Establishing more sustainable habits that both fit one's context and have a high positive impact is not always a simple process. It becomes even more complex when trying to turn such habits into lasting ones. Our PSLifestyle project is working with people in 8 European pilot countries to gather insights on what actions fit into the local context and how they can best be integrated into current lifestyles to achieve greater sustainability.

In the second round of PSLifestyle Living Lab workshops, lab participants came together to identify and jointly develop almost 100 actions for sustainable and good living in key areas such as housing, food, mobility and consumption.

In Finland, participants noted that actions such as "start generating your own energy" should be combined with more information on how quickly such investments would pay off. This, they felt, would encourage more people to plan solar installations for their homes, for example.

Portuguese participants strongly supported the idea of second-hand markets and refurbishing of products, but were aware that there is currently a culture of mistrust towards such markets and that more awareness-raising initiatives are needed to promote them.

The suggestions for measures and actions will be included in the PSL tool, alongside participants’ impressions and suggestions on how to improve the features of the PSL tool after testing it as part of this Living Lab round of workshops.

The inclusion of best practice information, such as apps to help find cycling routes and/or live information on public transport discounts, would help to encourage more sustainable mobility behaviour, according to the Italian Living Lab participants.

Adding some more gamification elements such as sharing your plans with others, achievement rewards and/or personalised reminders could be some entertaining user engagement additions according to Turkish, Slovenian and German participants.

The PSL tool will support European people to calculate their carbon footprint, receive personalised actions to reduce it, select and commit to specific actions, and create their plans for a more sustainable life. The PSL tool will be rolled out in 2023 in the 8 pilot countries of the project: Portugal, Finland, Estonia, Germany, Italy, Slovenia, Greece and Turkey.

Are you based in one of these countries and would you like to be involved in the development of the PSL tool? The last two lab meetings in each of these countries will take place in March 2023. At these meetings, you will have the opportunity to share barriers and opportunities to live more sustainably, and work together to develop recommendations for key system actors to make living well within planetary boundaries a reality. Sign up and register here!