Climate adaptation

What is climate adaptation?

Rising sea levels, heatwaves, droughts, storms: the consequences of climate change pose new challenges for the world and pose major risks to human lives, supply systems, infrastructure and the livelihoods of entire regions. Despite numerous climate protection measures, the emission of greenhouse gases will continue to influence the climate and not all climate change impacts can be prevented. We need to adapt to climate change in order to better deal with these consequences and prevent or reduce damage.

Adapting to the consequences of climate change requires a rethink of current practices, processes and structures by all social actors. At best, new measures enable institutions, systems, infrastructures and communities to react to changes and thus become more resilient to the consequences of climate change.

Climate adaptation in the city

Urban agglomerations play a central role in climate protection and climate adaptation. Due to the high concentration of population and infrastructure, they are particularly affected by climate change. At the same time, they are themselves contributing to climate change through high greenhouse gas emissions. Climate change impacts can cause major economic damage in cities. Due to the particularly high risk of urban areas, sustainable urban development must in future be measured by its climate-resilient planning. In this context, nature-based solutions in particular are playing an increasingly important role. For example, UfU is investigating the cooling and air purification effects of green and blue infrastructures and developing strategies for their better integration into urban planning processes on the basis of its findings. UfU also supports the conversion of previously unused urban areas into productive biomass areas through educational formats and multi-stakeholder dialog processes.