Resilient Investment for Sustainable Environments

ongoing

Nature-based solutions (NBS) are considered essential to solving the climate crisis. They have the potential to simultaneously address climate change, biodiversity loss and human wellbeing and development, by providing different ecosystem services. However, the typically small size of NBS projects, the difficulties to measure and monetize their co-benefits as well as the long time frame for investment returns and the risk profile, undermine their attractiveness for funding. In comparison to NBS alone, the combination of NBS and ecosystem-based approaches, physical measures and technological measures is able to provide measurable outcomes quicker, reducing the risk profile and facilitating faster implementation and long-time maintenance, broadening opportunities for ecosystem innovation and increasing investment attractiveness. Aiming for bankability-by-design, RISE-IN will assess a set of climate resilient solutions (CRS), including NBS and ecosystem- based approaches and physical measures, by mapping and quantifying their co-benefits and identifying innovative financing and investment opportunities accordingly. Co-creation and participatory processes with local stakeholders, including investors and businesses, will enable the screening of the most adequate solutions for each site, in terms of functionality and funding and within a framework of just resilience. The assessment will be complemented by 3 climate risk assessment models that will reduce uncertainty regarding risks associated with extreme events, water run-off and capital loss. RISE-IN will demonstrate this concept for flood management (most costly type of disaster in Europe) in Cesena (IT), Christchurch (NZ) and Póvoa de Varzim (PT). RISE-IN demonstrations will be further tailored for replication in Ghent (BE), Zhytomyr (UA), Kadikoy (TR) and in 3 additional sites of Demonstrator Cities (Demo Cities) to prove the impact of the concept to facilitate bankability and upscale implementation across EU and Internationally.