Ecologic Institute published a briefing for the ENVI Committee of the European Parliament to guide their participation in the upcoming UN Ocean Conference to be held June 2017 in New York City. 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 and the position of main stakeholders. In a final section, several recommendations to guide EU participation are provided. The briefing is available for download.

This policy brief introduces the SWITCH-ON Virtual Water Science Laboratory, a digital platform for scientific research and collaboration built upon the principles of transparency, community and open access. The Virtual Lab implements Open Science by encouraging collaborative experiment definition and by facilitating the search and upload of open datasets. The SWITCH-ON Policy Brief No.2 is available for download.

This policy brief illustrates how SWITCH-ON supports globally-connected science, digital innovation, and the use of open data to help citizens, governments, and businesses in Europe and across the globe move towards a sustainable future. It shows how the 14 SWITCH-ON products are closely aligned to the SDGs by addressing several EU environmental policy objectives. The SWITCH-ON Policy Brief No.4 is available for download.

This T20 Policy Brief sends a loud exhortation to the leaders meeting in the G20 Summit in Hamburg in July 2017. T20 or "Think 20" is a network of think tanks in the G20 countries, and 23 experts in 13 think tanks in 8 countries contributed to this policy brief. Ecologic Institute founder R. Andreas Kraemer, Senior Fellow at the Centre for International Governance Innovation (CIGI), led the drafting, and Benjamin Boteler, Ina Krüger, and Grit Martinez of Ecologic Institute contributed. The policy brief is available for download.

This policy brief illustrates how the SWITCH-ON project has provided proof-of-concept of how product development based on Open Innovation and Open Data can foster environmental and economic benefits in the European Union. This was achieved by transforming Open Databased hydrological science outputs into useful products and services for water managers, researchers, businesses and authorities at multiple levels. The SWITCH-ON policy brief is available for download.

After two years of research and stakeholder consultation, the BioSTEP consortium, led by Ecologic Institute, finalized the BioSTEP policy paper. This paper concludes five recommendations, aiming to support the revision of the European Bioeconomy Strategy. These recommendations were amended and complemented at the BioSTEP Forum, which was held in Brussels in March 2016. The policy paper is available for download.

Europe's coastlines are a product of human cultivation. Since settling on the coast, humans have engineered the coastal characteristics to suit the purposes of states, the economy and human recreation. At the time of the Treaties of Rome, Europe had just emerged from the devastating aftermath of the Second World War with a 'great hunger' for a liberal life style, leisure activities and travel. The diverse and scenic views of Europe's coasts offered the ideal destination for such endeavors. Soon, a rapid coastal urbanization coupled with a steady increase in mass tourism emerged. Spurred by the trust in technical and engineering capacities, new bold attitudes about building and living on the sea often interfered with the natural sediment transport of coastal systems, leading to erosion. Today, more than 42% of Europeans live in coastal regions with coastal infrastructure worth about 959 billion EURO. Recent and historic high-impact storm events have demonstrated that weather events pose a significant risk and can immobilize cities and countries. The FP7 project, Resilience-Increasing Strategies for Coasts – toolKIT (RISC-KIT), recently issued a policy brief to communicate lessons learned and to support the dissemination of tools, which coastal managers to improve coastal resilience in Europe and elsewhere.

The Heads of State and Government, the G20 Leaders should understand that "Energy Transformation has many Co-Benefits but Looks Bad in Outdated Economic Statistics". This is the key message of a T20 Policy Brief presented by 15 Experts in 11 Think Tanks in 7 countries ahead of the G20 Summit under the Presidency of Germany in Hamburg in July 2017. T20 or "Think 20" is a network of think tanks in the G20 countries. Ecologic Institute founder R. Andreas Kraemer coordinated the drafting, and Max Gruenig, President of Ecologic Institute US contributed. The Policy Brief is available for download.

This T20 Policy Brief shows that international policy and law build on the false assumption that displaced people and refugees can return to their place of origin when conditions improve, conflicts subside or homes are rebuilt. This cannot hold for many of those affected by climate change, and global governance of migration and flight needs to adapt. Ecologic Institute founder R. Andreas Kraemer coordinated the drafting of this T20 Policy Brief, and Katriona McGlade contributed. The Policy Brief is available for download.

Efficient energy policies rely strongly on consistent and comparable data provided by a sound data collection process and robust monitoring and verification (M&V) procedures. The third multEE policy brief presents five concrete policy recommendations to guarantee an efficient data collection process as well as a systematic M&V process of the measures. The policy brief is available for download.

Policy brief 2 outlines the participatory approach developed within BeWater and presents recommendations targeting actors within European bodies and institutions dealing with adaptation planning and adaptation in water management. Aspects of EU policies that could pose a barrier to implementation of adaptation action are highlighted, and complemented with necessary actions to overcome such barriers. Policy brief 2 is available for download.

Policy Brief 3 summarizes the key barriers that were identified during the BeWater project, as well as the means for overcoming these barriers through policy actions at the national or sub-national level. Policy Brief 3 is available for download.

This policy brief presents the SWITCH-ON toolbox that guides innovators to identify target markets and select a suitable business model consistently. This toolbox, called the Market Analysis Framework (MAF), has been applied by the developers of the 14 SWITCH-ON open data products and services, making it a tested and validated framework. By promoting demand-driven product development, the MAF can help European innovators increase their chances of achieving commercial success, ultimately contributing to the region's smarter, more sustainable, and more inclusive future economy. The Policy Brief No.1 is available for download.

This brief highlights the links between EU policy objectives and global targets for sustainable development, centring on aquatic ecosystems. It describes current research within the EU Horizon 2020 project AQUACROSS (Knowledge, Assessment and Management for AQUAtic Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services aCROSS policies), focusing on an integrative approach – ecosystem-based management (EBM) of aquatic ecosystems – to understand and balance common social, economic, and environmental objectives towards a more sustainable future. The brief is available for download.

What can we learn from European best practices on the existing Monitoring & Verification schemes and coordination mechanisms in Europe? Can bottom-up methodologies contribute to a more reliable measurement and verification process? The first two policy briefs produced by the multEE project feature a set of policy recommendations, six on M&V schemes and five on coordination mechanisms, aimed at policy makers at different policy levels engaged in the development of effective and coherent energy efficiency policies. The recommendations reflect the conclusions from a broader "Synthesis report on European best practices for M&V schemes and coordination mechanisms" that, based on an initial mapping of existing M&V schemes and coordination mechanisms across Europe, identifies and analyses a vast array of Best Practice cases on M&V schemes and coordination models. The recommendations are available for download.