Introduction:
The Irish ScienceDirect agreement 2023-2025 was negotiated by representatives of Irish universities, technological universities, institutes of technology and other higher education institutions, with assistance from IReL, THEA and the IUA. It succeeds the 2020-2022 transformative agreement, giving participating institutions continued read-access to the Elsevier’s Freedom Collection of journals and allowing affiliated corresponding authors to publish articles open access in 2,500 journals without publication charges. This new agreement improves on the 2020-2022 deal by including a 20% increase in the number of articles the consortium can publish open access.
All Irish authors publishing with Elsevier will continue to be able to post copies of their articles to their institutions’ open access institutional repositories.
Agreement period: 1 Jan 2023 – 31 Dec 2025
Participating members:
- Atlantic Technological University
- Dublin City University
- Dún Laoghaire Institute of Art, Design And Technology
- Dundalk Institute of Technology
- Maynooth University
- Mary Immaculate College
- Munster Technological university
- Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland
- South East Technological University
- Technological University Dublin
- Technological University of the Shannon: Midlands Midwest
- Trinity College Dublin
- University College Cork
- University College Dublin
- University of Galway
- University of Limerick
Publisher page: https://www.elsevier.com/open-access/agreements/ireland
OA quota per year: a minimum of 1,170 articles per calendar year, with the allocation split between the participating institutions. As of 6 November 2023, most institutions’ OA allocations are used up for 2023. As these allocations are not managed by IReL, authors should check with their institution’s library for more information.
Journals eligible for OA publishing:
Most Elsevier fully-OA journals and most Elsevier hybrid journals. For further information, search the Elsevier Journal Finder for this agreement, which provides details of the journals included. Also see the list of eligible journals in all IReL and Irish HEI open access agreements: http://bit.ly/irelOAjournals
Eligible authors:
- The corresponding author must be affiliated with a participating institution. The corresponding author must ensure their correct affiliation details are known to the publisher.
- Requests to publish OA under the agreement are subject to approval by participating members.
Eligible article types: all article types
OA publishing license: if accepted for publication in the journals included in the Agreement, the corresponding author shall be offered the option of publishing open access under a Creative Commons license (CC BY or CC BY NC ND). Authors shall retain copyright to the journal article.
Further information:
- Details of the agreement on ESAC registry of transformative agreements
- The full text of the agreement
- Announcement of the agreement, March 2023
FAQ:
Can I continue to post a copy of my article in an Elsevier journal using the Green Open Access model?
Yes, subject to the journal’s Green policy. For further information, see Elsevier’s Sharing and hosting policy FAQ or the Sherpa-Romeo database of publishers’ Green policies.
How long does the agreement last?
1 Jan 2023 – 31 Dec 2025. Only articles accepted for publication on or between these dates will be eligible to take advantage of no-fee OA publishing. For example: articles submitted in 2022 and accepted in 2023 will be eligible. Similarly, an article submitted in December 2025 but not accepted until 2026 will not be eligible.
What makes this a good deal?
The cost is within the normal cost inflation expected for a ScienceDirect read-only subscription agreement without an open access element: therefore it is effectively cost-neutral for the libraries involved. It also means that the agreement is cost-saving for the HEI sector as a whole, as some researchers who had been paying Article Processing Charges to have their articles published open access may not now need to pay.
Is there a limit on the number of OA articles per year?
Yes, each institution is allocated a specific OA allowance each year. Contact your institution’s library for further information. The allowance will cover a minimum of 1,170 articles per year.
Why are some journals excluded?
Journals like The Lancet and Cell Press titles are not included in the deal because the publishing costs of these journals are significantly higher than the per article publishing costs of other journals.
When I submit to an Elsevier journal, how do I take advantage of this agreement to publish open access?
When a paper has been submitted on or after 1 January 2023, and is subsequently accepted, the corresponding author will be be sent an e-mail with a link to an author workflow tool. The corresponding author is presented with publishing options. If the author selects Gold OA as part of the agreement, the article will be published OA, pending approval from their institution.
What type of open access license should I select?
We recommend that you check if your funding body requires a specific license. The agreement provides for the following open access licenses:
- CC-BY: Allows users to copy, to create extracts, abstracts and new works from the Article, to alter and revise the Article, and to make commercial use of the Article (including reuse and/or resale of the Article by commercial entities), provided the user gives appropriate credit (with a link to the formal publication through the relevant DOI), provides a link to the license, indicates if changes were made and the licensor is not represented as endorsing the use made of the work.
- CC-BY-NC-ND: Allows users to copy and distribute the Article, provided this is not done for commercial purpose s, and further does not permit distribution of the Article if it is changed or edited in any way, and provided the user gives appropriate credit (with a link to the formal publication through the relevant DOI), provides a link to the license, and that the licensor is not represented as endorsing the use made of the work.
What happens if my institution’s OA allowance is used up?
Open access publishing is offered on a first-come, first-served basis. If the allowance is use up during each year of the agreement, Elsevier’s editorial systems will instead offer corresponding authors the options of:
- open access via an article processing charge invoiced to the author, or
- traditional no-charge subscription-based publishing, where the article will be available only to subscribing readers and institutions.
Authors can continue to make their articles available using the Green open access model, subject to the journal’s policy – see above.
May I apply the open access provisions of the deal to past or recent publications?
No. The open access provisions are only available for papers accepted for publication between January 1, 2023 and 31 December 2025.