Improving our work environment

We expanded the Management Team with younger members of the four science departments and NMF so that we now have a somewhat larger MT, but one that is more diverse and a much better reflection of the population of NIOZ and their views. We appointed new heads of department for MMB, Laura Villanueva and for NMF, Aarnoud van de Burgt. And, after long preparation we finally launched the NIOZ PhD policy and established a NIOZ PhD Oversight Committee. Main areas where we can still improve are: putting more emphasis on skills such as teamwork, other ways of presenting our work, achieving a better work-private balance or finding other ways to regenerate our energy and creativity.

Climate initiatives

In 2022, the Royal Netherlands Academy for Arts and Sciences (KNAW) and the Dutch Research Council (NWO) called for the establishment of a new Climate Initiative. The main purpose of which would not be to do the best possible climate science, but the best possible science to speed up transitions such as the energy and food transition.The Climate Initiative was formally agreed upon and started late 2022. Also, after several years of negotiations, agreement was reached between the six founding organisations, including NIOZ, to set up the Delta Climate Centre (DCC) in Zeeland in 2023. The DCC reflects a similar strategy as the Climate Initiative and involves close collaboration with mbo (secondary vocational education), hbo (universities of applied science) and businesses and societal stakeholders. Our department of Estuarine and Delta Systems at Yerseke is playing a major role in the Center with food and Building with Nature studies. For NIOZ it implies diversification in the way we approach science at the benefit of increasing visibility of our role in society.

Grappling with issues of our time

We daily experience the impacts of the climate and biodiversity crisis in our work and lives, but NIOZ has also taken some hits resulting from the war in Ukraine. This occurs as uncertainty and anxiety at staff level, cancelled fieldwork and impacts on the energy price. We are still very much dependent on fossil fuel in our daily operations, both for our ships and in our own energy use and supply. Scientists and lab staff have started to look at how we can reduce our energy use, for instance by restraining temperatures of our freezers. We have asked assessments of our energy use and heating and are looking at plans how to reduce our dependence on gas in the future. Our aim is to operate at carbon neutrality in 2030. Closely related to this, and one of the more difficult issues we are facing, is how to deal with collaborations on ecological research by major fossil fuel companies establishing wind parks on the North Sea. In principle, this is work aimed at producing green or blue energy with ecological benefits such as increasing or restoring biodiversity and stimulating the energy transition. However, we do not wish to participate in “greenwashing”. To decide how far we want to go in these collaborations, we have started an open discussion on these issues within NIOZ to refine and define our position. At the same time, and partly also to prepare for the 6-yearly evaluation of the institute, we are refining our strategy. This will involve establishing the two broad overarching themes of climate and biodiversity more coherently in our work, management structure and outreach. The new strategy will be more comprehensive and involves new aspects of learning and development and diversity and inclusion. 2022 was an important year for NIOZ, it prepared us well for an even more exciting 2023.