April 22 was Earth Day — a day focused on finding solutions to combat climate change and encourage everyone to do their part to preserve the earth’s natural resources.

Thanks to an innovative new consultation service at Massachusetts General Hospital, researchers now have an opportunity to “go green” in their labs—not just on Earth Day but all year long.

A unique collaborative effort between the Mass General Research Institute and the Massachusetts General Hospital’s Center for the Environment and Health, the Greening Your Lab initiative is part of a hospital-wide effort to increase the environmental sustainability of healthcare.

While it may not be the biggest cause of climate change, healthcare contributes to about 10% of the greenhouse gases in the United States and 5% of the greenhouse gases globally, says Ann-Christine Duhaime, MD, a Physician-Investigator in the Department of Neurosurgery and Associate Director (Research and Publications) for the Center for the Environment and Health.

“It’s not an insignificant amount, and anything we can do to decrease that impact will improve human health,” Duhaime says. “This is our charge.”

The Greening Your Lab initiative offers members of the research community a customized consultation to help reduce the environmental impact of their labs and research processes.  

The Center has created a tip sheet with an overview of general approaches to decreasing the environmental footprint of research, including minimizing energy/carbon emissions, toxic chemicals, water, and solid waste. 

Researchers interested in a personalized consultation are asked to complete a request form with some basic information about their lab. A team from the Center then conducts an onsite assessment of the lab and provides a set of written recommendations for reducing emissions, toxins, and waste.

‘’We have five labs right now that have all agreed to pilot some of these processes, and we are in the early stages of potentially collaborating with other hospitals—in particular the Cleveland Clinic, which has some people who are really experts in this area,’’ says Duhaime.  

Measuring the Impact

While tackling a large and complex problem such as climate change can seem intimidating and even hopeless at times, Duhaime is optimistic that progress can be made—and measured.

“One of our charges—to take these efforts a step ahead of similar initiatives—is to do careful measurement of what these changes do in terms of environmental impact,” she explains.

“Interestingly, when people think about greening anything in healthcare, the first thing they think about is solid waste,” says Duhaime. “However, it turns out that 60-70% of our impact comes not from what takes place on site, but from areas of the supply chain that can be influenced through collective action.”

“If we collectively can put pressure on manufacturers to encourage them to produce products in a more environmentally careful way—to reduce packaging and improve reusable processes, for example—we can magnify our impact.”

Incentivizing Change

Another key challenge will be finding the best ways to incentivize the research community to make environmentally friendly changes, Duhaime acknowledges.

“You have incredible power as an individual [to change someone’s attitude] and there are ways that are effective and ways that can backfire,” she says. “How do we align incentives to do what’s good for the environment and what’s good for the research jobs that people are actually doing?”

She notes that studies have shown that one of the most effect ways to elicit change is to make the process both easy and rewarding.

“The brain makes value decisions,” Duhaime explains. “So if you’re not uper committed to the environment, you may need another incentive. That may be cost savings, improved efficiency, or a discount on new equipment that makes it easier to do your job.”

That’s why Duhaime is grateful to have Susan A. Slaugenhaupt, PhD, Scientific Director of the Mass General Research Institute, as her administrative partner in the Greening Your Lab initiative.  

“Sue has been a wonderful, enthusiastic partner who understands researchers to the core, and I think we have some really exciting work ahead of us.”

About the Mass General Research Institute
Research at Massachusetts General Hospital is interwoven through more than 30 different departments, centers and institutes. Our research includes fundamental, lab-based science; clinical trials to test new drugs, devices and diagnostic tools; and community and population-based research to improve health outcomes across populations and eliminate disparities in care.
Support our Research