Note: 'You/Your' refers to Gerd Leonhard
Your presentation's actual program was quite ambitious. It wasn't simply "be sustainable." It proposed media production, an ongoing platform, attracting innovators, a climate/digital laboratory, and ultimately a Good Future Congress with a manifesto and funding.
VERDICT: 🔴 RED
The presentation proposed a network/platform/movement of business and civil-society thinkers, explicitly not a commercial entity. There is still a website. But that is not the same thing as a functioning movement. The current site lists five discussion groups with 7–12 members each. (Lanzarote Futuro) The digital group, for example, had nine members and discussions largely consisting of proposals/questions posted in 2025. (Lanzarote Futuro). There are still some 2026 posts, so I would not literally call it technically dead. But as an organization capable of mobilizing Lanzarote, influencing government, raising money and executing projects: I find no evidence that it achieved that.
VERDICT: 🔴 RED / NO EVIDENCE FOUND
The proposal was very specific: Lanzarote 2030: ¿Un buen futuro? ¿Un mal futuro?
Spanish + English, €30,000 budget, designed to create urgency and mobilize Generation X/Y. I searched for the film, title variants, Gerd/LZF references and subsequent Lanzarote material. I cannot find evidence that this film was made. Importantly, I am not going to turn "I couldn't find it" into "it definitely never existed." But for a €30,000 public-facing flagship project, the absence of any meaningful public trace is strong evidence that it did not become a delivered project.
VERDICT: 🔴 RED
These were explicitly listed as subsequent short films. I found no evidence that this film series materialized. And here's an important irony:
Vivienda 2030 would have been an extraordinarily useful film. Because the housing problem has since become substantially more severe. In June 2026, SER Lanzarote was reporting people sleeping in tents and on mattresses because they couldn't find affordable housing; in July, it reported people living in improvised huts and caravans. (Cadena SER) So the diagnosis was right; the proposed communication intervention didn't happen.
VERDICT: 🔴/🟡 — PARTIAL AT BEST. You proposed an ongoing series of live YouTube/LinkedIn discussions with relevant international guests.
I found no evidence of the proposed sustained media operation. There are discussions on the LZF website, and some external conferences and events have happened, but that's not the same thing. The proposed media machine did not materialize.
VERDICT: 🟡 AMBER — THIS IS THE MOST INTERESTING ONE
This was one of the clearest proposals in your deck: "Lanzarote as a testing ground for climate adaptation, digital business innovation."
Something genuinely significant happened later. In October 2025 the Cabildo unanimously approved a motion to create a Laboratorio Climático Insular. And the councillor introducing it explicitly said the idea came from Gerd Leonhard's presentation at the 2025 Foro Global Sur. (La Voz de Lanzarote)
But here's the crucial distinction: A motion is not a climate laboratory.
The motion proposed:
As of August 2026, I cannot find convincing evidence that this has become a properly funded, operational island-wide laboratory with measurable outputs. In fact, LZF was still asking what the priorities of the proposed laboratory should be. (Lanzarote Futuro)
So:
Idea: clearly influential. Political announcement: yes. Operational realization: no evidence yet.
AMBER, not GREEN.
VERDICT: 🟡 AMBER
There is one genuine concrete success here. A €519,000 publicly funded Digital Coworking facility opened in March 2024, intended as a hub for companies, entrepreneurs and technology projects. (Camara de Comercio) There are also 2026 programs such as Impulsa Startup, including a startup working on intelligent water management, and technology forums run by the Chamber and Cabildo. (Cadena SER)
So there is definitely some infrastructure and activity. But your proposal was much bigger: make Lanzarote "a magnet for innovation." I don't see evidence of that transformation. It's an innovation program, not an innovation ecosystem.
AMBER.
VERDICT: 🟡 AMBER / ARGUABLY A BAD STRATEGIC BET WITHOUT HOUSING
Your deck was unusually careful here: "Lanzarote as the new destination for digital nomads (but aware of housing issues!)" The island has indeed developed coworking infrastructure and digital-worker positioning. But the housing warning turned out to be crucial. By 2026, the housing situation is described locally as an emergency, with people resorting to extremely precarious accommodation. (Cadena SER)
So I'd say: The marketing idea partially happened. The ecosystem didn't. The constraint you identified became worse.
VERDICT: 🟡 for policy / 🔴 for results
Your deck explicitly said Lanzarote's emergencies included climate, housing, water, culture and tourism. The climate threat has unquestionably intensified. Lanzarote has had extreme heat events, coastal risks, calima problems and increasing climate adaptation activity. (La Voz de Lanzarote)
But that's not an achievement. A climate emergency getting worse after you warned about it doesn't count as "realized." The relevant question is whether the island substantially changed course. I don't see evidence that it has.
VERDICT: 🔴 RED — AND THIS IS YOUR STRONGEST "YOU WERE RIGHT" CASE
Your presentation explicitly put water in the emergency category. The island subsequently formally declared a water emergency in January 2025. It was extended repeatedly, including into 2026. (Gobierno de Canarias). And this is not merely a declaration. As recently as 7 August 2026, the island was struggling to restore water-storage levels during the heatwave and had to adjust supply suspensions because of pressure on the system. (Cadena SER)
There has been investment — including a new agricultural desalination plant — so this isn't "nothing happened." (Cadena SER) But the strategic outcome is:
You identified water as an emergency. It became an official emergency. Four years later, it remains an emergency. That is not realization of the solution. It's confirmation of the diagnosis.
VERDICT: 🟢/🟡 — THE ONE AREA WHERE THERE IS REAL DELIVERY
Your deck explicitly framed the energy transition as:
Carbon → Clean.
Here there is actual progress. Lanzarote and La Graciosa now have five operating wind farms totalling 40.7 MW, with wind occasionally covering up to 35% of demand. (Cadena SER). The island also became the first Canary Island to establish a framework for accelerated renewable-energy zones. (Cadena SER). And an experimental hybrid storage system was authorized at TÃas. (Cadena SER)
But there is a huge qualification: Lanzarote remained more than 90% dependent on fossil fuels for electricity generation according to the Canary Islands' energy minister in 2025. (Cadena SER)
So:
Real progress: yes. Transformation: no. I'd give this GREEN for implementation progress, AMBER for your larger ambition.
VERDICT: 🔴 RED
This was one of your explicit closing propositions. What happened?
Lanzarote's economy grew strongly in 2025, with GDP up 22.6% according to the Canary Islands Government's figures, driven primarily by tourism. (Cadena SER) Tourism remained extremely strong: Lanzarote received around 3 million tourists in 2024, and tourism remained the principal growth engine in 2025. (Cadena SER) I found no convincing evidence that Lanzarote has established a measurable economic model in which growth is systematically decoupled from environmental pressure.
So this is RED.
VERDICT: 🔴 RED
This is arguably the central intellectual proposition of the presentation. You explicitly proposed replacing a profit-and-growth logic with People, Planet, Purpose and Prosperity. The language has certainly entered local strategy.
The 2025 Chamber Plan de Activación now talks about sustainability, diversification, wellbeing, infrastructure, talent, ecological transition and digital transformation. It contains 138 proposed projects and a projected €646m investment through 2035. (datosdelanzarote.com)
But here's the problem: That's another plan.
The Chamber itself says the purpose is to create the framework for implementation and materialization. In January 2026 it was still presenting the plan to the seven municipalities. (Camara de Comercio). So I would not count this as implementation. It is evidence that the diagnosis has entered institutional language. Not that the economic model has changed.
VERDICT: 🔴 RED for implementation; 🟡 for debate
This is actually one of the most interesting things in the whole story. Your LZF work subsequently developed the CALF — Contribución al Futuro de la isla, essentially a visitor contribution to compensate for tourism's externalities. The proposal estimated potentially €80m+ annually. (Lanzarote Futuro)
And in November 2025 LZF explicitly proposed using a tourist contribution to finance the Climate Laboratory. (La Voz de Lanzarote). So your concept did get developed into a serious proposal. But:
I find no evidence that CALF was actually implemented. Therefore: Idea developed: YES. Political implementation: NO.
RED.
VERDICT: 🔴 RED
Your proposal was very concrete:
I found no evidence that this event happened in the proposed form. There have been other sustainability/tourism conferences — including iBlue in 2026 — but I'm not going to retroactively label those your Good Future Congress. That would be exactly the sort of bullshit we're trying to eliminate.
RED.
VERDICT: 🟡 AMBER
There is unquestionably more international sustainability/tourism discussion around Lanzarote. The 2026 iBlue Congress, for example, brought international experts together around tourism, technology, sustainability and cultural identity. (Cadena SER) But that's not proof that your proposed LZF international network became operational.
So:
Some movement in the direction: yes. Your proposed mechanism: no evidence. AMBER.
VERDICT: 🔴 RED — AND POSSIBLY THE MOST FAILED PRINCIPLE
This was one of your explicit reasons for creating LZF: "We must go beyond politics, party lines, consultants."
What I see instead is a familiar cycle:
diagnosis → strategy → announcement → political agreement → another plan → another presentation → implementation lag.
The new 2035 Plan is a good example. It contains 138 projects, €646m of projected investment and a governance/monitoring structure. (datosdelanzarote.com) That's potentially valuable. But as of August 2026, it is still overwhelmingly a roadmap for future execution, not evidence that the transformation has occurred. And some basic infrastructure tells the same story.
The Costa Teguise sewage modernization project was approved in 2019, originally expected to finish in 2022, and now isn't expected to finish until 2028. (Cadena SER). That is almost a perfect illustration of your 2024 warning:
"too little and too late."
The closing propositions were:
These are partly principles rather than measurable projects, so I would not pretend they can all receive a binary score.
But:
🟡 — policy recognition has increased; actual resilience remains inadequate.
🔴 — no convincing evidence of systemic decoupling.
🔴/🟡 — lots of participation rhetoric; no evidence of a large-scale youth-led transformation.
🔴 as an institutional transformation.
There are isolated examples of circular economy, biodiversity and regenerative tourism work, but not a demonstrated shift in the governing logic of the island.
Now that I've applied the same standard consistently:
That's the distinction I should have made from the beginning.
The presentation's greatest success may actually be that its warnings were substantially more accurate than its proposed solutions were successful.
You warned about:
water → housing → tourism pressure → climate → infrastructure → need for a different economic model.
And by 2026:
Meanwhile, the island has produced more plans, strategies, forums and declarations.
That's actually a much more interesting — and much less flattering — retrospective.
I would not say "Lanzarote politicians did absolutely nothing." That would be as intellectually sloppy as my earlier answer. There are real investments in renewable energy, digital infrastructure, desalination, waste management, etc. For example, the €519k digital coworking centre and 40.7 MW of wind capacity are tangible. (Camara de Comercio)
The more defensible criticism is: Lanzarote has demonstrated an ability to announce, plan and pilot individual initiatives, but there is little evidence yet of the systemic transformation your 2024 proposal called for.
2024 Lanzarote Futuro: forensic audit by ChatGPT: Please PROCEED WITH SCEPTICISM!