PolicyOracle: Predicting Outcomes of Key Policy Indices

Your expert opinion on macroeconomic indicators considered by policy makers to shape policies in Europe? The SYMPHONY European research project (http://projectsymphony.eu/) implemented an online market simulation called PolicyOracle to monitor your expectation changes about key policy indices in real time. Participants are able to place bets on future prices of pivotal resources or future political events. By harvesting the crowd-intelligence provided by many informed individuals, policymakers are enabled to anticipate these predictions in their policy decisions. On top of that, you can learn about the expectations of your peers.   Read more

Simpol Project: Crowdsourcing for Transparency in the 2030 Climate and Energy Framework

Strongly influenced by lobbying activities, the EU took a step back on some of its climate targets within the 2030 framework for climate and energy policy. With the SIMPOL project, we are developing a new collaborative tool to identify the interests at stake in the complex negotiation process between different national- and EU institutions. You can help in creating a more complete picture of the organizations involved and their potential impact on the policy process by contributing to our crowdsourcing project. As a result, an interactive graph will enable you to explore and enrich the network of relevant stakeholders, their lobbying activities and other important attributes.

Contribute to our crowdsourcing project to make the invisible visible. Go to: http://finance4citizens.eu/cs2030

Investment-ortiented climate policy

February 19th + March 3rd, 2015

Thanks to a number of recent studies, initiated mainly by the German Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation, Building and Nuclear Safety (BMUB), it is possible to show that an investment-oriented climate policy can help overcome the stagnation of the European economy and the social and political crisis in Europe. Since other strategies continue to lose their plausibility, it is a must to have an open debate on our current take on climate policy. Read more

IPCC sea-level rise scenarios not fit for purpose for high-risk coastal areas

The sea-level rise scenarios of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) do not necessarily provide the right information for high-risk coastal decision-making and management, according to new research involving scientists from the Global Climate Forum in Berlin. Read more

Climate Finance and Sustainable Economic Recovery

published on Handelsblatt Online (September 23, 2014)
> www.handelsblatt.com/meinung/gastbeitraege/gastbeitrag-zum-klimagipfel-wie-gute-klimapolitik-die-konjunktur-anschieben-kann/10742108.html

by K. Toepfer, J-C. Hourcade, M. Aglietta, C. Jaeger

English version:
The day before this year’s UN General Assembly, September 23, its secretary general will host a UN climate summit in New York. President Obama will attend a meeting taking place in his country but key countries like China, India, Russia as well as the EU and Germany will not be represented by their top leaders. This is one more sign of the mismatch between dramatic rhetoric on global climate change and ineffective action in global climate policy. Read more

III. Open GSS Conference

October 8-10th, 2014
Unpacking Green Growth
A trans-continental conference

The future of global economic growth raises a whole range of questions, including, but not limited to, purely economic ones. Will the successes in reducing global poverty continue? Will inequality within key economies continue to increase? Will global and local environmental disruption continue? In the face of these questions, green growth has been proposed as an appropriate strategy. The vision of billions of poor people achieving a decent standard of living while economic activities become a force of environmental enhancement rather than disruption is certainly attractive. But is it feasible? Read more

Workshop “Sustainability Skills”

September 1st, 2014

Europe is fighting with high unemployment rates, especially among young people and in the Southern member states. Considering the debate on Green Growth stimuli in times of daunting secular stagnation, this workshop will focus on the reform of the vocational education in Europe. A panel discussion with high-level decision-makers and a following working session shall present ideas for a reform of the vocational education system making it more fit for the needs of a low-carbon economy. One of the major topics of the workshop will be the German dual vocational system. Read more

Green Business Models and Green Economy Conference

July 14th, 2014

Economic stagnation as well as climate change are two of the most pressing challenges at a global scale. Despite some positive news, a European economic recovery, especially in terms of employment, is not in sight. Even though there is progress, international climate negotiations have a hard time overcoming the gridlock of the past years. In Europe as elsewhere climate policy discussions are mainly focused on burden-sharing which leads to minimal action. To change this daunting path, there is a need to reframe the discussion on climate policy and economic policy. Read more

Climate change threatens to cause trillions in damage to world’s coasts, if coastal regions do not adapt to sea-level rise.

Coastal regions may face massive increases in damages from storm surge flooding over the course of the 21st century. According to a new study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, global average storm surge damages could increase from about 10-40 billion USD per year today to up to 100,000 billion USD per year by the end of century, if no adaptation action is taken. The study lead by the Berlin-based think-tank Global Climate Forum (GCF) presents, for the first time, comprehensive global simulation results on future storm surge damages to buildings and infrastructure. Drastic increases in these damages are expected, on one hand, due to rising sea-levels and, on the other hand, due to population and economic growth. Asia and Africa may be particularly hard hit because of their rapidly growing coastal mega-cities, such as Shanghai, Manila or Lagos. Read more