As the Maynooth University community marks Green Week (23–30 March), it’s an ideal moment to highlight the ways in which IReL contributes to environmental responsibility, climate action, and a sustainable scholarly future.
IReL is strengthening Ireland’s climate and sustainability efforts by expanding open access, promoting transparent research infrastructure, and now taking new steps to understand and reduce the environmental impact of digital scholarly publishing.
A new proposal introduces Environmental Impact monitoring in future licence agreements, seeking data from publishers on emissions linked to e‑resource hosting, data centres, and digital workflows. This will help clarify the Scope 3 “value chain” carbon footprint of Ireland’s e‑resource ecosystem and support more sustainable decision‑making across universities.
With many major publishers preparing for EU sustainability reporting requirements, IReL is using its influence to encourage transparency, accountability, and measurable emission‑reduction plans, contributing to more sustainable scholarly communications for all.
Kyle Adams, who leads the project, says:
“IReL is uniquely positioned as the national consortium of Ireland’s higher education research libraries to engage with publishers and peer consortia to build shared knowledge about the environmental impact of scholarly communications. We hope that this shared knowledge and international cooperation will enhance our members’ efforts to achieve their sustainable development goals.”