Modules

Re4Green Annex to the ALLEA European Code of Conduct for Research Integrity

Instructions for:ParticipantTrainer

Related Initiative

Goal

The main goal is to help researchers understand how research integrity principles: reliability, honesty, respect, and accountability and apply to environmental and climate considerations.

By the end of the module, learners should be able to:

Recognise the environmental and social impacts of research.
Understand environmental and climate responsibility as part of research integrity.
Connect the ECoC and DNSH principle to environmental and climate considerations.
Apply environmental and climate considerations across the research lifecycle.
Identify responsible and potentially problematic research practices from an environmental and climate perspective.
Balance environmental responsibility with research freedom and independence.

Duration (hours)

1

For whom is this important?

Research Ethics Committee MemberResearch Funding OrganizationResearch Supervisor / MentorResearchers

Steps

1Introduction

2Embedding environmental responsibility in research integrity

3Further Reading

What is this about?

This module is about integrating environmental and climate responsibility into research integrity. It explains how researchers can apply established research integrity principles: reliability, honesty, respect, and accountability, while also considering the environmental and social impacts of research.

1

Introduction

Research is essential for addressing global challenges such as climate change, biodiversity loss, pollution, and environmental degradation, but research itself can also have environmental and social impacts. Therefore, research integrity should include responsibility for recognising, minimising, and transparently addressing these impacts.

The European Code of Conduct for Research Integrity (ECoC) is based on four principles: reliability, honesty, respect, and accountability. While the ECoC already recognises respect for ecosystems and the environment, growing environmental and climate concerns require more practical guidance on how these principles should be applied.

The EU’s Do No Significant Harm (DNSH) principle provides an important benchmark for avoiding environmental harm, but its scope is mainly focused on economic and investment activities. More specific guidance is therefore needed for research.

2

Embedding environmental responsibility in research integrity

Principles

The RE4GREEN Annex does not introduce new research integrity principles. Instead, it applies the four existing ECoC principles: Reliability, Honesty, Respect, and Accountability to environmental and climate considerations.

Reliability: Research should be scientifically rigorous and should accurately consider environmental impacts, assumptions, uncertainties, and real-world feasibility.
Honesty: Environmental benefits, harms, limitations, and uncertainties should be communicated transparently. Researchers should avoid exaggeration or misleading sustainability claims.
Respect: Respect extends beyond people to ecosystems, cultural heritage, the environment, and non-human life. Particular attention should be given to Indigenous peoples, local communities, future generations, and relevant local and traditional knowledge.
Accountability: Researchers are responsible for considering the environmental consequences of their research, using resources responsibly, complying with environmental obligations, being transparent, and introducing mitigation measures where harm is identified.

Good Research Practices

Environmental and climate responsibility should be incorporated throughout the research process, rather than considered only at the end.

Research institutions should create an environment that supports responsible resource use and environmentally responsible research. Training, supervision, and mentoring should help researchers recognise environmental and climate implications and know when specialist expertise is needed.

During research design and procedures, researchers should consider potential environmental impacts, including those associated with energy use, materials, travel, fieldwork, and laboratory practices, and consider lower-impact alternatives where possible. Environmental risks should be identified, avoided, minimised, or mitigated.

Environmental and climate data should be properly documented, securely stored, and managed to support reproducibility. Open-data practices should respect sensitive ecological information and community-held knowledge.

In collaborative research, responsibilities for environmental impacts should be clearly agreed upon. When Indigenous peoples or local communities are involved, researchers should consider consent, data sovereignty, the right to decline participation, and the fair distribution of environmental benefits and burdens.

In publication and dissemination, environmental and sustainability claims should be evidence-based and transparent about assumptions, limitations, and uncertainties. Contributions from communities, environmental data sources, and field sites should be appropriately acknowledged, and incorrect environmental claims should be corrected.

Reviewers and editors should also evaluate the quality of environmental evidence and be alert to conflicts of interest and the inappropriate disclosure of sensitive environmental information.

Violations of Research Integrity

Traditional research misconduct fabrication, falsification, and plagiarism (FFP) can have additional consequences when research influences environmental or climate-related decisions.

The Annex therefore identifies environmentally relevant unacceptable practices, including greenwashing, exaggerating environmental benefits, selectively reporting favourable results, suppressing environmental risks or negative findings, allowing funders or sponsors to compromise research independence, misusing community-generated or environmental data, and disclosing sensitive ecological information that could cause harm.

RE4GREEN ANNEX TO THE ALLEA EUROPEAN CODE OF CONDUCT FOR RESEARCH INTEGRITY

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Other information