PROJECT DESCRIPTION
BACKGROUND
All European regions are vulnerable to climate change impacts, although the magnitude and intensity differ depending on the geographic, economic, and social characteristics of the region. According to the main climate projections for Europe, both the South and Southwest areas of Europe, where the Pyrenees are located, will be the most critical areas affected by climate change and particularly by the frequency and intensity of extreme events.
The international scientific community agrees that mountain areas such as the Pyrenees are among the regions that are most sensitive to the negative impacts of climate change. In the Pyrenees, climate change is already negatively impacting both socioeconomic and biophysical systems, namely biodiversity, ecosystems, quality of life of citizens, territory, and the economy. The synergetic effects of higher temperatures, changes in precipitation patterns and increasing frequency and intensity of extreme events (i.e., heat waves, heavy rain, droughts ...) are creating new challenging scenarios for a more sustainable development of this territory.
Seven regional climate change policies from three countries (Spain, France and Andorra) converge on this territory but fail to consider the mountainous nature of the territory and the cross-border approach. Therefore, it was necessary to define a cross-border strategy on climate change for the entire bioregion.
In this context, The Pyrenean Climate Change Strategy 2050 (EPiCC) was developed through a participatory process and approved on 13th of December 2021 by the Presidents of the six Pyrenean regions (Nouvelle-Aquitaine, Occitanie, Aragon, Catalonia, Basque Country, Navarre) and Andorra.
OBJECTIVES
The overall aim of the LIFE-SIP PYRENEES4CLIMA is the full implementation of the Pyrenean Climate Change Strategy 2050 (EPiCC), and more specifically the Operative Plan EPiCC 2030, in the whole territory (4 Spanish regions, 2 French regions and Andorra).
More specifically, the project aims to:
To improve the resilience of the Pyrenees to climate change as a substantial element to enhance the resilience in the territories connected or dependent on ecosystem services.
To catalyse demonstration actions on climate change resilience in mountain areas.
To strengthen the implementation of European policies through territorial cooperation.
Other operative objectives are linked to the implementation of a series of actions (best practice, demonstration, and pilot) in the framework of the project’s 5 main pillars (understanding climate impacts, increasing resilient natural areas, adapting the mountain economy, protecting the population and territory, and enhancing a new governance):
- To generate a detailed level of knowledge about the current state of climate change in the Pyrenees through the analysis of long-term climate trends.
- To provide climate simulation datasets and a set of multisectoral climate indices for the whole Pyrenees to assess climate change processes and impacts and to improve decision making.
- To promote a better and science-based management of the Pyrenees’ water resources.
- To provide citizens, administrations and managers with the needed qualitative indicators of climate change impacts in sentinel ecosystems and species.
- To improve understanding of the effects of adaptive management on the ecosystem structure and function of Pyrenean forests, grasslands and high-altitude ecosystems.
- To provide tools and protocols for the improvement of ecological interconnectivity in natural areas and strategic places.
- To apply tools for early detection and cross-border control of invasive alien species sensitive to climate change.
- To develop strategies and models for the adaptation and transition of ski and mountain resorts to climate change, to develop circularity solutions in the Pyrenean tourism economy and specific cross-border tourist offers, connected to soft mobility proposals (train, bicycle).
- To promote adaptation through the evaluation, implementation and testing of different agro-sylvo-pastoral practices, and to promote and to strengthen the local marketing of agricultural and pastoral products by creating virtuous consumption loops (short circuits, reduction in the transport of goods) and by developing new products.
- To test, promote and deploy an approach to the ‘forest-wood' sector that integrates forest management and natural processes, considering the multifunctionality of the forest.
- To apply the ‘One Health’ concept in the Pyrenees, estimating the influence of various environmental problems accentuated by climate change on the health of people and their vulnerable ecosystems.
- Enhance nature-based solutions to reinforce the protective role of Pyrenean forests to respond to natural hazards with a multi-risk approach in mountain areas and grassland systems through ecological soil restoration.
- Enhance local climate action in the Pyrenees massif by promoting local sustainability with the engagement of local actors and municipal climate networks.
- To consolidate and reinforce a multilevel governance system, promoting the mainstreaming of climate change into sectoral policies and especially at the municipal level.
RESULTS
The Project will increase the resilience of the whole community (population, economic sectors, and habitats/biodiversity) most vulnerable to climate change in the 7 territories of the Pyrenean massif.
More specifically:
- Extension of the temporal coverage of air temperature and precipitation data, prior to 1959 for the whole region.
- Increase of the number of climate variables monitored for the whole region: from 3 variables at the beginning of the project to 7.
- Creation of a sub-daily (hourly) precipitation database for the whole region.
- Quantification and geographical extent of the ‘Elevation Depending Warming’ phenomenon in the Pyrenees.
- New climate change projections for the whole Pyrenees based on new models and with higher spatial resolution (from 5 km to 1 km).
- Provision of a real-time open-source platform for monitoring extreme events (i.e., heat waves, cold waves, extreme precipitation, and droughts) in the Pyrenees.
- A working hydrological modelling tool that will allow a periodic evaluation of the Pyrenees’ hydrological cycle.
- A new series of quantitative indicators of climate change impacts for vulnerable ecosystems, habitats (cryosphere, hydrosphere, biosphere) and indicative species (forest, flora, fauna, invasive alien species), as well as agricultural soils.
- Long term trends of more than 200 plant species and plant communities of interest and vulnerable to climate change, with an estimation of risks of decline and extinction rates, and as well as a determination of the most vulnerable and resilient environments in the face of climate change.
- A time series data on structure and function of ecosystems (species composition, soil physical and chemical composition, species productive performance such as biomass production).
- New datasets on soil organic Carbon (C) sequestration in fields under organic farming and climate-smart forestry, as well as maps with geographical references to C content of soils and C sequestration potential capacity, soil temperature and soil humidity under different land uses and soil management, soil type and climate.
- To develop adaptive roadmaps established according to the main typologies and profiles of the ski resorts in the Pyrenees and their different vulnerabilities (climate, snow conditions, economic model, and their impacts on the environment)
- To develop a functional Tourism Innovation Incubator.
- The implementation of four pilot cases of agro-silvo-pastoral practices in the Pyrenees adapted to climate change.
- To develop a roadmap to improve the marketing of agriculture and pastoralism products in the Pyrenees.
- Implementation of forest management approaches close to natural processes, driving force to a transition towards an innovative circular bioeconomy of the forestry-wood sector and integrating local populations and elected representatives.
- Development of six (6) co-built multisectorial methodologies for adaptation to climate change to face existing challenges generated by extreme weather events and conditions that affect people's health, threat water availability, and increase the incidence of risks in high mountain areas due to increased climate variability.
- Implementation of eight (8) pilot cases, representative of the on-going challenges regarding extreme events and the needs of populations and territories to be better prepared and equipped to face climate change.
- Promoting local climate action in disadvantaged mountain municipalities and promotion of the Covenant of Mayors for Climate and Energy in the Pyrenees.
- Revitalisation of the Pyrenean Climate Change Observatory’s Technical committee and boosting the integration of the cross- border and mountain approach in regional climate policies.
- The management and promotion of meetings with national and European representatives in the field of climate change in mountain areas.
