Climate resilience in the name of sustainability
21. 05. 2024.
The climate resilience assessment evaluates the durability and operational capability of projects funded by grants in light of the anticipated effects of climate change.
To avoid increasingly severe climatic factors, it is crucial to properly adapt to an increasingly extreme environment, where the key is a conscious adaptation to the climate of the future and the promotion of sustainability. The climate resilience assessment provides assistance in this regard. Infrastructure projects—primarily due to their planned lifespan—are perhaps the most exposed to future climatic conditions. Therefore, during the planning phase, special attention must be given to quality parameters to ensure that the infrastructure can meet socio-economic needs in the long term without significant additional costs.
How are sustainability and climate resilience connected today?
Climate change is one of the major challenges of the 21st century, directly impacting both society and the economy. Reducing greenhouse gas emissions through related measures and investments is essential for ensuring the balanced sustainability of the planet. Without these investments, the average temperature of the Earth’s atmosphere could increase to such an extent in the coming decades that it could lead to serious and irreversible chain reactions, permanently altering the familiar climatic conditions, mainly manifesting in weather extremes (such as an increase in the frequency of heatwaves, droughts, storms, and flash floods).
The climate resilience assessment is a procedure that prevents infrastructure from being exposed to potential long-term climatic impacts while ensuring the principle of “energy efficiency first” and that the greenhouse gas emissions from the project are aligned with the 2050 climate neutrality target.*
The assessment provides an opportunity for project planners to implement additional measures that are essential for ensuring that the developed infrastructure operates cost-effectively in the long term. Therefore, sustainability efforts and climate resilience assessments are closely linked, and both are essential for future infrastructure to withstand the challenges posed by climate change. These assessments help identify high-risk projects and encourage the effective integration of climate protection and adaptation considerations into projects.
Main directions for conducting climate resilience assessments
The assessment consists of two interrelated yet distinct parts:
- evaluating changes in greenhouse gas emissions expected as a result of the project (climate neutrality sub-assessment);
- evaluating the project’s adaptation to climate change (climate adaptation sub-assessment).
The goal of these assessments in both areas is to identify high-risk infrastructural developments, which either result in significant greenhouse gas emissions or are particularly vulnerable to climatic impacts. Additionally, they aim to encourage the integration of climate protection and adaptation considerations during the planning and implementation of such projects.
Different types of projects require varying levels of detail in climate resilience assessments, which can be categorized as:
- Simplified climate resilience assessment: consists of a single part and focuses solely on the preliminary assessment of the sensitivity of the newly established infrastructure element to the consequences of climate change.
- Standard climate resilience assessment: comprises two interdependent phases: the screening phase, which is mandatory for all standard climate resilience assessments, and the detailed analysis phase, which is only required if the screening phase results deem it necessary.
Obligation for climate resilience assessment
Conducting a climate resilience assessment is a mandatory requirement for all infrastructural investments planned for a period of at least five years during the 2021-2027 European Union development cycle. Therefore, it is crucial to pay special attention to the vulnerability, exposure, and environmental impact factors of these developments, ensuring long-term sustainability goals can be met.
Experienced consultants from eNET Hungary Ltd. can perform the climate resilience assessment with professional integrity, guaranteed quality, and up-to-date information, thereby facilitating the success of infrastructural projects.
* Regulation 2021/1060, Article 2(42), laying down common provisions on the European Regional Development Fund, the European Social Fund Plus, the Cohesion Fund, the Just Transition Fund, and the European Maritime, Fisheries and Aquaculture Fund, as well as financial rules for these and for the Asylum, Migration and Integration Fund, the Internal Security Fund, and the instrument for financial support for border management and visa policy.
