Between 8-10 April 2025, several hundred delegates gathered to present and discuss issues around sustainable consumption and lifestyles in Lund, Sweden. As this conference was the final academic event of the EU 1.5° Lifestyles project, the team organised many different types of programmes and prepared several presentations.
These were the following:
- Wishing to find out about other researchers’ work focusing on 1.5° lifestyles, we organised a scientific session “Charting the Course: Exploring strategies and pathways to 1.5° lifestyles amid deep barriers to transformation”. The session was moderated by Kristóf Vadovics from GreenDependent Institute and included five presentations, among them one from Laura Scherer (Leiden University) on “Benefits of 1.5°C lifestyles beyond climate”.
Laura’s presentation can be downloaded from here.
- We organised a curated session “EU 1.5° Lifestyles: Strategies and pathways to overcoming barriers to a transformation of lifestyles” to present the main findings of the project. Following an introduction by Doris Fuchs, the session included the following presentations:
- Stephanie Cap (Leiden University): EU 1.5° Lifestyles: Impactful Lifestyle Options
- Halliki Kreinin (RIFS): What’s Keeping Us? Structural Barriers and Pathways to 1.5° Lifestyles
- Janis Brizga (Green Liberty): Structural Change for Welfare States
- Lena Domröse (adelphi), Jessika Luth Richter (Lund University): Lifestyle Options: Acceptance and Side Effects
- Doris Fuchs (RIFS), Edina Vadovics (GreenDependent): Core Insights on Lifestyle Change and Structural Change in Its Support
The presentations can be downloaded from this link.
The video of the presentations is available here.
- We also wanted to discuss how to put our project findings into practice and take them further in a more interactive setting, so we invited interested participants to a workshop on “Pathways to transformative sustainability: Exploring demand reduction and systemic change for radically sustainable lifestyles”. The workshop was introduced by Halliki Kreinin (RIFS) and then we worked in groups and explored communication strategies, ecosocial policies at various levels as well a show to keep 1.5° lifestyles on the agenda in the current polarised socio-political climate in an international group setting.
You can download the introductory presentation with the discussion questions from here.
- We invited interested conference participants to another interactive session where they could try our highly successful and popular climate puzzle in the session called “The Climate Puzzle – Experiences and ideas for further mainstreaming 1.5°-lifestyles”. This was a unique opportunity as the puzzle was available in 7 languages including English, Finish, German, Hungarian, Latvian, Spanish and Swedish. The session was introduced and moderated by Michael Lettenmeier (D-mat), the “father” of the climate puzzle, with support from all the project teams in order to facilitate working with the puzzle in various languages.
Michael’s presentation can be downloaded from here.
- In addition to full sessions focusing on the EU 1.5° Lifestyles project, members of the project team delivered several presentations in other sessions. Below, you can find a list of these presentations, and by clicking on the title, you can access the presentation slides, where available.
- Adina Dumitru, Luisa Losada, Manuel Peralbo, Pilar Vieiro, Montserrat Duran: Psychological dynamics in the adoption of sustainable lifestyles: the role of motivations, developmental experiences and their relationship to mental health
- Halliki Kreinin, Lea Becker, Josefine Henman, Paula Berendt, Jessika Richter, Matthias Lehner, Doris Fuchs, Oksana Mont, Andrius Plepys, Pia Mamut: Realising Sufficiency Policies: Examining political responsibilities for reducing aviation within the structure-agency nexus
- Michael Lettenmeier: 1.5–Degree Lifestyles - what`s next
- Edina Vadovics: Thinking labs supporting sustainable, 1.5° lifestyles: multiple roles, multiple stakeholders
At the conference, the project team also created a stall for the project where some of the project materials, specifically the Guide to 1.5° Lifestyles and the Climate Puzzle were available in several languages. Those interested could take copies of the Guide with them for further use. Of course, members of the consortium were available to discuss the project and its outcomes.
Summary by Edina Vadovics, GreenDependent Institute
If you speak Swedish - or use a translator tool :) - you may find it interesting to read the following statement highlighting the fact that "Our consumption must be reduced - for the climate" and "The green industrial transition is not enough. To reach the 1,5° target of the Paris agreement, the emissions from consumption must be reduced significantly"). The statement was published prior to the conference in a newspaper and was signed by members of the conference organising team, many of them also part of the EU 1.5° Lifestyles project team:
https://www.aftonbladet.se/debatt/a/LMG2Q9/forskare-var-konsumtion-maste-minska-for-klimatet