| Publisher |
American Chemical Society |
| Agreement ID | acs2022cdl |
| Has the agreement been disclosed and published? | Yes |
| URL | https://ucsf.app.box.com/ s/2xlys77a9ngeg0d838sfb7r6c81rbj78 |
| Agreement period | 01/01/2022 – 12/31/2025 |
| Consortia / Institution | California Digital Library (University of California), Statewide California Electronic Library Consortium, California State University |
| Country | United States |
| SIZE
Approximate range of annual corresponding author publications |
1500 |
| Comments on size/article output | Combined publication volume across the three collaborating consortia |
| COSTS
How do the costs of the agreement relate to previous subscription-only agreements with the publisher? |
Agreement costs within the range of the previous spending level |
| Comments on cost development | No prescribed cost increase for the library, however, underperformance in key aspects of the agreement relating to author grant participation could result in additional fees to the library (the library may choose not to pay these additional fees and end the OA portion of the agreement. Cost increases could occur from the perspective of all funds coming from the institutions based on the level of author contributions from grant funds. |
| FINANCIAL SHIFT
Transformative agreements vary by their transformative mechanisms, meaning the way in which financing is shifted from the subscription side to open access publishing. What are the characteristics of this agreement to this regard? |
Subscriptions partly converted to OA publishing fees |
| RISK SHARING
How do entitlements for open access publishing correlate to the anticipated article output? Which mechanisms for risk sharing have been agreed in cases of exceeding or not reaching the number of OA publishing entitlements? |
No fixed entitlements: all articles published are eligible. There are thresholds which need to be reached via authors that are able to contribute to publishing fees from grant funds under the multipayer model. If those thresholds are not met then the libraries may need to pay an additional fee to reach those thresholds, while if those thresholds are exceeded then the libraries receive a corresponding credit to their up-front spend the following year. |
| OA COVERAGE
Are all journals relevant to your affiliated authors (in which you expect them to publish) eligible for OA publishing under the agreement? |
Yes |
| Are fully open access journals covered by the agreement? | Yes |
| OA LICENSE | CC-BY preference, exceptions allowed |
| ARTICLE TYPES |
Original research articles Review articles Proceedings |
| ACCESS COSTS
What is the approximate share of access related costs of the overall agreement? |
20%-50% |
| Comments on access costs | Actual percentage of previous subscription payment which is redirected to support OA is dependent on OA publication volume and author grant participation under the multipayer model |
| ACCESS COVERAGE
Are all read relevant journals covered by the agreement? |
Yes |
| PERPETUAL ACCESS RIGHTS | Yes |
| WORKFLOW ASSESSMENT | Too early to assess |
| Comments on workflows | ACS uses CCC RightsLink for payment workflow |
| OVERALL ASSESSMENT AND COMMENTS | The agreement includes three California consortia – The University of California (via CDL), SCELC, and CSU. This agreement is the first California-wide transformative OA agreement, representing an effort to widen the reach of transformative agreements in the US to cover a larger, more diverse group of institutions, and potentially achieve benefits for all participants.
The ACS agreement also pilots a new financial structure which has the potential to redirect subscription funds to support OA publishing in combination with author grant contributions when able, under a single controlled-spend contract with planned growth in response to an increase in open access publishing. Under the agreement, which authors are asked if they have research funds available to pay a discounted publication fee for their OA articles; if they do not have those funds available the article is instead fully covered by the library’s ongoing financial commitment at the same level as the previous subscription. Publication fees paid by authors from their research funds, when they are able, aggregate towards a minimum yearly threshold; if the total is below that threshold then the library must pay the difference (or end the OA portion of the agreement). This model has the potential to create a sustainable, guided transition from the previous subscription model to a more appropriate and inclusive model supporting OA publication by all UC authors. |
| Request contact to the licensee | contact@esac-initiative.org |