Challenging practices: experiences from community and individual living lab approaches

Cities with their innovative capacity are key places to address critical climate, environmental and health challenges. Urban experimentations, such as Living Labs, can represent a starting point to reintroduce resources into the production cycle and reduce environmental impacts, embracing the paradigm of the circular economy (CE). According to recent studies, Living Labs at a city scale could generate significant environmental benefits, improvements in quality of life and positive impacts on citizens’ health.1 This paper aims at presenting the case of the Torino Living Lab on Sharing and Circular Economy (LLSC) to point out possible future scenarios of urban sustainable policies. The case study is analysed in five sections: (1) the description of the new permanent laboratory proposed by the City of Turin; (2) the past experiences of Living Labs in Turin; (3) the birth of LLSC and the involvement strategy; (4) the introduction of the eight admitted experimentations. In the light of the results collected, the last paragraph (5) came up with the Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Treaths (SWOT) analysis in the LLSC. Eventually, it deals with the research question by offering a common ground for global and local policies focused on sustainability and CE.

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Cycling towards sustainability: The transformative potential of urban design thinking in a sustainable living lab

Transportation Research Interdisciplinary Perspectives ◽

10.1016/j.trip.2020.100269 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 9 ◽

pp. 100269

Author(s):

Julian Alexandrakis

Keyword(s):

Urban Design ◽

Design Thinking ◽

Sustainable Living ◽

Transformative Potential ◽

Living Lab

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Lifestyle carbon footprints and changes in lifestyles to limit global warming to 1.5 °C, and ways forward for related research

Sustainability Science ◽

10.1007/s11625-021-01018-6 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Ryu Koide ◽

Michael Lettenmeier ◽

Lewis Akenji ◽

Viivi Toivio ◽

Aryanie Amellina ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Global Warming ◽

Quantitative Analysis ◽

Sustainability Science ◽

Scenario Development ◽

Carbon Footprints ◽

Related Research ◽

Living Lab ◽

Per Capita ◽

Using Data ◽

Subnational Analysis

AbstractThis paper presents an approach for assessing lifestyle carbon footprints and lifestyle change options aimed at achieving the 1.5 °C climate goal and facilitating the transition to decarbonized lifestyles through stakeholder participatory research. Using data on Finland and Japan it shows potential impacts of reducing carbon footprints through changes in lifestyles for around 30 options covering food, housing, and mobility domains, in comparison with the 2030 and 2050 per-capita targets (2.5–3.2 tCO2e by 2030; 0.7–1.4 tCO2e by 2050). It discusses research opportunities for expanding the footprint-based quantitative analysis to incorporate subnational analysis, living lab, and scenario development aiming at advancing sustainability science on the transition to decarbonized lifestyles.

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Evaluation and Lessons Learned from a Campus as a Living Lab Program to Promote Sustainable Practices

Sustainability ◽

10.3390/su13041739 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 13 (4) ◽

pp. 1739

Author(s):

Paul Save ◽

Belgin Terim Cavka ◽

Thomas Froese

Keyword(s):

Learning Curve ◽

Business Process ◽

Lessons Learned ◽

Process Models ◽

Sustainable Practices ◽

Business Process Models ◽

District Energy ◽

University Of British Columbia ◽

Living Lab ◽

The University

Any group that creates challenging goals also requires a strategy to achieve them and a process to review and improve this strategy over time. The University of British Columbia (UBC) set ambitious campus sustainability goals, including a reduction in its greenhouse gas emissions to 33% below the 2007 level by 2015, and 100% by 2050 (UBC, 2006). The University pursued these goals through a number of specific projects (such as major district energy upgrade and a bioenergy facility) and, more generally, through a “Campus as a Living Lab” (CLL) initiative to marry industry, campus operations, and research to drive innovative solutions. The CLL program has achieved significant successes while also demonstrating many opportunities for improvements and lessons learned. The aim of this study was to examine the UBC CLL program, to identify and formalize its operations, to extract key transferable characteristics, and to propose replicable processes that other universities and municipalities can follow to expand their sustainable practices in similar ways. There was a learning curve with implementing a CLL program at UBC; thus, the goal of this study was to potentially shorten this learning curve for others. The research involved an ethnographic approach in which researchers participated in the CLL process, conducted qualitative analysis, and captured the processes through a series of business process models. The research findings are shared in two parts: 1. generalized lessons learned through key transferrable characteristics; 2. a series of generic organizational charts and business process models (BPMs) culminated with learned strategies through defined processes that illustrate what was required to create a CLL program at UBC. A generalized future improvement plan for UBC CLL programs is defined, generic BPMs about CLL projects are evaluated, and the level of engagement of multiple stakeholders through phases of project life cycle given in the conclusion for future use of other Living Lab organizations.

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The Defining Characteristics of Agroecosystem Living Labs

Sustainability ◽

10.3390/su13041718 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 13 (4) ◽

pp. 1718

Author(s):

Chris McPhee ◽

Margaret Bancerz ◽

Muriel Mambrini-Doudet ◽

François Chrétien ◽

Christian Huyghe ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Food Systems ◽

Agricultural Sector ◽

External Factors ◽

Social Challenges ◽

Rural Living ◽

Living Lab ◽

Challenges And Opportunities ◽

Unique Nature ◽

Living Labs ◽

High Uncertainty

In response to environmental, economic, and social challenges, the living labs approach to innovation is receiving increasing attention within the agricultural sector. In this paper, we propose a set of defining characteristics for an emerging type of living lab intended to increase the sustainability and resilience of agriculture and agri-food systems: the “agroecosystem living lab”. Drawing on first-hand knowledge of case studies of large initiatives from Canada and France and supported by eight other cases from the literature, we highlight the unique nature of agroecosystem living labs and their distinct challenges with respect to their aims, activities, participants, and context. In particular, these living labs are characterized by exceptionally high levels of scientific research; long innovation cycles with high uncertainty due to external factors; and the high number and diversity of stakeholders involved. Both procedurally and conceptually, we link to earlier efforts undertaken by researchers seeking to identify urban living labs and rural living labs as distinct, new types of living labs. By highlighting what makes agroecosystem living labs unique and their commonalities with other types of living labs, we hope to encourage their further study and help practitioners better understand their implementation and operational challenges and opportunities.

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The electro-mobility Living Lab developped by eCAMPUS

2020 IEEE Vehicle Power and Propulsion Conference (VPPC) ◽

10.1109/vppc49601.2020.9330968 ◽

2020 ◽

Author(s):

E. Masclef ◽

E. Castex ◽

S. Miaux ◽

A. Bouscayrol ◽

L. Boulon

Keyword(s):

Living Lab ◽

Electro Mobility

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A Secure and Scalable Smart Home Gateway to Bridge Technology Fragmentation

Sensors ◽

10.3390/s21113587 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 21 (11) ◽

pp. 3587

Author(s):

Ezequiel Simeoni ◽

Eugenio Gaeta ◽

Rebeca I. García-Betances ◽

Dave Raggett ◽

Alejandro M. Medrano-Gil ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Smart Home ◽

Home Automation ◽

Dynamic Configuration ◽

Home Gateway ◽

Security Authentication ◽

Living Lab ◽

Automation Systems ◽

Authentication And Authorization ◽

Iot Devices ◽

Bridge Technology

Internet of Things (IoT) technologies are already playing an important role in our daily activities as we use them and rely on them to increase our abilities, connectivity, productivity and quality of life. However, there are still obstacles to achieving a unique interface able to transfer full control to users given the diversity of protocols, properties and specifications in the varied IoT ecosystem. Particularly for the case of home automation systems, there is a high degree of fragmentation that limits interoperability, increasing the complexity and costs of developments and holding back their real potential of positively impacting users. In this article, we propose implementing W3C’s Web of Things Standard supported by home automation ontologies, such as SAREF and UniversAAL, to deploy the Living Lab Gateway that allows users to consume all IoT devices from a smart home, including those physically wired and using KNX® technology. This work, developed under the framework of the EC funded Plan4Act project, includes relevant features such as security, authentication and authorization provision, dynamic configuration and injection of devices, and devices abstraction and mapping into ontologies. Its deployment is explained in two scenarios to show the achieved technology’s degree of integration, the code simplicity for developers and the system’s scalability: one consisted of external hardware interfacing with the smart home, and the other of the injection of a new sensing device. A test was executed providing metrics that indicate that the Living Lab Gateway is competitive in terms of response performance.

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