Decarbonising conference travel: testing a multi-hub approach

As the global research enterprise grapples with the challenge of a low carbon future, a key challenge is the future of international conferences. An emerging initiative which combines elements of the traditional in-person and virtual conference is a multi-hub approach. Here we report on one of the first real-world trials of a multi-hub approach, the World Climate Research Programme/Stratosphere-troposphere Processes And their Role in Climate (WCRP/SPARC) General Assembly held in Qingdao-Reading-Boulder during the last week of October 2022. Based on travel surveys of participants, we estimate that the multi-hub approach reduced the carbon footprint from travel of between a factor of 2.3 and 4.1 times the footprint when hosting the conference in a single location. This resulted in a saving of at least 288 tCO₂eq and perhaps as much as 683 tCO₂eq, compared to having the conference in one location only. Feedback from participants, collected immediately after the conference, showed that the majority (85%) would again attend another conference in a similar format. There are many ways that the format of the SPARC General Assembly could have been improved, but this proof-of-concept provides an inspiration to other groups to give the multi-hub format a try.