On October 12th and 13th the 2020 European Sustainable Development Network (ESDN) Annual Conference took place. Together with prominent speakers like Angela Merkel and Achim Steiner participants discussed the transformative potential of the EU Green Deal. Stephanie Wunder, Senior Fellow at the Ecologic Institute presented what steps are needed next to implement the Green Deals’ Farm to Fork Strategy. The presentation is available for download.

Nature-based solutions (NBS) are solutions that are inspired and supported by nature. They can be used in urban settings to complement or replace "traditional" or "grey" solutions to social and environmental challenges, such as air pollution, the heat island effect, water scarcity, flooding, loss of nature and lack of social cohesion. This guidance document highlights a range of policy and supporting instruments relevant for NBS design, implementation and maintenance.

2020: Green refuges for enabling cities' preparedness for future pandemics and global change. ENABLE Policy Brief 3.

Ecologic Institute, in collaboration with the Frankfurt School of Finance & Management and Ramboll Consulting, implemented the project "Accessibility of the Climate Change Adaptation Finance Data in Europe" for the European Environment Agency (EEA). The objective of this project was to create a succinct package of information consisting of (1) a literature review, and (2) responses from a questionnaire collecting national adaptation finance information.

This project assesses a selection of climate-change adaptation measures for the agriculture sector and gathers quantitative evidence on their potential to compensate for climate-change induced productivity losses. The results feed into the parent project "Climate change and bioeconomy – Sustainability gap analysis for the agricultural sector".

The European Parliament improves the Commission's proposal for a European Climate Law. Gross reduction target for 2030, legally binding climate neutrality targets, emissions budgets and a European Climate Council would make the European Climate Law what it should be: a reliable compass for the path to climate neutrality by 2050, writes Nils Meyer-Ohlendorf in his article for Tagesspiegel.

Together with FutureCamp, Ecologic Institute examines in detail the design options of climate protection contracts. The focus is on the practical implementation of the instrument, such as the design in compliance with EU state aid law as well as overlap and demarcation with other (funding) instruments.

This Briefing Paper examines coordination and implementation challenges between the water and agricultural sectors in relation to water quantity in the context of WFD implementation in the Spanish Guadalquivir river basin. The challenges are interlinked by the underlying difficulty of imposing unpopular decisions against the will of powerful actors in the agricultural sector. To address these challenges, the authors suggest various coordination instruments based on incentives, voluntary cooperation, persuasion and information exchange.The Briefing Paper presents one of six analyses of cross-sectoral coordination challenges that were conducted as part of the STEER research project and on which separate Briefing Papers are available.

The completed governance analysis shows that coordination in the Emscher catchment area is already effective. There is room for improvement when it comes to involving citizens and planning processes should also be characterised by a higher degree of flexibility. The analysis provides recommendations. This paper constitutes one of six analyses of cross-sectoral challenges in water governance. These have been conducted as part of the STEER research project and results are published in separate analyses and position papers.

As part of the Berlin Re-Use initiative, the online expert dialogue on strengthening the reuse of furnishings and building components took place on October 6, 2020. The aim of the virtual expert dialogue was to bring together stakeholders from the construction industry, initiatives, DIY stores, demolition and disposal companies who are committed to the reuse of building components and furnishings. Dwindling raw material supplies, shrinking landfill space and pressing climate change show that a fundamental rethink of how to deal with raw materials and waste is needed. The current linear economic model must change - away from the principle of "take, use, dispose" to circular economic activity. The ten speakers presented their re-use projects and shared their practical experiences. They discussed how re-use can be promoted in the construction and furnishing sectors and what obstacles need to be overcome. The 80 or so participants took the opportunity to ask questions and provide impetus for the discussion.

The new EU climate architecture should include a separate CDR target that builds primarily on restoring degraded ecosystems. This target should be legally binding and quantified – for the EU and Member States. It should not be a combined target which treats reductions and CDRs equally. This EU's CDR target should be enshrined in the European Climate Law.

The project focuses its respective activities on two regions: Eastern Wielkopolska in Poland and Lausitz in Germany. It provides local communities with a forum for inclusive debate. The forum invites citizens to address the region's specific problems, seek solutions, and formulate concrete project ideas. The project also offers access to policy updates, best practices, useful information, and opportunities for networking and exchange of ideas between Eastern Wielkopolska and Lausitz.

Ecologic Institute concluded the project "The Future of the EU – Make Climate Action its Trademark". The project established a network of think tanks from eight EU Member States – Germany, Bulgaria, Czechia, Estonia, Hungary, Italy, Romania, and Poland. The project monitored the domestic debates on the Conference on the Future of Europe (CFE) and its link to climate policies. The project also facilitated dialogues on the CFE between Member States, and contributed regularly to national debates on the CFE.

In the scope of the SUDEA project, Ecologic Institute and its partners analysed the challenges of sustainable urban development, to build up city environments that match with global environmental goals. The project's main hypothesis was, that urban development in the Arctic will be more sustainable if the positions of local stakeholders are reflected in decision-processes and policies are aligned across the national and regional level.