In its Europe 2020 strategy, the EU has set itself the challenge of smart, sustainable and inclusive growth, including the shift to a low carbon economy in 2020. To map out ex-ante pathways for the low-carbon transition and to monitor Member States’ progress towards this objective, new monitoring tools are needed. Together with Belgian, British and Polish researchers, Ecologic Institute has identified and evaluated options for monitoring the structural change to a low-carbon economy.

Green Infrastructure has emerged as a valuable tool to enhance ecosystem resilience and to contribute to biodiversity conservation and benefit human populations. Ecologic Institute and GHK produced a comprehensive overview of the design, implementation and cost efficiency of green infrastructure projects in the EU to solidify the understanding of this concept.

In response to growing climate change pressures, ecosystem-based approaches have emerged as a promising strategy to increase the resilience of ecosystems and support sustainable livelihoods. Ecologic Institute and the Environmental Change Institute examined the success factors leading to and obstacles hindering the implementation and integration of such approaches in climate change strategies. The report is available for download.

The economic crisis starting in 2008 stopped the momentum of transformation towards renewable energies and sustainable transport systems, but also provided opportunities for sustainable development.  The 7th Conference of the British-German Environment Forum (BGEF) meeting at Wilton Park on 24-26 February 2011 investigated the potential for green growth and moving economic policy Beyond GDP by increasing resource efficiency and decoupling of economic development from resource depletion and pollution. R. Andreas Kraemer of Ecologic Institute is an initiator and coordinator of the BGEF.

<p>&#13; Ingmar von Homeyer, Ecologic Institute Senior Fellow and Head of the Ecologic Institute representation in Brussels, provided an assessment of the Thematic Strategies as the most important ‘tool’ of the European Union’s 6th Environment Action Programme (6EAP) at a conference organised by Brussels Environment in the context of the 2010 Belgian EU Presidency.</p>&#13;

Emily McGlynn, Transatlantic Fellow at Ecologic Institute, regularly writes as a Policy Fellow at Americans for Energy Leadership, a Washington DC-based think tank. In the article "Arctic Oil and Gas: The Emerging Question" McGlynn discusses the latest developments in Arctic hydrocarbon exploitation and the need for improvements in both technology and regulation.

2010: Supporting the Thematic Strategy on Waste Prevention and Recycling, Final Report. IEEP, ECOLOGIC, ARCADIS, UBA, BIO INTELLIGENCE SERVICES, VITO.

This German-French infographic was developed in the course of the master thesis "Infographics for knowledge communication in international environmental policy".

Emily McGlynn, Transatlantic Fellow at Ecologic Institute, spoke to decision-makers, policy analysts, scientists and students at the Arctic Frontiers Conference in Tromsø, Norway (28 January 2011) about the EU's impact on the Arctic environment. Arctic stakeholders were very interested to hear the results of the EU Arctic Footprint and Policy Assessment Project, as coordinated by Ecologic Institute.

Emily McGlynn, Transatlantic Fellow at Ecologic Institute, presented the EU Arctic Footprint and Policy Assessment project to Arctic indigenous stakeholders at a side event organized by the European Commission, DG MARE during the Arctic Frontiers conference in Tromsø, Norway on 25 January 2011. The EU Arctic Footprint report was discussed alongside other EU Arctic policy developments.

In this paper, Sascha Müller-Kraenner, one of the founders and a Partner of Ecologic Institute, investigates the nature of the European Union’s relations to third countries with regard to renewable sources of energy and the options available for further developing those relations in order to more effectively exploit the potential of renewable energy. While the EU has the potential to cover its electrical power needs from renewable sources alone, cooperation with third states in the use of renewable energy sources will play an important role – as can be seen in the large-scale Desertec project.

A new publication in the journal "Ecological Indicators" by Tanja Srebotnjak, from Ecologic Institute, and Peter Hardi, from the Central European University in Hungary, examines the potentials for sustainable bioenergy production in Bulgaria, Romania and the former Soviet republics in Central Asia. The study draws on official statistics and modeling results and concludes that bioenergy potentials are highest in Bulgaria, Romania, and Kazakhstan but depend on several factors including crop choice, climatic conditions, availability of suitable land, and the institutional and legal infrastructure.