Rebekkah Smith-Aldrich

Can we, should we, focus on the core value of sustainability when so many of our professional core values are under attack? While some of our patrons are under attack? As we see the repeated attempts to dismantle the Institute of Museum and Library Services?

Libraries offer a key to action now and hope for the future.

We have now passed the point of no return: We have not acted fast enough to slow the increasing frequency and severity of the impacts of the climate emergency in our lifetime. Even if we were to do everything “right,” climate scientists predict we have at least 30 more years of increasingly dire impacts from climate change. We now find ourselves facing this reality with an incoming administration that has already declared plans to roll back environmental protections that would have helped us do things “right” for future generations. So, what now?

This year’s crop of libraries demonstrates a continued commitment to the well-being of library workers and patrons through biophilic design, a tried-and-true construct to connect people with nature in hopes of improving human health.

The American Library Association and the Sustainable Libraries Initiative have announced the new National Climate Action Strategy for Libraries and created an implementation guide to help libraries incorporate climate action locally into strategic and facility plans.

UPDATE: The ALA-SLI National Climate Action Strategy Working Group will hold an open forum to introduce a draft Climate Action Strategy for Libraries to ALA members, and to solicit feedback from the field, on Thursday, March 14. All library workers and trustees are invited.

The American Library Association and the Sustainable Libraries Initiative have teamed up to create a National Climate Action Strategy for Libraries to be released later this year. Both organizations have been working to raise awareness in the profession for the need to act with urgency to create communities of practice that can help library workers understand the issue and that can provide the practical approaches to manage the predicted impacts and systemic nature of climate change.

Public and academic libraries should be leaders in moving away from fossil fuels, prioritizing investments in net-zero energy construction, renewable energy, and electric vehicles. This requires commitment from leadership in facility and budget planning. Library administration and governing boards of trustees need to step up to prioritize greenhouse gas emission reduction in their strategic and operational planning.

The New Canaan Library, CT, is leading the way to address human rights in the building product supply chain.

On Earth Day 2022, Suffolk County, NY, Executive Steven Bellone announced a $12 million investment in electric vehicle charging stations. He chose the Lindenhurst Memorial Library—the second library in the country to be certified under the Sustainable Libraries Initiative’s Sustainable Library Certification Program—as the location for the press conference.