Environment: Launching EU project for islands' climate and economy

The EU project SOCLIMPACT aims at modelling downscaled climate change effects and their socioeconomic impacts in European islands for 2030–2100, integrating the climate outlooks and economic systems currently available for Europe, and funded by Horizon 2020 which includes Italy in collaboration with ENEA, CMCC, the University of Bologna and ANCI Sardinia. Pilot studies bring together partners from 12 European islands and archipelagos with different geographical and climatic environments from the Baltic to the Mediterranean (Sardinia, Sicily, Corsica, Balearic Islands, Cyprus, Malta, Crete), from the Atlantic (Madeira, Canary Islands and Azores) to the Caribbean Sea (French Antilles), focusing on specific sectors of the "Blue Economy", to develop and appraise long-term adaptation pathways for effective climate change taking into account the European strategy for decarbonising the economy. "Gianmaria Sannino, Head of the Climate Modelling Laboratory and Impacts of ENEA states that the climate modeling activities will be coordinated and the environmental indicators of innovation will be identified to enhance sustainable development of the islands. For example coastal erosion indicators will be studied taking into account climate induced sea level and sea temperature rise. The new SOCLIMPACT project on climate simulations will also expand the international databases currently available". Despite the socio-economic importance of the islands and their vulnerability to climate change, there is no reliable climate outlook available on pathways towards the decarbonisation policies for the sustainable management and protection of natural resources and ecosystems in harmony with the economic development of local communities.

"Giovanna Pisacane researcher of the Climatic Modeling and impact Laboratory also affirmed that “this gap is mainly caused by the insufficient spatial scale of the climate models – in the best case around 30Km – and the limited economic impact studies for the marine and maritime industry and the difficulty in estimating the economic value of intangible and non-monetary goods such as landscape, biodiversity and ecosystem services". EU SOCLIMPACT aims at filling these gaps and providing local administrations, public and private stakeholders with more detailed information on the spatial and accurate resolution on the complex climate change impacts in an island and the environmental impacts and inevitable economic consequences. Moreover, SOCLIMPACT aims at evaluating the cost-effectiveness of feasible and sustainable interventions, outlining a 'reference methodology' applicable to islands. SOCLIMPACT (Downscaling CLImate imPACTs and decarbonisation pathways in EU islands, and enhancing socioeconomic and non-market evaluation of Climate Change for Europe, for 2050 and beyond) is coordinated by the Universidad de las Palmas de Gran Canaria, and brings together 24 European partners.