Is the climate crisis making young adults go on vacation in new, less carbon-intensive ways? That is the main question in Katinka Bundgård Fals’ PhD thesis, which uncovers how young Danes go on vacation, and what potentials and impediments it entails for climate-friendly change.

Flying is the most carbon-intensive form of private consumption, underscoring the need for less carbon-intensive vacation forms. Katinka Bundgård Fals’ project shows that climate-friendly change is sparse, pointing out both alternative vacation forms emerging among Danish young adults and the impediments to such change. Flight-free and local vacation forms are emerging, but flying and distant destinations remain attractive, available and relatively cheap due to strong social norms and uneven regulation.

The dissertation thus contributes to our understanding of social dynamics that enable and inhibit climate-friendly changes.

The PhD study was completed at the Department of Environmental Science, Faculty of Technical Sciences, Aarhus University.

This summary was prepared by the PhD student.

Time: Friday, 29 August 2025 at 13:00
Place: Building 7220-D, room 169, The Danish School of Education, Aarhus University, Tuborgvej 164, 2400 København NV.
Title of PhD thesis: Wanderlust on a Warming Planet: Exploring climate-friendly practice change in young adults’ vacations
Contact information: Katinka Bundgård Fals, e-mail: katinka@envs.au.dk, tel.: +45 20575787
Members of the assessment committee:
Associate professor Jenny Rinkinen, Social Sciences, LUT School of Engineering Sciences, LUT University, Finland
Senior researcher Toke Haunstrup Bach Christensen, Department of the Built Environment, Aalborg University, Denmark
Professor Katarina Elofsson, Department of Environmental Science, Aarhus University (chair)
Main supervisor: Senior researcher Lars Kjerulf Petersen, Department of Environmental Science, Aarhus University, Denmark
Co-supervisor: 
Associate professor Jonas Andreasen Lysgaard, Danish School of Education, Aarhus University, Denmark
Associate professor Anne Gammelgaard Ballantyne, Department of Business Development and Technology
Language: The PhD dissertation will be defended in English

The defence is public.
The PhD thesis is available for reading at the Graduate School of Technical Sciences/GSTS, Ny Munkegade 120, building 1521, 8000 Aarhus C.