Real Versus Digital (ReVerDi): Sustainability optimization for cultural heritage preservation in national libraries

The ReVerDi project applies the Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment approach to assess these infrastructures from an environmental, social-cultural and economic perspective. It thereby provides the scientific basis required for national libraries and other galleries, libraries, archives and museums (GLAM) institutions to create future-proof infrastructures.

The consortium consists of three research groups and three national libraries from the United Kingdom, the Netherlands and Switzerland.

Country teams consisting of a research group and a library are responsible for project implementation in the respective country, while each research group is responsible for a transnational focus topic (environmental, social-cultural, economic).

The three research groups have complementary backgrounds (natural sciences, engineering, social sciences, humanities) and expertise (digital technologies, LCA, cultural heritage), which provide a strong foundation.

ReVerDi aims at answering the following research questions about environmental factors (focusing on GHG emissions), social-cultural factors (long-term availability and accessibility of knowledge) and economic factors (investment and operating costs) are assessed:

1. What requirements are placed on the archiving and handling of national library collections by legislators and users?
2. How can libraries effectively improve their social and cultural impact to be more inclusive, accessible and sustainable at the same time?
3. How much environmental impact and economic cost does the archiving and handling of physical and digital media collections in libraries cause today and how can both be reduced? ow will the situation change in the future?
4. How can a sustainable and future-proof mix of methods for archiving and handling digital and physical media collections, considering legislative and user requirements as well as inclusiveness and accessibility of cultural heritage be achieved?