates to an increase of 14% compared to the target set for the end of Run 3, despite significantly increasing demand due to the expanding physics programme.
Further, the Organization aims to cover 10% of its electricity needs by renewable energy sources by this point in time, thanks to power purchase agreements, and to reduce its gas consumption by 60% compared to 2018.
CERN’s objective for scope 1 emissions is to reduce the emission of greenhouse gases resulting from the Organization’s activities by 50%.
With regard to energy-related emissions, CERN aims to keep its scope 1 and 2 emissions constant compared to 2018.
For scope 3 emissions, the objective for commuting is to reduce individual motorised transport to 50%, the objective for emissions from duty travel is a reduction of 30% compared to 2019; in the area of catering, the objective is to increase the offer of vegetarian/vegan meals to 50% of the total offer.
Objectives for procurement are being developed in the framework of the environmentally responsible procurement project and will be presented in future reports.
CERN’s objective is to keep its annual water consumption below 3 600 megalitres despite the growing demand for cooling water, to reduce the zinc load in effluents to the Nant d’Avril river in Switzerland by 90% and to increase the water retention volume available on CERN sites.
CERN has committed to maintaining the rate of recovery of its non-hazardous waste above 70% in terms of weight. With respect to the reference year 2022, the Organization aims to increase the total rate of reuse by 10% by 2030 and to reduce the campus “household waste” per person on site by 5% (all in terms of weight). For radioactive waste, the objective is to keep the amount of waste recycled from the clearance of former radioactive waste above 55 tonnes/year.
CERN’s objective with respect to biodiversity is to conserve and enhance the Organization’s natural, agricultural and forest areas, thereby fostering biodiversity in the identified ecosystems (shrublands, meadows, woodlands and wetlands) and reducing the presence of urban heat islands on the CERN sites.
Despite an expanding scientific programme, CERN’s objective is to keep its radiological environmental impact negligible by continually optimising its facilities and activities to ensure that the doses received by the public are kept below 0.02 mSv per year (for reference, the European annual dose limit for public exposure to artificial sources is 1 mSv).
CERN’s priority is to control and reduce the noise footprint resulting from the Organization’s activities. Concretely, CERN intends to reduce noise hotspots (>40 dBA) in residential areas, carrying out systematic environmental noise impact assessments for new infrastructures and major consolidation work.
CERN’s objective is to reduce the potential environmental impact of hazardous substances used for the Organization’s activities. Concretely, the aim is to reduce the quantity of transformer oil present on CERN’s sites by 120 m3 (compared to the 2023 baseline, 1 784 m3).
