The objective of this project was to provide Members of ENVI Committee of the European Parliament an overview of key issues and stakeholders' positions in preparation to the UN Ocean Conference in June 2017. The brief provides a short overview of the UN 2030 Agenda and specifically, Sustainable Development Goal 14: Conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas and marine resources for sustainable development (SDG 14). The brief identifies key issues for discussion at the upcoming Ocean Conference and the positions of the main stakeholders. The brief also provides an overview of the role of the EU and its current marine policies, actors and institutions. In a final section, several recommendations based on findings are suggested to guide the participation of ENVI Members at the Ocean Conference. The brief relies on discussions and position papers produced in preparation to the Ocean Conference until March 2017.
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Journalists, like the general public, often wrestle with the complex scientific foundations, politics and economics of climate change and its solutions. The Climate Change Summer School for Journalists addressed this very challenge with the primary aim of improving media coverage around the implementation of the Paris Agreement. Seventeen journalists from Africa, Asia and Latin America and the Caribbean participated in the ten-day training course. An overview of the articles and documentaries from journalists involved is available online.
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Green and Blue infrastructure (GBI) in cities holds large potential to effectively address emerging global challenges, such as climate change impacts, increasing urbanisation and declining access to nature, as it can deliver multiple societal, ecological and economic benefits in parallel. This multifunctional potential of GBI has only recently begun to gain weight in research, policy and planning and has yet to be fully unlocked. The EU-funded BiodivERsA project 'ENABLE' responds to this gap by utilizing a transdisciplinary systems approach to examine the relationship between social-ecological dynamics and GBI's potential to meet multiple goals, including biodiversity conservation and climate change adaptation. The four-year research project, funded by the BiodivERsA network, is led by the Stockholm Resilience Centre and supported by Ecologic Institute and nine other research partners.Read more
In 2017, Ecologic Institute is continuing to analyze key legislative proposals and political processes related to the 2030 energy and climate policy framework of the European Union (EU). This includes specifically the proposed regulations for the post-2020 Effort Sharing and for the Governance of the Energy Union. This work is being done in support of and as a contribution to an initiative by the European Climate Foundation (ECF), with the aim to advance the overall understanding of the options for future EU energy and climate governance in collaboration with many fellow research institutions.
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With the funding programme SINTEG, the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy (BMWi) seeks to implement practical tests for the energy supply of the future and the digitalisation of the energy sector. In five showcase regions new and innovative solutions, such as for example smart grids, are tested and exemplary solutions for a secure, efficient and climate-friendly energy supply with high proportions of intermittent power generation on the basis of wind and solar energy are developed. Ecologic Institute is part of the accompanying projects funded by the BMWi and manages the work package on regulatory framework and legal questions.Read more
The valuation of damages and risks for the human health caused by environmental pressures is a methodological challenge, as there are no market prices for most of those damages and risks. But a number of ecoomic methods have been developed to estimate and value those risks and damages.Read more
To put our energy system back on track to achieve the long term EU greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions reduction targets, scaled up efforts are required especially in the three major areas of energy consumption: transport, heating and cooling, as well as electricity generation for households and industry. As these sectors still rely largely on fossil fuels, radical technological changes are needed. Therefore, the main objective of this project is to obtain an overall picture of what technological options are available and how these options can be combined to drive decarbonisation efforts and ensure resilience of the EU energy system.
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Ecologic Institute is a core partner in the Framework contract for services to move towards good environmental status of the European marine waters by implementing the Marine Strategy Framework Directive (MSFD). The objective of the framework contract is to support DG Environment, the Members States, and the Regional Sea Conventions with the implementation of the MSFD.Read more
The Ecologic Institute is writing a brief study on the topic "the energy transition as a European project" on behalf of the Heinrich Böll Foundation. The study focuses on the electricity sector and the policy measures and objectives, which the EU and Germany's neighbouring countries pursue in this policy field.
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The Ecologic Institute supports the German Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation, Building and Nuclear Safety (BMUB) in their preparations for the newly established G20 Climate Sustainability Working Group.Read more
