The management board of the Deutsche Umwelthilfe e.V. (DUH) has appointed Sascha Müller-Kraenner—one of the founders and a partner of Ecologic Institute, Berlin and Vice-Chairman of the Ecologic Institute in Washington DC—as chief executive of the nature, environment, and consumer organization. The trained biologist has led the association since January 2015 together with Jürgen Resch who has held the position since 1986.

Dr. Nils Meyer-Ohlendorf testified in the Bundestag on investment protection under CETA on 15 December 2014 (Committee of Economy and Energy). He argued that investment protection in CETA is superfluous because the EU and Canada already provide high levels of investment protection through their national legal systems. His statement is available for download (in German only) or in Bundestag document 18 (9) 300.

The second European Climate Change Adaptation conference (ECCA) will take place in Copenhagen, 12–14 May 2015. Presentation abstracts can be submitted (link is external) until 1st of February 2015.

What does policy consultancy mean in practice? What is a think tank and what does it do? Christiane Gerstetter and Susanne Langsdorf discuss these and other questions with students of the bachelor program "Internationales Politikmanagement" (ISPM) at Bremen University of Applied Sciences. About 20 students participate in the seminar "Policy consulting in intermediary organisations".

In the course of an environmental research and development project of the Federal Environment Ministry (BMUB), the Federal Environment Agency established in 2012 the "Fish Protection and Downstream Fish Migration" forum. During the five workshops organised by this forum, over 200 representatives from the government, fishery and environmental organisations, energy industry, engineering offices, and research institutions held a discussion about Fish Protection and Downstream Fish Migration. During this discussion, the interests and positions about the status of knowledge and technology, the need for action, and research on the subject of population protection were developed and illustrated.

From 24 to 28 November 2014, Ecologic Institute implemented a study trip for 8 members of the South African Energy Committee. Participants were able to meet and discuss with representatives from ministries, think tanks, NGOs and business representatives in Berlin and Hamburg. Both national policies and examples of local and regional implementation of the German energy policy were highlighted while taking into consideration opportunities and challenges for South Africa.

When and why were environmental think tanks founded in Germany? How is the system for environmental consulting organized in Germany today? What is the daily work of an environmental think tank? Susanne Langsdorf, researcher at Ecologic Institute, presented the system in which environmental research and consultancy is organised in Germany and the daily work of an environmental think tank to students.

Christiane Gerstetter and Nils Meyer-Ohlendorf spoke on regulatory cooperation and investment protection in the stakeholder forum "TTIP re:negotiate" in Berlin on 17 November 2014. The event was co-organized by the Heinrich Böll Foundation and the School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) of Johns Hopkins University, Washington DC (USA).

On 14 November 2014 the workshop "model examples for prevention and management of marine litter in the Baltic and North" was held at Ecologic Institute in Berlin. Stefanie Schmidt presented "Governance schemes and measures for the prevention of marine litter -case study Germany," which were analyzed in the context of CLEANSEA. Following her presentation, she discussed with participating stakeholders from government, industry, academia and environmental organizations, the strengths and weaknesses of the existing approach and considered need and options for action. The presentation slides are available for download.

Susanne Altvater from Ecologic Institute moderated a workshop of the CleanSea project team with stakeholders of the German administration, industry, science community and NGOs. She presented aims and tasks of the CleanSea project. The presentation slides can be downloaded.

Ina Krüger's presentation gives a brief introduction to the ongoing works on task 5.2 of the CleanSea project, for which model cases are analysed concerning their current and possible future contribution to the prevention and management of marine litter in the Mediterranean, Baltic and North Sea. In the first part of this presentation the preliminary results of the analysis matrix are presented. In the second part, a model case on the collection and recycling of ghost nets is analysed and discussed in depth. The presentation slides are available for download.

From 14 to 15 November 2014 the conference, "Transformations of the Ecology Movement: from the 'Limits to Growth' to the Rio Conference," took place in the Archiv Grünes Gedächtnis (Green Memory Archive) of the Heinrich Böll Foundation in Berlin. Doris Knoblauch and Susanne Langsdorf (both of Ecologic Institute) presented two articles on the development of environmental policy consultancy in Germany, which were written for the project "From 'The Blue Sky above the Ruhr' to the 'Energiewende.'"