We’re drawing a breath here at the Library, after a busy time taking part in Green Libraries Week (7–13 October).

What took place across the UK?

During a packed week there were over 270 events held in libraries across the UK. They stretched from Orkney’s Public Library, which held a Halloween costume swap to encourage reuse rather than buying new ones, to Falmouth Library in Cornwall, which hosted a range of events covering biodiversity, recycling, energy and the environment.

Green Libraries Week spread across the Irish Channel with events in Northern Ireland and Eire, and to different types of libraries, with university and health trusts taking part as well as lots of local public libraries.

CILIP map showing all the Green Library Week events

Looking for something to read? Take a look at these green reading lists shared by Hampshire and Jersey Libraries.

Want to get informed while you’re on the move? Why not listen to the Green Libraries Week podcast created by CILIPS Scotland?

What took place at the British Library?

During Green Libraries Week we had 11 events, plus blogs and social media. We launched our new sustainability strategy and shared information about our own journey.

On Tuesday our Chief Executive, Sir Roly Keating, chaired a panel event, asking “What is the role of libraries in the face of the climate crisis?”. The panel was made up of Amina Shah, Chief Executive of the National Library of Scotland, Claire Pickering, Library Manager from Wakefield Public Libraries, and Maja Maricevic, who is both our Director of Science and Innovation and also Chair of the Green Libraries Campaign, the sector-wide campaign with the vision of Every library, a green library.

Our Chief Executive, Roly Keating, launching our sustainability strategy at the panel event on the role of libraries in the face of the climate crisis.

Our other events included:

• a sustainable coffee tasting
• a sustainable catering roadshow with our chef Simon and Slow Food UK
• a Green Start-up Stars panel, showcasing four businesses we have helped support who put sustainability at the heart of their business model
• an international webinar on how libraries can collaborate with writers to tell climate stories
• a consultation event with 50 school pupils, to help our Learning team develop a new programme for schools on sustainability and climate change
• sessions for our staff, including a new sustainability induction session, raising awareness.

What is the impact of Green Libraries Week?

Green Libraries Week is all about raising awareness of climate action in really practical ways, while showcasing the very best that libraries have to offer. It shows a whole sector working together to make change.

Being part of Green Libraries Week helps us continue the conversation on climate change with staff and visitors at the Library, and gives us the opportunity to use our voice to amplify the work of others in the sector.

Celebrating our impact, supporters and partners

Every autumn we publish highlights from across the Library that show the reach of our services and the positive impact they have on people and communities – across the country and around the world. It also celebrates the role philanthropy and sponsorship plays in bringing about this change.

To read our report please visit support.bl.uk.

The stories featured this year include:

• our conservation appeal, supported by hundreds of individual donations, which helped us conserve some extraordinary documents. It includes a precious medieval manuscript that annulled Henry VIII’s marriage to Anne of Cleves
• British Library on Tour, which supports local institutions and provides major items from the collection for display nationwide
• our expanding programme of schools, family and cultural work across Leeds, building on our decades-long commitment to Yorkshire.

Many of the stories featured would not have been possible without individual donors, charitable grants and corporate partners. Thank you. You helped strengthen people’s skills, increase knowledge and light the spark of inspiration. We're excited to discover where it will all lead.

Why not join us?

The projects and stories we featured this year are just a snapshot of our wider programmes and services. Every year this includes:

• working with thousands of school children to help develop their skills through moments of wonder and discovery
• major exhibitions and live events that shine a spotlight on fascinating people and stories
• collaborations with libraries and other cultural spaces nationwide, helping to deliver a rich and accessible programme for the communities they serve
• support for business and innovation so that anyone can turn their great ideas into a successful business
• vital conservation work to preserve and protect our precious collection so that it can be enjoyed and inspire even more people, for generations to come.

If you’d like to discover more – or perhaps you’d like to help us achieve even greater reach and impact in 2025 and beyond – then please visit support.bl.uk and get in touch.

How we’re facing the climate crisis

The climate crisis – and its potential effects on our operations and collections – is something that cuts through all the work we do. For over a decade we've been actively working to lessen our environmental footprint and aim to help the libraries sector take a leadership role in promoting sustainability.

We’ve already done a lot to improve the sustainability of our own sites, operations and services, and now we’ve developed our first sustainability and climate change strategy which will help us take concerted action, including working towards net zero carbon.

To mark the launch of our strategy, here’s a whistle-stop sustainability tour of the British Library to guide you through some of the ways we've been lowering our environmental footprint.

1. Using less energy and carbon

Like any organisation, the key for us has been to be lean, be clean, and be green. This means using less electricity and gas, and generating more energy on-site through things like solar panels.

The changes we have made have had a major impact; we’ve reduced our carbon emissions by 68% since we started measuring and reporting them in 2009.

Many of the changes aren’t things you would notice, like:

• energy efficient lighting
• more efficient motors in our heating and humidification equipment
• turning off the heating in our basement stores over the weekend.

When it comes to heating, burning gas causes greenhouse gas emissions which contribute to climate change. That’s why we’ve also secured grant funding to install a lower carbon alternative called a ground source heat pump, which uses free heat from the ground to warm up water. This will soon heat several of the buildings at our storage site in Boston Spa.

We also now have solar panels on the roof of three buildings at Boston Spa. And at St Pancras we’ve commissioned Naked Energy to deliver the UK’s largest solar heat project, which makes hot water from sunshine. The installation comprises 950 solar collectors across our roof. It is expected to reduce the building’s CO2 emissions by 55 tonnes and generate 216 MWh of energy annually – the equivalent of powering and heating a community centre or swimming pool for a year. Next time you wash your hands at St Pancras, remember we’ve got sunshine on tap!

Looking ahead, we’ve got three big transformation projects in London and Yorkshire, all of them with stretching environmental targets. Our newest storage building in Boston Spa is the first ever purely passive automated library storage facility, meaning that it’s not actively heated or cooled.

2. Making our food more sustainable

We’ve built sustainability into our contracts with our caterers, cleaners, printers and designers. You’ll see this in our cafés which offer delicious vegetarian and vegan food, while our chefs have partnered with Slow Food in the UK to save British food varieties from extinction. This year they are focusing on Dorset Blue Vinny cheese, Pink Fir Apple potatoes and Hampshire watercress.

In addition we’re:

• replanning our menus to minimise food waste
• composting our coffee grounds
• using metal and wooden cutlery, not plastic
• offering more recycling facilities.

3. Going green in our shops

Our shop has become a pilot retailer, trialling eco-friendly packaging alternatives for several of our suppliers. When sourcing products for our ranges, we prioritise sustainable options. For example, our range includes LeFrik bags made from recycled water bottles and reusable cups from Circular & Co., crafted from recycled coffee cups.

We also stock sustainable T-shirts from Teemill produced from organic cotton and prints using low-waste digital technology with vegan inks. At the end of any garments’ life, they can be returned to Teemill to be recycled into new T-shirts, ensuring zero waste.

Meanwhile online, we offer carbon-neutral shipping on every order which has helped us reduce shipping emissions by approximately 14 tonnes.

4. Sustainable travel

We’re big on sustainable travel, with the majority of our visitors arriving by public transport. We also provide cycle racks to encourage eco-friendly travel, and we've recently purchased our very first electric car, further cutting down on vehicle emissions.

5. Partnering with libraries

We've collaborated both nationally and internationally with libraries, galleries, museums and research institutions, while remaining deeply embedded in our local communities. As a founding partner of the Green Libraries Campaign and a signatory of the Green Libraries Manifesto, we actively support library authorities across the country by providing resources and participating in collaborative research.

Our Living Knowledge Network is a UK-wide network of public and national libraries, and through it, we’ve kick-started conversations about the role that libraries play in enabling positive climate action in communities.

Explore past talks on sustainability and nature from our partner libraries, all available to watch on-demand. From practical tips on greening your home to learning about the impact of the climate crisis, libraries can inspire you to make positive changes to help address the most urgent environmental issues of our time.

6. Telling stories through culture and events

Our exhibitions allow us to showcase our collection and share important stories. Our Animals exhibition last year, highlighted issues such as ecological damage and extinction, with an opportunity to listen to a reel of tape containing the song of a now-extinct songbird.

We’ve also run webinars, conferences and learning events focusing on different aspects of climate action.

We're making our exhibitions themselves more sustainable, by designing with lower impact materials and reusing where we can, for example using reusable partition walls and acrylic hoods.

7. Making sustainability part of how we work

Perhaps the biggest challenge, still work in progress for us, is making sustainability a natural part of how we work. We’re offering staff Carbon Literacy training to raise awareness and understanding. This year we are making sustainability part of our business case process and procurement policies.

We know there is lots more for us to learn and do but we are determined to play our part.

Want to know more? Read our sustainability strategy (PDF, 5mb).