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Paper short abstract

Current research ethics and integrity frameworks often neglect environmental and climate ethics implications. The RE4GREEN project fills this gap by engaging 170+ stakeholders in eight Social Labs to explore these issues in R&I and support the transition to a more sustainable research ecosystem.

Paper long abstract

Research and innovation practices themselves have important environmental and climate ethics implications, which current research ethics and integrity frameworks often neglect. The RE4GREEN project aims to respond to this gap through a bottom-up, participatory engagement process.

Between May 2024 and December 2025, eight Social Labs (SLs) engaged over 170 stakeholders across Europe and beyond, representing diverse disciplines and regional perspectives, including contributions from Japan and South Africa. Each SL combined an initial round of interviews with three online and one in-person workshop.

The activities uncovered a wide range of environmental and climate ethics concerns connected to R&I. Ecological impacts, as well as justice and equity issues emerged as the most significant concerns. Resource intensity, technoeconomic constraints, and competing needs and priorities were also considered highly relevant. Issues such as gender dimension, resource use within research practices, and the impact of technologies on animals were seen as less pressing, yet still important especially within specific disciplines or regions.

The SLs examined the EU’s Do No Significant Harm principle, a key supporting instrument integrating sustainability into research funding mechanism. Participants highlighted difficulties to define “significant”, the broad definition of environmental objectives, the unclarity of individual project boundaries, and the principle’s limitations in capturing cumulative, indirect, or long-term harms.

Finally, through a world building exercise, the need for a major societal shift was articulated where sustainability becomes a guiding value for governance, research priorities, and evaluation systems, supported by stronger coordination across actors and more involvement of impacted communities and society at large.