Workshop “Pro-active management of forests to combat climate change driven risks: Policies and measures for increasing forest resilience and climate change adaptation".

The IPCC launched on 8 August the Special Report on Climate Change and Land, which assesses interlinkages between climate change effects and desertification, land degradation, sustainable land management, food security, and greenhouse gas fluxes in terrestrial ecosystems. The Summary for Policy Makers, as well as the full report, are available on the IPCC website.

ClimCards, a card game released by the Permanent Secretariat of the Alpine Convention, focuses on achieving different targets for climate change adaptation and mitigation in the Alps, through policy or individual actions, while various unexpected events keep occurring. This game is suitable for 3-6 players of 10 years+ and available in English, German, French, Italian and Slovenian.

Over most of Europe, the average temperature in June 2019 was higher than the 1981-2010 average for the month and it was particularly warm over parts of central and eastern Europe. Around the middle of the month temperature records were broken in eastern Europe. Western and central Europe experienced a short, but intense heatwave during the last week of the month.

To find out information about adaptation to climate change in Belgium, the National Climate Commission has developed a new web portal as part of the implementation of the National Adaptation Plan. The portal aims to provide available information about climate change (observations, scenarios, impacts), adaptation policies, vulnerabilities and adaptation measures in 14 sectors.

Societies worldwide have become more resilient to climate disasters, but climate change is likely to result in an unprecedented rise in climate extremes, which will challenge the climate resilience and adaptive capacity of our societies.

This report is written by the EY project on behalf of the Norwegian Environment Agency, and examines how transnational physical climate change risks are managed in a selection of European countries and in the private sector in general. The report provides input on how public and private actors in Norway can continue their work on transnational climate change risks.

A Commission appointed by the Norwegian government has assessed climate-related risk factors and the significance for the Norwegian economy.

Bark beetles are currently responsible for killing an unprecedented number of trees in forests across Europe and North America. Researchers are therefore urging to step up research into bark beetles; also in view of climate change.

This event, organized by the Pyrenean Observatory on Climate Change (OPCC) and the Aragon Region, aims at presenting and transferring the results of the OPCC2 project and associated projects.

A recent Joint Research Centre article warns that the extreme drought conditions that affected central and northern Europe's 2018 spring/summer growing season could become the norm within 25 years, and calls for innovative adaptation measures to deal with extremes.

This Joint Research Centre study investigated the effects of extreme climatic events on agricultural commodity markets. It shows that if historical events, such as the 2003 European heatwave, occurred in the near future, the economic impact would be visible not only on regional crop yields and prices but also on international markets.

C3S User Learning Services offers high quality free eLearning resources supported by face-to-face training sessions on the use of climate data for climate adaptation challenges and on the use of the (Copernicus) Climate Data Store (CDS) toolbox. In total 30 face-to-face trainings sessions will be organized throughout Europe.

All parts of Europe’s energy system, from availability of energy sources to energy consumption, are potentially vulnerable to climate change, according to a European Environment Agency report. To secure reliable supply of clean energy, Europe’s energy system needs to adapt and become more climate resilient.

The European Union Greenhouse gas Monitoring Mechanism Regulation (MMR) Article 15 on Adaptation actions required Member States to complete the second reporting cycle in March 2019. The information provided is presented in the country pages of Climate-ADAPT. Similar information from non-EU EEA member countries is presented as well.

New report by the European Academies’ Science Advisory Council (EASAC): 'The imperative of climate action to protect human health in Europe' highlights an alarming range of health risks due to climate change and the benefits of rapid phase out of fossil fuels.

The Covenant of Mayors Office is organizing its second webinar, where city practitioners will present various aspects on how to design adaptation strategy plans, how to engage with citizens and how to build on existing policies. A tool which facilitates the identification of adaptation measures to address a range of climate change hazards will also be presented.

Climate was in the focus of the XV Alpine Conference in Innsbruck, Austria, on 4 April 2019, where a common declaration of the eight Alpine countries and the European Union was released, and two documents were approved setting the Alps on the path to climate neutrality and climate resiliency by 2050. All relevant policy information is available now in the new brochure 'Climate-neutral and Climate-resilient Alps 2050' published in English, German, Italian, French and Slovenian.

The Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) has launched in May 2019 the first global assessment on the state of ecosystems. According to the report, biodiversity and ecosystem functions and services are deteriorating worldwide at unprecedented rate due to human activities, and climate change is one of the direct drivers of this change in nature and human well-being.

The aim of the fifth webinar of the European Climate Adaptation platform (Climate-ADAPT) is to disseminate the basic features of the Climate-ADAPT case studies: criteria for their identification, structure for their description, development process, and current state of the case study collection. Besides two specific case studies from a developer perspective and a local implementation point of view are going to be presented and the use of the Climate-ADAPT pool of case studies will be promoted, e.g. for: strategic policy process, awareness raising, planning, development of guidelines, design and implementation of similar applications in other locations. Participants will discuss further development of case studies and share potential ways to improve the case study search tool.

The European Environment Agency (EEA) has produced the report ‘Adaptation challenges and opportunities for the European energy system: building a climate-resilient low-carbon energy system’. This report assesses how the impacts of climate change can affect the current energy system in Europe. This EEA report will be launched on 18 June in Brussels during a dedicated session at the Policy Conference of the EU Sustainable Energy Week, together with senior stakeholders from the European Commission and other organisations. If you would like to attend the launch event, please register for the Policy Conference by 21 May (for free) and ensure that you register specifically for this session: ‘18 June 2019, 14:00-15:30. Preparing the European energy system for the impacts of climate change (Energy transition, I40)'.

A new study commissioned by the German Environment Agency (UBA) gives answers to questions that were raised in an online survey, workshop and expert interviews. The results give advice for the further development of the German Adaptation Strategy.

The European State of the Climate 2018, compiled by the Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) and implemented by the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) on behalf of the European Union, gives a general description of the year as a whole; the heat records and extreme rain falls almost across Europe, and a view of the weather events in the European part of the Arctic region.

This international conference aimed to provide information on Turkey’s current situation regarding the climate change, recent international studies and developments following COP 24, climate change policies at local level.

The EU project PLACARD has released its policy brief on how the European Union can manage the risks of climate extremes.

Without the climate change caused by human activity, simultaneous heatwaves would not have hit such a large area as they did last summer. This is the conclusion of researchers based on observational and model data.

The PLACARD interchange recipe book for making stories can help you to get people engaged and work towards a climate-proof and disaster resilient society.

The PLACARD Connectivity Hub is a new "search and discovery" tool that helps planners, decision-makers, researchers, policymakers, students, and interested citizens to find knowledge and organisations working on climate change adaptation (CCA) and disaster risk reduction (DRR) issues.

Experts highlight the challenge cities face to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, increase cities' resilience to extreme weather and also give people quality space to live in.

There is an urgent need to ensure that coastal areas are adapting to the impacts of climate change. Risks in these areas are projected to increase because of rising sea levels and development pressures. This report reviews how OECD countries can use their national adaptation planning processes to respond to this challenge.