Pope Francis's eco-village to promote ecological conversion at 2025 Jubilee

Pope Francis’s plan to build an eco-village in the historic gardens of Castel Gandolfo, the summer residence of the popes, will be complete for the 2025 Jubilee, allowing pilgrims and tourists to participate in an immersive experience of “ecological conversion,” organizers said.

In February 2023, after delays caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, Francis finally launched his “Borgo Laudato Sì” project, which combines sustainable agriculture with environmentally friendly teaching programs aimed especially at vulnerable and marginalized groups. The pope’s ambitious project, inspired by his 2015 encyclical Laudato Sì, emphasizes sustainability, a circular economy and integral human ecology, which places the human being at the center and in connection with the environment.

The aim of the Borgo is to become self-sustainable through the use of solar panels and to achieve zero water waste. Francis, who reinforced the care of creation in his 2023 apostolic exhortation Laudato Deum, describes water as a fundamental human right in his encyclical, and the Borgo will reflect this principle by using containers to collect rainwater and restructuring the plumbing of the garden’s many fountains to recycle water. Organizers are working to make all intra-garden transport electric. Plastic is banned within the garden.