Coline Leprieur and Mathis Autexier are third-year students at Mines Saint-Étienne.
As students who are mindful of environmental challenges, they both pursued the Industrial and Territorial Environment major, as well as modules related to the energy transition, which inspires them for their future careers.
For their international mobility, they chose the Biotechnical Faculty of Ljubljana in Slovenia. The low-carbon mobility grant enabled them to get there by carpooling. Today, they tell us more:
🚗 How did you find out about the low-carbon mobility grant?
With the desire to continue deepening our knowledge of the environment, we chose an exchange semester with the Biotechnical Faculty of Ljubljana in Slovenia. Our choice was motivated by the course offering (Climatology, Global Change and Forest Ecosystem, Plant Ecology) to better understand the mechanisms of climate change and their consequences on ecosystems. However, one of the determining factors was also the country’s accessibility via low-carbon transport. Both convinced that energy sobriety is the path to adopt to limit climate disruption, we refused to have to take the plane, which is why European countries, and Slovenia in particular, emerged as our preferred destinations.
🚗 How did you decide to carpool?
We were informed about the low-carbon mobility grant by email, and it immediately motivated our carpooling project. During his gap year, Mathis converted his own van. This enabled us to travel to Slovenia in a more environmentally friendly way and provided a solution for exploring the surroundings of Ljubljana once we were there.
🚗 How did the trip go?
Our journey went extremely well. We travelled along the Italian coast. The road, the landscapes and the sunshine were magnificent. This mode of transport allowed us to travel at our own pace and stop whenever we wanted: lunch with a view of Monaco, dinner in Italy…
“This carpooling trip with Mathis strengthened my conviction that the sense of freedom inherent in travel is not determined by the number of kilometres covered, but by the feeling of adventure and discovery, proving that it is not necessary to cross oceans to feel a change of scenery.”
Coline Leprieur
🚗 Thank you to Coline and Mathis for answering our questions!
At Mines Saint-Étienne, we are committed to highlighting our students’ low-carbon initiatives. They are the engineers of tomorrow, and thanks to their commitment, our School is firmly engaged in the ecological transition for the long term.
