Brussels, 4 June 2025
Yesterday evening, during the EU Green Week, the Commission announced the winners of this year’s LIFE Awards. These Awards recognise the most innovative, inspirational and impactful projects financed by the EU’s LIFE Programme in three categories: nature protection and biodiversity; circular economy and quality of life; and climate action.
The LIFE Award for Nature and the LIFE Citizens’ Prize went to LIFE Lynx. The project from Slovenia, Croatia, Italy, Slovakia, Romania brought together conservationists, hunters and local communities to successfully reverse the decline of the Alpine Lynx in the Dinaric Alps. Winning the LIFE Award for Circular Economy and Quality of Life, LIFE POPWAT piloted a new nature-based technology to remove pollution from contaminated water in Czechia and Poland. Then the LIFE Award for Climate Action went to LIFE DESERT-ADAPT, a project combating desertification by improving soil quality, water retention capacity and ecosystem resilience in Italy, Spain and Portugal.
Yesterday, Commissioner for Environment, Water Resilience and a Competitive Circular Economy, Jessika Roswall announced the winners who were selected by expert jury members including representatives from the Committee of the Regions, academia and civil society
Finally, a special category, the Rising Star, was introduced at this year’s edition to highlight the remarkable contribution of a LIFE project to circular economy. It was awarded to LIFE RE-ZIP, a Danish project to replace thousands of tonnes of commercial packaging waste with more environmentally friendly reusable eCommerce packaging.
More information on the LIFE Award winners is available online.