Green Quest: The Simulation Game

About the project

Green Quest: The Simulation Game is an Erasmus+ small-scale partnership in the field of youth, coordinated by Ecological Future Education (Latvia) with EMOTiC (Austria) as partner. It ran from October 2024 to September 2025 and created a role-play simulation in which players negotiate the future of a wind farm in the fictional town of Inerbantosa, together with a facilitator manual in English and German.

Why a game about a wind farm? Green projects are rarely simple. A renewable energy plant can cut emissions while raising questions about landscapes, tourism, nature, land use and who actually benefits. Green Quest helps young people move beyond idealism towards "360 degrees of thinking": evaluating green initiatives, anticipating possible collateral damage and looking for compatible solutions that are genuinely sustainable for the environment, society and the economy.

In the scenario, an onshore wind farm of 150 turbines is planned for Inerbantosa. Six roles sit at the table: the Corporate Wind Farms Developer Zoreatex, Environmental Groups, the Tourism Chamber, the State Development Agency, Other Energy Companies and Local Farmers. Over three negotiation rounds they work through five issues: the scale of the project, economic and energy market dynamics, tourism concerns, societal implications such as a climate bonus for each household, and the environmental impact. An agreement needs the support of five of the six players.

Each role brings its own interests and priorities, and the game combines a scoring system, contested issues and facilitator guidance. Players have to listen, build alliances, weigh trade-offs and test whether a deal really works for the people affected. Taking on these roles strengthens green skills, systems thinking, strategic thinking and consensus-building, and links the experience to the Sustainable Development Goals.

The facilitator manual guides youth workers through preparing, running and debriefing the simulation for groups of 12 to 36 participants, with different levels of complexity, background materials, role sheets for all six players and a participant briefing. The work plan included a four-day transnational training in Latvia for 12 youth workers, with beta testing and adaptation of the method for different youth groups, followed by local pilot sessions in Austria and Latvia designed to involve at least 36 young people and to refine the game and manual.

For young people, Green Quest offers a safe space to step into someone else's shoes and experience how decisions about the green transition are made. For youth workers, it adds an interactive, simulation-based method to their non-formal education practice.

Green Quest also lives on beyond the original partnership. It is used in Youth4GreenPolicy, a project under the EU's Citizens, Equality, Rights and Values (CERV) programme that builds youth workers' capacity to promote sustainability, civic engagement and youth participation through policy simulations.