Sustainable clinical trials knowledge hub
Healthcare accounts for 4-5% of global greenhouse gas emissions, and clinical trials are an often overlooked part of this. Every year, trials emit an estimated 100 million tonnes of CO2e, roughly the same as the annual emissions of a country the size of Belgium.
What is the knowledge hub?
The hub promotes adoption and scaling of leading practices for low-carbon clinical trial design and operations by bringing together insights from clinical researchers, clinicians, industry partners, academics and regulators. You'll find practical resources, including implementation cases and guidance, covering the entire clinical trial supply chain. It's here for everyone involved in clinical research.
Sustainable Clinical Trials Community of Practice (CoP)
What it is:
Our collaborative LinkedIn group for amplifying and accelerating action to reduce the environmental impact of clinical trials.
How it can help:
Through the group, you can discover leading practice and innovation, share knowledge, connect with others facing the same challenges, and help remove the barriers to change.
Who it’s for:
Anyone interested in making clinical trials more environmentally sustainable.
Interested in joining?
Request to join our Community of Practice on LinkedIn.
Clinical Trial Carbon Calculator
What it is:
A free-to-use carbon calculator for clinical trials, aligned with our assessment methodology.
How it can help:
The calculator uses an activity-based approach to estimate a trial’s total carbon emissions. It highlights emission hotspots, showing you where the biggest opportunities for reduction lie.
Who it’s for:
Everyone involved in designing, managing and reporting clinical trials, including suppliers, who wants to cut trial emissions quickly and at scale.
Find out more about the Clinical Trial Carbon Calculator.
Upcoming Events
Sustainable clinical trials resource library
Explore our full collection of clinical trial-related materials, including implementation cases and publications.
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The Environmental Sustainability Gap in Clinical Trials: Workforce Attitudes, Barriers, and Emerging Practice from an International Survey
October 2026 This report presents the findings of our BIG Clinical Trials Sustainability Survey. The survey gathered 181 responses from...
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Systematic, contextual, and individual influences drive trialists’ behaviour relating to greener trial design and delivery – A qualitative study
Journal of Clinical Epidemiology | Oct 2026 | To identify the key behavioural determinants that influence how people working in...
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Carbon Calculators for Healthcare
The growing demand for carbon accounting has driven a proliferation of carbon calculators enabling organisations to calculate their overall carbon...
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Carbon footprint of clinical research: a systematic review and quantitative synthesis of estimates, sources of variation and emission hotspots
BMJ | Oct 2026 | Nekouei Shahraki M, Van Bodegraven L, De Haes F, et alCarbon footprint of clinical research:...
Knowledge hub feedback
The hub is a living library of information and we love feedback! Please let us know if there’s a question you would like answered or if you have any resources to share.
