Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2025 Jan 2;13(1):2447454.
doi: 10.1080/21642850.2024.2447454. eCollection 2025.

A little more conversation, a little more action, please: the carbon footprint of travelling to conferences of the European Health Psychology Society

Lisa M Warner  1 , Ruvn Fleiner  1 , Gudrun Sproesser  2 , James A Green  3 , Lucia Rehackova  4 , Jennifer Inauen  5 , Vera Araújo-Soares  6 , Claudia Teran-Escobar  7
Affiliations

A little more conversation, a little more action, please: the carbon footprint of travelling to conferences of the European Health Psychology Society

Lisa M Warner et al. Health Psychol Behav Med. .

Abstract

Introduction: The environmental impact of on-site conferences, with air travel as the primary contributor to greenhouse gas emissions, has prompted a surge in research in recent years. The objective of this report is to raise awareness and stimulate transformation in the organisation of meetings of the European Health Psychology Society (EHPS).

Methods: We conducted estimations of travel-related CO2eq emissions of EHPS conferences in 2019, 2022, and 2023, and performed projections for 2024 and 2025. Additionally, we developed hypothetical scenarios for selected European cities as centroids for future conferences.

Results: EHPS conferences with an online option result in significant reductions in CO2eq emissions when compared to on-site only conferences. The selected European locations of these conferences enable more delegates to choose alternative forms of transportation instead of flying, such as trains, cars or buses, and consequently lead to significantly lower CO2eq emissions.

Discussion: The principal avenues for curbing travel-related emissions while maintaining on-site attendance are the provision of hybrid conferences with enhanced online participation and the optimisation of venue locations.

Keywords: CO2 equivalent; air travel; flying; greenhouse gas emissions; sustainable mobility.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Figures

Figure 1.
Figure 1.
Sum of distances travelled to EHPS conference locations in 2019–2023, by travel distances within and outside of Europe (on-site participants only). Source: World Map Original by Vardion, svg-ified by Simon Eugster on Wikipedia (https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Datei:BlankMap-World_gray.svg); Map of Europe on Wikipedia (https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/0c/Blank_map_Europe_with_borders.png).
Figure 2.
Figure 2.
Estimated proportions (absolute numbers) of different modes of transport used to travel to EHPS conferences between 2019 and 2025. Note: Mode of transport estimated according to delegates’ affiliations and distances to conference venues.
Figure 3.
Figure 3.
CO2eq emissions saving potentials by format and (hypothetical) EHPS conference location.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

    1. Attari, S. Z., Krantz, D. H., & Weber, E. U. (2016). Statements about climate researchers’ carbon footprints affect their credibility and the impact of their advice. Climatic Change, 138(1–2), 325–338. 10.1007/s10584-016-1713-2 - DOI
    1. Atmosfair . (n.d.). Atmosfair: Climate protection with Atmosfair. Retrieved December 28, 2024, from https://www.atmosfair.de/de/
    1. Barron, A. R., Parker, B. J., Sayre, S. S., Weber, S. S., & Weisbord, D. J. (2020). Carbon pricing approaches for climate decisions in U.S. higher education: Proxy carbon prices for deep decarbonization. Elementa: Science of the Anthropocene, 8, 42. 10.1525/elementa.443 - DOI
    1. Bousema, T., Selvaraj, P., Djimde, A. A., Yakar, D., Hagedorn, B., Pratt, A., Barret, D., Whitfield, K., & Cohen, J. M. (2020). Reducing the carbon footprint of academic conferences: The example of the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene. The American Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene, 103(5), 1758. 10.4269/ajtmh.20-1013 - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Cavallin Toscani, A., Atasu, A., Van Wassenhove, L. N., & Vinelli, A. (2023). Life cycle assessment of in-person, virtual, and hybrid academic conferences: New evidence and perspectives. Journal of Industrial Ecology, 27(6), 1461–1475. 10.1111/jiec.13430 - DOI

LinkOut - more resources