At Sustainable Places 2025, NEUTRALPATH showcased its model for citizen labs, empowering local voices to drive climate change in European cities
Widely available and efficient, the citizen engagement propeller is an always-ready cost-effective solution for accelerating European cities journey towards climate neutrality. That’s the idea behind NEUTRALPATH climate-neutral labs set up across five EU cities: Dresden, Zaragoza, Ghent, Istanbul and Vantaa. Paula Vega, Strategic Design Lead at Three o’clock, presented NEUTRALPATH co-creation approach on behalf of the consortium, during her talk at Sustainable Places 2025 in Milan.
What makes these labs effective? Citizens, NGOs, public authorities, industry and academia are brought together from the earliest stages. Starting from defining the lab’s vision and governance to co-creating and testing solutions, diverse communities work together to build cleaner and more equitable urban environments. Since innovative, clean solutions should be both technically feasible and widely accepted to achieve beneficial and durable goals.
Interactive methods such as games, digital totems and world cafés are being used to identify the real needs of residents, including tenants, homeowners and vulnerable groups. This inclusive approach is already bringing results, as shown in Zaragoza’s recent Open Day that attracted over 150 participants. The NEUTRALPATH’s labs experience is already demonstrating how cities can build a path to climate neutrality that is genuinely rooted in, and voiced by, their communities.
Image credits: Paula Vega
