The Jean Monnet Network on Atlantic Studies is an initiative across the four Atlantic continents by 10 leading think tanks and independent experts to collaborate in interdisciplinary exploration of three emerging pan-Atlantic themes of particular relevance to the European Union: (1) energy and transport in the context of climate change; (2) commercial interactions such as trade and investment; and (3) pan-Atlantic challenges to human security.

The aim of the ATLANTIC FUTURE FP7 research project is to study the rationales of cooperation in the Atlantic area and identify EU strategies for engaging in a wider transatlantic relationship within the Atlantic space.

The committees of the European Parliament play a critical role in ensuring the effectiveness of EU policy during both the development of legislation and policy and its subsequent implementation. The Committee on Foreign Affairs (Affaires étrangères, AFET) is one of the 20 Committees of the European Parliament and is, among others, responsible for the Common Foreign Security Policy (CFSP) and the European Security and Defence Policy (ESDP). Ecologic Institute was leading a consortium of six institutes given a framework contract to provide the European Parliament’s Foreign Policy Committees with independent expert advice on a range of issues relating to developmental and environmental policy. During the course of this project, standard briefings, ad-hoc briefings, studies and workshops were conducted.

The EC increasingly participates in international conferences and mixed international agreements alongside its Member States. The appearance of both EC and Member States raises questions of competences for the negotiation, conclusion and implementation of such international instruments. In particular in the field of marine environment, substantial progress is hindered by an opaque division of competences between the EC and its Member States and lack of coordination. Accordingly, the German Federal Environmental Agency commissioned Ecologic with the task of analysing the division of external competences between the EC and its Member States taking into account the OSPAR-Convention.

Annually since 2012, the Policy Center for the New South, previously known as OCP Policy Center, holds its Atlantic Dialogues conference in Morocco. In 2017, it established the Atlantic Dialogues Advisory Board (AD-AB). R. Andreas Kraemer, Founder and Director Emeritus of Ecologic Institute, was appointed and now serves on the Atlantic Dialogues Advisory Board.

At the 2018 Global Think Tank Summit (GTTS2018) in Brussels, hosted by European think tank Bruegel and the Think Tank and Civil Societies Program (TTCSP) of the University of Pennsylvania, Ecologic Institute prepared and hosted a panel on the geopolitics of climate change. It covered the geopolitical dynamics of accelerating climate change as well as the geopolitical consequences of transformation in the energy and transport sectors.

<p>How can we improve policy monitoring of national implementation to further protect the Arctic environment and its inhabitants? With the WWF Arctic Council Scorecards, Ecologic Institute and WWF International Arctic Programme continue and update the overview of the implementation status of specific recommendations by the Arctic Council with a particular focus on maritime activities, climate change and biodiversity protection as well as ecosystem-based management.</p>

Resource extraction has often significant impacts on the environment. Ecologic Institute analyses for the German Federal Environment Agency governance instruments which can foster, establish and enforce global standards for environmentally sound raw material extraction. The project assesses international treaties, international customary law and non-binding international instruments, as well as European and national instruments with extraterritorial effect. Based on this assessment, Ecologic Institute develops recommendations how existing instruments could be improved or new approaches could be developed. The study covers abiotic raw materials (metals and ore, other minerals and fossil raw materials) and their extraction, treatment, transport and processing.

How can we improve policy monitoring of national implementation to further protect the Arctic environment and its inhabitants? With the WWF Arctic Council Scorecards, Ecologic Institute and WWF International Arctic Programme undertook the effort to provide a first overview of the implementation status of specific recommendations by the Arctic Council with a particular focus on maritime activities, climate change and biodiversity protection as well as ecosystem-based management.

In this project, Ecologic Institute together with ICLEI and Umweltbundesamt Wien, support the Committee of the Regions in analysing the role of cities and regions in the UNFCCC process after the adoption of the Paris Agreement. The project identifies positions of cities and regions, analyses the outcome of COP21 in this respect, and highlights future opportunities in the UNFCCC process to get remaining positions endorsed.

The international negotiations on the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) currently mainly focus on the design of the future climate regime. Ecologic Legal provides expert advice to the German Federal Ministry of the Environment, Nature Conservation, Construction and Nuclear Safety, especially on the development and assessment of German and EU positions. The project builds on the work of the earlier project "Further legal and institutional aspects of the international post-2012-climate negotiations."

The American Institute for Contemporary German Studies (AICGS) at Johns Hopkins University initiated a project in collaboration with the Ecologic Institute discussing the geopolitics of the Energy Transformation.