GREENER HEALTHCARE CARBON LEDGER · EST. 2009
CARBON LEDGER · EST. 2009

What your department can actually cut.

Not another campaign. A ledger of actions — each with its evidence grade, its CO₂e saving, and the study it comes from. Built for clinicians with a waiting list, not a communications budget.

An operating theatre between cases: surgical lamps in standby glow, anaesthesia machine beside a draped table
THE HIGHEST-YIELD ROOM IN THE LEDGER · OT, GRADE A
4.4%
of global net emissions come from healthcare — in every country
HCWH GLOBAL REPORT
2.0Gt
CO₂e a year — the fifth-largest 'country' if healthcare were one
HCWH 2019
100
countries committed to low-carbon health systems (ATACH)
WHO OCT 2025
4.4%
of England's footprint is the NHS — first national net-zero plan, 2040/45
NHS ENGLAND
THE LEDGER · SAMPLE

Five entries, the way the full ledger reads.

Printed on white because it's meant to be printed — pinned to a theatre noticeboard, taken to a governance meeting.

IDActionEvidenceCO₂e / yrDept
ACT-011Switch desflurane → sevoflurane across elective listsStrong RCT / dept data188 ttheatres
ACT-014Plug-and-test manifold leaks; fix N₂O piping at sourceStrong RCT / dept datavariestheatres
ACT-021Dialysate flow reduction where clinically appropriateCohort / modelling12 tkidney care
ACT-031Dry-powder inhaler switch for eligible asthma patientsStrong RCT / dept data146 tinhalers
ACT-041Single use of plasma-derived waste streams auditEstimatedest.primary care
Evidence grades — A: peer-reviewed department-level measurement or RCT; B: cohort study or published modelling; C: credible estimate awaiting local audit. CO₂e figures are per average English trust, from the sources on each department page.
THE NUMBERS

Two charts that explain the whole ledger.

Every action on this site sits under these two distributions. Sources on each chart.

HOW IT WORKS

Audit-grade, not advice-column.

01

Pick an action

Filter your department's ledger by evidence grade and effort. Every entry names the study behind the number.

02

Measure your baseline

Gas logs, inhaler prescribing data, dialysate volumes. Each action page lists the exact dataset to pull.

03

Log the delta

Report the change in the same units the ledger uses — so your number adds to a public, comparable record.

RECENT EVIDENCE

What the literature measured this year.

Continuously scanned from Europe PMC. Full timeline with grades on the evidence page.

A clinical education library corner: reading lamp over an open medical journal
2026

Environmental sustainability in anesthesia and operating room practice

BMC Anesthesiology 2026 · DOI 10.1186/s12871-026-03858-0

2026

Green nephrology: mitigating the environmental burden of dialysis

Frontiers in Medicine 2026 · DOI 10.3389/fmed.2026.1793544

2025

Effects of departmental green anaesthesia interventions on carbon emissions

British Journal of Anaesthesia 2025 · DOI 10.1016/j.bja.2025.03.038

2026

CO₂e emissions and cost impact of inhaler switching programmes

Current Medical Research and Opinion 2026 · DOI 10.1080/03007995.2026.2628120

COMMON QUESTIONS

Asked by clinical teams.

Where do the CO₂e numbers come from?
From peer-reviewed studies, NHS England publications and department-level audits — each ledger entry links its source. Where a figure is modelled rather than measured, the evidence grade says so.

SOURCES: EUROPE PMC · NHS ENGLAND

Can I use the ledger in a QI project?
Yes — that's what it's for. Each action page gives you the baseline dataset, the intervention and the reporting unit, so results slot into SusQI-style frameworks.

SUSQI FRAMEWORK · CSH

Is this the old Centre for Sustainable Healthcare site?
No. This domain hosted CSH's work from 2009 to 2016 — including the 10:10 checklists that inspired this ledger. CSH lives at sustainablehealthcare.org.uk. This is an independent project that continues the domain's tradition in ledger form.

DOMAIN HISTORY · WAYBACK MACHINE

METHOD

Three rules, no exceptions.

RULE 01

No number without a source

Every CO₂e figure and every grade links to a named study, guideline or NHS publication. No entry ships on vibes.

RULE 02

Grades travel with claims

An action is only as strong as its evidence. Grade A through C is printed beside every claim, on every page.

RULE 03

Clinical care comes first

Nothing here compromises patient safety. Where an action needs clinical judgement, the entry says so explicitly.