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REGIONS4CLIMATE PROJECT
Regions4Climate, innovation to accelerate climate adaptation in 12 regions
Zabala Innovation will be part of the 44-partner consortium that seeks to measure resilience to climate change
Adaptation to climate change has become one of Europe’s main objectives for 2030. In the face of escalating climate change, the EU is facilitating research and implementation of new social innovations at the local level to accelerate our resilience.
Regions4Climate will have significant socio-cultural, economic and environmental impacts over the five-year duration of the project and with its 24 million budgets. The work will be carried out by 44 partners from 13 countries and is part of the Horizon Europe framework programme.
The project expects at least 13.8 million people living in the 12 Regions4Climate regions to benefit directly from the results of the project in the long term, with the potential for scaling up to around 746 million people living in Europe in the long term.
Under the EU’s Climate Change Adaptation Mission, which helps to implement the “European Green Deal“, 118 regions and communities in Europe are involved in working towards climate resilience. In this context, more than 100 organisations have received €50 million from the Horizon Europe programme – Research and Innovation Actions in Support of the Implementation of the Climate Change Adaptation Mission – to address current and projected climate change challenges and build more resilient European communities.
Regions4Climate will carry out innovative actions to improve climate resilience in close collaboration with stakeholders within the actual environments of partner regions. Through a cross-sectoral approach, the project will develop and validate resilience solutions including novel technologies, their integration and implementation in combination with new business models and innovative policies. This will facilitate and enhance decision-making and improve regional resilience to climate change by providing a set of proven, scalable, and easily replicable climate change adaptation solutions.
European regions included in Regions4Climate
Regions4Climate involves 12 European regions in developing and testing their resilience plans and transformative adaptation pathways, enhanced by cross-border collaboration and knowledge sharing. Partner regions include the Basque Country (Spain), Southern Aquitaine (France), Azores (Portugal), Tuscany (Italy), Køge Bay (Denmark), Burgas (Bulgaria), Helsinki-Uusimaa (Finland), Pärnumaa (Estonia), Eastern Crete (Greece), Castilla y León (Spain), Nordic Archipelago (Finland, Åland, and Sweden) and Troodos (Republic of Cyprus).
The Basque region will be represented in the project by the partners: the Publicly-Owned Environmental Management Company of the Basque Government, IHOBE; Department of Economic Development, Sustainability and Environment, DESMA; the Center of Applied Research and Technological Development, TECNALIA, and AZTI Foundation.
The Basque Country is one of the 118 regions selected for the EU Climate Change Adaptation Mission, where it has been recognised as an advanced adaptation region thanks to its track record in climate planning of more than 20 years.
The selection of the Basque Country to form part of this mission, together with its participation in the Regions4Climate project, confirms the innovative and pioneering nature of the work carried out by the Basque Government in the field of adaptation, with relevant and important projects such as the LIFE IP URBAN KLIMA 2050 project, the vulnerability, and risk analysis of the Basque coast in the face of climate change Kostaegoki, as well as the promotion of a new model of climate governance between public and private entities and the deployment of local climate action through the Udalsarea 2030 network, the Basque Network of Sustainable Municipalities.
Zabala Innovation’s work at Regions4Climate
Zabala Innovation will be working on the project from three different perspectives. Firstly, the Bilbao office will lead Social Innovation. In the words of Irene Pelegrín, one of our social innovation experts: “The project will develop cross-sectoral strategies that incorporate social, technological, business, governance, and environmental aspects to the common challenges posed by climate change; facilitating informed and adapted decision-making in the European regions and communities most exposed to the impacts of climate change.”
In addition, it will support the Dissemination and Communication tasks, in which one of the objectives is the positioning of the Basque Country as one of the reference pilots of the project to measure resilience to climate change. And, finally, it will also be supported by Consultancy Services to pursue the common objective of the project.