Oecotrophologie · Facility Management (OEF)
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Actual initiatives to cultivate more sustainable modes of consumption have not materialized and there are indications that an implementation gap is becoming manifest.
Research must begin to systemically integrate initiatives to promote improvements in quality of life, to distinguish long-term structural consumption trends, and to identify the social mechanisms and cultural aspects of consumer behavior and household decision making.
Improving residential energy efficiency is widely recognized as one of the best strategies for reducing energy demand, combating climate change and increasing security of energy supply. However, progress has been slow to date due to a number of market and behavioural barriers that have not been adequately addressed by energy efficiency policies and programmes.
This study is based on updated findings of the European Futures for Energy Efficiency Project that responds to the EU Horizon 2020 Work Programme 2014-15 theme 'Secure, clean and efficient energy'. This article draws on five case studies from selected European countries - Finland, Italy, Hungary, Spain, and the UK - and evaluates recent energy efficiency developments in terms of indicators, private initiatives, and policy measures in the residential sector. Our analysis shows that the UK government has implemented a better range of policies, coupled with initiatives from the private sector, aimed at improving energy efficiency. However, its existing conditions appear to be more problematic than the other countries. On the other hand, the lack of effective and targeted policies in Finland resulted in increased energy consumption, while in Hungary, Spain and Italy some interesting initiatives, especially in terms of financial and fiscal incentives, have been found.
It is increasingly obvious that for safeguarding environmental sustainability, eco‐efficiency measures will need to be complemented by sufficiency, in particular by strong sustainable consumption. The Theory of Planned Behaviour TPB and Social Practice Theory SPT offer different views on consumer behaviour, and on ways to change it. This paper briefly describes the challenges, discusses the applicability of both theories and their meaningfulness for policy recommendations.
We suggest an approach combining results of both bodies of theory, complemented by ideas from political economy, to substantiate the Prism of Sustainable Consumption we introduce as a heuristic sufficiency policy tool. It is useful to identify affordability criteria for change in each dimension, as the basis for deriving suggestions for effective policy interventions. We conclude
that (i) effective interventions are possible, (ii) they have to address several dimensions of affordability simultaneously, and (iii) the sufficiency policy space prism can be a useful tool in structuring planned interventions.
As a salutogenic concept, “consumption corridors” aims to support what is necessary for sustainable wellbeing to be achieved in relation to the Earth system, with a deep consideration for justice and equity. Living in consumption corridors is a representation of everyday life whereby people live within limits, so that all people – now and in the future – can access what is needed to live a good life. In this special issue, a series of scholars and practitioners have come together to further develop the concept, engage with its ethodological implications, and relate it to consumption domains and policy implications. We begin by introducing how the concept emerged, in relation to the complexity of grappling with the societal transformations required for achieving more sustainable forms of consumption. We then present the different contributions, which demonstrate the importance of considering both maximum and minimum consumption standards, the relevance of human-need theories, as well as the difference between achieving wellbeing and the means necessary for doing so. We conclude by opening up to areas that merit further deliberation: how to relate consumption corridors to everyday-life dynamics, but also to the critical question of power relations at play in implementing consumption corridors.
Contemporary food production and consumption cannot be regarded as sustainable and raises problems with its wide scope involving diverse actors. Moreover, in the face of demographic change and a growing global population, sus-tainability problems arising from food systems will likely become more serious in the future. For example, agricultural production must deal with the impacts of climate change, increasingly challenging land-use conflicts, and rising health and social costs on both individual and societal levels. The unsustainability of current arrangements arises from the industrialization and globalization of agriculture and food processing, the shift of consumption patterns toward more dietary animal protein, the emergence of modern food styles that entail heavily processed products, the growing gap on a global scale between rich and poor, and the paradoxical lack of food security amid an abundance of food. These factors are attributable to national and international policies and regulations, as well as to prevalent business prac-tices and, in particular, consumers’ values and habits. The most effective ways for affluent societies to reduce the environmental impact of their diets are to reduce consumption of meat and dairy products (especially beef), to favor organic fruits and vegetables, and to avoid goods that have been transported by air on both individual and institu-tional levels (e.g., public procurement, public catering). In examining the unsustainability of the current food system this article reviews the pertinent literature to derive a working definition of sustainable food consumption, outlines the major issues and impacts of current food-consumption practices, and discusses various policy interventions, including information-based instruments, market-based initiatives, direct regulations, and “nudges.” It concludes with a call for integrative, cross-sectoral, and population-wide policies that address the full range of drivers of unsustainable food production and consumption.
Despite widespread recognition of the need to transition toward more sustainable production and consumption and numerous initiatives to that end, global resource extraction and corresponding socio-ecological degradation continue to grow. Understanding the causes of this persistent failure is a necessary step towards more effective action. This article contributes to that understanding by synthesizing theory and evidence that links unsustainable production-consumption systems to power and inequality. While sustainable consumption and production research and action mostly focuses on technological or behavioral change, the socio-ecological inequalities driving production-consumption systems built into the organization of our global political economy, remain largely overlooked. In response, we propose a structural political economy orientation that seeks explicitly to reduce these inequalities and advance environmental justice and, thus, create the conditions for sustainable production-consumption systems. We then propose three important arenas of research and action towards sustainable production-consumption systems: justice, governance, and co-production of knowledge and action. These arenas, collectively and individually, can serve as entry points to study and act on the dynamics of (un)sustainable production-consumption systems. This can be done at the micro level, with respect to specific commodity chains or systems of provisioning, or at meso and macro levels with respect to national and global production networks. Our proposed orientation helps distinguish research and practice proposals into those emphasizing management and compensation resulting often in persistence of unsustainability, from those proffering structural changes in unsustainable production-consumption systems. We invite critique and collaboration to develop this research and action agenda further.
A synthesis is made of 10 topics within climate research, where there have been significant advances since January 2020. The insights are based on input from an international open call with broad disciplinary scope. Findings include: (1) the options to still keep global warming below 1.5 °C; (2) the impact of non-CO2 factors in global warming; (3) a new dimension of fire extremes forced by climate change; (4) the increasing pressure on interconnected climate tipping elements; (5) the dimensions of climate justice; (6) political challenges impeding the effectiveness of carbon pricing; (7) demand-side solutions as vehicles of climate mitigation; (8) the potentials and caveats of nature-based solutions; (9) how building resilience of marine ecosystems is possible; and (10) that the costs of climate change mitigation policies can be more than justified by the benefits to the health of humans and nature.