Join us for the annual #flyingless “New Years Eve Eve” party at Spatial Chat (similar to Zoom, but you can move around and chat). Dec 30, 2022 at 4pm eastern (9pm UTC). Invite friends. Bring a beverage. Connect with low-carbon innovators around the world. [Edit Dec 14: corrected hyperlink] 

A new commentary in Lancet Planetary Health this week highlights our #flyingless petition (which you can support here) and encourages research funders to support feasible steps to “substantially and rapidly decarbonise academia.”

Teun Bousema, Leonard Burtscher, Ronald P van Rij, Didier Barret, and Kate Whitfield analyzed selected research activities of the European Research Council (ERC), the European and Developing Countries Clinical Trials Partnership (EDCTP), and other organizations, noting ways that aviation emissions could be reduced while preserving the effectiveness of these important research endeavors.

The authors point out how lessons learned during the pandemic may be carried forward: “Research funders are in a unique position to incentivise and enforce sustainable research practices that are in line with IPCC recommendations. Given the success of virtual meetings during the pandemic, reverting to old practices can only be interpreted as an active decision to ignore international climate action recommendations.”

Join us for a social event on the Gather Town platform Nov 14 at 2pm CET (8am EDT / 10pm JST). Learn about #flyingless projects around the world and have some fun, including Time to ExPlane, the Greener Academia petition initiative, and our own #flyingless petition initiative. Gather Town is a decentralized conversation space in a low-key easy-to-use game-like spatial video setting.