The fourth SWICE Conference, which took place on the 10th of June 2026 in Fribourg, has once again proved the vitality and engagement of our community of researchers and stakeholders. Under the tagline “Building bridges for an energy transition that accounts for human needs”, this year’s conference saw the two sister consortia SWICE and Lantern come together under a unified banner.
SWICE and Lantern researchers, who are scattered across Swiss universities and higher education institutions in the three linguistic areas of the country, were eager to seize the yearly opportunity for a live catch-up with their colleagues. In addition, the engaging program of the day attracted many cooperation partners of both consortia (including utilities SIL, SIG, Groupe E and BKW, and the Swiss Society of Engineers and Architects SIA), as well as other representatives of the private sector and civil society, such as the Centre de Compétences pour la Durabilité dans la Construction (CCDC). Public sector representatives were also present, most notably of the city of Fribourg.
To kick off the conference, Delphine Ding delivered a keynote on behalf of Architectes pour le Climat, an association of architects and civil engineers working to transform the built environment to mitigate and adapt to climate change. Her presentation reminded the audience of the enormous environmental impact of the construction sector, before focusing on potential solutions through better design, the reuse of materials and a focus on repair and maintenance.
The numerous links between the research of both consortia were made obvious in the next phase of the conference, in which the audience was invited to follow one of three sessions. In the first session, “Sufficiency in the built environment & renovation strategies”, presentations ranged from a country-wide sufficiency pathway for housing in Switzerland to a decision-support tool to evaluate energy impacts of new working models. Session two, “Recreational practices & sustainable mobility”, included various talks on tools to visualize mobility patterns and impacts, and insights into heat adaptation through personal cooling. Finally, session three, “Energy communities & energy demand”, highlighted links between teleworking, energy use and wellbeing, among other topics.
After the logistical challenge of fitting a hundred people into the frame for a group photo was overcome, a well-deserved lunch break provided an opportunity for networking, and it became evident from the energy in the room that the bridges alluded to in the conference tagline were indeed being built with excited fervor.
The afternoon session saw the audience once again split between three workshops, respectively on 8-minute neighbourhoods, meta-factors influencing Living Labs, and neighbourhood-based energy cooperation.
Next, a marketplace was set up during the coffee break, to showcase the numerous tools developed by both consortia, including Gridly, Persona Cards, the SWICE app, REHO-FM and others. After a comprehensive wrap-up, participants gathered around an apero in the afternoon sun, which nicely concluded this year’s SWICE + Lantern conference.
We already look forward to next year’s edition!
Pictures by Colm Kuonen