The annual UN 2020 Sustainable Development Goal 7 Energy Tracking Report is being launched along with 2020 Sustainable Development Goal 7 policy briefs, to which several IIASA researchers have contributed.
As Canadian expats in Austria, one of the things that has particularly struck my family and I is the orderliness with which the country is dealing with the pandemic. As quarantine policies were put into place, we saw panic toilet paper hoarding in other countries, but here in Austria people were (amazingly) compliant and seemed to obey instructions and timelines provided by the authorities. We never worried about our basic needs. Grocery stores were always well stocked, public transit was always there and on time – and masks were readily available when required as physical barrier to protect others.
In light of the new strategic plan that will become operational in 2021, IIASA has appointed four program directors to lead new research programs. Raya Muttarak, Keywan Riahi, Elena Rovenskaya, and Yoshihide Wada will form part of the scientific leadership that will address the institute’s research priorities to ensure that program objectives are aligned with the new IIASA strategy and institute values.
IIASA and the International Science Council (ISC) have established a partnership combining the strengths and expertise of the two organizations to define and design sustainability pathways, through a multi-stakeholder dialogue, that will enable a more equitable post-COVID world.
While national and international efforts to reverse the trend of deforestation have multiplied in recent years, there is still no clear evidence to suggest that these initiatives are actually working. A new paper published in One Earth, calls for a radically different approach that focuses on our understanding of how individuals make their choices about forests and livelihoods.
This year due to the coronavirus pandemic the International Conference Risk Management in Energy is held in the format of webinar. On the invitation of the Russian Deputy Minister of Energy IIASA provides scientific input to the discussions.
According to new research, a pipeline of disruptive technologies could transform our food systems, ecosystems, and human health, but attention to the enabling environment is needed to realize their potential.
IIASA researchers will participate in the European Geosciences Union 2020: Sharing Geoscience Online presenting research on climate change, risk and resilience, water systems, energy, food systems, and more.
IIASA researcher Raquel Guimaraes and former research assistant Debbora Leip encourage the support of the Cercedilla Manifesto, arguing that it is high time for the scientific community to take responsibility and set an example by making research meetings more sustainable.
A high-level IIASA delegation visited the Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development (OECD) for the third meeting of the IIASA-OECD Task Force on Systems Thinking, Anticipation, and Resilience.
BeWhere is a spatially explicit, bottom-up, techno-economic, system optimization model designed to support cost-effective, low-carbon system transitions at the supply chain level.
Plants and vegetation play a critical role in supporting life on Earth, but there is still a lot of uncertainty in our understanding of how exactly they affect the global carbon cycle and ecosystem services. A new IIASA-led study explored the most important organizing principles that control vegetation behavior and how they can be used to improve vegetation models.
A new study by researchers from IIASA and China investigated the impacts of different levels of global warming on hydropower potential and found that this type of electricity generation benefits more from a 1.5°C than a 2°C climate scenario.
IIASA researcher Sonja Spitzer will discuss health misperception and healthcare utilisation among older Europeans at an online socioeconomics research seminar hosted by the Vienna University of Economics and Business.
A new working group of the Earth Commission, comprising renowned scientists from institutions around the world including IIASA, will investigate future pathways of how humanity might develop sustainably to ensure a safe and just world for all.
As the world economy is falling into one of the biggest contractions of the last decades, a new study of economic recession patterns finds that the likelihood of a downturn was high even before the onset of the Coronavirus crisis.
The global COVID-19 crisis is challenging the social fabric of countries and communities across the globe. Interventions such as lockdowns, social distancing measures, and economic stimulus packages have been introduced to reinforce societal resilience. The resilience of national health systems is particularly in the spotlight – primarily keeping occupancy numbers of intensive care beds under a critical threshold, as well as improving access to basic health services for people infected with the virus, and ensuring that infections do not spread further.