<p>&#13; The 2010 Senior Congressional Staff Study Tour of Germany brought Chiefs of Staff of members of the US Congress to Berlin and Cologne to take stock of the political situation in Germany after the federal election in September 2009 and before the vote in North Rhine-Westphalia in May 2010. On invitation by The United States Association of Former Members of Congress (USAFMC), R. Andreas Kraemer of Ecologic Institute led a discussion on the current trends and outlook for energy policy in Germany and the European Union.</p>&#13;

In March 2010, Dr. Camilla Bausch and Benjamin Görlach of Ecologic Institute hosted the 14th Climate Talk, together with Dr. Susanne Dröge of the German Institute for International and Security Affairs, where questions concerning the governance of the international climate finance were discussed.

<p>&#13; The Water Integrity Network (WIN), hosted by Transparency International (TI) in Berlin, convened 20 experts for a consultation on the nexus of water corruption and integrity, environment and climate change.  The consultation on 29 March 2010 was held in the headquarter of the Heinrich Boell Foundation; it was chaired by R. Andreas Kraemer of Ecologic Institute, and supported by Grit Martinez of Ecologic Institute and WIN.</p>&#13;

<p>&#13; Christiane Gerstetter, Fellow Ecologic Legal, provided an introduction to various international agreements to a Palestinian audience during a workshop in Ramallah on 29-30 March 2010. The workshop was convened by the Environmental Quality Authority of the Palestinian National Authority (PNA). Its aim was to raise awareness among Palestinians about international environmental agreements.</p>

<p> Ecologic Institute was invited to participate in a conference on &quot;Climate Change Policy: Lessons from the European Experience&quot; hosted on 25 and 26 March 2010 by the Center for European Studies at Rutgers University as part of &quot;Lessons from Europe&quot;, a two-year program of events exploring what US policy-makers and citizens can learn from the experiences of European democracies in addressing 21st century policy challenges.</p>

The RADOST project brought together roughly 100 participants to its first annual conference, which took place in Schwerin. The focus of the conference was set on the challenges of climate change in the German Baltic Sea region. Discussions were held about the current state of scientific knowledge and approaches and practical examples of adaptation measures. The conference took place under the auspices of the Ministry of Economy, Labour and Tourism Mecklenburg-Vorpommern.

<p> European insights from the integration of emissions trading systems helped inform participants at GLOBE 2010, North America&rsquo;s largest international conference on business and the environment. Michael Mehling of the Ecologic Institute in Washington DC joined a panel sponsored by the German Consulate General in Vancouver.</p>

<p>&#13; In 2010 the German Energy Agency GmbH (dena) and the German American Chambers of Commerce (AHK USA) organized the 2nd German American Energy Conference. This year’s conference was themed „Promising Markets for Renewables and Energy Efficiency”. It offered information about current trends and support frameworks within U.S. and EU energy markets and how companies can benefit from them. The event attracted more than 400 participating experts and high level speakers. Within a panel discussion Stephanie Schlegel, Fellow und Coordinator Bioenergy and Agriculture at the Ecologic Institute spoke about opportunities for German biomass companies in the U.S. market and the relevance of sustainability requirements for the further development of transatlantic bioenergy markets.</p>&#13;

<p>&#13; As part of this year’s theme “Climate Change and Security Policy,” the Tönissteiner Kreis held this panel discussion in cooperation with the International Club of the Federal Foreign Office of Germany.  Stephan Sina from Ecologic Institute along with Steffen Bauer (German Development Institute) and Bernd Mesovic (Pro Asyl) sat on the panel. The discussion was moderated by Dagmar Dehmer (Tagesspiegel).</p>&#13;

<p>&#13; "Towards a Nuclear Power Renaissance? – Challenges for Global Energy Governance" was the theme of the 7th Transatlantic Energy Governance Dialogue convened by the Global Public Policy Institute (GPPI) and the Brookings Institution, supported by the European Commission, in Potsdam, Germany, on 4 to 5 March 2010.  R. Andreas Kraemer of Ecologic Institute offered his reflections on the proceedings and spoke about "A Transatlantic Agenda for Global Nuclear Governance" at the concluding panel.</p>&#13;

The German national Sustainable Development Strategy (SDS) has the potential to set the pace for Germany’s development towards a more sustainable society. Unfortunately, the strategy fails to define overarching strategic objectives. Isolated measures, indicators and time plans need to be bundled in an integrated strategy for the future. The authors of the policy brief "Sustainability needs Strategy" recommend that the German Government includes four new areas of action in its current SDS: sustainable wealth; sustainable labour policy; sustainable engagement policy and culture of sustainability. These areas are decisive to successfully embed sustainability in Germany’s government, economy and society and will determine whether Germany remains a leader in sustainability. Anneke von Raggamby, Senior Fellow and Head of European Integration at Ecologic Institute is Associate 2009/2010 at the stiftung neue verantwortung (snv) and was one of the authors of this policy brief. The policy brief "Sustainability needs Strategy" is available for download.

At the end of this year in Cancún, Mexico, a Roadmap for a binding climate agreement should be in place. After finding themselves at the sidelines of what was a disappointing Copenhagen summit, it is even more important that Europeans now inject new life into the negotiations.

Tanja Srebotnjak, Senior Fellow at Ecologic Institute, with co-authors Professor Christopher Murray and Professor Ali Mokdad from the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington in Seattle, USA, published a methods paper in Population Health Metrics on small area estimation.

In this article in Internationale Politik, Germany's leading foreign policy magazine, Martin Kremer of the Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik (SWP) and Sascha Müller-Kraenner, Senior Policy Advisor of Ecologic Institute, discuss the new tools for EU climate foreign policy under the Lisbon Treaty and the possible role of the European External Action Service.