Skip to main content
European Commission logo
English English
CORDIS - EU research results
CORDIS
CORDIS Web 30th anniversary CORDIS Web 30th anniversary

Drivers and Feedbacks of Changes in Arctic Terrestrial Biodiversity

Project description

An advanced model of 21st century Arctic change

The EU-funded CHARTER project aims to advance state-of-the-art (SOTA) knowledge on Arctic biodiversity change and social-ecological systems. It will achieve this by investigating drivers/feedbacks of cryospheric change, incorporating local peoples’ ways of knowing. Moreover, it aims to elucidate effects of biodiversity changes on local communities and help integrate biochemical soil carbon exchange, sea ice and albedo into an earth system model, incorporating all of these into the latest Arctic regional climate modelling efforts. The project constitutes an ambitious effort to create an advanced SOTA model of 21st century Arctic change with major socio-economic implications for the cryosphere.

Objective

CHARTER aims to advance state-of-the-art (SOTA) knowledge on Arctic biodiversity change and social-ecological systems (SES) on four critical fronts: i) Feedbacks: To understand transitions in vegetation cover, energy balance and cryospheric change at centennial, decadal, and present-day time scales; ii) SES and biodiversity: To understand the effects of biodiversity changes on indigenous/local communities and traditional livelihoods, e.g. reindeer herding; iii) Modelling: To integrate biochemical/permafrost soil carbon exchange, sea ice and albedo into an Earth System Model (ESM), and incorporate these into the latest Arctic Regional Climate modeling efforts; and iv) Policy: To develop strategies supporting Arctic communities with co-benefits and synergies between adaptation, mitigation and policy implications. To accomplish these, CHARTER combines expertise from Earth System sciences, biodiversity indices and SES research. CHARTER is an ambitious effort to advance SOTA modelling of 21st century Arctic change with major socio-economic implications and feedbacks for the Cryosphere. We bring together our strongly participatory approaches that incorporate indigenous/local communities’ ways of knowing regional changes with SOTA research on circumpolar climate dynamics and long-term palaeoecological studies. CHARTER collates and processes truly transdisciplinary quantitative and qualitative empirical datasets for a holistic view that can be modeled. Arctic residents and stakeholders work alongside scientists to identify risks and viable adaptation strategies in relation to projected changes and future resilience in Arctic SESs. CHARTER combines natural sciences with ESM and participatory approaches to leverage the untapped potential for wild ungulate and livestock management to regulate global climate feedbacks through biogeoengineering. CHARTER’s results will lead to new tools and data for implementing sustainable strategies and establish public dialogue on the Arctic.

Call for proposal

H2020-LC-CLA-2018-2019-2020

See other projects for this call

Sub call

H2020-LC-CLA-2019-2

Coordinator

LAPIN YLIOPISTO
Net EU contribution
€ 895 916,25
Address
PL 122
96101 Rovaniemi
Finland

See on map

Region
Manner-Suomi Pohjois- ja Itä-Suomi Lappi
Activity type
Higher or Secondary Education Establishments
Links
Total cost
€ 895 916,25

Participants (21)