Search for projects

Decades of insufficient action (despite multiple scientific warnings) have heightened risks of irreversible tipping points in the Earth systems. Urgent and critical actions are needed to avert societal collapse. Phase-2 of the Transformations within Reach (TwR) is intended to provide an action-oriented synthesis for catalyzing societal transformations toward sustainability.

A multidisciplinary consortium of leading European universities, research institutes, companies, NGOs, and practitioners in the field of disaster risk reduction has started a major EU-funded project called MYRIAD-EU to improve our understanding, assessment, and management of disasters caused by combinations of different kinds of natural hazards (e.g. climate, hydrological, geological, and biological hazards).

'Risk-layering' strategies to reduce, retain and transfer disaster risk not only protect productive assets and lives, but implemented appropriately, could yield a number of additional benefits that could enhance wellbeing and resilience. Yet, conventional static macroeconomic models are not capable of analysing how alternative fiscal resource allocations to risk-layering options may affect developing countries’ growth trajectories under the impact of climate change.

A consortium consisting of the SYRR group of IIASA, ETH Zurich, and the InsuResilience Solutions Fund (ISF) will undertake macro-level socio-economic risk modelling, scenario assessment and policy analysis to understand how public sector climate and disaster risk financing strategies interact and complement risk reduction interventions in order to strengthen the resilience of vulnerable countries. IIASA will build on its CatSim Model to not only assess fiscal implications but also study broader resilience impact on relevant case study countries studied. The project will finally seek to develop recommendations on the design of smart support regarding comprehensive risk management for the case study countries.

To avoid climate risk, a state may resettle an entire community to another location within the country. This is known as planned relocation (PR), a government-led strategy undertaken to guard against the impacts of climate change. PR in Europe remains largely framed as an ad hoc response in post-disaster settings. But this could change with the increased risks of natural disasters. The EU-funded ITHACA project will investigate how current PR and climate adaptation policy and governance landscapes should integrate PR into long-term resilient development in Europe.

DECIPHER (DECIsion-making framework and Processes for Holistic Evaluation of enviRonmental and climate policies) is an EU Commission funded project that aims to embed risk, opportunity, resilience and feasibility dimensions into the economic methods that support decision-making in order to increase the effectiveness, efficiency, and legitimacy of climate and environmental policies.

There is a need for a radical step-up in the attention we pay to current and future climate impacts and associated efforts. Despite inspiring examples of adaptation solutions, stand-alone risk reduction projects that tackle issues through direct or existing policy levers are common practice. Adopting a systemic, transformative approach is advocated by the Mission Adaptation and European Green Deal. P2R takes an innovative systemic approach to regional climate resilience; one indivisible from Europe’s future economic and social development, intersecting with net zero commitments, and demanding a markedly different approach from the one adopted so far.

Directed aims to improve the interoperability of multiple European climate risk assessment and planning tools and bring them together in a manageable system (a data fabric) that enables better disaster risk assessment and management by European disaster protection authorities and first responders. Using ‘Real World Labs’ to critically analyse and improve current work-flows and governance linked to disaster risk management and disaster risk reduction. Promoting a multi-risk perspective on climate change adaptation by considering the impacts of floods, droughts, heatwaves, forest fires and storms.

The main objective of CLIMAAX is to support the implementation of the EU Adaptation Strategy and the HE Mission Adaptation first objective: preparing and planning for climate resilience.

IIASA is a core member of the Flood Resilience Alliance, an innovative partnership between research, development and humanitarian NGOs and the private sector that works together for making at step change with regard to policy, finance and practice of managing floods and other climate-related hazards towards increased community resilience.

COACCH (CO-designing the Assessment of Climate CHange costs) is a Horizon 2020 project that aims to advance knowledge regarding climate change impacts and policy that can be used directly by stakeholder communities.

In an interconnected world, Europe’s economy and society will be increasingly affected by climate change impacts that occur beyond its borders. This Horizon 2020 project explores how this will affect Europe’s economy, finance and policy.

Macromode addresses the recent shift in disaster risk management perspectives and how indirect losses due to natural hazard risks can be decreased within highly interlinked and complex systems such as the economy of a country.

Urban metabolism is a model to study the flow of energy and resources as they enter cities, how they are used and consumed, and how they exist cities as wastes. By studying urban metabolism, we can get a better understanding of how resources are used and ways to reduce negative environmental impact. As the fraction of people living in cities continue to expand around the world, urban metabolism analysis can help decision makers develop cities to become resource efficient, climate friendly, resilient and equitable.

PHOENIX (Human Mobility, Global Challenges and Resilience in an Age of Social Stress) is a Belmont Forum funded project that aims to examine how Global Changes - including environmental and climate changes, demographic changes, changing consumption patterns, energy and land-use, developments in the politics of food and mental health, and socio-cultural transformations - impact mobility.