Lehmann, Karl, Melanie Kemper 2017: Website-Konzept für die Fördermaßnahme "Plastik in der Umwelt" www.bmbf-plastik.de. Berlin, unpublished.

Carbon and Climate Law Review (CCLR), a leading journal in the field of climate change law and policy, celebrates its 10th anniversary this year. Since its inception, colleagues from Ecologic Institute have contributed to its success as authors and members of the Editorial Board. To commemorate the anniversary, CCLR invited the authors of the inaugural issue to revisit their articles from a decade ago, and to reflect on them with the present perspective.

Kemper, Melanie, Georg Lamberty, Falko Wagner 2017: Informationsplattform Gewässerrenaturierung – Website Konzept, Berlin, September 2017, unpublished.

This book describes and analyses necessities for a more resource-efficient world. Authors across Europe, discuss solutions for a more sustainable use of natural resources and present good practice examples – such as repair services, digitalised construction projects and chemical leasing. The book addresses decision-makers and experts from the fields of policy development, industry, academia, civil society, and the media. Ecologic Institute's Mandy Hinzmann, Nick Evans, Terri Kafyeke, Stephen Bell and Martin Hirschnitz-Garbers took on the role of managing editors.

Ecologic Institute co-authored the RECREATE policy brief no. 7 on challenges and opportunities for national waste prevention programs. The authors state that the political framework needs to be more enabling and with further support for research and development targeted at measuring waste prevention and behavior change to unlock the potential of waste prevention. The RECREATE policy brief is available for download.

The EU is currently negotiating a comprehensive reorientation of energy and climate policy for the decade 2020-2030. Ecologic Institute drafted a strategy paper on how the next German federal government can shape the EU negotiations so as to create an EU electricity market regulation that is conducive to the German energy transition. Four central elements are identified: raising the ambition of energy targets and introducing long-term targets, developing effective oversight instruments to ensure compliance, adjusting the electricity market to the needs of wind and solar power, and initiating an exit strategy for coal firing. The paper is available for download.

'Protecting the natural environment is part of our responsibility for future generations' – this is the environmental policy guiding principle of the coalition agreement of Merkel's third cabinet. Has the Federal Government made environmental protection its guiding principle in the last four years? The answer: there is light and shadow. More light in international environmental policy and more shade at home. There have been some important achievements, but in the last four years none of the negative environmental trends have been stopped or even reversed. All in all far too little – as Nils Meyer-Ohlendorf finds in this opinion paper.

On 5 September 2017, Stephanie Wunder, Senior Fellow at Ecologic Institute, gave a short presentation at the Federal Environment Agency's "Forum 2017 - Effectively reducing food waste - achieving more together". She reported on interim results from the European project REFRESH, which deals with the prevention of food waste and the recycling of surplus food.

Cross-border trade and the rules governing it impact consumers. Trade has benefits for consumers, such as access to goods not available domestically. Yet it also has certain risks, such as exposure to traded goods that may be dangerous. Against this background, consumer organisations on both sides of the Atlantic have been discussing what a consumer-friendly trade policy could look like. Christiane Gerstetter and Lena Donat of Ecologic Institute's Legal Team have compiled a study examining what complaint mechanisms for consumer organisations concerning international trade agreements could look like.

The illegal pollution of soil, water, and air, the illegal trade in protected species or the illegal shipment of waste abroad – these are different forms of environmental crime. Environmental crime has many negative consequences. Its environmental impacts range from the destruction of forests to the pollution of water, soil, and air and even to species extinction. Moreover, many types of environmental crime also affect human health, and organised forms of environmental crime undermine state structures and sustainable development.

In the framework of the scientific accompanying research (PlastikNet) of the research focus "Plastics in the Environment – Sources • Sinks • Solutions" (Plastik in der Umwelt – Quellen • Senken • Lösungsansätze) Ecologic Institute coordinated 20 joint research projects, which dealt with plastics in the environment funded by the German Federal Ministry for Education and Research (Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung, BMBF).

Using natural resources sustainably in the long term requires applying and scaling-up resource efficient technologies and infrastructures as well as changing behaviour and social practices. Technologies and infrastructure can only then unfold resource savings potential, when accepted and used across society. In this context, socio-economic and socio-cultural developments will affect both the availability and the use of technological and social innovations.

As part of a project to structure the energy law, Ecologic Institute contributed to a working paper on improved disclosure of subsidized electricity from renewable energy sources in electricity labelling. In this paper, criticisms of the regulations on the disclosure of EEG electricity in electricity labeling are evaluated and proposals for further development are presented. The discussion paper is available for download.

In the frame of this project a short study on the policy instrument of specific CO2-emission targets for car manufacturers in the EU is carried out which analyses and evaluates the policy instrument. The foci of the research are two questions: How did the instrument perform regarding the reductions of specific CO2-emissions of passenger cars? And how much can it contribute to reduce overall CO2-emissions of passenger transport in the EU, so as to contribute to reaching the target of the Paris agreement to stay below a warming of 2°C? The short study is available for download.

The chapter "Why are Green Fiscal Policies such a Small Part of Green Economic Policies? Evidence from three European Countries" of the book 'The Green Market Transition - Carbon Taxes, Energy Subsidies and Smart Instrument Mixes' presents and compares the green tax systems in place in Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands. One of the chapters authors, Ecologic Institute's Marius Hasenheit, describes the evolution of green taxes in Germany.