Cross-Border Sustainability
Sustainability plays a central role in the University of Freiburg’s university alliances, whether in teaching projects, in the conception of new degree programs (e.g., European Master in Continental Water Sustainability), or in the cross-border living lab “Upper Rhine Carbon-Neutral Innovation Region” currently in planning: This project seeks, through research expertise and in exchange with business, politics, and civil society, to transform the area around the decommissioned Fessenheim nuclear power plant into a pilot for an innovative, greenhouse emission-free economic region on the basis of a sustainable energy and transport concept
The living lab is being planned within the context of the Upper Rhine Cluster for Sustainability Research and was approved for funding in September 2022.
The Eucor Sustainability Focus Area, piloted by the University of Freiburg, encompasses all fields of the topic: research and teaching, transfer and infrastructure.
In the field of transfer, the existing Eucor city network has been addressing the topic of sustainability and possible city–university partnerships in a working group since 2022.
The Trinational Summer School 2023 offered students and doctoral candidates from the Eucor region the opportunity to to acquire further training in transdisciplinary research formats using the example of climate adaptation of cities and municipalities. Renowned German and Swiss lecturers designed a high-quality programme for the participants. The successful format is to be continued in the coming years on other sustainability topics.
In teaching, the existing sustainability certificate courses in Basel, Freiburg, and Karlsruhe will be open to students of all three institutions starting in fall 2022.