Lighting a light together - for the environment and the future
On January 17, 2026, Cristina Beard and Connor Rhude from the Open Digitalization Alliance Palatinate and the Chair of Business Administration, in particular Sustainability Management at RPTU Kaiserslautern-Landau held a three-hour workshop entitled "Lighting a light together - for the environment and the future" on the topic of sustainability.
The participants - mainly residents from the Goetheviertelpart of the intergenerational and community-oriented BAU AG Kaiserslautern housing project Nils (neighborly, inclusive, livable, self-determined living) - brought a variety of perspectives and great interest in sustainable lifestyles.
In an introductory lecture and a subsequent discussion round, the speakers provided comprehensive insights into the topic of sustainability and conveyed numerous theoretical insights as well as practical suggestions on how to make one's own everyday life more sustainable. The audience was very interested and at the same time surprised by the wide range of topics. They particularly appreciated the wide range of information and the fact that there are hardly any places where such a central and socially relevant topic is presented so comprehensively. The practical examples and concrete tips, for example on providers of free repair manuals or local initiatives and opportunities relating to sustainability and sustainable business models in and around Kaiserslautern, were also very well received. There was agreement that events of this kind should be offered more frequently in order to anchor sustainable knowledge more broadly in the population.
In the practical part that followed, collected wax scraps were melted down in different colors and new candles were poured into old, cleaned jars and containers together with all participants. In this way, decorative and functional new products were created from supposed waste. Two principles of the circular economy , "R6: Repurpose" and "R7: Remanufacture", which had previously been discussed in the lecture, could thus be directly experienced in practice and implemented in everyday life.
Many thanks to BAU AG for making such events possible.
