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Many people have heard of a carbon footprint. Maybe they have taken one of the many online tools to calculate their own or have seen it calculated for a product they were buying.  Maybe some are sceptical because they have read that oil companies were behind its development to place the responsibility for reducing emissions on individuals. But what is a carbon footprint really, how do we go about calculating it, and how can it be useful in…

On September 15th 2022, three students from the University of Münster co-organised a “Student Thinking Lab” dealing with 1.5° lifestyles, as part of their studies. The workshop was aimed at students from different higher educational facilities and fields of study in the area around Münster. It focused on sharing information about sustainable lifestyles and discussing structural barriers to sustainable lifestyles (and how to overcome them)…

We as a society in Latvia are poorly concerned about climate (European Commission, May – June 2022), and also, we often are reluctant to participate in discussions and connect climate change reduction initiatives to our lifestyles. This is the reason why we – Green Liberty team – prefer to use gamification as a technique to gain increased attention of society to urgent global issues, including climate lifestyles. The gaming elements that we use…

The CO2 emissions of flying have been a hot topic for several years now, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic when the amount of flight travel decreased momentarily (UN News, 2021). In the meantime, discussions on alternative ways of travelling have surfaced. But how convenient is it to travel by train in Europe? During spring 2022, when it was time for our first in-person meeting in Germany with the EU 1.5° Lifestyles partners, my colleague…

The latest UNEP Emissions Gap Report (2021) and IPCC sixth assessment report (2022) show that it is possible to limit the global temperature rise to 2.2°C if the net-zero emissions pledges are fully implemented and, thus, they call for immediate action both from the production and consumption-side. The  projections show that policy-makers, businesses and society need to take effective measures to mitigate greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and…

One of the heart pieces of the EU 1.5° Lifestyles project are the so-called Citizen Thinking Labs. Does this mean we lock up citizens into laboratories and experiment with their brains? No, of course not. We had a virtual coffee with our two project partners Lena Domröse and Maren Tornow from adelphi, who conceptualize the labs, to learn more about what a Citizen Thinking Lab looks like.

In the EU 1.5° Lifestyles project, we are working and interacting with different stakeholders to learn more about 1.5° lifestyles as well as the factors that enable and obstruct efforts to these ways of living. As part of this learning process, we are interviewing citizens who are pioneers of 1.5° lifestyles in different European countries. We will share their inspiring stories in our blog. First, we share the story of a Hungarian family.

The IPCC report underlines the need to stay within 1.5° of warming.

We sat down with Dan O’Neill to discuss the topic of transformative change, (limits to) economic growth, and how 1.5° lifestyles can be “a good life for all”. Below we have summarised the key takeaways from our discussion.

One of the key features of the 1.5° lifestyles approach is going beyond the assumption that consumers are the only ones responsible for the climate impacts of consumption. Our lives and behaviors are shaped and structured by factors such as income, policy, infrastructure, media and societal values. All of these variables shape the environment in which we consume and determine which choices are available for individuals living in different…