The 2022 Challenge engaged nearly 1,200 labs and saved over 9.5 million kWh—highlighting the real-world climate impact of lab sustainability practices.
This year’s challenge demonstrated how simple lab actions can scale to massive environmental savings. Here’s what our global community accomplished together.
Total energy saved across all participating labs.
Greenhouse gas emissions avoided.
Participated globally across all sectors.
Organizations represented in the 2022 Challenge.
Participating cold storage units.
Electricity use equivalent to the energy saved.
Award categories for the Freezer Challenge
While every participating lab is a winner for helping save an incredible amount of energy, we are proud to honor the below labs for their significant contribution to the Freezer Challenge.
kwh/day savings is not the only determinant of whether a lab or organization receives a top award or honorable mention. Many actions in the Freezer Challenge do not equate to energy savings – normalized points is the first factor looked at, then kwh/day saved.
Note: Winning Streak Awards are given to previous year’s winners that exceeded their energy savings from last year.
Biotech/pharmaceutical sector winners
- Top Organization Award: Amgen
- Large Size Lab Award: Amgen Massachusetts Pivotal Biologics Lab, USA
- Medium Size Lab Award: Raw Materials Lab, Bio-Rad (Kidlington Branch), Oxfordshire, UK
- Small Size Lab Award: Process Biochemistry Lab in Biogen at Cambridge, USA
- Biorepository/Core Services/Shared Cold Storage Facility Award: South San Francisco Biobank, Astrazeneca, USA
Academic sector winners
- Top Organization Award: University of Virginia, USA
- Large Size Lab Award: Traidl-Hoffmann Lab, Institute of Environmental Medicine, University of Augsburg, Germany
- Medium Size Lab Award: Bristol Bioresource Laboratories, University of Bristol, UK
- Small Size Lab Award: Manne Lab, University of Alabama at Birmingham, USA
- Biorepository/Core Services/Shared Cold Storage Facility Award: The Indiana CTSI Specimen Storage Facility, the Indiana University School of Medicine, USA
Government sector winners
- Top Government Organization Award: Central Veterinary Laboratory in Harare, Zimbabwe
- Medium Size Lab Award: The Ostrander Laboratory of the National Human Genome Research Institute at the National Institutes of Health, USA
Hospital/clinical/other winners
- Top Organization Award: Boston Children’s Hospital, USA
- Large Size Lab Award: Microbiology Lab, St. Vincent’s Hospital, Dublin, Ireland
- Medium Size Lab Award: NSW Biochemical Genetics Service, Sydney Children’s Hospital Network, Australia
- Small Size Lab Award: Richard Wood Lab, MD Anderson Cancer Center, USA
- Biorepository/Core Services/Shared Cold Storage Facility Award: Nationwide Children’s Abigail Wexner Research Institute Biopathology Center, USA
Honorable mentions (organizations)
- MD Anderson Cancer Center, USA
- University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, USA
- The Institute of Cancer Research, UK
- National Institutes of Health, USA
Honorable mentions (labs)
- Sample Technologies Lab, QIAGEN, Germany
Congratulations once again to all the winner’s of this year’s competition, and to the thousands of labs and scientists that participated this year.
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