Managing Carbon Footprints in Research‐Intensive Organizations: Lessons From Las Campanas Observatory

ABSTRACT Research‐intensive organizations, including astronomical observatories, face increasing pressure to align their operations with global sustainability goals. This study presents a practical framework for assessing and managing carbon footprints using life cycle assessment (LCA) and the Must‐have, Should‐have, Could‐have, and Will‐not‐have (MoSCoW) prioritization method. Applying this to Las Campanas Observatory (LCO) in Chile, we identify and quantify the significant sources of greenhouse gas emissions between 2019 and 2022. Our findings show that Scope 3 emissions account for the majority of LCO's carbon footprint, primarily due to international travel (49%) and daily commuting (17%). These results emphasize the importance of governing emissions beyond direct operational control. Through benchmarking against 17 organizations with recognized sustainability strategies, we derive actionable recommendations tailored to research‐focused institutions. This study contributes to sustainability governance in research institutions by integrating hybrid LCA with the MoSCoW prioritization method and strategic benchmarking. This combined framework advances existing approaches by not only quantifying emissions, including underexplored Scope 3 categories, but also by providing a structured, theoretically informed tool for decision‐making under resource and capacity constraints. Empirically, the paper expands carbon governance research to remote, research‐intensive observatories, offering transferable lessons for knowledge‐producing institutions seeking to align operations with global climate goals.