from National Museum Directors' Conference (UK) -
NMDC adopts guidelines to reduce museums’ carbon footprint
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With the greater awareness of how the implementation of museum preservation measures can often lead to very inefficient use of energy - and contributing to global environmental problems - museums in the UK have taken the first necessary step in acknowledging the issue and committing to implementing sensible guidelines to balance the needs of preservation and limited natural resources.

The 4 pertinent principles of the guidelines are:

- Environmental standards should become more intelligent and better tailored to clearly identified needs. Blanket conditions should no longer apply. Instead conditions should be determined by the requirements of individual objects or groups of objects and the climate in the part of the world in which the museum is located;

- Care of collections should be achieved in a way that does not assume air-conditioning or any other current solutions. Passive methods, simple technology that is easy to maintain, and lower energy solutions should be considered;

- Natural and sustainable environmental controls should be explored and exploited fully;

- When designing and constructing new buildings or renovating old ones, architects and engineers should be guided significantly to reduce the building’s carbon footprint as a primary objective.

See also:
Full document of NMDC guiding principles for reducing museums’ carbon footprint
Paper presented by Sir Nicholas Serota, Director, Tate, May 2008.
Paper by Mark Jones, Director, V&A

Link via IIC News.
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