Environmentally responsible human genomic data governance: points for consideration

Human genomic research and genomic medicine are rapidly expanding, bringing significant data storage requirements. With genomics initiatives generating data from increasing numbers of people globally, the potential for further genomic data growth is extensive. Drawing on one current national genomics initiative, Genomics England currently sequences 80,000 patient genomes per year. This data and its related outputs require 100 petabytes of storage space 1 , more than the annual data generated by the world’s largest science instrument, the Large Hadron Collider (~90 petabytes of data per year) 2 .