25Oct 2021
CEP running a webinar on the creation and use of foresight information for national State of Environment (SoE) reporting

CEP to deliver a webinar for Western Balkan countries to build interest and facilitate discussion on the use of foresight information in their SOE reporting

CEP is part of a team commissioned by the European Environment Agency (EEA) to design and lead a webinar for national experts from Western Balkan countries on 28th October 2021, as part of the project ’Strengthening the participation of the Western Balkans in the work of the European Environment Agency 2020-2021. Actions for Water and Foresight assessments’. The project is being led by the European Topic Center on Inland, Coastal and Marine Waters (ETC/ICM).

CEP is responsible for the development of a checklist document for the assessment of the implications of Global Megatrends at the national level.  This checklist is intended to guide WB countries through the process of developing foresight content for national State of the Environment (SOE) reporting.

This checklist document represents a simplified version of the approach described in a methodological toolkit Mapping Europe’s environmental future: understanding the impacts of global megatrends at the national level (Eionet report No 1/2017) also developed by CEP and published by EEA in 2017.  The streamlined process sets out clearly the steps that countries can take to complete a ’light-touch’ study suitable for preparing outlook information for SoE.

The webinar will present the checklist to national experts and elaborate how its implementation can help Western Balkan countries develop foresight content for national SoE reporting. The webinar will also provide an opportunity for participants to discuss and explore the proposed process and share expectations, and concerns for completing it.

Please contact Rolands Sadauskis (Project Manager) for further information on the project.

Team CEP
14Oct 2021
CEP research published on measuring recovery from extreme weather events

ClimateXChange has published a report prepared by CEP and partners measuring recovery from extreme weather events.

ClimateXChange has published the report ‘Measuring recovery from extreme weather events’ which was prepared by CEP and the University of Strathclyde.

This research built on CEP’s work on flood resilience and investigated international approaches to assessing recovery from extreme weather events, the data sources they use and their applicability to Scotland. The aim was to develop a common understanding of climate resilience and the critical components in planning for local and national recovery from extreme weather.

The report identifies monitoring frameworks used internationally which could be relevant to Scotland and evaluates the extent to which they would work with the approaches set out in Scotland’s National Performance Framework and the Scottish Climate Change Adaptation Programme (SCCAP).

Based on international experience, the building blocks for developing a system for monitoring recovery from extreme weather events in Scotland are:

  • Framing recovery within a set of wider social goals such as wellbeing or resilience.

  • An approach that establishes the different areas or recovery that need to be considered and the role the community will play in deciding the system to be used.

  • A set of indicators of recovery.

  • Joined-up data across different scales (national, regional/local and community) with a focus on process and outcomes.

  • Relevance of the spatial scale at which data is collected and the timing and frequency of collection to the indicator.

  • Drawing on existing information.

For more information, please contact the Project Director, Paula Orr (Technical Director).

Team CEP
7Oct 2021
CEP undertaking evaluation of Property Flood Resilience Grant Scheme for Defra

CEP are leading on a new project for Defra to carry out a process and impact evaluation of the Property Flood Resilience (PFR) grant scheme

CEP, in partnership with University of the West of England (UWE) Bristol and Flood Hazard Research Centre (FHRC), Middlesex University, has been awarded a project by DEFRA to carry out a process and impact evaluation of the Property Flood Resilience (PFR) repair scheme to help understand the effect of the scheme on resilience in flood affected council areas.

The PFR repair scheme is activated following severe weather events that impact multiple local authorities, lastly in February 2020 and November 2019. All eligible flooded properties have access to grants through the PFR scheme. To be eligible a council area has to have more than 25 properties flooded.

This project will evaluate how the PFR repair scheme’s delivery process has worked and the impact this has had in areas affected by flooding. The two key questions are:

  • How effective are processes employed for delivering the Government Property Flooding Resilience (PFR) repair schemes in 2019 and 2020?

    • What benefits has the scheme delivered?

    • What improvements (if any) could be made?

  • What is the impact of the scheme in council areas that have received PFR grants and have flooded since?

    • In these areas, did the resilience measures make a measurable difference and if so, how

    • How does this contrast with areas where flooding has occurred, but PFR has not been utilised?

    • Has the scheme contributed to increase the uptake of PFR?

The project started in August 2021 and will run until August 2022.

For more information, please contact Clare Twigger- Ross (Project Director, CEP) or Rolands Sadauskis (Project manager, CEP).

Team CEP