Museums are the invaluable cultural institutions that serve a crucial purpose in our ever-expanding modern world. By their very definition, they’re conservationists, saving artifacts, objects, and knowledge for the future in responsible and ethical ways. And now is the time for the museum of the future, in which the buildings housing these amazing exhibits are as environmentally friendly as their conservation practices. The movement to encourage all museums around the world to pursue green innovations has gained incredible traction in the last several years, and it’s become vitally important that any new construction embody the best in green design principles.

Of course, being green in a museum means more than just eco-friendly construction materials. It has to do with how the space is used, how things like heating and cooling are achieved, how much waste they produce, and how energy efficient the building is. It’s also necessary for the space to serve multiple functions, fulfilling the diverse needs of the community. Certain groups (like the Association of Zoos and Aquariums) also have environmental requirements for accreditation. Finally, a central tenet of being a green museum means having a focus on educating the community about an environmental concern.

Here’s a list of the best sustainable museums around the world, including new museums and those that have undergone renovation. With a diversity of subject matter, these museums appeal to the full range of human imagination as they fulfill the promise of sustainable design.

California Academy of Sciences  (United States)

This landmark scientific institution combines education, outreach, and research in innovative ways that appeal to visitors from around the globe. Their signature green roof provides energy, controls waste water, and serves as a place to nourish various plant specimens. The green roof also reduces their energy requirements by keeping the building cooler. Inside, you’ll find a focus that’s as green as their roof. The indoor rainforest, aquarium, and natural history museum combined offer practically countless exhibits on the natural world, conservation, sustainability, and environmental stewardship. Their service to the public is also a vital one, and they’ve been educating visitors and conducting invaluable research since they opened.

Natural History Museum of Utah (United States)

With a particular emphasis on the natural history of Utah and the surrounding regions, the NHMU is dedicated to preserving artifacts and educating visitors about the relationship between humans and the natural world. Renovated in 2011 to meet new green building standards, this popular regional museum works to minimize their environmental impact while maximizing the cultural impact they can make on their visitors. Their green roof and extensive solar array work to manage water waste and take advantage of the sun to heat and cool the building. Many of their building materials are locally sourced, too!

Jeongok Prehistory Museum (South Korea)

Built on a site of archeological significance in South Korea, the Jeongok Prehistory Museum is dedicated to creating a space that brings the prehistoric past alive for visitors. The structure is built between two elevated points, making it fit seamlessly with the natural environment in striking ways. The soft edges and curvy structure evoke natural flowing water, which, combined with their prehistoric garden, makes the outside just as attractive as the inside. The construction of the exterior is not only beautiful, but it also regulates internal temperature to minimize energy waste.

Salvador Dalí Museum (United States)

Home the most extensive collection of Salvador Dali’s work outside of Europe, this museum is already renowned for its cultural offerings. Designed to evoke the same sense of languid movement and surrealism as the paintings it houses, this museum minimizes energy use and reduces any negative impact on the delicate Florida ecosystem. It even has important environmental features that are unique to its geographic area – it’s built to be hurricane-resistant.

Exploratorium (United States)

This bayside museum in San Francisco is another exemplar of sustainable design. With cooling and heating provided by recycled bay water, they reduce the amount of energy needed to manage building temperatures. They also take advantage of solar panels on the roof to provide energy for the building, so they avoid carbon emissions. As a museum their mission is to instill wonder and curiosity in their visitors, and their exhibits certainly have a focus on the environment and human interaction.

Ningbo History Museum (China)

This stunning, unique museum was built from the ultimate in recycled materials – local used tiles and bamboo cased in cement. Imagined to represent the intersection of mountains and oceans that have influenced this region of China, the Ningbo is both visually evocative and environmentally friendly. The recycled materials not only reduce construction waste, they also represent important facets of local culture as they replicate traditional building materials from generations prior. The artifacts and objects within continue the story of Ningbo, with a variety of exhibits about local culture, history, and heritage.

Grand Rapids Art Museum (United States)

This extensive museum features a well-curated collection of art and artifacts that range from the Renaissance to Modern Art, all in an eco-friendly building. When it was built it won the honor of the world’s first LEED-certified art museum, with green features like water recycling facilities, CO2 reduction technologies, and heat minimizing systems. The museum’s striking visuals also makes it an attractively green building, offering distinctive angles and thoughtful interior design. Their mission to bring together creative spaces for the community also evokes the human side of green initiatives.

Cité de l’Océan et du Surf (France)

With a location on the Basque coast of France, you know this building is bound to be inspiring. Charged with a specific ecological focus, the Cité de l’Océan et du Surf (as its name indicates) features exhibits that explore the important intersections between the built environment and the ocean. Like many of the other museums on this list, this building was designed to evoke its subject mater, with flowing, graceful curves, bright, airy windows, and wide open spaces that call to mind the beautiful wilderness of the ocean. It’s a multi-award-winning building for its innovative and sustainable design, too.

Children’s Discovery Museum (United States)

This Illinois museum was the first LEED-certified children’s museum in the entire country, and was an early pioneer in advancing sustainable design. This modest but engrossing educational museum was built to emphasize the use of recycled materials, green power, and environmentally friendly items like paint and adhesives. Because it’s part of the expansion of a new and updated town center, its leadership in green building has set an important example for the community and for children’s museums across the country.

Museum of Liverpool (United Kingdom)

Another striking design, the Museum of Liverpool is a curated history of the industrial development of this British port and the significant role it has played and continues to play in global development. With such a lofty goal, it’s no wonder that the building itself stretches to new heights in green design. Energy efficiency and the reduction of carbon emissions was the primary concern of the designers, and their CHP system is among the best at generating both electricity and building heat through the same mechanisms.

If you want to see the real America, get out of the city and head for the Great Outdoors.

27 of the country’s 50 states have at least one National Park within their borders, and millions of people, both Americans and otherwise, choose to holiday in National Parks every year.

The first National Park to be created, in 1872, was Yellowstone, so vast that it extends from Wyoming into Montana and Idaho. Other popular US National Parks include Yosemite, with its stunning valley and the iconic El Capitan; Sequoia; Zion; Arches; Big Bend; Joshua Tree and the hot ‘n’ sticky Everglades of Florida. Covering many diverse landscapes, from parched desert to mysterious swamp, snow-capped peaks and glacial lakes to volcanos, the US National Park system provides protected habitats to an astonishing variety of wildlife, including bears, wolves, bison, alligators and bald eagles. These parks make for some of the very best holiday destinations in the USA.

The best way to appreciate the majesty of Yellowstone National Park is with a Ranger Program

National Parks are all about exploring the incredible scenery, whether you’re swimming or kayaking in a lake, hiking, mountain biking or horse riding along a network of trails, or just pausing for breath while fly fishing. But the system only works because it is managed to accommodate all of the ‘stakeholders’ – visitors; industry; tourism organisations; environmentalists and conservationists; government and, of course, the flora and fauna of the parks themselves.

What do US park rangers do?

A big part of successful park management is down to the Ranger service. These men and women perform a variety of essential roles, from helping injured animals to maintaining trails, enforcing regulations to educating the public. As part of this, most if not all US National Parks offer ranger-led programs that visitors can join.

Why join a Ranger-led program in a US National Park?

There are many different types of ranger-led programs in US National Parks, from tours of historic and heritage sites, to guided hikes and talks about wildlife.

Why join one?

• To understand the fascinating ways in which a park functions, from managing the landscape to coping with transport, and learning firsthand the challenges and joys of being a ranger
• To discover how different ecosystems can coexist in harmony, the fragility of the environment, and how park visitors can help protect it
• To learn how to stay safe while wandering around the park with potentially dangerous wild animals in the vicinity, picking up tips such as how to dispose of food properly
• To learn about the plants and animals you seeing all about you – how to identify different tracks, droppings or leaves
• To find out fascinating park history such as how Yellowstone is actually centred over a gigantic supervolcano (ulp!) or why Joshua Trees are so-called
• To get out and about in beautiful natural landscapes accompanied by a professional guide who knows all the best routes
• To entertain and educate your children – they can even become junior rangers for a day
• To admire the breathtaking beauty of US National Parks during different seasons

How to book a Ranger Program in a US National Park

Every park should have its own seasonal schedules available on the individual website, such as this activity schedule for Yellowstone National Park.

Keep in mind that some activities such as Ranger-led hikes can be very popular, especially during peak season, so it’s worth booking in advance.

Some activities may need to be paid for, while others cost nothing but a donation is recommended.

How to holiday in an American National Park

• Dress for the weather and terrain, but always remember that park weather can be extremely changeable. In the morning it could be fresh and sunny, by afternoon it could be snowing
• Always be aware there are wild animals around you. Inexperienced hikers should stay on marked trails and if you do plan to go off them, ensure someone knows your route and when you plan to get back
• Carry water with you at all times, especially in parks such as Joshua Tree, Big Bend, Badlands or Arches where temperatures can be extreme and there’s little shade to be found
• Know when to visit National Parks – some routes may be closed off during winter for instance, while in the summer months some areas can be very crowded or mosquito-ridden
• It’s a cliche but it bears repeating: Take only photographs, leave only footprints
• Camp if you can, for the full park experience
• Coach tours operate in many US National Parks, but if you prefer to make your own way around then consider mountain-biking rather than driving to help with congestion
• Don’t expect to see everything in just one visit – and even if you do, you’ll probably find it impossible not to visit again

We actually stumbled upon Jenny Lake by accident, and it’s scary to think that we nearly missed it, as this stunning body of water in the Grand Tetons National Park was one of the highlights of our road-trip through the USA.

Planning a visit to Jenny Lake, Grand Tetons National Park

Jenny Lake is a glacial lake, around 12,000 years old, and it is breathtakingly beautiful. You can hike around it, sail across it, swim through it and the water is so pure I’d be tempted to drink from it too. We (that is to say myself, my wife and our son) found ourselves a secluded patch of sand close to the main trailhead, shaded by spruce firs and conifers. We would hear other daytrippers and hikers walking past, but saw virtually no-one else the whole day. It was like we had our own personal lake.

Getting to Jenny Lake is a breeze. It’s actually one of the main focal points in Grand Tetons National Park, and therefore well-signposted, and with ample car parking close by from May to October. In peak season though, you need to keep in mind that this is a very popular area and so you want to be arriving early.

You can also camp near Jenny Lake and I really, really wish we’d done that because I can only imagine how good it would feel waking up to views of the lake and Signal Mountain, then taking a refreshing swim before breakfast.

Ranger Programs in Grand Tetons National Park

When you visit a US National Park you can usually join a Ranger Program, though in peak season you’ll probably want to book ahead. On our second day at Jenny Lake we decided that we wanted to understand the area a little better, as well as stretch our legs, and so we dropped by the visitor centre to see what kind of programs they had on offer that day. This also worked for us because our son had seen rangers wandering around when we’d visited other National Parks and he was interested to learn more about what they did.

Outside the visitor centre a ranger was entertaining a small crowd with a display of wolf pelts. He was explaining how the colour of a wolf’s fur can vary depending on where they live, and by the season, as a form of camouflage when stalking prey. Our son was thrilled when he was invited to stroke the various pelts to see how soft they were – he wanted to stroke a real wolf afterwards and we had to explain there might be a few logistical and safety issues preventing that!

We were so lucky that we were visiting just outside peak season, because we didn’t need to reserve a place on any of the Grand Tetons ranger programs. We joined a departing group headed for a short walk along the south shore to Moose Ponds. That was about three miles in duration, and the pace was fine for our five year-old son. It was wonderfully relaxing just to wander along the banks, with the ranger (think his name was Tim?) explaining the flora and fauna of Grand Tetons as we went.

In the afternoon, we joined a talk by another ranger (Liz?) about bear safety. You’ll find both black bears and grizzly bears in Grand Tetons and although the chances are they will stay as far away from people as they can most of the time, if you’re going hiking then you always need to have your wits about you. So we learned the basics of bear safety from Liz, about how talking or singing as you walk lets the bears know you’re coming so they don’t get any nasty surprises, how to deploy bear spray if needed and, worst come to worst, what to do in the event of a bear attack. I happened to look at my son at this point and his eyes were gleaming, as he hung on the ranger’s every word – strange kid.

Why you should try Ranger Programs in US National Parks

As someone with a passion for ecotourism, I’m a huge fan of the Ranger Programs that operate in many American National Parks. If people are going to protect these pristine environments then we need to understand them, and the knowledge that rangers build up through years of exploring trails, monitoring animals and vegetation, is an invaluable resource.

The other reason I think Ranger Programs are so great is as a way of educating and entertaining children. My son was just five when we visited Jenny Lake, but he was absolutely enthralled by the talks we were given, and thoroughly enjoyed the nature walk too. He probably learned more about wolves, bears and glaciers in that one day that he’ll pick up from books or school in the next few years, because it was all right there in front of him. You just can’t beat this kind of hands-on learning. If we’re ever lucky enough to go back to the States, I’ll enroll him in a Junior Ranger Program for a day so he can experience life as a park ranger – he’d love it.