European Climate Change Adaptation Conference 2013

The European Climate Change Adaptation Conference 2013 will bring together scientists and practitioners working on adaptation to the impacts of climate change. The conference will create a European forum bringing together world-class science, with the aim of fostering a creative dialogue with climate adaptation policy makers and practitioners. The theme of the conference is integrating climate into action.

Even under the most optimistic greenhouse gas emission reduction scenario we are facing already a certain level of future climate change. The first impacts of climate change are now observable in Europe and internationally. These impacts create new risks and vulnerabilities, while also generating opportunities for some. But while the need to manage climate vulnerabilities and to adapt is now widely understood, questions about whether, how and when to adapt are often hard to answer. New knowledge from science and practice is critical to making judgements, choices and decisions in the context of uncertainties.

The conference is co-sponsored by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF), the European Commission, the City of Hamburg and the University of Hamburg. The conference is an initiative of four EU research projects: RESPONSES, CLIMSAVE, MEDIATION and ClimateCost.

Scope of the conference

The main theme of the conference is integrating climate into action. Major topics to be covered will include:

• climate vulnerability assessment
• risk assessment
• economics of adaptation
• decision-making under uncertainty
• governance of adaptation
• adaptation strategies and planning
• mainstreaming climate adaptation
• adaptation cases studies: organisational, sectoral and regional
• monitoring and measuring adaptation
• impact and effectiveness studies
• role of tools and knowledge in adaptation
• communicating impacts, vulnerability and adaptation

Science, practice, interaction

The European Climate Change Adaptation conference 2013 will combine interactions about the latest science with interactions from the world of policy and practice.

Research on adaptation requires knowledge of the risk and decision-making contexts, while adaptive action requires a combination of scientific and practical knowledge.

To this end, there will be three types of conference sessions:

1. Science sessions: Latest results from research is presented and discussed.
2. Practitioner sessions: Sessions in which both scientists and practitioners (or only practitioners) present and discuss common issues related to uncertainty, costs and benefits, strategies, governance, tools.
3. Science-practice interaction: Researchers and practitioners work together on resolving an adaptation challenge defined by a decision-maker or practitioner.

The conference will be working actively with the KomPass expertise centre (DE), the Knowledge for Climate programme (NL), and the UK Climate Impacts Programme to structure the contributions by practitioners and to facilitate interactions between scientists and practitioners at the conference.

Organisation and governance

The conference is being organised by TuTech Innovation GmbH. A Steering Committee with representatives from the BMBF, the UBA, the European Commission, the City of Hamburg, the four sponsoring EU projects and Klimzug (the German climate adaptation programme) will manage the conference. An International Scientific Board will provide oversight over the scientific quality of the conference.

International Scientific Board

• Neil Adger, University of Exeter, United Kingdom
• Frans Berkhout, VU University Amsterdam, The Netherlands
• Guy Brasseur, Climate Service Center Hamburg, Germany
• Timothy Carter, SYKE – Finnish Environment Institute, Helsinki, Finland
• Sergio Castellari, Centro Euro-Mediterraneo per i Cambiamenti Climatici (CMCC), Bologna, Italy
• Martin Claussen, Max-Planck-Institut und Universität Hamburg, Germany
• Joyeeta Gupta, VU University Amsterdam, The Netherlands
• Stephane Hallegatte, World Bank, France
• Paula Harrison, University of Oxford, United Kingdom
• Ana Iglesias, Universidad Politecnica de Madrid, Spain
• Richard Klein, Stockholm Environment Institute, Sweden
• Zbigniew Kundzewicz, Potsdam Institute for Climate Research, Germany
• Diana Liverman, University of Arizona, USA
• Jacqueline McGlade, European Environment Agency, Denmark
• Karen O’Brien, University of Oslo, Norway
• Claudia Pahl-Wostl, Universität Osnabrück, Germany
• Martin Parry, Imperial College London, United Kingdom
• Rob Swart, Wageningen University, The Netherlands
• Pier Vellinga, Wageningen University and VU University, The Netherlands
• Paul Watkiss, University of Oxford, United Kingdom

Local Organising Committee

• Frans Berkhout (chair), VU University Amsterdam, Netherlands
• Martin Claussen, Max-Planck-Institut und Universität Hamburg, Germany
• Achim Daschkeit, Umweltbundesamt, Dessau, Germany
• Gerlinde Loebkens, TuTech Innovation GmbH, Germany
• Arne von Maydell, TuTech Innovation GmbH, Germany
• Florrie de Pater, VU University Amsterdam, Netherlands
• Helmut Thamer, TuTech Innovation GmbH, Germany

First Announcement (pdf)

Call For Abstracts (pdf)

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