The French Agence nationale pour la gestion des déchets radioactifs (ANDRA) is responsible for identifying, implementing and guaranteeing safe management solutions for radioactive waste, in order to protect present and future generations from the risks inherent in such substances. 

The Autorité de sûreté nucléaire (ASN) is the French Nuclear Authority, which is responsible for the oversight of nuclear safety and radiation protection in order to protect people and the environment.

CERN’s Energy Management Panel (EMP) examines CERN’s energy consumption and identifies measures to improve efficiency Organization-wide and promote energy reuse.

The CERN Environmental Protection Steering Board (CEPS) was established in 2017. Its mandate is to identify environmental areas to be addressed, rank them in order of priority, propose programmes of action and, once the latter have been endorsed by the Enlarged Directorate, follow up their implementation.

The CERN Safety Policy is the Organization’s reference document for all matters relating to health, safety and environmental protection. The policy includes the explicit goal of limiting the impact of the Organization’s activities on the environment.

The Comité tripartite sur l'environnement (CTE) is a tripartite committee comprising representatives of CERN and of the environmental authorities of the Canton of Geneva (Switzerland) and the Prefecture of Ain (France), set up to examine non-radiological environmental matters.

The European Intergovernmental Research Organisation Forum (EIROforum) is a consortium that brings together eight of Europe’s large intergovernmental research organisations to promote and support European research through synergies.

The FCC (Future Circular Collider) Feasibility Study arose from the 2020 update of the European Strategy for Particle Physics. It includes a scientific component and numerous technical considerations, as well as administrative and financial matters and extensive territorial feasibility studies relating to geology, environmental impact, infrastructures and civil engineering.

The Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) is an independent international organisation that helps private and public bodies to understand and communicate their impact by providing a sustainability reporting framework and set of guidelines.

Global warming potential (GWP) is a value that describes the radiative forcing impact of one unit of a given greenhouse gas, relative to one unit of CO2 over a given period of time. The GWP values convert greenhouse gas emissions data for non-CO2 gases into units of CO2 equivalent.

The High-Luminosity LHC (HL-LHC) is an upgrade of the LHC designed to achieve instantaneous luminosities a factor of five larger than the LHC’s nominal value, thereby enabling the experiments to enlarge their data sample by one order of magnitude compared with the LHC baseline programme.

The Occupational Health and Safety and Environmental Protection (HSE) unit is responsible for all matters relating to health and safety and environmental protection at CERN.

The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is the world’s largest and most powerful particle accelerator. It first started up on 10 September 2008 and consists of a 27-kilometre ring of superconducting magnets with a number of accelerating structures to boost the energy of the particles along the way.

LHC points
CERN SITES. The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is the world’s largest particle accelerator. Its 27-km ring is buried 100 metres below the French and Swiss countryside, with access points known as “sites” located around the ring.

Materiality is a term used in sustainability reporting. In this report, material topics are those that deal with the environmental impact of CERN on internal and external stakeholders.

The Office fédéral de la santé publique (FOPH for English acronym) is the Swiss Federal Office for Public Health. It is responsible for public health in Switzerland, including matters of radiation protection.

The Ordonnance sur les mouvements des déchets (OMoD) regulates the transport of special waste and other waste subject to control within Switzerland, the transboundary movement of all types of waste, and the transport of special waste between third countries, when a Swiss company organises or participates in the operation.

The Ordonnance sur la radioprotection (ORaP) is the Swiss regulation on the protection of human beings and the environment against ionising radiation.

The Prevention of Pollution by Liquid Chemical Agents (PoLiChem) working group was established to update and consolidate the inventory of the quantities and types of liquid chemical agents present on the CERN sites, including performing risk assessments and establishing risk severity scores.

Science Gateway will be an education and outreach facility next to the Globe of Science and Innovation. It will be a beacon to encourage young people to aim for careers in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM).

Scope 1 refers to direct greenhouse gas emissions, i.e. emissions from sources that are owned or controlled by an organisation.

Scope 2 refers to energy indirect greenhouse gas emissions, i.e. emissions that result from the generation of acquired and consumed electricity, steam, heat, or cooling.

Scope 3 refers to other indirect greenhouse gas emissions, i.e. emissions that occur outside the organisation, both upstream and downstream, that are not included in the energy indirect greenhouse gases (scope 2).

The United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) address the global challenges the world is facing, including those related to poverty, inequality, climate change, environmental degradation, peace and justice.

The Super Proton Synchrotron (SPS) is the second-largest machine in CERN’s accelerator complex and provides beams for experiments at CERN, as well as preparing beams for the LHC.

The tripartite agreement on radiation protection and radiation safety is an agreement between CERN, the Swiss Federal Office for Public Health (FOPH) and the French Nuclear Authority (ASN). Under the agreement, a framework has been established for the discussion of topics related to radiation protection, specifically the protection of CERN personnel and the public from ionising radiation, both on site and in the vicinity of CERN’s facilities.

The Wigner Research Centre for Physics is a research centre near Budapest, Hungary. Until 2020, computing capacity at Wigner was remotely managed from CERN, substantially extending the capabilities of the Tier 0 activities of the Worldwide LHC Computing Grid (WLCG).

The Worldwide LHC Computing Grid (WLCG) is the data-storage and analysis infrastructure built and maintained for the entire high-energy physics community that uses the LHC.

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Questions regarding this report may be addressed to environment.report@cern.ch.

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