The prison administrations draw up environmental action plans or roadmaps, often in response to governmental obligations. Sweden, for example, established an environmental management policy for the prison service (Kriminalvårdens policy för miljöledning), as well as an action plan. Some prison administrations devote part of their activity reports to a review of the ecological transition measures adopted during the year and their results. The New Zealand prison administration has a chapter on its carbon footprint, on reduction measures of its emissions and the protection of the natural environment. Also included are various case studies and graphics showing the change in consumption. The English Ministry of Justice does the same and includes tables for the analysis of its progress, in particular relating to greenhouse gas emissions, emissions from flights, water consumption and waste management and recycling.

In March 2023, the Irish prison service published its Climate Action Roadmap. This document, around 20 pages long, identifies how the prison service plans to achieve the targets set in the Irish government’s Climate Action Mandate. The roadmap notes that the government set “ambitious targets” that will be “challenging […] to deliver”, in particular due to the condition of the prison estate, which includes old buildings. The prison administration says that promoting a culture of sustainability within the organisation is central to its strategy. New positions have been created, such as Climate and Sustainability Champion or Energy Performance Officer. Green teams and a Climate Action Committee have also been set up. Each prison has its own green team which creates projects around the facility, for example on biodiversity and the harvesting of rainwater. The chairpersons of the local committees meet regularly in an “Action Forum for the Climate” to share their experiences.

The Dutch prison administration created a team responsible for sustainable development (team Duurzaamheid) in 2022. It has two primary missions: reduce energy consumption and map the consequences of sustainable development targets, in particular those set by the government, for the prison administration.

In Northern Ireland, the energy crisis reinforced the need for the work already begun behind the scenes by several members of the prison administration to reduce energy consumption and develop better methods for managing it. A steering committee proposes guidelines and the adoption of decisions on sustainable development for the entire prison administration. It reviews energy performance, budgets, and the coordination of measures to continue reducing carbon consumption and emissions.

In England and Wales, a Climate Change and Sustainability Unit has existed within the Ministry of Justice for around ten years. The multidisciplinary team is made up of about thirty people and is responsible for the integration of sustainable development in all the departments of the Ministry and its independent bodies. The Ministry of Justice regularly opens positions relating to the ecological transition.

The teams dedicated to sustainable development formulate various strategies to make their voices heard, guide decisions and find resources in contexts where security concerns are often given precedence over environmental measures.

Academic research is a way to convince people. The results of a study conducted by the University of Birmingham on green spaces in England and Wales prisons are often used by the Climate Change and Sustainability Unit in the country. It demonstrates that a 10% increase in green spaces within a prison would reduce cases of aggression between incarcerated people by 6.6%, self-harm incidents by 3.5% and violence towards staff by 3.2%. The unit also conducted research in 2024 on the relationship between high temperatures and outbreaks of violence. In the Netherlands, the sustainability team is planning to work with a university to produce research on the influence of green spaces on the well-being of people in prison.

Despite this wind of change, prison staff still receive little training on the environment and the ecological transition. Yet, a research study carried out in Hawaii (United States) showed that: “A common barrier to implementation of a waste management program is a lack of knowledgeable personnel.”

However, training seems to be more the exception than the rule at present. Although training modules exist, they are primarily directed at senior management and management teams in the prison administrations. In England and Wales, a training course on carbon is offered to functional personnel (sales staff, project implementation, human ressources, etc.). The Scottish prison service provides all staff with online training on climate change and the circular economy to encourage internal discussion on planned measures.

Training centres for prison staff appear to have very few training modules focused on environmental matters and ecological transition. The Swiss Centre of Expertise in the Execution of Penal Sanctions indicates that it does not address the ecological transition during basic training for personnel or during in-service training. It is the same in Sweden: the subject is not included in training programmes and there are no plans to do so in the near future. In France, future directors of prison services benefit from a training programme common to senior level civil servants. One of the six modules deals with incorporating the ecological transition into public policies.

To comply with obligations, particularly at the national level, prison administrations are adopting new methods and procedures for constructing and adapting facilities with a view to reducing their carbon footprints. Many administrations follow the Building Research Establishment Environmental Assessment Method (BREEAM). In Belgium, the Buildings Agency requires BREEAM certification with a minimum level of “Very Good” or “Excellent”, depending on the project. In Northern Ireland, a BREEAM certificate of “Excellent” is required for new constructions. The threshold is set at “Very Good” for renovations, given the inherent limitations of existing buildings.

In Finland, carbon neutrality must be taken into consideration from the early stage of planning for all new infrastructure. The aim is both to build in areas where facilities can be linked to lines of public transport and to favour short distances for trips to and from the prison. The building’s air flow direction and general location must be accounted for in the architectural design. Carbon-neutral or low-carbon materials must be used. The walls and roofs are especially thick in order to limit temperature variations, and geothermal wells and heat pumps are installed. Lastly, renewable energy sources are used in the buildings, in particular solar energy.

In Norway, new buildings, according to Statsbygg¹, are designed to conserve energy. They are built like passive houses and must strive for higher standards than those of the Norwegian building code: insulation at least 30 cm thick; sealed joints; installation of geothermal wells, heat pumps, an energy monitoring system, and LED lights; energy efficient devices; waste management system. Sources of energy must be sustainable, and the use of solar panels must be systematically planned for. New facilities are expected to consume less than 65 kWh/m2 per year and reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 30% (compared to a similar reference building).

In England and Wales, the new facilities are presented as the first to be “net zero”. They are designed to be entirely electric, with the installation of heat pumps, efficient lighting systems and thousands of solar panels. According to the Ministry of Justice, the use of concrete and recycled steel prevents the emission of 40,000 tons of carbon. In Scotland, authorities are taking a similar approach. The new Inverness prison, to be completed in 2026, is also designed to be “net zero”. Modular construction methods are used off-site in an environmentally controlled workshop to pre-assemble the internal wall panels and external walls. This is expected to reduce transportation by truck and the delivery of materials to the site.

Numerous other prison administrations mention the adoption of the following measures: using sustainable materials (in particular more wood); reducing the use of concrete; installing solar panels or even solar farms as well as boreholes, green rooftops and better insulated windows; replacing lighting with LED bulbs; and implementing decarbonisation plans for the vehicle fleet as well as monitoring and control systems for energy and water consumption.

The Northern Ireland prison administration uses, for example, a monitoring and targeting system, which allows it to see energy performance in real time, around the clock, measured via counters. In Norway, Statsbygg recommends dividing the electric meters in the new buildings: heating of rooms (heated floors / radiator), hot ventilation, sanitary hot water, cooling ventilation, lighting, and technical equipment for the building’s operation. This allows for better energy management, as consumption is recorded for each system.

In Pakistan, power cuts are frequent and can last from 10 to 15 hours a day in the province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. This has an impact on information and security systems, as well as on people in prison. In 2024, the UNODC installed solar energy systems in six prisons around the country.

Biodiversity action plans and landscaping plans are increasingly being drawn up. Several prison administrations say they plan to construct their new prisons so that the staff and visitors feel encouraged to use eco-friendly means of transport and active transportation modes. It is no longer uncommon to see electric vehicle charging stations and covered bicycle parking in the facilities. In Finland, trains are a favoured method for the transport of people in prison to court or elsewhere.

In Geneva, Switzerland, the Cantonal Office for the Environment and the Office for Detention, have joined forces to run a circular economy project on the Puplinge-Choulex prison site. On the basis of a preliminary inventory, improvement priorities have been set for energy management, buildings, waste, transport, outdoor spaces, food, etc.

Prison authorities are aware of the scale of the effort required to reduce their carbon footprint. The transition from new buildings to older ones, which are difficult to renovate, is an additional challenge. The Scottish prison service anticipates difficulties: despite “various carbon related refurbishment and development activity cross the prison estate, the age and condition of some of the older sites will continue to present significant challenges in working towards Net Zero emission objectives”.

The prison administration of Northern Ireland, on the other hand, gives priority to improving the sustainability and resilience of its existing prisons. It believes that building new structures will only add to the Ministry’s carbon footprint.

Construction projects are often designed at national level so as to be replicable. Alice Jill Edwards, UN Special Rapporteur on torture, points out that while an infrastructure may work very well in one place, it may be totally unsuitable elsewhere. “Yet quite often [governments] are relying on the same private company to design all their prisons. Expertise needs to be built up and shared in collaboration with leading architectural firms, NGOs and other actors”, she suggests.

The expansion of prison estates puts a considerable limit on the impact of the measures. In England, Belgium and even New Zealand, prison authorities have trouble reducing their carbon footprint, given ongoing construction projects. In Northern Irland, the increased number of people in prison in 2023 resulted in an overall increase in water and electricity consumption despite a decrease in previous years.

Newly constructed prisons claiming to be sustainable are regularly criticised. A notable example is Haren prison in Belgium, which was presented by the prison administration as a new, eco-friendly facility but which is, since the beginning, the subject of a lot of controversy. Authorities are criticised for the destruction of twenty hectares of highly biodiverse arable land. The prison is proving to be particularly resource-hungry: the average cost of gas and electricity combined is 32.7% higher than the average of Belgium prisons. The Buildings Agency explains this rise by the increased use of electrical systems (cell opening, security systems, etc.) and the better living conditions for the people in prison. Yet, other newly built prisons, designed along the same lines, consume much less

To make prisons more sustainable, what could be more natural than greening them and their operations?

For several years now, the English Ministry of Justice has encouraged the reintroduction of gardens to supply prison kitchens. These initiatives are seen as training and labour opportunities for people in prison and a way to combat recidivism. The Ministry’s 2018 sustainable operations strategy notes the importance of offering reintegration opportunities through experience in two particular fields: waste management and the environment. Numerous British organisations offer training in gardening and horticulture in prisons, as a way of improving the health and well-being of people who are incarcerated and to encourage their reintegration.

In Norway, many facilities have green spaces, which are maintained partly by people in prison. This allows them to receive training in landscape gardening , according to Berit Johnsen, head of the research department of the University College of the Norwegian Correctional Service.

In New Zealand, people in prison can obtain professional qualifications in sectors relating to agriculture, horticulture, sylviculture, pig production, etc. They can also get involved in activities of conservation and restoration of natural environments, in particular via a partnership called Good to Grow, conducted in collaboration with the Department of Conservation.

People incarcerated in the United States are also involved in agricultural work. US facilities supply food every day for almost 1.2 million people. Various abuses are denounced: an investigation by the Associated Press brought to light the ways in which certain major corporations use labour from people in prison without declaring it, concealing the origin of the products sold. Incarcerated people are often excluded from protections offered by labour laws, such as compensation for workplace accidents and federal security standards. They receive very little wages, when paid at all. The Prison Agriculture Lab, a collaborative space for inquiry and action in agriculture in the prison system, launched the ArcGIS interactive map. It “presents data from a first ever nationwide study of prison agriculture in the United States and places it within local socioeconomic, demographic, and agricultural contexts “. The critical perspective of agricultural practices analyses the carceral consequences and the conditions of food production, livestock production and vegetable production in prisons.

Food production in prisons does not translate to improved food quality for prisoners, as the food produced is often sold or distributed outside of the prisons, to charities for example. Likewise, the presence of farms and agricultural projects does not necessarily reflect environmental awareness.

Training people in prisons on ecological transition remains extremely rare around the world. A handful of initiatives have nevertheless come into existence. Among them is the Sustainability in Prisons Project (SPP) offered to people in prison in 12 prisons across the Washington State, in the United States, on a large variety of science, sustainability and environmental programmes. Launched in 2023, this partnership between the Evergreen State College and the Washington prison service brings together people in prison, prison personnel, scientists, civil society organisations and students. Some of the courses allow people in prison to obtain university credits. Generally speaking, SPP programmes seem to help develop better relationships between staff and people in prison, and help increase workplace satisfaction among the personnel.

Other projects are flourishing in the field of energy and waste management. On Reunion Island (France), a photovoltaic plant was installed in 2014 within the Port prison. It supplies electricity to more than 4,000 homes and provides training for people in prison in new energy sector trades. In Northern Ireland, recycling activities are organised in each facility, providing work for many of the people in prison while reducing waste. In Peru, the “productive prison” (Cárceles Productivas) policy is to develop entrepreneurship workshops in the country’s prisons, by using recycled material.

In the Netherlands, the prison administration aims to create a recycling station in every facility, following a pilot project conducted in a prison which attained less than 5% of residual waste. Recycling workshops are increasingly common in England and Wales.

In 2022, the Borgo prison in Corsica (France) introduced, a composter that reduces waste by 80 to 90%. The project is part of a training and rehabilitation programme for people in prison: they operate the composter and manage the production of composed, which is then used within the facility or donated to the outside.

Prisons suffer from pollution as much as they contribute to it: this is a vicious cycle identified in several studies conducted notably in Australia and the United States. Facilities are “too often built near (or directly on) abandoned industrial sites, places deemed fit only for dumping toxic materials”. They themselves contribute to making the situation worse, with their considerable environmental footprint.

Some initiatives are supportive of the state’s involvement in matters of climate change. Others voice their opposition against what they call window dressing. They regret that “practices (…), which purportedly aim to reduce environmental impact, can ultimately serve to justify the construction of more prisons, lead to more incarceration, and perpetuate a cycle of ecological injustice.”

Researchers Yvonne Jewkes and Dominique Moran pointed out, in 2015, the role of the “greenwashing of the prison system” : behind the stakes of ecological transition, the greening of the facilities re-legitimises the prison system and the businesses that benefit from it. The reason why prisons pollute so much, they argue, is that the institutions are locked into mass incarceration logics that lead to overcrowding.

The researchers highlighted the flaw in the approaches that focus on rehabilitation activities in relation to nature: they promote a logic of “purification” of individuals and the individualisation of rehabilitation, without looking at the social, economic and material issues that led to the commission of the offence.

There is a need to rethink the future of the criminal justice system in a world in transition. The multiplication of offences linked to activism and the increase in those connected with climatic are likely to further push up the number of people in prison around the world. Mass incarceration phenomena disproportionately affect underprivileged populations who are already being hit hard by the impact of climate change.