This document summarizes the open access policies and initiatives at Imperial College London. It discusses the UK's transition to open access as recommended by the Finch Report, including policies from major funders like RCUK and Wellcome Trust. Imperial College London has established funds and processes to support authors in making their work openly accessible in compliance with these policies. However, challenges remain around transparency of publishing costs and the sustainability of "hybrid" open access models where publishers charge for open access publication as well as subscriptions.

1. “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly”
Open Access in the UK
Open Access Tage 2014, 9th September 2014
Dr Torsten Reimer (@torstenreimer)
Open Access Project Manager, Imperial College London

2. Outline
1. Introduction
2. UK Journey to Open Access
3. OA at Imperial College London
4. Towards Transparency in Publishing Costs
5. Conclusion

3. The Imperial College OA REF Challenge:
~£100m – ~100% OA

4. Imperial College London – key facts
• Seven London campuses
• Four Faculties: Engineering,
Medicine, Natural Sciences and
Business School
• Ranked 3rd in Europe / 10th in
world (THE World University
Ranking)
• Net income (2013): £822m, incl. £330m research grants and contracts
• ~14,000 students, ~6,600 staff, incl. ~3,500 academic & research staff
• Staff publish ~10,000 scholarly articles per year
http://www.imperial.ac.uk/

5. OA at Imperial, early 2012
• Wellcome Trust funds to pay for
article processing charges (APC)
administered since 2005.
• Newly established OA fund
(£150,000) for staff who don’t
have access to other funds.
• The College repository Spiral,
established in 2008, holds
theses and papers published
by Imperial staff.
• A new Open Access mandate
requires copies of all peer-reviewed
publications to be
deposited in Spiral.

6. Outline
1. Introduction
2. UK Journey to Open Access
3. OA at Imperial College London
4. Towards Transparency in Publishing Costs
5. Conclusion

7. Wellcome Trust OA Policy
WT early adopter, drives OA policy
development.
Policy requires peer-reviewed
papers to be available through
Europe PMC.
Funds for CC BY publications
available through the institution.
Current sector compliance 66%,
WT introducing sanctions.
Imperial, fund management
described as “exemplary”, no
sanctions.
To include other charities for
Charity OA fund.

8. 2012 – Finch Report and Shift to Gold OA
• Driver: boost UK’s digital
economy and create more value.
• In June 2012 the UK government
accepts report of the “Working
Group on Expanding Access to
Published Research
Findings” (aka Finch Group).
• Recommends to make publicly
funded research outputs
available as OA, with a
preference for Gold.
• Controversial, some criticise
publisher influence.
www.researchinfonet.org/publish/finch/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/policyexchange/8410110541/ CC BY

9. RCUK Policy on Open Access
• Policy replaces earlier
approach (2005) to pay for
OA from project budgets.
• Effective from April 2013.
• All RCUK-funded papers to
be OA within 5 years.
• 75% gold, 25% green OA
• Gold: CC BY; green 6-12(24)
month embargo periods.
• RCUK allocates annual OA
budget to universities.
• Responsibility to support and
enforce lies with university.
http://www.rcuk.ac.uk/research/
openaccess/policy/

11. Post-2014 REF Policy as Game Changer for Open Access
“The core of this policy is as follows: to be eligible for submission to the
post-2014 REF, outputs must have been deposited in an institutional
or subject repository on acceptance for publication, and made
open-access within a specified time period. This requirement
applies to journal articles and conference proceedings only […]. Only
articles and proceedings accepted for publication after 1 April 2016 will
need to fulfil these requirements, but we would strongly urge
institutions to implement the policy now.”
http://www.hefce.ac.uk/pubs/year/2014/cl072014/#d.en.86764
⇒ Challenge: move (as close as possible) to 100% OA (closed deposits
allowed as exceptions) through green route, on acceptance.
⇒ No extra funding available, yet significant increase in OA support costs.
⇒ However, gives universities the chance to get control of their outputs
again and to significantly boost OA.

12. Outline
1. Introduction
2. UK Journey to Open Access
3. OA at Imperial College London
4. Towards Transparency in Publishing Costs
5. Conclusion

13. The Imperial Open Access Project*
Open Access Project
(OAP) group
OA Executive, via
Project Manager
OA Implementation
Group
Library
Team Leader:
Education and
Research Support
OA Fund Manager
OA Support Assistant
Education and
Research Support
Assistant
Team Leader:
Systems and
Innovation Support
Services
Not formally in the
project
Liaison Librarians Acquisitions and
Metadata
Senior Library
Assistant Metadata
Senior Library
Assistant Metadata
Finance & Facilities
Manager
ICT
Programme Manager
Analysts and
Developers
Research and
Academic Support
Team Leader
Research Office
(Project Manager)
Research Systems
and Information
Manager
Research Operations
and Assurance
Manager
College Headquarters
Research Officer
Strategic Research
Manager
OAP members:
• Chair: Dean of Faculty of Natural Sciences
• College Secretary
• Director of the Graduate School
• Director of Library Services
• Director of the Research Office
• Representatives of the faculties
• Senior Planning Officer
• Project Manager
* only three staff in the project work 100% on OA.

14. Project Priorities
1. Phase (2013-14)
• Improve OA systems support
• Make processes more efficient and scalable
• Increase support capacity
• Improve user-facing online presence
2. Phase (2014-15)
• Focus on communication and outreach
• Prepare for REF OA support
• Continue to deliver efficiencies
3. Phase (2015-16)
• Implement REF OA support
• Continue work on communications and efficiencies
4. Phase (2016-)
• OA becomes business as usual

15. Imperial Open Access Options
• College Preference for Green
• Green OA through Symplectic
Elements and Spiral (repository)
• Options for Gold OA (2014-15):
• RCUK fund: £1,35m
• Wellcome Trust (soon:
Charity Open Access)
fund: scales up as
required
• Imperial fund: £650,000
• Project funding available
• Journal does not charge
an APC
• Uptake of Gold much higher
than Green

17. Author action RCUK*
compliant
Wellcome**
compliant
HEFCE
post-2014 REF
compliant
NIHR
compliant
(APC paid for) Immediate OA in a
journal
ý ý ý ý
(APC paid for) Immediate OA in a
journal with CC BY licence
þ
ý ý ý
(APC paid for) Immediate OA in a
journal with CC BY licence and
publisher deposit to EuropePMC
þ
þ
ý þ***
Deposit, following publication, of
accepted/final version with compliant
embargo
þ ý ý þ
Deposit, following publication, of
accepted/final version with compliant
embargo and deposit to EuropePMC
þ
þ
ý þ
Deposit on acceptance with closed
access/on request with compliant
embargo
ý ý þ ý
Deposit on acceptance with
immediate access
þ ý þ þ
Deposit on acceptance with
immediate access and deposit to
EuropePMC
þ þ þ þ
Compliance tables by Ruth Harrison (r.e.harrison@imperial.ac.uk)

18. Issues Around OA Fund Management
Publishers/journals
• Pricing and OA conditions often difficult to identify for authors
• Journal OA policies still changing
• Journals offer non-compliant licences
• Invoicing per individual article
• Invoices lack relevant information (such as article title, licence)
• Invoices not always sent to correct address
• Articles only published after payment received
• Publishers sometimes claim copyright for CC BY articles or keep them
behind paywalls
• Pages and colour charges add complexity (and increase costs)
Funders
• Lack of harmonisation of funder policies
• Could sometimes be clearer on compliance procedures
Universities
• Standard invoice payment time is 30 days

19. Publisher Agreements/OA Deals
The College Library has concerns about OA prepayment/discount
deals with “legacy” publishers:
• Makes APC market less transparent
• Double dipping not addressed
• Discounts too low
• Funds locked away with publishers
• Some deals offer non-compliant licences
• Deals might add to market concentration
• “Buying compliance” (retrospective OA offerings) not good use of public
money
The College Library is exploring agreements with OA publishers that offer
real benefits such as reduction of admin overheads or discounts that are
seen as value for money.

20. Process Improvements
Fund Management 09/2013 Fund Management 09/2014
3 application forms, supported by 4
spreadsheets
1 application form supported by online
database and fund management tool
No way for authors to save drafts or revisit
past applications
Authors can save drafts and revisit past
application
All information added manually by authors Author data entry significantly reduced, data
feeds from staff directory, grants system etc.
Information exchanged via email and phone Tasks delegated through system
Invoices go to authors Invoices go to the library
On average 8 interactions between author
(too early to say)
and library
30 days invoice payment time Invoices paid within 5-10 working days
Manual reporting through combining
Reporting from single data source
spreadsheets

21. ASK Open Access

22. Work on REF “on acceptance” Workflow
Current process Ideal REF process?
Article published
CRIS detects publication,
collects metadata
Author claims output,
ideally adds manuscript
(Manuscript deposited)
Article accepted
Authors uploads
manuscript with metadata
Metadata made public
Manuscript deposited
(closed with embargo)
Article published
CRIS detects publication,
ideally updates metadata
Author may have to claim
output
Article accepted
Publishers share
manuscript and metadata
Metadata made public,
Manuscript deposited
Article published
CRIS detects publication
and claims automatically
REF process

23. New Approach to Licensing
https://www.flickr.com/photos/rooreynolds/243810133 CC BY NC
Explore new licencing
approaches:
• Give academics control
over their outputs
• Reduce admin overheard
(embargos, checking
publisher policies)
Options for licensing service
include:
• SPARC/Edinburgh
Addendum
• Harvard-style policy
approach

24. Cost of OA - Resourcing
Preliminary (!) data from College OA project:
• Gold OA requires ~3x management effort compared to Green OA per
article
• and about twice the time from academics, in particular hybrid journals
Hypothetical scenarios, assuming 0.5h per deposit and 1.5h per gold
application, for 10K articles per year and an average APC of £1,750:
• 100% REF compliant: 3-4 FTE
• 100% REF + 40% Gold (assuming efficiencies): 6 FTE + £7m APC
• 100% Gold: 10 FTE + £17.5m APC
Scenarios do not factor in cost of academic time and the effort is lower
than current fund/repository management time.

25. Outline
1. Introduction
2. UK Journey to Open Access
3. OA at Imperial College London
4. Towards Transparency in Publishing Costs
5. Conclusion

26. Tim Gowers’s FOI Request
Dear [Head of university library],
I would like to make a request under the
Freedom of Information Act. I am interested to
know what [name of university] currently spends
annually for access to Elsevier journals. I
understand that this is typically split into three
parts, a subscription price for core content, which
is based on historic spend, a content fee for
accessing those journals via ScienceDirect, and
a further fee for accessing unsubscribed titles
from the Freedom Collection, also via
ScienceDirect. I would like to know the total fee,
and how it is split up into those three
components.
Many thanks in advance for any help you can
give me on this.
Yours sincerely,
Timothy Gowers
http://gowers.wordpress.com/2014/04/24/
elsevier-journals-some-facts/
University
Cost
Enrolment
Academic Staff
Birmingham
£764,553
31,070
2355 + 440
Bristol
£808,840
19,220
2090 + 525
Cambridge
£1,161,571
19,945
4205 + 710
Cardiff
£720,533
30,000
2130 + 825
Durham
£461,020
16,570
1250 + 305
Edinburgh
£845,000
31,323
2945 + 540
Exeter
£234,126
18,720
1270 + 290
Glasgow
£686,104
26,395
2000 + 650
Imperial College London
£1,340,213
16,000
3295 + 535
King’s College London
£655,054
26,460
2920 + 1190
Leeds
£847,429
32,510
2470 + 655
Liverpool
£659,796
21,875
1835 + 530
London School of
Economics
£146,117
9,805
755 + 825
Manchester
£1,257,407
40,860
3810 + 745
Newcastle
£974,930
21,055
2010 + 495
Nottingham
£903,076
35,630
2805 + 585
Oxford
£990,775
25,595
5190 + 775
Queen Mary U of London
£454,422
14,860
1495 + 565
Queen’s U Belfast
£584,020
22,990
1375 + 170
Sheffield
£562,277
25,965
2300 + 460
Southampton
£766,616
24,135
2065 + 655
University College London
£1,381,380
25,525
4315 + 1185
Warwick
£631,851
27,440
1535 + 305
York
£400,445
17,405
1205 + 285

27. Wellcome Trust release APC Data, 2012-13
• WT released data on
2012-2013 APC spend:
http://dx.doi.org/10.6084/
m9.figshare.963054
• Data cleaned up and
analysed by the community
(http://bit.ly/1qQHet9); 2129
APC, 94 publishers.
• Michelle Brook’s analysis
highlights massive spend
on hybrid journals:
“In Oct 2012 – Sept 2013, academics spent £3.88 million to publish articles
http://blog.wellcome.ac.uk/2014/03/24/new-data-on-wellcome-trust-grant-spending/
in journals with immediate online access – of which £3.17 million (82 %
of costs, 74 % of papers) was paying for publications that Universities
would then be charged again for.”
http://access.okfn.org/2014/03/24/scale-hybrid-journals-publishing/

28. WT Data highlights Cost and Quality of Service Issues
WT highlights the following issues:
• Content remaining hidden behind pay-walls;
• Content not available in PMC/Europe PMC;
• Missing, incorrect, or contradictory licence;
• CC-BY licensed articles still linked to sites
where readers may be charged.
“In summary we contacted 20 publishers in
relation to 150 articles (approximately 7% of
the total number of articles for which an APC
had been paid).”
“The bigger issue concerns the high cost of
hybrid open access publishing, which we have
found to be nearly twice that of born-digital
fully open access journals.”
http://blog.wellcome.ac.uk/2014/03/28/the-cost-of-open-access-
publishing-a-progress-report/

29. The Issue with Hybrid Journals
Academia pays twice: through subscription and
APC (“double dipping”).
Practically no sign of hybrids “flipping” to Gold or
“offsetting” (IoP and Sage excluded).
Developing an Effective Market for Open Access
Article Processing Charges:
• Average APCs vary from $1,418 (OA
journal) to $2,097 (OA journal, subscription
publisher) and $2,727 (hybrid journal)
• Full OA journal market seen as functioning
• Hybrid market was found to be extremely
dysfunctional
http://www.wellcome.ac.uk/About-us/Policy/Spotlight-issues/
Open-access/Guides/WTP054773.htm

30. Universities release APC Data
http://figshare.com/articles/Imperial_APC_data_2006_2014_/1086122
http://figshare.com/articles/
University_of_Edinburgh_RCUK_Gold_Open_Access_APC_data_2013_1
4_/1146256
http://figshare.com/articles/University_of_Glasgow_APC_data_2013_14_/
1117888
http://figshare.com/articles/Liverpool_APC_data/1083499
http://figshare.com/articles/University_of_Sheffield/1116258
http://figshare.com/articles/
University_of_St_Andrews_APC_data_2013_2014/1150253
http://figshare.com/articles/Sussex_APC_data_2013_14_/1066953
http://figshare.com/articles/Warwick_APC_data/1063704
http://libraryblogs.is.ed.ac.uk/openscholarship/2014/05/01/university-of-edinburgh-
open-access-update-april-2014/

31. RCUK Review of OA
FOI request from Research Fortnight to 84 HEIs
• 27 responded with average compliance of 49%,
but 11 non-compliant
• 84% gold route reported
• HEI who checked found 8% of OA articles not
been made OA by publisher
http://www.researchresearch.com/index.php?
option=com_news&template=rr_2col&view=article&articleId=1344415

32. Example RCUK Response: Edinburgh
https://www.era.lib.ed.ac.uk/bitstream/1842/9386/1/University%20of%20Edinburgh
%20RCUK%20Open%20Access%20Report%202013-14.pdf CC BY 2.5

33. Data from the Imperial College Response to RCUK
Category Numbers
Papers estimated to relate to RCUK projects ~4,000
Sample of papers known to relate to RCUK-projects
1,326
Papers from sample published as Gold OA 709
Papers from sample deposited in Spiral 31
Total Spend from RCUK fund £299,492.12
Average APC paid from RCUK fund £1,837
Spend on hybrid journals £252,683.02
Average hybrid APC £1,974
Average APC for full OA journals £1,337

34. Outline
1. Introduction
2. UK Journey to Open Access
3. OA at Imperial College London
4. Towards Transparency in Publishing Costs
5. Conclusion

35. The Good, the Bad, the Ugly
• Broad understanding of
cost of OA required
• OA publication process
needs to become more
efficient and cheaper
• Hybrid journals!!
• Sustainability of Gold OA:
£163m subscriptions vs
£245m Gold OA for UK
(~140K articles annually)
• HEFCE policy massive
challenge, but also a
chance
https://www.flickr.com/photos/csullens/3532617842 CC BY SA 2.0