Latest news and events on Climate-ADAPT

A one-day conference (online and in-person workshops) focus to various innovation aspects, exploring the impacts of nature-based solutions for climate change adaptation, biodiversity, people and society, and health & wellbeing.

The more than 90-year-old green oasis, Enghaveparken, has been transformed following an extensive renovation project. The park is now one of the largest climate change adaptation projects in the City of Copenhagen, and can now retain up to 22,600 cubic meters of stormwater runoff, where as normal rainfall channeled to the park, can be reused.

The German Environment Agency has presented the "Climate Impact and Risk Assessment 2021“. If climate change continues unchecked, the risks from heat, drought and heavy rainfall throughout Germany will increase sharply in the future, the study says. The damage will have a knock-on effect on ecosystems that are already heavily polluted, such as soils, forests and water bodies, and on humans and their health. The study also shows that many of these risks can only be reduced through immediate action as many adaptation measures take a very long time to become effective.

On 12 May 2021 the International Association of National Public Health Institutes (IANPHI) held a webinar to discuss how COVID-19 affected heat waves risks in 2020. Experts were discussing the key lessons learned by the national public health institutes and other public health stakeholders, and exchanged solutions and good practices.

This year’s edition of the European Union (EU) Green Week, Europe’s biggest annual environmental event, has closed with record involvement from citizens and stakeholders around the EU. Dedicated to the EU ambition of a zero pollution, the event zoomed in on efforts to tackle pollution of air, soil and water, creating a world where pollution is no longer harmful for people’s health and ecosystems.

Based on new national risk mapping, the Danish Coastal Authority has made new analyses and strategies available for use in coastal protection planning efforts. "Kystplanlægger" is a coastal planning tool targeted at coastal municipalities. The entire Danish coastline has been risk-mapped up to 2120 with respect to better manage the risks of flooding and erosion.

The EU funded Life Adaptate project organizes its final conference to present and exchange the latest advances in climate change research in six countries and municipalities. The aim of this conference is to bring together scientists, policymakers, organizations and citizens engaged with climate change impacts and adaptation in the urban environment.

In the framework of the EU project ENERGee Watch, partners are developing Peer-to-Peer learning courses targeted to local authorities, and local and regional energy and climate agencies. One course is dedicated to adaptation to climate change: climate change adaptation and assessment, methods and data for diagnosis, indicators and strategies, and guides participants in building their own roadmap to ensure that adaptation to climate change is integrated into energy-climate action plans. The courses will be held online in 2021 and 2022.

The EU Interreg Project ADRIADAPT has come to an end. The Adriadapt multilingual web platform now acts as a support tool for each municipality in the Adriatic region offering solutions to address predicted impacts in this area, and as a guide for planning and implementing resilience and adaptation plans.

The World Health Organization (WHO) launches public consultation on draft COP26 Special report on climate change and health, with the deadline for comments on the 25 August 2021. The COP26 Special Report: 'The Health Argument for Climate Action', aims to raise the health voice, health arguments and health urgency of tackling the climate crisis. It reflects the growing evidence and availability of solutions to maximize the health benefits of tackling climate change, while also offering a clear set of asks and proposed solutions from the global health community to climate change policy makers at COP26.

In this workshop, co-organised by the European Environment Agency/Climate-ADAPT, findings and key messages from the concluding KE4CAP project, funded by the European Commission, will be presented. It aims to understand the evolving policy and practice context within which climate adaptation platforms (CAPs) operate, and to explore how knowledge exchange activities can help CAPs support multi-level governance of adaptation in the future. This workshop will bring together the international CAP community. It is targeted towards organizations planning or preparing, and managing adaptation knowledge platforms at various governance levels.

This second Coastal Communities Adapting Together (CCAT) online event brings together practitioners and academics, with expertise in policymaking, coastal management, climate change adaptation, community engagement and is about debating the best practices in supporting coastal communities in Wales and Ireland to understand the impact of climate change, and how it might impact their local communities. CCAT is an Interreg project funded through the Ireland Wales Cooperation Programme.

The International Union for Conservation of Nature's (IUCN) World Conservation Congress is about setting priorities and driving conservation and sustainable development action. This delayed congress edition is about nature-based solutions for adaptation to climate change.

The IPCC is currently producing its Sixth Assessment Report (AR6), which consists of contributions from the three IPCC Working Groups and a Synthesis Report. The Working Group I contribution was published, and the main results were presented in a press conference on 9 August 2021. This report will be a key contribution to the UNFCCC COP26, which is starting in less than three months.

In June 2021, the Council of the EU adopted the new European climate law. It sets into legislation the objective of a climate-neutral EU by 2050. It also requires EU institutions to ‘ensure continuous progress in enhancing adaptive capacity, strengthening resilience and reducing vulnerability to climate change’, thereby making adaptation a legal requirement for the EU for the first time.

The Race to Resilience is a global campaign run by the COP26 Presidency and High-Level Climate Champions to rally leadership and support from cities, regions, businesses and investors to help frontline communities build resilience and adapt to the impacts of climate change. The Race to Resilience aims to catalyse action by non-state actors to build the resilience of 4 billion people from vulnerable groups and communities to climate risks.

With the adoption of the New EU Forest Strategy for 2030, a flagship initiative of the European Green Deal that builds on the EU Biodiversity Strategy for 2030, the EU is proposing a new strategy that contributes to the ‘Fitfor55’ package of measures proposed to achieve greenhouse gas emission reductions. Forests are a natural ally in adapting to and fighting against climate change and biodiversity loss, and will play a vital role in making Europe the first climate neutral continent by 2050.

The European Commission has released the “Fit for 55” package, a suite of measures that will underpin the European Union’s efforts to reach its pledge of reducing greenhouse gas emissions 55% from 1990 levels by 2030. Part of the larger EU Green Deal, the package includes policy proposals that define the pathway for the EU's ambition to fulfil its contribution under the Paris Agreement. It includes all elements of the Green Deal including the new EU's Climate Adaptation Strategy. It is the Commission's proposal for the legislative tools to deliver on the targets agreed in the European Climate Law.

A new report shows that EU’s ecosystems generated an annual flow of selected seven ecosystem services at the value of € 172 billion. Restoring degraded ecosystems, which helps climate regulation and in protection against natural disasters, has the potential to double nature’s contribution to the EU economy.

The conference carried out as a webinar series organised by the Disaster Competence Network Austria (DCNA) supports the dialogue and the networking between the individual scientific disciplines and departments in disaster management. It covers climate change related impacts such as extreme weather events and floods, as well as the protection of critical infrastructure and discusses various methods of disaster management.

The European Central Bank (ECB) and the European Systemic Risk Board (ESRB) have published the “Climate-related risk and financial stability”, a report that maps out prospective financial stability risks and establishes a detailed topology of physical and transition risks arising from climate change across regions, sectors and firms.

The 2021 Climate Alliance International Conference will explore how municipalities across Europe are already building on EU climate policy by making it tangible, and working with stakeholders towards an inclusive transition for all.

The European Commission’s Green City Accord has hit a milestone number of cities willing to adopt even more ambitious environmental protection targets. Alba Iulia (Romania), Košice (Slovakia) and Grenoble (France), the European Green Capital 2022, all made their commitment official. These cities join other signatories in setting ambitious targets to tackle pollution, protect nature and biodiversity, and to support the circular economy and local climate adaptation actions.

In spite of the COVID-19 pandemic, Europeans remain very concerned about climate change and support action across the EU to tackle it, according to the latest Eurobarometer survey by the European Commission. European citizens now identify climate change as the single most serious problem facing the world. A majority of the respondents agrees that adapting to the adverse impacts of climate change can have positive outcomes for citizens in the EU.

The European Commission adopted the Work Programme 2021-2022 of the new EU framework programme for research and innovation Horizon Europe. Compared to Horizon 2020, the basic structure of the individual work programs has changed to a breakdown into 'destinations', 'calls' and 'topics'.

The Joint Research Centre (JRC) released a new report that calls for better coordination to manage the risk of severe droughts, as climate change brings increasing global temperatures and disrupts rainfall patterns.

This workshop facilitates a dialogue on integrated approaches across Regions4's main three agendas: climate action, biodiversity, and sustainable development, and their interlinkages.

Participative workshop to kick start a dialogue on how to collectively accelerate the transition towards a nature-inclusive and climate-resilient society.

Daring Cities is designed to empower urban leaders – such as mayors, city councilors, administrators, and urban thought leaders, as well as civil society decision-makers and community organizers – to tackle the climate emergency, inlcuding approaches on adaptation to climate change.

The aim of this call for project proposals topic is to identify, monitor and quantify the direct and indirect impacts on human health, including in occupational settings, and related risk factors correlated to climate change. Projects are expected to contribute, inter alia to the European Climate and Health Observatory.