SPK to become climate neutral by 2035
News from 10/01/2021
A foundation-wide task force has developed a vision for an SPK that acts sustainably in ecological, social, and economic respects. It has appointed sustainability officers, who will take up their duties on 1 October.
This year it has become abundantly clear – not least due to devastating floods, widespread forest fires, and ever more serious water shortages – that man-made climate change is on the march. In recent years, countless cultural institutions at the national and international levels have introduced measures of their own to mitigate climate change. The management of the Stiftung Preussischer Kulturbesitz (Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation) has recently launched a range of initiatives to evaluate and reduce the Foundation's carbon footprint. A foundation-wide task force has developed a vision for an SPK that acts sustainably in ecological, social, and economic respects. The prime goal of this process is for the SPK to become climate-neutral by 2035.
Beginning on 1 October, there will also be a new position with responsibility for developing and gradually implementing a foundation-wide sustainability strategy in cooperation with the existing initiatives. This position will be occupied by Nina Schallenberg, currently the curator of the Nationalgalerie at the Hamburger Bahnhof – Museum für Gegenwart – Berlin (Museum for Contemporary Art ), and Daniel Naumann of the planning department of the General Directorate of the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin (National Museums in Berlin). Bringing together a wealth of expertise in different professional fields, they will team up to share the position, which in organizational terms reports directly to the Vice President.
As one of the largest scientific and cultural institutions in Germany, the SPK bears great responsibility towards society as a whole. It also has immense potential to mitigate climate change by introducing measures that will either make its own activities more sustainable or exert an influence in many areas at national and international level. The current reform process offers a unique opportunity to implement sustainability horizontally as a policy in all SPK institutions and across hierarchies by means of new collegial governance and participatory structures.