Scheduled to take place from 5 to 9 June 2017, the 3rd European Climate Change Adaptation Conference has now opened its call for abstracts. The theme for ECCA 2017 is ‘Our Climate Ready Future’. The conference aims to inspire and enable people to work together to discover and deliver positive climate adaptation solutions that can strengthen society, revitalise local economies and enhance the environment.

The call is open for both session and abstract submissions. Three types of sessions will be organised: Practice, Science-practice, and Science. All session and abstract submissions should link to one of the conference themes.

Abstracts from practitioners and scientists that show real-world examples of climate adaptation are welcome. Case study abstracts showing how their experience can be useful to others, e.g. through identifying lessons learned, providing recommendations on best practice and considering whether the approach could be transferred to other regions or different contexts, are welcome.

More information on the conference website.

You can also download the flyer here.

The Second Hungarian case study workshop took place from 28-29 June 2016 in Veszprém, Hungary. The event brought together about 50 stakeholders and researchers to discuss what could be the possible solutions for Hungary by 2100 in the event of extreme climate change (above 2°C).

Watch the video reoprt: 

Videographer: Dénes Fellegi (http://www.fellegicreation.com/)

Find all IMPRESSIONS videos on our YouTube Channel.

Planned series of three workshops for each case study are at the beating heart of IMPRESSIONS research efforts. These events allow researchers to meet stakeholders from across policy and practice and measure the project’s work against real-world needs and experiences.

With the advice collected from the first Hungarian case study workshop in 2015, and with fresh ideas and results collected over the last year, the IMPRESSIONS team met up with Hungarian stakeholders for the second time to discuss different socio-economic scenarios and a positive vision for the region.

The Second Hungarian case study workshop took place from 28-29 June 2016 in Veszprém, Hungary. The event brought together about 50 stakeholders and researchers with the aim to develop possible adaptation and mitigation solutions for Hungary by 2100 in the event of extreme climate change (above 2°C ).

Group photo - worskhop participants; Credit: Gellért Gombai

Various aspects of climate change impacts were discussed in several main categories, including: human health, agricultural and urban land use, and water.

Taking back results from the discussions, IMPRESSIONS researchers will now model the possible pathways from now until 2100 that will ensure sustainability of the jointly developed positive vision.

  
  
Scenario visuals; Credit: BEE Environmental Communication

A new EEA report ‘Urban adaptation to climate change in Europe 2016 – transforming cities in a changing climate’ provides an in-depth overview of actions that urban planners and policymakers can take to help lessen the impact of climate change. The report outlines the changes and socio-economic challenges cities face due to climate change, and the possible consequences.

It analyses the approaches cities can take to adaptation and explains that short-term coping or incremental adaptation measures alone will not be enough to mitigate the threats.

The report targets local, regional, national and European governments and organisations as well as experts and researchers concerned with urban adaptation. It complements other Agency products such as the EEA report 2/2012: Urban adaptation to Climate change in Europe – Challenges and Opportunities and the interactive map book on urban vulnerability to climate change.

The EEA’s task is to provide knowledge for this process at different levels. The Agency provides assessment reports and maintains the European Climate Adaptation Platform Climate-ADAPT and facilitates information exchange among stakeholders, such as co-organising the annual Open European Day Resilient Cities.

From 23 to 24 May 2016, the IMPRESSIONS project hosted its second Central Asia case study in Baku, Azerbaijan. In a conference room overlooking the Caspian Sea, with Central Asia at the opposite end, 26 participants from Central Asia, Russia, China, Europe and beyond, discussed with the IMPRESSIONS team current and future challenges for the Central Asia region, against the backdrop of high-end climate change.

Central Asia is deeply affected by current climate variability. Future climate change is likely to bring significant risks to people, infrastructure and natural resources in the region, but the extent of future impacts depends on the quantity and quality of development in the region over the coming decades. The same climate impact – for example a prolonged drought – will have very different consequences depending on the social, political, economic and cultural features of the society that is impacted. That is one reason why it is especially important to consider the impacts of future climate change across a range of socio-economic scenarios. 

Following the first workshop in Kazakhstan in 2015, four regional socio-economic scenarios were developed that explore four distinct worlds in Central Asia until 2100. In Baku, these four scenarios, representing a plausible realm of possibilities for the future, were used as a basis for this strategy exercise in an intense two-day workshop: through an interactive process, the discussions focused on exploring the impacts of high-end climate change in Central Asia and its spillover effects in Russia and China; and comparing the respective strategic approaches for and towards the region, forming sets of strategies. In order to enable an integrated perspective on these issues, the attending stakeholders and experts represented civil society, businesses, research and international organisations, with expertise in various sectors such as water, energy, agriculture and security. 

In the coming months, the IMPRESSIONS team will be compiling and analyzing the rich inputs received from the participants, in preparation for the third and final Central Asia case study workshop in 2017.

Inside IMPRESSIONS is taking a journey to explain what's behind the project's structure. In the following months you can learn more about each work package and the research involved in it straight from our top scientists and work package leaders.

After WP1's video last month, in this new episode Dr Jens Christensen, Danish Meteorological Institute and Dr Kasper Kok, Wageningen University, talk about the work within WP2, integrated multi-scale scenarios and IMPRESSIONS case studies.

A first draft design of the Information Hub together with a summary of the next steps has been finalized as an important milestone towards one of IMPRESSIONS’s major outputs.

The IMPRESSIONS Information Hub will synthesise the results of the project and aims to become both a reflective and engaging open tool to steer further debate on how to confront high-end scenarios in Europe and beyond.

The Hub is planned as an easy-to-use tool for practitioners aiming to gain practical insights on the results of the projects using, for example, maps, policy briefs, narratives, videos and infographics. It will also provide guidance for practitioners and other researchers to follow the steps taken within the IMPRESSIONS project, such as participatory scenario development, visioning, pathway development, and assessment of risks and opportunities in the context of high-end scenarios.

Over the coming months the design of the Hub will evolve based on discussions within the project and with stakeholders in upcoming workshops. This will proceed together with the development of the content of the Hub.

How can society plan for the future if we only look at individual issues in isolation? Climate change impact studies typically focus on a single sector such as agriculture, forestry or water, ignoring the implications of how different sectors interact. A new study, published in Nature Climate Change, suggests that an integrated, cross-sectoral approach to climate change assessment is needed to provide a more complete picture of impacts that enables better informed decisions about climate adaptation.

The importance of a cross-sectoral approach as a prerequisite for any type of comprehensive climate impact assessment is not a new notion. Already stressed by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), it is surprising that until now no published research has assessed the differences between impacts simulated by single sector and integrated models.

As a part of the FP7-funded EU project IMPRESSIONS* which aims to assess the implications of high-end climate change (+2 degrees and above), the new paper aims to demonstrate the benefits of using multi-sectoral modelling approaches.

"To address the current knowledge gap, in our paper we compare 14 indicators derived from a set of impact models run within single sector and integrated frameworks across a range of climate and socio-economic scenarios in Europe. The results show that single sector studies misrepresent the spatial pattern, direction and magnitude of most impacts because they omit the complex interdependencies within human and environmental systems", explains Dr. Paula Harrison, Center for Ecology & Hydrology (CEH), UK.

Full press release.

The original research article is available here.

Miriam Dunn, University of Edinburgh and IMPRESSIONS Scottish case study leader, gives an update on the recent IMPRESSIONS second workshop for the Scottish case study, held at the Stirling Court Hotel in spring 2016. The purpose of this workshop was to further develop the stakeholders’ vision for Scotland in 2100; to explore how different policy measures might help or hinder to achieve that vision under the different socio-economic scenarios developed in the first workshop; and to explore the updated information about climate change impacts for different sectors.

On the 11^th and 12^th April, 20 stakeholders from a wide range of organisations with an interest in land resource management in Scotland participated in a two-day workshop with researchers as part of IMPRESSIONS. The workshop was the second of three workshops for the case study and included a majority of stakeholders who were also participants in the first workshop. The days featured facilitated breakout sessions during which the stakeholders explored updated information about the projected climate change impacts for different sectors in Scotland and, considered these alongside four different socio-economic scenarios. The stakeholders also looked at how different climate change adaptation policy measures might fare within the scenarios, and discussed what could be done to help achieve their vision for Scotland in 2100.

Feedback from the workshop was overwhelmingly positive, with stakeholders commenting that they had found it to be useful, inspiring and thought-provoking. And as always, the researchers involved welcomed the opportunity to work with such a diverse, knowledgeable and engaged group of stakeholders.

Video credit: Archie Crofton

IMPRESSIONS

The IMPRESSIONS (IMPacts and Risks from high-End Scenarios – Strategies for InnOvative solutioNS) project aims to increase our understanding of the consequences of high-end climate change, and in so doing to support adaptation strategies of stakeholders. It is a major EU-funded project that includes Scotland as a case study. It has built upon the scenarios developed by the CLIMSAVE project, but this time focuses on decision-makers’ strategies for dealing with the impacts of high-end (>2°C) climate change in Scotland. The project brings together researchers as well as stakeholders from both policy and practice and from varied sectors across Scotland.

Stakeholders are an integral part of the IMPRESSIONS (IMPacts and Risks from high-End Scenarios– Strategies for InnOvative solutioNS) project and their continuing enthusiastic involvement makes the project successful.

Next Steps

The outcomes of the workshop are being used to feed back into the project over the next 2 years to identify adaptation and mitigation pathways (and policies) to address climate change impacts; to develop action plans and empowering narratives; and most importantly, to support adaptation strategies of stakeholders within the land resource management sectors in Scotland. A key goal is to create better contextualised and more usable information about adapting to climate change. If you are interested in being involved in the next workshop, please feel free to get in touch.

Further information about the project can be accessed on the website or by contacting Miriam Dunn (miriam.dunn@ed.ac.uk).

In the beginning of March, the European Commission presented an assessment of the implications for the European Union of the new global climate agreement adopted in Paris in December 2015. The assessment looks at the next steps in the process and how the Paris Agreement will be implemented in the EU. The assessment is accompanied by a proposal for the European Union to sign the Paris Agreement.

The immediate next step is the signature of the Paris Agreement. The Agreement will open for signatures on 22 April 2016 in New York, and enter into force when at least 55 Parties representing at least 55% of global emissions have ratified. Moving forward, the EU will need to be prepared to participate fully in the international processes foreseen under the Paris Agreement, including the periodic "global stocktakes" designed to progressively review ambition levels and progress made. The EU will also need to continue to deliver its fair share on climate finance.  

During the next 12 months, the Commission will present the key remaining legislative proposals to implement the 2030 climate and energy framework. This includes proposals for an Effort-Sharing Decision for sectors not covered by the EU emissions trading system and on land use, land use change and forestry (LULUCF) as well as legislation to set up a reliable and transparent governance mechanism for the post-2020 period. The Commission will also present the necessary policy proposals to adapt the EU's regulatory framework in order to put energy efficiency first and to foster EU's role as a world leader in the field of renewable energy.

Inside IMPRESSIONS is taking a journey to explain what's behind the project's structure. In the following months you can learn more about each work package and the research involved in it straight from our top scientists and work package leaders.

In this first episode Tiago Capela Lourenço and Maria João Cruz from the Lisbon University, alongside Henrik Carlsen and Adiz Dzebo, Stokholm Environmental Institute, explain the work done in WP 1 - Innovative and effective decision-making under uncertainty.

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