We are Germany's cultural memory and have been collecting the national cultural heritage of text, image and sound publications since 1913. Our unique mandate is to catalogue this immense, ever-growing repository of knowledge and preserve it for posterity.
We also believe it is our social responsibility to protect our planet and safeguard its future. Our Earth has limited resources. Sustainable thinking and action and an environmentally conscious lifestyle can help us use them more mindfully. And time is of the essence. In 2019, a state of climate emergency was declared in Leipzig, the city in which the German National Library was founded.

Libraries as institutions also have great potential when it comes to supporting the sustainable development goals defined by the United Nations (Agenda 2030).

Our contribution

As Germany's central archival library, we fulfil a sustainable mandate in the truest sense. Moreover, the German National Library is increasingly orienting its goals, methods and services on greater sustainability – both environmental, economic and social.

Environmental

We constantly review and optimise our energy supplies and use of resources to ensure that natural resources are used mindfully with an eye to the protection of global ecosystems.
The switch to LED lighting has reduced our energy consumption by 27% over the last five years. The installation of a photovoltaic system at the Frankfurt am Main location will enable us to generate 50 % of the electricity needed during the warm summer months ourselves. Parts of our building in Leipzig are already supplied with renewable energy from a geothermal plant. We intend to implement the European environmental management system EMAS to help us save resources intelligently.

Analogue and digital collections both need space. Plans for stack and server extensions like those currently being realised in Leipzig are designed with sustainability in mind right from the outset so that construction and renovation work can be carried out in an energy-efficient manner..

Economic

Sustainable management enables us to align our tasks with the protection of the environment. Our business activities are geared towards conserving natural resources and using renewable energies whenever possible.
Our collection of digital works is increasing exponentially, and we also digitise our collections retrospectively. With regard to collection preservation, we focus on preventive measures and opt for sustainable storage solutions (e.g. acid-free archival boxes). We are gradually making the switch to electronic file management in order to reduce paper consumption in our administrative departments.

By opening up our collections and educating users, we provide access to reusable information while encouraging cooperative collecting and the development of joint archival infrastructures.

We reuse available equipment for events and exhibitions and work with regional partners in the service sector whenever possible. We are also expanding our virtual services.

With regard to cooperation across locations, we are increasingly relying on virtual communication formats and reducing the use of public transport for business trips to a minimum.

Social

Creating a stable society that allows all members to participate and guarantees employment and human rights for generations to come means working together to meet social needs and overcome challenges.
As central archival library, the German National Library collects works without judging their content. It stands for diversity, transparency, democratic values and social participation, and sees itself as a library for the public as a whole.

We offer flexible and mobile work time models, are committed to helping employees reconcile work and family life, and create safe working conditions. Internal social and conflict counselling promotes mutual cooperation. We offer a range of individual and specialised training measures to facilitate lifelong learning. We also play our part in revolutionising transport by offering our employees a subsidised Jobticket.

Our goals

Sustainability is much more than just a task; it is a mindset which we have adopted and are committed to. It is constantly on our minds as we deal with all the tasks, topics and projects within the German National Library's remit.

The German National Library has therefore added sustainability to the values incorporated into the strategic planning that forms the basis of our day-to-day plans and activities.

The German National Library's worlds of work are being overhauled step by step with an eye to sustainability. A sustainability working group was formed in the autumn of 2023 with this goal in view. It comprises members of all the German National Library's domains and departments and develops proposals designed to foster the German National Library's development as a sustainable institution. A comprehensive concept is currently being developed.

Do you have any questions or suggestions? If so, please feel free to contact us: nachhaltigkeit@dnb.de