Cross-border trade and the rules governing it impact consumers. Trade has benefits for consumers, such as access to goods not available domestically. Yet it also has certain risks, such as exposure to traded goods that may be dangerous. Against this background, consumer organisations on both sides of the Atlantic have been discussing what a consumer-friendly trade policy could look like. Christiane Gerstetter and Lena Donat of Ecologic Institute's Legal Team have compiled a study examining what complaint mechanisms for consumer organisations concerning international trade agreements could look like.

In the frame of this project a short study on the policy instrument of specific CO2-emission targets for car manufacturers in the EU is carried out which analyses and evaluates the policy instrument. The foci of the research are two questions: How did the instrument perform regarding the reductions of specific CO2-emissions of passenger cars? And how much can it contribute to reduce overall CO2-emissions of passenger transport in the EU, so as to contribute to reaching the target of the Paris agreement to stay below a warming of 2°C? The short study is available for download.

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.

Stelljes, N, Albrecht, S, Martinez, G., McGlade, K. BONUS SOILS2SEA Deliverable 6.2. Proposals for new governance concepts and policy options. Ecologic Institute, Berlin, May 2017, www.Soils2Sea.eu

This report describes the work undertaken in the BRIGAID market scoping exercise at the European scale. Its aim is to help the BRIGAID innovators to identify those regions within Europe where potential business opportunities could emerge based on an analysis of the current and expected impacts of climate change and the current adaptive capacity at the regional level. The market scoping should facilitate the identification of markets that have a high potential of adopting innovative climate change adaptation measures whilst also differentiating between the specific hazards that BRIGAID innovations address.

The EU is discussing how to reform its energy and climate policy for the period after 2020. The short study "Energiewende as a European project" looks at the negotiations on the Clean Energy package from a German perspective. It shows the enormous opportunities of the European internal market. A more developed cross-border electricity market in the EU will make it much cheaper to make the German Energiewende a reality. Yet, to go further and define a joint project for an EU-wide energy transition will require additional efforts to develop concrete objectives and implementation steps together with the other Member States.

This Synthesis Report provides an overview of the achievements, lessons learned and challenges identified through the RISC-KIT project activities, including the development and application of the tools at ten case study sites in a range of coastal regions across Europe. The lessons learned are then fed into a series of recommendations for improved DRR for Europe and beyond. The resulting insights and accompanying recommendations have been considered in relation to their relevance to EU and international processes that both directly and indirectly address coastal DRR. The RISC-KIT Synthesis Report is available for download.

In the context of a framework contract with the European Commission focused on supporting the implementation of European water policies, Ecologic Institute has contributed to the preparation of a best practice overview report on how water management issues can be addressed within Rural Development Programmes. The report is available for download.

This paper explores six climate protection studies, namely for France, Italy, Poland, Sweden, United Kingdom and Germany. The authors, among them Ecologic Institute's Lena Donat, analyze objectives, results, modeling approaches, main assumptions and input parameters. The inclusions of long-term strategies in the Paris Agreement and in the European Commission's proposal for a new regulation on the "Governance of the Energy Union" make this analysis very topical. The analysis is available for download.

As part its on-going participation to a framework contract with the European Commission on supporting the implementation of European water policies, Ecologic Institute led an assessment of how Member States' current Rural Development Programmes (2014-2020) address agricultural pressures on water bodies and promote measures that can contribute to protect and restore the water environment, reducing flood and drought risk. The report is available for download.

Transforming the linear economy, which has remained the dominant model since the onset of the Industrial Revolution, into a circular one is by no means an easy task. Such a radical change entails a major transformation of our current production and consumption patterns, which in turn will have a significant impact on the economy, the environment and society. Understanding these impacts is crucial for researchers as well as for policy-makers engaged in designing future policies in the field. This requires developing an in-depth knowledge of the concept of the circular economy, its processes and their expected effects on sectors and value chains.

The RISC-KIT Web-based Management Guide is one of the five RISC-KIT tools designed to highlight key principles recommended for the planning of local DRR measures using examples from the case studies and elsewhere to provide practical illustrations. It is intended to give guidance to coastal managers in Europe and those facing similar challenges beyond the region as well as other groups concerned with coastal management (i.e. coastal resource users, technical and scientific experts and policy makers). The guide includes prevention, mitigation, protection and preparedness measures with recommendations for their use in various socio-economic, cultural and environmental settings. The RISC-KIT Web-based Management Guide is available for download.

In principle, increased trade resulting from trade agreements can offer consumers access to goods and services that are less expensive or of higher quality. At the same time, there is a risk that rules in trade and investment agreements limit the sovereign right of states to adopt measures for consumer protection at the domestic level. Hence, much depends on how these agreements are designed. A study, compiled by Christiane Gerstetter, Senior Fellow at Ecologic Institute and Christian Pitschas, provides an overview of consumer-related rights in recent international trade agreements. The study is available fro download.

National long-term (2050) climate strategies have received increased attention in European policy debates in the past two years. The Paris Agreement also invites countries to develop such strategies. This study (a collaborative effort between IDDRI and Ecologic Institute) looks at five existing 2050 strategy processes in the EU and assesses what lessons they hold and how they fit within the emerging 2030 governance framework. The study is available for download.