<p>&#13; <strong>We celebrate 15 years of Ecologic Institute in Berlin:</strong><br />&#13; 15 years of enthusiasm in science and policy, in dialogue, with ideas, and the will to shape the future. For a better environment.</p>&#13;

At the invitation of the U.S. Consulate General Leipzig Katharina Umpfenbach held a lecture on U.S. climate and energy policy on 27 May 2010. The event was part of a lecture series titled &ldquo;Obama and the &lsquo;new&rsquo; U.S.&rdquo; organised jointly by the political science faculty of the University of Erfurt, the Regional Center for Political Education and the U.S. Consulate General.</p>

The German national Sustainable Development Strategy (SDS) has the potential to set the pace for Germany’s development towards a more sustainable society. Unfortunately, the strategy fails to define overarching strategic objectives. Isolated measures, indicators and time plans need to be bundled in an integrated strategy for the future. The authors of the policy brief "Sustainability needs Strategy" recommend that the German Government includes four new areas of action in its current SDS: sustainable wealth; sustainable labour policy; sustainable engagement policy and culture of sustainability. These areas are decisive to successfully embed sustainability in Germany’s government, economy and society and will determine whether Germany remains a leader in sustainability. Anneke von Raggamby, Senior Fellow and Head of European Integration at Ecologic Institute is Associate 2009/2010 at the stiftung neue verantwortung (snv) and was one of the authors of this policy brief. The policy brief "Sustainability needs Strategy" is available for download.

R. Andreas Kraemer of Ecologic Institute moderated a panel entitled "Quo Vadis Carbon Trading?" at the conference "The Great Transformation – Greening the Economy", which was jointly organized by the Heinrich Böll Stiftung, the Center for American Progress, and the Mercator Foundation. The panel focussed on economic instruments in climate policy, the EU Emission Trading Scheme and its links to carbon markets and also Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) projects in other countries.<p></p>

Concerned that issues raised by climate change may be creating new avenues and possibilities for corruption in the water sector, the Water Integrity Network (WIN) convened a panel of experts for consultation. Potential challenges include a misuse of the term ‘climate change’ and a lack of transparency in the discourse surrounding this topic. In addition the channelling of large sums of money into poor countries could increase the risk of corruption in the water sector without bringing real protection to threatened communities. WIN posed the question: does the issue of climate change require the water sector to change its approach to prevent and deal with corruption? The consultation was supported by Ecologic Institute, with Grit Martinez advising on the framing and scoping of the exercise, and R. Andreas Kraemer chairing the consultation plenary. The WIN report is available for download.

European cultural landscapes are significantly shaped by human activities and provide a multitude of ecological services which benefit human society. In an article published in the May 2010 issue of "Natur und Landschaft", the concept of ecosystem services is evaluated in regard to its limits and potentials to analyse conflicts between land use and nature conservation.

<p>&#13; The Water Integrity Network (WIN), hosted by Transparency International (TI) in Berlin, convened 20 experts for a consultation on the nexus of water corruption and integrity, environment and climate change.  The consultation on 29 March 2010 was held in the headquarter of the Heinrich Boell Foundation; it was chaired by R. Andreas Kraemer of Ecologic Institute, and supported by Grit Martinez of Ecologic Institute and WIN.</p>&#13;

Christiane Gerstetter and Doris Knoblauch, Fellows of Ecologic Legal, are teaching a seminar at the University for Applied Sciences Bremen in the summer term 2010. The seminar is entitled &quot;Policy consulting by intermediary organisations&quot; and is part of the International Degree Course in Policy Management; its aim is to provide students with first-hand insights into the work of an environmental think tank.

At the EU level, there is great need for legal reforms concerning the liability of enterprises for violations of human rights and environmental norms abroad. This is the result of a study co-authored by Christiane Gerstetter, Fellow Ecologic Legal and pro bono lawyer for the European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights.

In this chapter, Ecologic Senior Fellow Ingmar von Homeyer argues that the institutional structures and processes underlying EU environmental governance have undergone a significant transformation in recent years. Important characteristics of this emerging "experimentalism" in EU environmental governance include the transition of many important decisions into the implementation stage, trans-nationally networked implementation, and the creation of indicators and reporting requirements for regular review and revision of policies.