What measures can you take right now to make your institution more sustainable?
Joined this week by Caitlin Southwick, Founder and Executive Director of Ki Culture, we took a look at common art industry operations and processes from a variety of angles to discuss what you can do now to improve your carbon footprint.
Below are some of the actionable measures that can be started and finished during the second half of 2020. Both to lessen our impact on the environment and, in most cases, save time and cut costs!
Making Our Premises More Sustainable in 2020
Whether it’s an office building, a gallery, or a storage warehouse there are so many things we can do today to become more sustainable!
- Turn off lights and technology. Did you know that the average photocopier, when left plugged in overnight on standby, uses the same amount of energy as making 30 cups of tea? One of the easiest ways to save energy, which is great for the planet and cutting costs, is to turn off lights when not in use and power down your technology every evening and before the weekend.
- Use power strips or timers. Power strips are an easy way to turn off multiple devices in one go. You can even get timers that will automatically switch off the power at your desk or workstation at a specific time each day!
- Meter monitors. Curious about how much energy different appliances consume, especially when they are plugged in but not being used? Meter monitors are a low cost way to measure energy consumption. You might just be surprised what you can turn off to decrease your energy bill.
- Get to know your Facilities Manager. Communication is key to good sustainability practices. Use your Facilities Manager as a resource to discover where you can make more eco-friendly choices! Your Facilities Manager is also the one who implements your organization’s standards for climate control. Make sure they know exactly what those standards are (watch the recording for Caitlin’s incredible true story on this point!).
- Take personal responsibility. There are many ways each and every one of us can lessen our environmental impact without even needing to approach our organization. One important aspect of this is personal technology devices. Try turning your personal computer and phone to ‘dark mode’ in order to save battery life and use less electricity.
Making Art Movement More Sustainable in 2020
Art movement, and especially air freight, is often focused on as the biggest issue in making the art world sustainable. In fact, our buildings are the biggest offenders on the sustainability front. But there are still many things we can do when art travels to make the process better for the planet.
- Art packaging. There are a variety of interesting alternative packaging options available for art movement. Whether you are considering Rokbox, Turtle, or making your own it’s important to consider reusability and reduced weight as key factors to making your packaging more eco-friendly.
- Staff travel. Although we are currently doing much less staff travel due to the pandemic, perhaps it is a good moment to consider whether we can continue traveling less in the future as well. Articheck is currently developing Virtual Courier to help reduce continuous courier trips, which also will make a huge impact on budgets.
Making The Art World More Sustainable Going Forward
What seeds can you plant now to take bigger steps towards sustainability in future?
Step 1: As buildings and how we manage them are the biggest concern for climate change, learning about the BIZOT Green Protocol is a great place to start.
Step 2: For those familiar with the BIZOT Protocol, it is time to implement these relaxed standards for climate control in our institutions.
If you are a gallery ready to take the second step, check out the Gallery Climate Coalition here: https://www.galleryclimatecoalition.org/.
And if you are a museum who would like to run a test of the BIZOT protocol before implementing it in its entirety, the Articheck team would love to help. You can send us a message using this form: https://www.articheck.com/contact/
A special thank you to our guest speaker, Caitlin Southwick, Executive Director of Ki Culture.
