Baltadapt is a Baltic Sea Region-wide climate change adaptation strategy, which aims to provide a framework to strengthen cooperation and information sharing within the region and help to create a coherent set of adaptation policies and actions from the transnational to the local level.
Climate change will influence precipitation amounts and patterns, and lead to an increase in terrestrial and ocean temperatures and a rise in sea level. The resulting changes will jeopardize the integrity of the ecosystem and increase risks caused by natural disasters.
There are good experiences of adaptation in the Baltic Sea Region but they are somehow fragmented and do not acknowledge the fact that the Baltic Sea is a specific eco-region. Baltadapt is developing a Baltic Sea Region-wide climate change adaptation strategy that will focus on the sea itself and its coastline.
Such a strategy cannot be adopted by Baltadapt, but the project can ensure its preparation and clear the ground for its adoption by developing:
- An improved knowledge base:
A knowledge brokerage process between political decision makers and researchers leading to improved institutional capacity. The Baltic Window, a one-stop-shop information portal compiling all available information on climate change in the Baltic Sea Region, shall be the hub for decision makers from the Baltic Sea Region
- An Action plan:
Providing the operational basis for implementing the BSR-wide Climate Change Adaptation Strategy and influencing policies, programmes and regulations. Together with the action plan, recommendations on funding mechanisms for financing climate change adaptation initiatives shall be given
The three major problem areas covered by Baltadapt are:
- Regional climate information
Baltadapt identifies state-of-the-art knowledge on Baltic Sea regional climate change. The synthesis builds on available data from regional climate change modelling as well as meteorological records of past weather extremes
- The Baltic Sea ecosystem
Climate change will increasingly drive marine ecosystems and biodiversity loss, unsustainable use of the sea (e.g. overfishing) has rendered marine ecosystems and socioeconomic systems more vulnerable to climate change and thus less capable of adapting
Baltadapt aims at identifying the relevant information for designing appropriate adaptation measures and knowledge gaps that need to be closed.
- The coastal zone
While sea level rise is a threat for some coastal infrastructure (cities, streets, railways etc.) measures taken to protect coastal areas from sea level rise might on the other side jeopardize the ecosystem.
Baltadapt reviews the impact of climate change on coastal zones’ environmental conditions as well as on coastal uses and functions and strategies and management options
Baltadapt is financed by the Baltic Sea Region Programme 2007-2013 and part-financed by the European Union (Regional Development Fund). Lead partner is the Danish Meteorological Institute. The Project duration is from October 2010 to December 2013.