Gerard Martínez Görbig, PhD researcher at the University of Twente (UT) and member of LOCALISED, was interviewed for the ‘PhD Stories’ series of U-Today – an independent journalistic medium at the UT – to present the work he is doing to support local governments in adapting to climate change and ensuring climate justice.

At the heart of Gerard’s research is the development of the Climate Action Strategiser, a tool designed to help local governments develop plans to reduce emissions and adapt to the impacts of climate change. To ensure that his research is practically applicable, he has engaged with the cities of Barcelona, Vienna and Gdansk-Gdynia-Sopot from the outset, working directly with the people who will ultimately use the results of the LOCALISED research results.

In addition, Gerard emphasises the importance of equal access to the impacts and benefits of climate actions, which is why his research aims to pay particular attention to the impacts on vulnerable groups and how climate action can inadvertently lead to energy poverty. He stresses the need for climate justice in Europe. 

When it comes to bridging the gap between climate research and practical solutions, Gerard is at the forefront: CLICK HERE to read the full interview.

The University of Twente team in LOCALISED is composed by: Diana Reckien, Johannes Flacke, and Gerard Martínez Görbig

Photo: Active Hearing event with representatives of an elderly collective in the headquarters building of Ciutat Vella, In Barcelona.

The Citizen Engager is a toolbox and step-by-step guide designed to foster citizen engagement in the field of climate policy. It is being developed within the LOCALISED project by the Participation Team of the Austrian Society of Environment and Technology (ÖGUT). Its primary goal is to enable the co-creation of climate policies between citizens and local decision-makers, ensuring that these policies are socially just and inclusive. 

The primary audience for The Citizen Engager comprises local and regional decision-makers across Europe, including elected representatives, politicians, and civil servants. These individuals play a crucial role in implementing climate policies at the grassroots level, and The Citizen Engager aims to equip them with the tools and knowledge needed to engage effectively with their communities, and in particular with groups that are more negatively impacted by climate change and climate policy.

The guide is enriched with insights drawn from applied case studies conducted in three partner cities and regions, offering practical examples of successful citizen engagement. One notable case study comes from the City of Barcelona, a key partner in the LOCALISED project. Barcelona is actively conducting a series of “active hearing” events, engaging vulnerable groups to discuss climate change adaptation and mitigation. These events involve citizens from various districts who share their fears and needs concerning climate change. The feedback gathered during these consultations will be featured in The Citizen Engager, providing a practical example of effective citizen participation.

The documentation of this case study is coordinated by ÖGUT with the support from the Institut de Recerca en Energia de Catalunya (IREC), a technical partner of LOCALISED  based in Barcelona. Enric Mont Lecocq and Soledad Ibañez from IREC have participated as observers in several active hearing groups, collecting feedback, impressions, and photographs. Their observations are instrumental in showcasing how citizen engagement methods can be improved and when they are successful.

The Citizen Engager is developed as a tool for decision makers for creating climate policies that reflect the voices and needs of local communities. By facilitating meaningful dialogue between citizens and policymakers, it paves the way for a more resilient and socially just approach to climate action.

On June 27th, join us at the 11th European Urban Resilience Forum (EURESFO) for a workshop where we will tackle the specific challenges of small and mid-sized cities & regions in setting-up climate action plans. The workshop is part of the Multilevel governance, cooperation and just transition: resilience leaves no one behind stream.

In this highly interactive session, we will focus on the unique difficulties that small and mid-sized cities and regions encounter when setting up climate action plans. Key topics include:

• Developing ambitious Sustainable Energy & Climate Action Plans (SECAPs) with limited resources
• Addressing social impacts by integrating mitigation and adaptation
• Linking Mitigation and Adaptation measures to Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)
• Engaging citizens as advocates and agents of change
• Creating a collaborative environment across different governance levels

Together with our participants and invited speakers from various administrative contexts, we aim to share and collect experiences, thoughts, and ideas, present the new tool “LOCALISED Climate Action Strategiser” designed to aid in overcoming these challenges, and discuss necessary adjustments and additional factors to enhance the tool’s effectiveness.

This is a unique opportunity to contribute to urban decarbonization and climate action planning: LEARN MORE

Source: Making PEDs. All rights reserved.

The LOCALISED partner, Catalonia Institute for Energy Research (IREC), is leading the “Making PEDs” project, an international initiative aimed at creating Digital Twins as a decision support tool for cities transitioning towards climate neutrality. Over the next 2 ½ years, IREC, along with 10 partners from four European countries, will work on this ambitious project designed to foster the active regeneration of urban areas in Linz (Austria), Civitavecchia-Rome (Italy) and Bærum (Norway).

Making cities sustainable is a multifaceted challenge, involving complex interlinked issues such as materials, technology, real estate business models, mobility, and energy. Additionally, social aspects are becoming increasingly significant, with co-creation and participatory approaches adding a human dimension to urban transformation projects.

The Making PEDs project will explore and test the application of 3D visualization and simulation tools—Digital Twins—as crucial instruments to manage complexity and support urban decision-making while engaging citizens in the regeneration of urban districts. “The project will not only research and plan climate neutral PEDs (Positive Energy Districts), but more importantly facilitate this transition by providing Digital Twins as a decision support tool”, says Jaume Salom of the Catalonia Institute for Energy Research (IREC) and manager of the project. “While we look at the assessment of energy districts and how citizens impact the energy equation, a critical part will be to develop reliable predictions for business models in the large-scale energy retrofitting of buildings”, Mr. Salom adds.

IREC is the coordinator of Making PEDs, overseeing the development and integration of PED calculation methodologies from a holistic life-cycle assessment perspective. The developed digital twins and models will be tested and refined to support decision-making processes for the regeneration of the target districts aiming for climate neutrality in Linz, Civitavecchia-Rome and Bærum.

Making PEDs – Key information

Making PEDs is an international project under the Driving Urban Transitions (DUT) program, coordinated by IREC and set to commence in November 2023. The project was prominently featured at the DUT projects kick-off event held in Brussels on 11-12 April 2024. The event brought together all projects funded in the DUT Call 2022 and representatives from involved national funding agencies, giving the opportunity to meet and establish a strong community.
Partner cities include Linz (Austria), Civitavecchia-Rome (Italy) and Bærum (Norway). The expert partners in the Making PEDs consortium are IREC (Spain), ATER Civitavecchia (Italy), AIT – Austrian Institute of Technology (Austria), CICLICA (Spain), NTNU – Norwegian University of Science and Technology (Norway), R2M Solution (Italy), Università Degli Studi Roma Tre (Italy), and Urban Future (Austria).

LOCALISED is co-organizing the 2024 edition of the European Urban Resilience Forum (EURESFO) that will take place from 26 – 28 June within the framework of the Valencia Cities Climate Week, hosted by the city as part of its EU Green Capital 2024 celebrations. Additionally, the project is leading an highly-interactive workshop to tackle the specific challenges of small and mid-sized cities & regions in setting-up climate action plans

Over three days during the Valencia Cities Climate Week, EURESFO24 will offer 20+ sessions and interactive workshops built around 3 key thematic streams with more than 100 speakers and moderators from European cities and regions, including ICLEI members Burgas (Bulgaria), Paris (France), Dresden (Germany), Athens, Thessaloniki (Greece), Rotterdam, the Green Metropolitan Region of Arnhem Nijmegen (Netherlands), Rome (Italy), Valongo (Portugal), Barcelona, Valencia (Spain), Malmö (Sweden), Izmir (Türkiye), and Mykolaiv and Ostroh (Ukraine), among others. The event will bring together high-level representatives of cities and regions from across Europe to discuss challenges and opportunities to strengthen resilience in the context of sustainable urban development.

Each of the three key thematic streams, and a fourth special stream, will address crucial aspects of resilience, sustainable development and recovery. The first stream focuses on multilevel governance, cooperation, and the need for a just transition. The second stream delves into water resilience and the promotion of the Blue Economy within and beyond the Mediterranean region. The third stream aims to enable transformation towards resilient, adaptive, and climate-neutral cities and regions. The fourth special stream focuses on building resilience in fragile settings and bridging the gap between humanitarian responses to post-conflict resilience and the recovery process.

On June 27, within the “Multilevel governance, cooperation and just transition: resilience leaves no one behind” stream, LOCALISED organises the workshop “What kind of tools and practices do city and regional administrations need to make urban resilience a reality?” to explore how to better integrate mitigation and adaptation measures, and how to ensure a collaborative environment in local administrations. Together with participants and invited city representatives, we will share experiences and test a support tool in-the-making: the Localised Climate Action Strategiser.

Elina Bardram, Mission Manager, Director for Adaptation & Resilience, Communication, and Civil Society Relations, DG CLIMA, European Commission, highlights: “In the face of climate change, collaboration is not merely an option but a necessity. Inclusive and participatory processes are also key for pursuing the priorities of the European Union. As we convene at the 11th EURESFO in Valencia, let us recognise the urgency of working together across all levels of governance and sectors. Our mission, as outlined by the EU Mission on Adaptation to Climate Change, extends beyond dialogue; it demands concerted action. EURESFO is a great opportunity to leverage collective wisdom and drive impactful change towards resilient, sustainable futures for all.”

Harriët Tiemens, Director of the Green Metropolitan Region of Arnhem-Nijmegen (Netherlands) adds:
“Water resilience and a meaningful integration of the Blue Economy is key to a more resilient future. It is important to use the specific soil and water conditions as guiding principles for rural and urban development. This should be included as a guiding principle in European policy and as a condition for funding programmes.”

To exchange expertise and better understand the strengths and weaknesses of local decarbonization plans in the UK, which can be applicable to the EU’s localised decarbonization plans, on April 23, 2024, CMCC team from LOCALISED consortium hosted a talk by Dr. Kyle Herman from the University of Sussex (UoS) titled “Shoreham Port’s Decarbonisation Plan: Orchestrating Complexity for Mission-Driven Innovation and Technological Integration”. 

According to the official estimates, industrial regions and clusters in the UK are important for the economy, employing 1.5 million people across steel, oil refining, chemical, and other energy-intensive industries, and worth £320 billion in goods and services. Yet, they are a major source for the UK’s greenhouse gas emissions (GHGs), cumulatively generating nearly 32 metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent annually.

To revive declining industries, and to meet GHG reductions by 2050, the UK has earmarked substantial public funds—worth billions of pounds in the coming years—to drive industrial decarbonisation across its regional clusters. Following on from the much larger cluster decarbonisation competition—the industrial decarbonisation challenge—the UKRI recently awarded £6 million in funding to ten local industrial decarbonisation clusters (LIDPs), two of which are Ports (Port of Poole and Shoreham Port). 

This research explores Shoreham Trust Port, outside of Brighton & Hove in the South of the UK. Researchers from UoS ground their study in the innovation ecosystems approach, given the plurality of actors and technologies involved. They then apply orchestration in multi-stakeholder networks theory to examine Shoreham Port’s industrial decarbonization mission as it undergoes collective and collaborative planning, experimentation, and production of its 2035 net-zero goals embedded in its decarbonisation plan. 

They use a multi-modal approach consisting of fifty semi-structured interviews, one survey for each industrial partner, a separate survey for local tenants, and a techno economic assessment of energy, emissions, costs. 

The data will then undergo several different transformations:

• Interview data will be cleaned and summarised using natural language processing (NLP); a link/edge analysis will be conducted for actor network; 
• The surveys will feed into the techno economic analysis, providing assessment of current and future costs, investments, and opportunities for the LIDP.

The results of this research will shed light on:

• The immediate and medium-term net-zero investment opportunities;
• How this project can leverage the findings to quickly drive net-zero in Shoreham Port;
• How orchestration and orchestrators have managed the emerging complex system for industrial decarbonisation in Shoreham Port.