Latest news and events on Climate-ADAPT

Societal transformation towards climate resilient European regions and cities is a key policy target at all levels. In this webinar the aim is to identify the key factors that contribute to accelerating and scaling up local action in the field of climate change adaptation to support this target.

European research often has a focus on local or regional aspects of transformation, in particular in the context of COVID recovery. With this webinar, the local aspects of societal transformation will be put into a global context from a citizen perspective. COVID has reset the global scene in many ways and offers a chance to rethink our approach to climate change, including adaptation.

This webinar, carried out in the frame of the 5th European Climate Change Adaptation Conference (ECCA 2021), presents state-of-the-art knowledge on the effects of global warming, linked to heat stress and other climate hazards, on our health in a European context. It will also be discussed how alternative policy options and measures can help safeguard the health and wellbeing of citizens through climate action. Registration for ECCA 2021 is necessary to attend this webinar, but available without cost.

The aim of this webinar is to showcase what works across the EU in terms of adaptation action. Discussions will have a regional focus acknowledging that that the Southeast of Europe is probably one of the most vulnerable regions in Europe.

Since its launch in December 2020, the European Climate Pact has started to roll out EU-wide activities to involve citizens, communities and organizations in climate action, including adaptation, and building a greener Europe. On the Climate Pact website more information can be found about the Pact’s network of volunteer Ambassadors, climate action pledges, and events taking place across Europe.

This 7th webinar of ECCA 2021 is about exploring and considering means of enhancing the use and development of climate services and climate adaptation (knowledge) platforms as enablers of climate action.

Level(s) is a new European approach to assess and report on the sustainability performance of buildings, throughout the full life cycle of buildings. Using existing standards, the Level(s) framework with its indicators provides a common language for building sustainability. In particular, some of the Level(s) indicators are also useful in ensuring the climate resilience of buildings, and have adaptation relevance as well.

The recently adopted and published European Standard: ‘Adaptation to climate change - Guidelines on vulnerability, impacts and risk assessment’ (EN ISO 14091:2021) offers organisations a consistent, structured and pragmatic approach to understand their vulnerabilities and to prevent or mitigate negative consequences caused by climate change, while taking advantage of opportunities. It was developed in parallel to the respective standard of the International Organisation for Standardization (ISO) (ISO 14091, 2021-02) which was set up based on an initiative of Germany and South Korea.

This webinar is structured on four topics: (1) the policy support, (2) the knowledge base, (3) the applications and (4) the way ahead of NbS for climate change adaptation and disaster risk reduction in Europe. It provides presentations and discussions with key experts on different aspects of NbS and offers the opportunity to the participant to interact with them.

Innovative adaptation funding initiatives at international level will be presented, and it will be highlighted how advanced knowledge can boost climate-proof investments. In the break-out groups, participants will discuss different key tools, drivers and solutions for sustainable finance.

The latest climate impact science will be presented that considers climate impacts as interconnected, co-occurring, cross-border changes in the innovative format of a policy simulation. Participants in a simulation game will be working on propositions of actions to counteract the crises that can emerge from transboundary climate impacts.

The World Health Organization - Regional Office for Europe has launched its 2021 #KeepCool campaign, helping advise communities and decision-makers on ways to stay healthy in the heat and adapt for increased temperatures in the future.

Efforts in tackling climate change at national level across Europe can be made more effective by robust governance frameworks as well as well-functioning, well-resourced advisory bodies. An EEA briefing has analysed the institutional settings for policy-making on mitigation at the national level in Europe, the role played by advisory bodies and their influence on policy decisions. Although the focus of the analysis was predominantly mitigation, some advisory bodies were found to focus on adaptation as well.

The NATURVATION project has produced 775 European Assessment Maps as well as a set of City-scale Assessment Maps on Malmö, Barcelona and Utrecht. The European maps show the potential of nature-based solutions to address climate change adaptation and mitigation across 775 European cities.

The Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) will host a virtual workshop on climate challenges in the Baltic Sea region in collaboration with DWD and GOPA Com to understand how climate data is currently used in this region, and what datasets or tools are needed to help decision makers to plan for current and future climate change in the Baltic Sea region.

Interested in climate risk and resilience? Join the Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) Conference & General Assembly, three afternoons of online presentations and debate on the latest developments in climate monitoring, with speakers and panellists from leading international research institutes, government services and private-sector innovators.

The European Commission has published new guidelines to facilitate a better understanding of land-based wildfire prevention and effective responses. They point towards prevention measures that can be taken through governance, planning and forest management, and outline how EU Member States can access EU funding for wildfire resilience and work together at EU level.

The European Climate Data Explorer, developed jointly by the Copernicus Climate Change Services (C3S) and the EEA, provides easy access to climate variables and climate impact indicators from the C3S Climate Data Store. It also enables zooming in on maps to focus on smaller regions of interest; it includes time series for specific regions, and users can export images and data. This new tool is intended to support European countries to develop and implement their national, subnational and local climate adaptation strategies. It will be expanded in the future with further indices, new data sources and additional functionalities.

A new screening tool for Denmark, called KAMP, compares selected national data, calculations and projections and it is aimed in particular at planning and environmental works in local government. The tool can be used to assess how many buildings and infrastructure could potentially be affected by flooding, and it can estimate the value of the buildings and constructions that risk damage.

The Climate Action Plan 2.0 of the Alpine Convention, developed by the Alpine Climate Board (ACB) and approved by the XVI Alpine Conference, was released in April 2021. Paving the way for the short and mid-term implementation of the Alpine Climate Target System 2050 towards climate neutral and climate resilient Alps, the plan identifies implementation pathways with concrete priorities in ten sectors.

This policy paper by OECD provides a comprehensive assessment of the recent and projected socio-economic development of coastal areas. It reviews the environmental pressures exerted by human activities on coastal areas, as well as the impacts of climate change that exacerbate existing challenges. The paper calls for a coordinated and well adapted policy response to address these challenges.

This 5th OPERANDUM webinar will be about a digital hub called Geospatial Information Knowledge Platform (GeoIKP). It is aimed to scale up public awareness, knowledge and uptake of Nature-based Solutions when addressing hydro-meteorological hazards and it can fuel vulnerable communities to adapt to climate change.

CASCADE project (funded by the EU) aims to improve the capacity to understand, assess, and treat current and future climate change related risks on the local level, focusing on the particular in Baltic Sea Region conditions. This final event will bring forward the results and recommendations from the project and also discusses the future of climate adaptation and resilience in the Baltic Sea Region.

Three articles in the April 2021 issue of the magazine "UMID: Umwelt und Mensch – Informationsdienst" deal with heat action plans (HAPs). In their articles, the authors discuss the effectiveness of heat action plans in Europe, shed light on the state of health care in Germany and give recommendations for the development of HAPs: action needed in terms of heat prevention.

The “HeatResilientCity” project, investigating since 2017 on how urban districts and buildings can be better adapted to heat, has been extended by two years by the German Federal Environment Ministry. In the second phase of the project, the plan is to familiarize practitioners with the subject of heat adaptation in urban districts, to form new networks and to jointly develop suitable tools and decision-making aids for urban and open space planning.

A new version of the Swedish Climate Change Adaptation Portal has been launched with a new design and more content. The portal shows how the Swedish society is affected by the changing climate, and how adaptation work is being carried out. Almost 30 agencies contribute to the portal content.

The main aim of the conference is to bring together scientists, policy makers, as well as all organizations and citizens engaged with climate change impacts and adaptation at the urban environment.

The goal of this conference is to inspire adaptation action by showcasing solutions, exchanging knowledge, creating connections, and encouraging dialogue on how to act more and faster at every level. A webinar series on pressing climate change adaptation challenges from 25 May to 10 June will be followed by the high-level conference on 22 June.

Working with nature and enhancing the role of ecosystems can societies help to adapt on climate change, reduce its impacts, and increase climate change resilience. Such an approach can deliver multiple benefits, including lowering pressures on biodiversity, improving human health and well-being, reducing greenhouse gas emissions and building a sustainable economy, according to a new European Environment Agency report.

In three virtual sessions of two hours on 4, 18 and 25 May, learning and capacity development activities will be organised to support countries in designing and applying integrated approaches in their adaptation, mitigation, and development agendas.