Development of a multi-stakeholder dialogue platform and Think tank to promote innovation with Nature based solutions

Report on the market potential through synergies in International level

Task 7.3 will collate the results of Tasks 7.1-7.2, together with any required new evidence identified in the international synergies meeting of Task 7.2. The outputwill be an evaluation of market potential for NBS to the EC and scaled to global impact if implemented more extensively worldwide. The market potential will include impacts on infrastructure value, employment markets, social and health benefits, operational savings, capital investment, and future reduction in environmental risks such as ecosystem failures and costs of climate change adaptation. The initial draft report will be reviewed by the Project Board and a selected team of the international partners and revised in line with critical feedback. The final draft will be presented during year 3 at the final annual project meeting. The ongoing activities of WP6 will establish the platform during project year 2 for a ThinkNature - organised session on “Nature Based Solutions – market potential and risk management” at the International Unio

Report on Dialogue Steering Statement Papers and Dialogue Outcomes for the Climate Change Adaptation and Mitigation Plans

The outcomes of a dialogue for climate change adaptation and mitigation will be presented. For this topic, 1 brainstorming forum and 1 debate will be held in Paris. The dialogue topics are: 1. Integrated and holistic solutions that meet both adaptation and mitigation objectives and are applicable across different sectors such as integrating materials, green and blue infrastructure, enhancing ecosystems with view to climate change, etc. 2. Discussion on natural resource management natural ecosystems by “zero waste” production. This will start from short term efforts to better understanding of actual system limits and encouraging efficient use of resources, towards the long-term development of new frugal technologies. 3. How to enhance the cost-effectiveness of solutions in order to address societal and environmental challenges such as developing low cost, low maintenance and low carbon emissions solutions to climate change challenges. 4. How to integrate new and innovative approaches such as nature based

Report on dissemination activities

Frequent dissemination to key targets and stakeholders, in order to foster the development, implementation and monitoring of urban ecosystem service based approaches in planning.

Barriers Landscape and Decision Making Hierarchy for the Sustainable Urbanisation in Cities via NBS

Guided by the National Representatives and the Regional Think and Do Tank, an analysis of the current situation and needs in relation to perceived barriers will be carried out concerning the urbanisation of cities. This will be achieved through semi-structured interviews /questionnaires which although more difficult to carry out than structured interviews, they are more flexible allowing new questions to be brought up as a result of what the interviewee says. The questionnaire will be completed through face-to-face and/or telephone interviews with selected interviewees from one of the stakeholders’ categories, namely engineers, architects, local governments and policy makers as well as with the people involved in Horizon Projects. Moreover, a bulk number of questionnaires will be collected via online tools using the Internet based ThinkNature Platform. The questionnaire/interviews which will be performed in parallel with the dialogue steering events, will include some of the following identified barriers:

Report on Dialogue Steering Statement Papers and Dialogue Outcomes for Urbanisation in Cities

The outcome of a dialogue among the various stakeholders (private and public sector, architects, practitioners, policy makers) that will be initiated and sustained on nature-based solutions (NBS) in the context of sustainable urbanisation in cities and human well-being, will be presented. Through the organisation of 1 brainstorming forum and 1 debate that will be held in Milan the following issues will be discussed: 1. Mapping the opportunities available for existing and new NBS associated with materials, buildings and infrastructure in cities. The incorporation of NBS in building and at district level will also be explored. 2. Generation of co-benefits through greening cities in relation with climate change adaptation and mitigation. 3. The role of cultural heritage in renaturing cities and how to incorporate existing knowledge from historic buildings and districts in restoration with nature. 4. The role of NBS in advancing sustainable and resilient infrastructure development and upgrade. 5. The effectiv

Consortium identity and templates

Development of a visual identity (logo, colours, style elements) and guidelines for all external communication. Included are default templates for Word, Powerpoint, etc. and a set of default texts about the project.

Report: Analysis of the business case for the application of the nature based solutions

WP7 participants will review evidence and data gaps identified from the Kick-Off meeting workshop session. Desk study methods will collate evidence and data from public data products, from all project partners, and from experts identified on the register of international experts. The data will be collated within a GIS database that will be accessible from the secure members’ pages of the project web site. The business case for NBS will be developed through 3 steps. 1. Definition of ecosystem services and their restoration and enhancement potential through NBS will be done within the Milano and Paris Forums described in WP4 for Innovation Dialogue Steering. These events in turn address the necessary approaches to implementing NBS as potential solutions to the 4 Challenges; in brief - restoring ecosystems, sustainable urbanisation, climate change, and managing risk. We will explicitly engage with partners of the Belmont Forum to bring national funding agencies and their communities of expertise into the Th

The ThinkNature Handbook

The development of the ThinkNature Handbook is considered one of the major tasks of the project. ThinkNature Handbook will be a comprehensive guide for Nature Based Solutions that will constructively summarize all the current knowledge regarding the different domains of NBS. Its aim will be to improve understanding of the relevant actors regarding the actual and potential impact of NBS. The creation of the ThinkNature Handbook will be a dynamic process that will feed from the dialogue steering events (i.e. brainstorming forums on NBS innovation domains) and the outcomes of WP4, will exploit all the produced knowledge from the barriers identification process (WP5) and will incorporate the designed strategies for decision making and the policy proposals of WP5. For the development of the Handbook the following actions are foreseen: • Development of Contents that will cover the following topics: o Technical Aspects of Nature Based Solutions: How to perform rehabilitation through renaturing. o Policy Aspects, r

Final publishable report

At the end of the project a final publishable report is written by the project leader, supported by the project partners.

ThinkNature Forum proceedings

The proceedings of the Nature Based Solutions Forum will be included in this report. A Nature Based Solutions Forum will be organised where all relevant stakeholders from the various groups will get together and undertake major decisions. The organisational structure of the NBS will support the effective transfer of knowledge among the various groups which are: • Business representatives and market actors • Scientist and Experts • Policy makers and stakeholders • End users such as municipalities, local and regional authorities, etc. The Forum will be initialised using electronic media, such as LinkedIn and will continue with physical meetings, sessions, etc. The first Forum meeting will take place in Brussels with the launch of the Think Nature Platform and the election of the Board and Chair.

Report on training webinars and summer school

The material collected from T6.1 and T6.2 will be organised in specific modules to support the training webinars and the summer school that will be performed in T6.3. Each module will focus on a specific domain of the nature based solutions according to the structure of the ThinkNature Handbook. Information collected regarding the technical, social, economic and policy aspects of Nature Based Solutions, as well as selected examples of existing case studies per NBS domain will be organized in discrete modules that will constitute the webinar material. FORTH and TUC will undertake the organization of the webinars that will be regularly performed throughout the duration of this task. Technical experts, policy stakeholders, market actors and other experts per NBS domain will be invited to contribute to the formulation of the material and the structure of each webinar, as well as to be the speakers of the webinars that are relevant to their expertise. FORTH and TUC will also undertake the invitation of the relevan

Report on the Strategic Plan in Regional Level. Report and Statement Papers of the four Regional Meetings

Following the formulation of the Platform, Regional Think and Do Tanks will be organised. The Regional Think and Do Tank will be initiated soon after the European Platform Formulation. Four Regions are defined based on the climatic classifications by Koppen and the EC, DG Agriculture and Rural Development, Climate Change: • Ocean Climatic Region managed by UNIVLEEDS (West and Atlantic Areas marked in yellow) • Mediterranean Region managed by CNR (South and South-East regions marked in orange) • Temperate Continental Region managed by GIB (Central Europe marked in light green) • Northern Temperate Region managed by UoH (Northern Areas marked in dark green) Each Regional Think and Do Tank will nominate a member to the ThinkNature Platform Board. The role of the Regional Think and Do Tank will be to: • Review and Guide from the regional perspective the activities and initiatives of the Platform. • Collect and organise the information at regional level by continuous interaction with the Local Repres

List of synergies in International level for nature based solutions

The members of the International Advisory Board, who will provide independent advice and steering to the ThinkNature project, will participate in the project kick-off meeting. The current membership is the following experts. Prof. Yongguan Zhu, Director Chinese Academy of Sciences Urban Environment Institute Kun Chang Yi, Korean Architect and Vice-Chairman of Aum & Lee Architects and Associates, Seoul, Korea Carlos Alvarez, Vice President for Region III The Americas, International Union of Architects Prof. Mattheos Santamouris, Anita Lawrence Chair in High Performance Architecture, U. New S. Wales, Aus. Prof. Peter de Ruiter, Director of the Inst. for Biodiversity and Ecosystem Dynamics, University of Amsterdam Joao Suplicy, Practicing architect, Brazil, President of Panamerican Federation of Associations of Architects At the project kick-off meeting, a workshop session for WP7 with all project participants and International Advisory Board members will take place. The session will identify international orga

Report on Dialogue Steering Statement Papers and Dialogue Outcomes for the Risk Management and Resilience

The outcomes of a dialogue among the various stakeholders for risk management and resilience will be presented. 1 brainstorming forum will be organised in Paris and will address the following points: 1. Combing nature based solutions for risk management in various levels such as reduction of pollution, carbon storage, preservation of biodiversity, recreational activities, and economic opportunities. 2. How to offer synergies in reducing multiple risks in regional level. How the risk management in local level influences regional and EU level. 3. How to leverage funds for long term benefits and to ensure massive involvement of politicians and private companies in the implementation and funding of such solutions. 4. How to promoting ecosystem-based solutions is in itself an innovative way to consider risk management as an integrated approach, combining different scales and planning perspectives. 5. Robust monitoring of the performance and assessment of the impact of deployed NBS.

Report on Dialogue Steering Statement Papers and Dialogue Outcomes for Restoration of Degraded Ecosystems

The outcome of a dialogue among the various stakeholders for restoring degraded ecosystems using NBS. 1 brainstorming forum and 1 debate will be organised in parallel with the previous one (for sustainable urbanisation in cities, T4.1) for restoring degraded ecosystems. The event will be organised in Milan, Italy. The topics under discussion are: 1. How to handle the expanding resource needs for land within Europe and how to prioritise agriculture, forestry, energy, transport, industry. The role of combined efforts in this field as well as innovative techniques for restoring and reclaiming land, such as soil fertility restoration techniques. 2. Benefits of restoring ecosystems and establish a green infrastructure, such as reduced stormwater runoff, dealing with extreme temperatures. 3. The role of restoration in increasing resilience and adapting to climate change as well as contributing to human well-being. 4. Development of business and investment models to create market opportunities. Landscape improvem

A report including the case studies portfolio and analysis as well as access to the case studies database

This task includes the creation of an internet based case studies’ portfolio for nature based solutions. TUC will prepare a comprehensive template list of examples regarding good synergies between technical aspects and outdoor comfort requirements. The creation of this template list will be an interactive process with the ongoing workshops, brainstorming forums and debates, organized in WP4. The dialogue steering process is expected to boost knowledge regarding NBS domains, recent examples and technological developments. This template will be then discussed in the ThinkNature Platform Board and will be distributed to the coordinators of on-going and completed projects related to the major domains of nature based solutions. The information gathered will be homogenised in order to be easily found and compared with existing conventional approaches. The collected information will be encoded and tabulated as to be easily visualised. By creating a “portfolio” of existing case studies with proven impact –

Proceedings of the final conference

The presentation of the final report of the project is accompanied by a conference. This conference will conclude the project and will be the start of a new phase in which the platform continues to operate.

Barriers Landscape and Decision Making Hierarchy for Restoring Degraded Ecosystems via NBS

The present task will focus on the identification of barriers for the restoration of degraded ecosystems using NBS. This will be achieved through semi-structured interviews /questionnaires which although more difficult to carry out than structured interviews, they are more flexible allowing new questions to be brought up as a result of what the interviewee says. The questionnaire will be completed through face-to-face and/or telephone interviews with selected interviewees from one of the stakeholders’ categories, namely engineers, architects, local governments and policy makers as well as with the people involved in Horizon Projects. Moreover, a bulk number of questionnaires will be collected via online tools using the Internet based ThinkNature Platform. The questionnaire/interviews which will be performed in parallel with the dialogue steering events, will include some of the following identified barriers: • Technological Barriers: Lack of knowledge regarding the various available technologies for the

Report on the Nature Based Solution Platform Action Plan including mission, members, groups, board

The Nature Based Solutions European Platform’s organisational structure, mission statement, strategic and action plan will be formulated during this task. A science-policy-business-society interface will be established as a multi-level partnership, which brings together multi-disciplinary scientific expertise, policy, business and society, including NGOs, CSOs, and citizens The following activities are foreseen for the formulation of the NBS Platform: • The mission statement of the Platform will be developed and communicated amongst the partners. It should be concise, well defined with a clear message for all interested parties. • The benefits of membership in the Platform will be discussed and reported. • The Code of Conduct will be also decided. • The Action Plan will be elaborated at the early stages of the project and it will include the following: • Advice at the Local level • Advice at Regional level • Innovative aspects and Working Groups • A Nature Based Solutions Forum will b

Policy proposals and decision making mechanisms for Climate Change Adaptation and Mitigation using NBS

An initial Barriers Landscape Assessment will be revealed for CCAM and the role of NBS. Complementary strategies for addressing the CCAM through Sustainable Urbanisation of Cities and Restoration of Ecosystems will be revealed. The work performed in this task will be based on the deep evaluation of the questionnaires and interviews of the previous tasks in order to identify and demonstrate how CCAM nature-based solutions can be embedded in local level spatial planning and decision-making mechanisms. Concrete proposals on policy and decision making mechanisms will be developed for: • Addressing flood risk management via NBS: The restoration of the flood plain of the Noordwaard polder, Netherlands is a good example. • Mitigating heat stress in urban environments: green infrastructure can decrease temperatures and heat stress events. Trees are particularly effective, but green roofs and walls, gardens and parks, as well as cool materials and blue areas can contribute only in addressing this issue. The ex

Policy proposals and decision making mechanisms for Risk Management and Resilience

The outcomes of the previous tasks will provide the steering instruments for addressing Risk Management and Resilience through NBS: Concrete proposals on policy and decision making mechanisms will be developed for: • Supporting the NBS as a major tool for risk management and resilience by overarching the NBS co-benefits in reduction of pollution, carbon storage, preservation of biodiversity, recreational activities, and economic opportunities. • Steering the changes in current regulations in Europe such as the Flood Directive, the Energy Efficiency Directive and the Water Framework Directive. • Promoting ecosystem-based solutions in an innovative way to consider risk management as an integrated approach, combining different scales and planning perspectives.

Report on Strategic Plan in Local Level and List of Local Representatives

A consulting/supporting body, the Local Representatives (LR), will be established in each target country, inviting the participation of representatives of the local key market actors, policy makers and official bodies of the stakeholder groups. In many cases, stakeholders are not technical people so any guidelines and recommendations should be easy to use and explained in their terminology. Therefore, LR members are essential for the success of the coordination and support action. The LRs will assist in the identification of the barriers and needs (WP5), and with the decision making and indicators. They will ensure that the focus of the coordination and support action is correct, while in turn benefitting from the resulting assessment, recommendations and improved processes. Their exact role will be to: • Pinpoint the key players at local level that may promote the nature based solutions in their country, i.e. representatives from the engineers’ and architects’ chambers, associations and stakeholders,

Project leaflet

A project leaflet (small brochure) will be designed to communicate the fundamentals of the project (the Think Nature Message Tree). This leaflet will be used by all parties to describe the project.

Joint event/publication with other Horizon 2020 and/or IEE projects

It is important that the developed framework for nature based solution is scientifically sound and embedded into other existing projects. This is conducted except for the other activities, with the organisation of a joint activity (for example a conference, workshop or joint publication) with another platform/Horizon2020 project.

10 publications in national magazines/websites

A minimum of 10 publications in national media, one in each participating country will be conducted.

Quarterly electronic newsletters

Composing a quarterly electronic newsletter and distribution of it by the project partners and within the learning community.

Organisation of 1ST set of Brainstorming Forums with web-streaming and debates in Milan

Organisation of 1ST set of Brainstorming Forums with web-streaming and debates in Milan. 1 brainstorming forum and 1 debate will be organised and will be held in Milan for sustainable urbanisation in cities. 1 brainstorming forum and 1 debate will be organised in parallel with the other for restoring degraded ecosystems.

10 press releases

10 press releases at key moments of the project, one in each participating country, will be conducted.

Two dissemination videos

Development of two short videos which introduces the project, communicates the principles of the Think Nature Message Tree and encourages the viewer to participate in activities of the platform and the development of nature based solutions in general. Development of a 30 sec and a 90 sec video, both wholly or partially animated

Organisation of 2nd set of Brainstorming Forums in Paris

Organisation of 2nd set of Brainstorming Forums in Paris. 1 brainstorming forum will be organised and will be held in Paris for climate change adaptation and mitigation. 1 brainstorming forum will be organised in parallel with the other, for risk management and resilience.

The set of ThinkNature demonstrators

A set of downloadable and/or online demonstrators will be developed: • A Mobile App Game. • A set of four recorded interviews with relevant policy makers, market actors and technical experts. These online demonstrators will serve as introductory, explanatory and dissemination material towards all interested parties. They are expected to raise attention and interest towards NBS and help build a wide and multidisciplinary audience. The demonstrators will also act as training material that will be used in the training sessions. In this context, one summer school of 5 days will be organised in TUC, Crete. The summer school will be oriented on the four domains of NBS, while it will be addressed to energy experts, spatial planners, landscape architects, climatologists and industry. Policy stakeholders will be invited to contribute to the courses. The summer school will provide the opportunity of enhancing the interactions and exchanges between science, policy, business and society to mainstream both the ava

A report describing the ThinkNature Message Tree

A Message Tree for the ThinkNature Platform will be created at the early stages of the project. This Message Tree will start with the first key messages and will evolve in the course of the project. This structure will ensure consistent, clear messages with supporting arguments, facts and examples that would be easily comprehended and transferred. It will provide the foundation for the outreach to the various decision makers and external material developed for this audience. It will also serve as an efficient tool to raise citizens’ awareness regarding the advantages of NBS that could promote citizen-driven innovation and public demand towards NBS activities. The ThinkNature message tree will include: a) One overarching umbrella message b) Three statements/core messages that support the main idea. The messaging will use language that will resonate with decision-makers. c) Supporting facts and examples, evidence and proof points that will be developed by T6.1 and 6.2.

Project website and social media

Both a website and social media are set-up and actively updated over time, addressing a broad audience.

List of targeted media and media partnerships

Establishing relations with media and writing a list of targeted media. Media will be divided into two main categories; (1) professional media addressing field experts, urban planners and public authorities; and (2) generic media addressing a broad audience and other stakeholders. The first group are the implementers of nature based solutions; the second group is the context, the urban ecosystem in which they operate.

4 international conference papers

It is important that the developed framework for nature based solution is scientifically sound and embedded into other existing projects. This is conducted also by the participation in at least four international conferences with a conference paper.

Internet based communication platform

The proposed platform will be an integrated multi-stakeholder internet solution that will enable virtual connectivity and collaboration. Among other functionalities will be the ability to connect, create teams and NBS activity streams. This tool will support all internet based activities of ThinkNature project, i.e. Online brainstorming forums and debates (WP4), Case study database (WP6), Webinars (WP6), Online questionnaire distribution and collection (WP5), Demonstrators and videos (WP6). The ThinkNature Platform will be linked with the Green Digital Charter Initiative in order to highlight the impact of ICT technology in energy and carbon emissions reduction in urban areas as well as identify climate adaptation technologies linked to sensor technologies for digital, smart cities (following on the ideas of Carlo Ratti and his MIT Sensable City Lab). The main tool for circulating knowledge among stakeholders will be the Wikis. Wikis are the easiest and unconstrained way to create content. The use of templa

Deliverables

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