The initiative, known as Green DiSC, is the first open access and free certification scheme for institutions aiming to mitigate the environmental impacts of their computational research.
Sustainability goals
Hosted by the University of Edinburgh’s Software Sustainability Institute (SSI) and developed in partnership with the University of Cambridge, Green DiSC provides a roadmap for scientists to better meet their sustainability goals.
Six research groups from across Europe have become the first recipients of a Green DiSC certification, having completed the Bronze criteria.
Environmental impacts
Certification schemes have long helped research laboratories reduce their environmental impacts but up to now there has been no equivalent scheme for the rapidly growing field of computational research.
The need is increasingly urgent in a world where high performance computing, AI and large datasets produce more greenhouse gas emissions per year than the aviation sector, experts say.
Bronze certification
In June 2024, Green DiSC launched its Bronze criteria, the first level of the certification scheme.
Designed to guide anyone working in research across any domain, Bronze lays out the initial steps to embed sustainability into team activities – from their training resources to their hardware, data storage and computing infrastructure.
Successful teams
In this first round, the scheme recognised four research groups for embedding sustainability into their practices, and two support teams for facilitating sustainable research across their organisations.
The successful teams included the Breast Cancer Research Data Science Team, The Institute of Cancer Research’s Scientific Computing Team and the Laboratory of Computational Genomics, University of Pavia, Italy.
The next deadline to apply for certification is the 19 November 2025.