Solutions for less waste

Browse our greener equipment and instruments

Reduce your lab's footprint with product choices that generate less waste and use fewer resources.

When minimizing waste in your lab, every little bit helps—whether it’s reducing or eliminating plastic or developing opportunities to safely reuse materials.

Part of designing our products is examining how we source and use our raw materials. Our scientists and engineers continually look for new opportunities to better align our purchases to our production, either by avoiding excess materials or buying bulk quantities to minimize packaging waste and the environmental impact of frequent shipments.

Less waste criteria

Our products that generate less waste meet one or more of the following criteria:

Reduces the need to use other materials (e.g., plastic consumables) by at least 25%
Generates at least 25% less waste than preceding or comparable product
Is made with at least 25% less material by mass, or replaces two or more products, resulting in fewer materials
Contains a prescribed minimum percentage of recycled content
Incorporates recycled content
Includes content from renewable resources
Has a longer shelf life or useful life compared to preceding or comparable product
Reduces the need for water and is more water efficient by at least 20% compared to preceding or comparable product

View complete list of Greener by design products

Browse selected greener lab plasticware and consumable products

Samco UrineGUARD Specimen Containers

Thermo Scientific Samco 24-hour UrineGUARD Specimen Containers (2,500 mL, 3,000 mL, 3,500 mL) help alleviate mess and exposure during urine collection and sampling. The containers have a custom spout for pouring and an accurate scale for proper measurement without needing a graduated cylinder.

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Sustainability impact: SamcoUrineGUARD Specimen Containers are made from 31% post-industrial recycled plastic material. All manufacturing container waste from the product series is collected, processed into recycled resin pellets at a recycling facility and returned for use within the same manufacturing process. By including recycled plastic resin, we reduce the virgin petroleum-based feedstock needed to manufacture them.

Qubit Protein BR Assay Kit

The Invitrogen Qubit Protein BR Assay Kit is a fluorometric assay that combines accuracy, compatibility and ease of use to enable simpler and faster determination of protein concentration. With a streamlined workflow that requires fewer steps and standard setups, the Qubit kit protocol is easy to perform and requires only a 10-minute incubation at room temperature

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Sustainability impact: Compared to traditional protein quantitation assay methods such as the Bradford assay, the Qubit Protein BR Assay Kit generates 85% less plastic waste.

ART pipette tip reload towers and inserts

The ART Reload Towers and Inserts are designed with laboratory efficiency and sustainability in mind. Not only do they take up less valuable space on the shelf, but they also generate less plastic waste.

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Sustainability impact: ART Reload Towers for 200 uL tips provide ten racks of tips using on 870 g of material compared to 1,590 g for ten hinged racks of the same style representing a 45% reduction in plastic waste. The ART Reload Towers for 20 uL and 1,000 uL tips generate 53% and 54% less waste, respectively.*

ART Reload Inserts also create less waste-23% for the 2000 uL size, 25% for the 20 uL size, and 18% for the 1,000 uL size when compared to hinged racks.*

Nunc Edge 2.0 96-well plates

Nunc Edge 2.0 96-Well Plates are designed to minimize evaporation of cell culture medium from the plate and reduce risks of the "edge effect" that may occur on a standard 96-well plate. They contain less source material than other plates on the market, with a single plate (with lid) weighing only 59 g, compared to 62–65 g for other suppliers' plates.

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Sustainability impact: Researchers use various strategies to counteract the 'edge effect' of standard plates, such as taping plates, preincubation, and avoidance of outer wells. However, these workaround strategies are inefficient in material use, labor, or both. In contrast, by requiring fewer materials and enabling effective use of all 96 wells, Nunc Edge 2.0 plates maximize time, budget, and resources. Overall, they produce up to 9% less plastic waste and 37.5% more useful capacity.

Browse selected greener, lower waste equipment and instruments

Attune NxT flow Cytometer

The Attune NxT Flow Cytometer provides high sensitiviity and thoroughput without sacrificing performance accuracy. Acoustic focusing technology allows for more control over the sample, enabling increated flow rates without destroying cellular populations or losing detection sensitivity. Running a flow cytometry experiment becomes easier and greener by limiting the amount of fluid used.

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Sustainability impact: Low sheath fluid usage-generates only about 1-2 L of biological waste per run versus the 20 L generated by conventional cytometers, a reduction of 90-95%.*

DynaSpin Single-Use Centrifuge

The Thermo Scientific DynaSpin Single-Use Centrifuge is used for cell harvest unit operation in bioproduction workflows to support recombinant protein, monoclonal antibody and bioengineered vaccine production applications. It adds efficiency and increases filter capacity, a scalable solution that replaces the first depth filtration stage with a centrifugation step and reduces the number of filters needed.

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Sustainability impact: Compared to a traditional depth filtration workflow, the DynaSpin Single-Use Centrifuge generates up to 69% less filter waste and up to 74% less liquid waste. The resulting material and equipment reduction can shrink the overall manufacturing suite footprint by up to 32% and the warehouse space footprint by up to 78%.

QuantStudio 7 Pro Dx Real-Time PCR System

The Applied Biosystems QuantStudio 7 Pro Dx Real-Time PCR System was designed to be the qPCR platform for the future. Combining modern hardware and software in a compact footprint, this instrument enables customers in molecular diagnostics to achieve maximum efficiency, smarter productivity and higher accuracy from their workflow. Its footprint is 52% smaller than the prior model, promoting efficient use of lab space and better freight density.

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Sustainability impact: With the QuantStudio 7 Pro Dx system, our engineers focused on building the instrument’s capabilities into a smaller form factor. As a result, it uses 46% less material than the prior model, generates 81% less waste during calibration and uses up to 26% less energy. Its smaller footprint also improves freight density to help reduce emissions during transit.

Countess reusable slide

Countess 3 Automated Cell Counters provide highly accurate and precise brightfield, and fluorescence cell counts even for challenging cell sample types.

The Countess Reusable Slide is a green, cost-efficient alternative to disposable slides. Even if your lab uses only a few slides per day, you can reduce cost and generate less waste per year with the reusable slide.

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Sustainability insights

Reducing packaging waste with the Supply Center

Thermo Fisher Scientific's Supply Center consolidates ordering and procurement processes by providing instant access to green lab products and consumables. Through your Supply Center, you can choose from more than 1,400 greener product alternatives—simply look for the green leaf symbol.

Learn about our Supply Center program

Get the facts. Find details on all green product claims for each of our greener product lines.

We take sustainable product design seriously and believe all greener product claims should be transparently documented. For each of our greener product lines, we provide a green fact sheet that explains and substantiates the greener product claim(s) related to that product line.

Browse complete list of greener products