Daylight Awareness Week 2025
Future Solar Societies
3-7 November 2025
Celebrate daylight with us!
Call for Contributions now open!
As the world needs to move away from fossil fuels, we are entering a new era — one where daylight can play a central role in how we live, work, and care for our planet. Future Solar Societies imagines a world shaped by the power of the sun — not only through solar energy and sustainable technologies, but also through nature-based systems, lifestyles, and cultural perspectives that embrace natural light.
This year’s Daylight Awareness Week explores how daylight can help build healthier, more sustainable, and fairer societies – for both people and the ecosystems we depend on. From climate-friendly architecture to traditional knowledge of living with daylight, from emerging technologies like artificial photosynthesis to sunlight-driven processes in forests and oceans — we will highlight stories, science, and solutions that show how daylight is key to thriving in a changing climate.
Download our Campaign Guide to find out all about this year’s edition and how to get involved.
How you can contribute
We welcome contributions from scientists, students, practitioners, and institutions whose work relates to daylight – and who are eager to make daylight-related knowledge more accessible, visible, and relevant to society.
Suggested formats:
Online contributions are especially encouraged for their global reach, but local, in-person activities are also welcome.
- Host a live webinar, online talk, or virtual workshop
- Create a blog post, short video, or podcast episode
- Contribute a case study, article, or interview
- Share a photo series, art project, or personal story
- Run a social media campaign (e.g. #DaylightRoutine)
- Organise a local event: public lecture, daylight walk, children’s workshop, lab visit, or film screening
Key dates
- Campaign week: 3-7 November 2025
- Submission deadline: 15 August 2025
- Submit to: office@daylight.academy
Use #DaylightWeek & #FutureSolarSocieties to join the global conversation!
PREVIOUS EDITIONS
Daylight Awareness Week 2024
Daylight as a force for good
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Prof. Christian Cajochen (Head of the Centre for Chronobiology at the University of Basel in Switzerland) talks about the impact of daylight on our health, with a special focus on sleep.
This resulted from a collaboration with Jan-Frieder Harmsen and his podcast CHRONO:MEDICINE (previsouly named 247MUSCLE).
The episode is divided into two parts:
Listen to part 1 (also available on Spotify, and Apple Podcast)
Listen to part 2 (also available on Spotify, and Apple Podcast)
Delve into the mysteries of circadian rhythms, sleep and daylight with Prof. em. Anna Wirz-Justice (Centre for Chronobiology, University of Basel in Switzerland), a pioneer in the field of chronobiology, in this special Halloween episode of the Light O’Clock podcast.
The episode was created in partnership with Light O’Clock, a regular podcast produced by the Translational Sensory & Circadian Neuroscience Research Group at the Max Planck Institute for Biological Cybernetics. The episode is hosted by Carolina Guidolin.
Listen to the episode (also available on Spotify and Apple Podcast)
by Lisa Heschong (2024)
“We are lucky that our planet rotates. During the day, the sun’s intense radiation warms the earth and brightens our beautiful blue atmosphere. At night, in the sun’s dark shadow, the earth cools, sending its heat back out into infinite space. Because of its 24-hour rotation, no one face of the planet gets burned by unrelenting radiation, or is forever deprived of the sun’s life-giving energy…”
by Lynne Peeples (2024)
“Skylines around the world—from Denver to Delhi—are rapidly rising and densifying to accommodate growing urban populations. The efforts are well-intentioned; making cities compact can reduce energy use. Yet it can also introduce other environmental and public health problems, such as a diminished distinction between night and day…”
by Paul Bogard (2024)
“I wish to speak a word for darkness, for that natural quality on which so much depends, the matching half to natural daylight, both so valuable for life. It makes sense to consider natural darkness on Halloween, a celebration that plays with our fears, because it’s our fear of the dark that often separates us from the value of natural night. Just as we take for granted the benefits of daylight, so we live in ignorance of the dark. But this can change…”
Daylight Awareness Week 2023
Daylight and us: learning from the past?
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Daylight Awareness Week 2022
Journey of Light: from Space to our Cells
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Daylight Awareness Week 2021
Three reasons why we need daylight
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Daylight Awareness Week 2020
When daylight rhymes with health
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