Galleries and museums are guilty of boosting global warming and paying too much for heating and air conditioning, according to Tate galleries director Sir Nicholas Serota. The influential art expert is leading a backroom campaign to urge fellow art gallery chiefs across the world to drop stringent rules about the temperature and humidity levels inside their buildings.

"There is a strong feeling emerging that new galleries and refurbishment should not have to assume the same established levels for climate and humidity," said Stephen Deuchar, director of the Art Fund and former director of Tate Britain. "But in the last few years there has been much more pressure on galleries around the world to lend precious works they would not have considered lending before, and so they look for reassurance."

International regulations about maintaining the right temperature and "relative humidity" inside an exhibition were laid down in the middle of the last century, driven by fears that artworks would be damaged if their surroundings changed.

As it stands, unless a museum can guarantee a climate of 70 degrees Fahrenheit (21 degrees Celsius) and 50% relative humidity, it is not seen as suitable to borrow great art. The rules were established in London after artworks were moved to avoid the aerial bombardments of the first and second world wars.

Studies of the effects of the storage of the British Museum's collections, which were held in underground rail tunnels during the first world war, were followed by analysis of the minimal damage to works stored in stable slate quarry caves in Wales in the second world war.

But today, alongside improvements in technology, the understanding of how artworks are damaged has deepened. Behind the scenes Serota, along with Mark Jones, former head of the Victoria and Albert Museum, is now calling for a radical rethink. "We need to establish a new dialogue between professionals and empower them to consider fresh options," Serota told an international conference, before setting up a working group and looking into how to make changes at the Tate. "We need to devise imaginative new solutions to resolve the dichotomy between long-term collections care and expensive environmental conditions," he said.

Tensions about the care of great works of art when they travel have always run high. Some of the invaluable paintings on display at the hit Leonardo da Vinci show that opened at the National Gallery have been at the centre of such rows. The loan of the priceless Lady With An Ermine, held by a gallery in Krakow and now on show in London, was in doubt last year, when Polish experts said it was too delicate to be moved.

"When you look at the current Leonardo show, you can see it is the result of some very sophisticated negotiations between curators and conservators," said Deuchar. So far the Tate has proceeded cautiously by making changes in the collection display galleries at Tate Modern and Tate Britain, but it has not rolled them out at its loan exhibition galleries, nor in the rooms where vulnerable works might be displayed.

"Materials which are highly sensitive will always need tight controls. It is hoped that over the next couple of years definitive guidelines and conditions can be reached through co-ordinated research findings from a range of institutions in the UK and internationally," added the Tate.

The National Museum Directors Conference has modified advice in "interim guidelines" in response to Serota's arguments, but they have pointed out that lower temperature limits were set for the comfort of human beings, not just to preserve artworks.

Meanwhile, a gallery in America has taken the bull by the horns. Without discussion, Indianapolis Museum of Art has unilaterally abandoned agreed environmental control levels and lets temperature and humidity fluctuate a little to either side of the global standard [see footnote].

Architects also advocate a return to buildings with "smart" ventilation –the kind put out of business by air conditioning. Yet, as Deuchar points out, there is no way to prevent the effects of time on an artwork entirely. Conservators will ruefully admit that the work they do simply slows down inevitable decay.

• This footnote was appended on 17 November 2011:

The Indianapolis Museum of Art has asked us to make clear that it has expanded the temperature and relative humidity ranges in its permanent collection galleries and storage areas based on studies conducted by the Smithsonian Institution Conservation Analytical Laboratory in 1994. New ranges have been implemented with small monthly seasonal adjustments to achieve efficiencies in energy consumption without adversely affecting the condition of collection objects and loans. The environment, including micro-climate cases, can be set to lenders' specification or programmed to match the permanent galleries. The IMA stresses that its temperature and humidity ranges are more conservative than the Bizot Group and Smithsonian recommendations, and are well within the global standard.