All projects in detail

Focus: Adaptive, cross-border sediment management to protect the Wadden Sea from sea-level rise.

GCF role: How formal and informal institutions shape conflict and acceptance in sediment decisions.

Focus: How off-balance-sheet fiscal agencies financed wars, reconstruction and large transformations – and how they can finance the green transition.

Approach: Historical case studies, theory and policy proposals for green transition finance.

Focus: A co-created socio-economic assessment of future climate risk across European countries, sectors and households.

GCF role: Coastal impacts and adaptation decision-making with the DIVA model.

Focus: Sustainable, commercial aquaculture of seaweed and mussels in offshore wind farms of the North and Baltic Seas.

GCF role: Governance of multi-use offshore areas.

Focus: New formats for citizens' deliberation on the European Green Deal, tested in around 13 countries.

GCF role: Research partner in a consortium of 16 research institutes and civil society networks.

Focus: A holistic decision-making framework for EU climate and biodiversity policy, combining economic and biophysical models.

GCF role: Coastal risk and adaptation modelling with DIVA.

Focus: An international symposia series on how coastal societies adapt to sea-level rise – and why cultures of protection, insurance and retreat differ.

Format: Interdisciplinary symposia with case studies from all world regions.

Focus: A multi-level climate adaptation framework tested with 15 solutions in 7 demo sites across all EU biogeographical regions.

GCF role: Partner in a consortium of 32 organisations from 9 countries.

Focus: Large-scale coastal restoration as low-carbon adaptation, demonstrated at nine pilots in all EU regional seas.

GCF role: Funding and financing arrangements for nature-based coastal solutions.

Focus: Better marine protection in the North and Baltic Seas – from monitoring to acceptable conservation measures.

GCF role: Acceptance and effectiveness of conservation concepts and governance structures.

Focus: Clearing an estimated 1.6 million tonnes of WWII munitions from German seas – safely and with public support.

GCF role: Advocacy analysis, a multi-criteria analysis of dump sites and research on public acceptance.

Focus: An open web platform on coastal flood risk and adaptation for decision makers across Europe.

GCF role: Coastal risk scenarios and adaptation analysis with the DIVA model.

Focus: A standardized computational platform for agent-based Decision Theatre models that scales from laptops to HPC.

Output: Concept paper, R prototype (version 0), tutorial and technical documentation.

Focus: Compound flood events at the German Baltic coast – when storm surges coincide with other extremes – and what they mean for flood risk and adaptation decisions.

GCF role: Impact assessment and decision analysis of flexible flood-risk strategies.

Focus: Robust projections of sea-level rise from ice sheets and glaciers down to local coasts – with a focus on low-probability, high-impact scenarios.

GCF role: Coastal impact assessment with the DIVA model and climate services for the Maldives.

Focus: Ecosystem-supporting coastal protection for the German Baltic Sea – such as dune reinforcement, salt marshes or managed retreat.

GCF role: Project coordination; social acceptance, governance and economics of the strategies.

Focus: Why coal and carbon-intensive regions tip into clean-energy transitions – and how to enable positive tipping points.

Scope: 20 regional case studies across Europe plus partners in Australia, Canada and Indonesia.

Focus: Why some regions embrace the energy transition while others reject it – Berlin vs. the rural district of Spree-Neiße.

Output: Evidence and decision support for a socially just, region-specific Energiewende.

Focus: Science communication: citizens and experts explore a sustainable mobility transition in interactive Decision Theatres.

Format: Five Decision Theatre events in Essen, Berlin and online, based on the MoTMo model.

Focus: A participatory method where stakeholders explore simulations of possible futures on large screens and discuss policy options.

GCF role: Developed a lean, mobile and online version based on multi-agent models.

Focus: ISIpedia, an open encyclopedia of consistent, policy-relevant climate-impact simulations, co-designed with users.

GCF role: Coastal impact simulations and metrics with the DIVA model.

Focus: Coastal climate services that combine sea-level projections, impacts and adaptation options with the needs of decision makers.

GCF role: Led the climate services for the Maldives and contributed to the global service.

Focus: A co-designed, downscaled assessment of the risks and costs of climate change in Europe, including tipping points.

GCF role: Coastal risk and adaptation costs with the DIVA model.

Focus: System-analytical research on the German energy transition across heat, power and mobility.

GCF role: Co-lead of Work Package 9 “Digitization and ICTs” together with Fraunhofer IWES.

Focus: Integrated assessment of extreme sea levels, flood risk and adaptation options for the entire German Baltic Sea coast, including high-end sea-level rise.

GCF role: A fast flood model and adaptation pathways based on robust decision-making.

Focus: Linking high-performance modelling and transition experiments to foster transformations towards sustainability.

GCF role: Partner of Leuphana University Lüneburg and Arizona State University.

Focus: Where can green growth deliver on its promises? Win-win strategies that reconcile climate action with jobs and prosperity.

GCF role: Project coordination; research on coastal adaptation finance and governance.

Focus: High-performance computing for Global Systems Science – data and simulations for global challenges.

GCF role: Pilot study on the diffusion of green growth, e.g. sustainable mobility.

Focus: Making the financial system serve society – financial stability and long-term sustainable investment.

Output: Quantitative tools to assess systemic risk and sustainable finance policies.

Focus: How Europe's vocational education can prepare people for the jobs of a low-carbon economy.

GCF role: High-level stakeholder workshops and dialogues together with Germanwatch.

Focus: Agent-based macroeconomic tools that let policymakers test measures against economic and financial crises – fed with the expectations of citizens and stakeholders.

Output: A policy platform combining an agent-based model, social-media mining and information markets.

Focus: Why investment in the German Energiewende stalls – and how re-coordinating the expectations of industry, finance and civil society could unlock a low-carbon growth path.

GCF role: Stakeholder dialogues, workshops and thesis papers together with Germanwatch.

Focus: Impacts of high-end sea-level rise and the effectiveness and barriers of coastal adaptation, from local to global scale.

Key finding: Protecting cities pays off economically – but finance, equity and social conflict decide whether adaptation happens.

Focus: Network science and big data for modelling financial and climate policy – and for a greener, more stable financial system.

GCF role: Research on climate-finance networks and green transition policies.

Focus: Options for Romania and Bulgaria to contribute to a 40 % EU emission reduction by 2030.

Key finding: Energy efficiency is a particularly promising lever in both countries.

Focus: A European-Russian centre, hosted by the Nansen Centre in St. Petersburg, to strengthen joint research on environmental and climate change in the Arctic and Sub-Arctic.

Output: Long-term scientific cooperation between 11 institutions from Russia and the EU.

Focus: A global programme giving direction and coherence to research on climate vulnerability, impacts and adaptation (VIA).

GCF role: Lead authorship of the PROVIA Guidance on choosing methods for VIA assessment (2013).

Focus: Community-driven intercomparison of global impact models under common climate and socio-economic scenarios.

Key finding: Without adaptation, up to 600 million people could be affected by coastal flooding in 2100 (DIVA model).

Focus: Integrating climate variability and change into coastal zone management in 11 Mediterranean countries.

GCF role: High-resolution coastal data and flood and erosion analysis for Croatia and Tunisia.

Focus: An open-source macroeconomic module to assess costs and benefits of German energy and climate policies.

Innovation: Multi-agent model with multiple equilibria to identify win-win climate policies.

Focus: Impacts of 2 °C global warming on water, energy, coasts, health and other sectors across Europe and vulnerable regions.

GCF role: Sea-level rise impacts with the DIVA model, with a special focus on the Maldives.

Focus: Methods and a common platform to help European decision makers assess climate impacts, vulnerability and the costs of adaptation.

GCF role: Led the work package on a diagnostic framework for choosing adaptation approaches.

Focus: Building a research programme on global systems in ongoing dialogue with decision makers.

Format: Open network of workshops, working papers and conferences.

Focus: Can Europe grow, cut emissions and reduce unemployment at the same time? A rebuilt EU climate-economy model with investor expectations and learning-by-doing.

Key finding: A 30 % target could add up to 6 million jobs and 0.6 % growth per year by 2020.

Focus: How an ecological investment programme could help Germany escape the growth crisis.

Key finding: Unemployment could fall below two million by 2020.

Focus: How research on complex global problems – climate change, energy security, sustainable cities, inequality – can be discussed between science and politics.

Format: Structured science-policy dialogues.

Focus: Assessment of the German government's integrated energy and climate programme and its economic implications.

Output: Study "Investment for a climate-friendly Germany" (2008).

Focus: Natural and socio-economic consequences of climate change in the Mediterranean region.

Output: Regional Assessment of Climate Change in the Mediterranean (2013).

Focus: Climate-related risks and opportunities in insurance, asset management and lending.

Focus area: Mainstreaming climate risks into asset management.

Focus: An open ecosystem of tools and global data for coastal impact and adaptation modelling.

GCF role: Develops and maintains DIVACoast.jl and the global DIVA dataset.

Focus: Agent-based model simulating private mobility demand in Germany up to 2035.

Output: Scenario tool used in the Decision Theatre on sustainable mobility.

Focus: Carbon risks in the German economy and a carbon stress test for German financial institutions.

GCF role: Consortium partner in the UBA-commissioned study (with Ecofys, University of Oxford, Triple A Risk Finance, University of Zurich and Germanwatch).