Sustainable collecting: the big picture

Blog series Collection care

Author Maureen Pennock

Our Sustainability Strategy (PDF, 4.3MB) has a huge impact on what we do at the British Library. From our places and purposes to our partnerships and people, sustainability has fast become embedded in the life of the Library. A lot of this work is visible from the outside, from the solar panels on our roof in St Pancras to the environmental themes in our exhibitions and the great work we’re all celebrating right now during Green Libraries Week. But there’s plenty goes on behind the scenes too, particularly in terms of our collection. Not just in terms of what we collect, but also in terms of how we manage and care for it, for generations to come.

As a knowledge institution, our collection is at the heart of what we do. As a memory organisation, it’s our duty to ensure it persists over time. And sustainable collecting is all about understanding that bigger picture: how our collecting activities may be affecting climate change, and how we can minimise their impact without compromising on our service quality.

We’ve two big pieces of work underway right now to help develop our approach to sustainable collecting. The first of these ties in nicely with our partnerships and research purposes, collaborating with peers in other national libraries and Universities on a cutting edge sustainability life cycles research project: ReVerDi.

ReVerDi digs into fundamental questions about the impact of ‘real versus digital’ collecting, gathering and analysing data from across the Library to develop evidence and inform our decisions about developing and supporting the collection in the future. Taking a triple bottom line perspective, it explores not just our environmental impact but our economic and societal impacts too. This holistic approach is the only way to really ensure we balance the needs of today with those of our tomorrows, for decades to come.

The external partnerships in ReVerDi are complemented by the second big initiative, our internal Sustainable Collecting Staff Group. This unites colleagues from different parts of the Library, each working with different collections and in different roles, to evolve environmental practices across core Library functions. This ‘ground up’ approach allows us to explore and test newly innovative solutions for more environmentally friendly library workflows, informed by the people who know them best. It’s a really productive space for new ideas to form and flourish, based on our day-to-day work, experiences, and library knowledge. We’re thinking outside of the box on this one and excited to see where it takes us.

If you want to know more about ReVerDi, we’re presenting a paper at the iPRES2025 international digital preservation conference that presents our methodology and early findings: Sustainability in Context - An Evidence-based (Digital) Preservation Lifecycle Investigation.

For updates on our other sustainable collecting activities, watch this space. We’re keen to share our learnings with the sector as we develop.