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The French National Research Institute for Sustainable Development (IRD) is a multidisciplinary academic organisation working in partnership with countries in the Mediterranean and intertropical zone. Through sustainability science, IRD is committed to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals. Because of its missions, the IRD has a particular footprint linked to the activities of its agents (2100 employees in 2020) and partners, who travel between France and the rest of the world.The COVID19 health crisis has forced changes in work habits. This study aims to analyze the impact of these changes on carbon emissions. All business trips of IRD employees and partners in the period 2017-2022 were collected in an anonymized database (aboout 67,000 entries), which describes trips, mode of transportation, reasons for travel, and traveler status.The annual number of trips dropped sharply during the health crisis, from an average of 14,000/year in 2017-2019 to less than 6,000 in 2022 (-60%). Associated carbon emissions dropped by 70%. Starting in 2021, the number of trips increased to about 90% of pre-covid levels in 2022. However, while the share of air travel in total travel has decreased slightly in 2022 compared to 2017-2019, the share of car travel has increased sharply over the past three years, at the expense of train travel, which remains less used than before COVID. On a finer scale, the share of each mode of transport (and therefore the associated footprint) differs markedly according to the regions in which the research teams work, depending on the type of activity and the modes of transport available (e.g. rail travel mainly in Europe, field campaigns mainly by car).The analysis highlights that the few trips authorized in 2020 and 2021 were primarily for overseas field activities or mobilities, to and from France. These activities, which cannot be replaced by videoconferencing and which constitute the core of IRD's activity, have been prioritized. The widespread use of videoconferencing has reduced the need for travel, especially for meetings and conferences. This is likely accompanied by an increase in virtual meetings, the associated footprint of which is not assessed here.Traveling less, using videoconferencing when possible, or pooling several objectives for a single trip are trends that seem to emerge from our analysis. It is interesting to note that they are consistent with the actions proposed by research teams engaged in footprint reduction strategies, as highlighted for example by the serious game "Ma Terre en 180'" or the national survey of the Labo1point5 group.Our analysis, with only one year without travel restrictions (2022), must be consolidated over a longer period (at least 3 years) to assess the sustainability of practice changes and their impact on IRD's carbon footprint. These results will serve as guidelines to define the necessary actions to reduce the environmental footprint of IRD research activities.

Independence in energy production is a key aspect of development in West African countries, which are facing fast population growth and climate change. Sustainable development is based on the availability of renewable energy sources, which are tightly tied to climate variability and change. In the context of current and projected climate change, development plans need reliable assessment of future availability of renewable resources.In this study, the change in the availability of photovoltaic (PV) and wind energy in West Africa in the next decades is assessed. Specifically, the time of emergence (TOE) of climate change in PV and wind potential is estimated in 29 CMIP5 climate projections.The ensemble robustly simulates a shift into a warmer climate in West Africa, which already occurred, and projects a decrease in solar radiation at the surface to occur by the 70s. The reduction in solar radiation is associated with a projected increase in the monsoonal precipitation in the 21st century. It results a likely change into climate conditions less favourable for PV energy production by the 40s. On the other hand, the projected change in the monsoonal dynamics will drive the increase in low level winds over the coast, which in turn will result in a robustly simulated shift into climate conditions favourable to wind power production by mid-century. Results show that climate model projections are skilful at providing usable information for adaptation measures to be taken in the energy sector.