ENABLE Project Wins the BiodivERsA Award for Excellence and Impact

News
Date: 15 December 2021
Location: Berlin, Germany

We are thrilled to announce that the ENABLE project has been awarded the BiodivERsA Prize for Excellence and Impact. This award recognizes the excellent research performed in ENABLE and the impacts that were achieved for both policy and society. As a project partner, Ecologic Institute lead the work assessing the socio-cultural perceptions and preferences of citizens for different forms of green and blue infrastructure and supported the policy and institutional analysis in the project cities as well as the formulation of policy options.

The ENABLE project investigated the factors that influence the realisation of green and blue infrastructure potential for a better living environment in cities. Focusing on the role of infrastructures, institutions, and perceptions, ENABLE used social and environmental justice together with resilience to assess the generation and distribution of ecosystem service benefits. The framework, developed by the researchers in consultation and collaboration with local stakeholders, was tested and applied in multiple European cities and offer a new baseline for understanding and unlocking green and blue infrastructure potential in urban areas.

The Prize, awarded on a yearly basis since 2018, gives the opportunity to the winners to present their work in an animated video as part of the BiodivERsA Prize for Excellence and Impact. This prize acknowledges the excellent, pioneering research performed in BiodivERsA-funded projects and showcases the achievements of projects that have produced excellent science with concrete impacts for policy and/or society.

City Level Policy and Institutional Frameworks – A supporting or hindering factor for green and blue infrastructure?

Insights from five ENABLE cities

Year 2018

Publication:Report

Work Package 3 (WP3) of the ENABLE-project aimed to analyze citizen perceptions of and preferences for various CES provided by GBI. It also identified potential means to integrate such knowledge and information in municipal planning processes. This report presents the research results of the work package.

Methodological Review and Framework: Cultural ecosystem services provided by green and blue infrastructure

Year 2018

Publication:Article

The capacity of multifunctional natural areas to simultaneously address user preferences, answer municipal needs, and fulfil wider political obligations is far from being fully realised. The present article responds to this situation and highlights the Q-method as an effective approach for assessing and integrating user viewpoints on urban GBI and its benefits in urban decision-making and planning processes.

Integrating User Preferences into Urban Green and Blue Infrastructure Planning

Insights from Halle, Germany and Stockholm, Sweden

Year 2019

Publication:Article

The circumstances under which different ecosystem service benefits can be realized differ. The benefits tend to be coproduced and to be enabled by multiple interacting social, ecological, and technological factors, which is particularly evident in cities. As many cities are undergoing rapid change, these factors need to be better understood and accounted for, especially for those most in need of benefits. We propose a framework of three systemic filters that affect the flow of ecosystem service benefits: the interactions among green, blue, and built infrastructures; the regulatory power and governance of institutions; and people's individual and shared perceptions and values. We argue that more fully connecting green and blue infrastructure to its urban systems context and highlighting dynamic interactions among the three filters are key to understanding how and why ecosystem services have variable distribution, continuing inequities in who benefits, and the long-term resilience of the flows of benefits.

Enabling Green and Blue Infrastructure to Improve Contributions to Human Well-Being and Equity in Urban Systems

Year 2019

Publication:Policy Brief

2020: Operationalising EU Policies for Urban Green and Blue Infrastructure. ENABLE Policy Brief 1.

Operationalising EU Policies for Urban Green and Blue Infrastructure

ENABLE Policy Brief 1

Year 2020

Publication:Policy Brief

2020: Local Action for Green and Blue Infrastructure – Lessons learned from transdisciplinary and cocreation processes in cities. ENABLE Policy Brief 2.

Local Action for Green and Blue Infrastructure – Lessons learned from transdisciplinary and cocreation processes in cities

ENABLE Policy Brief 2

Year 2020

Publication:Policy Brief

2020: Green refuges for enabling cities' preparedness for future pandemics and global change. ENABLE Policy Brief 3.

Green Refuges for Enabling Cities' Preparedness for Future Pandemics and Global Change

ENABLE Policy Brief 3

Year 2020

Project

Green and Blue infrastructure (GBI) in cities holds large potential to effectively address emerging global challenges, such as climate change impacts, increasing urbanisation and declining access to nature, as it can deliver multiple societal, ecological and economic benefits in parallel. This multifunctional potential of GBI has only recently begun to gain weight in research, policy and planning and has yet to be fully unlocked. The EU-funded BiodivERsA project 'ENABLE' responds to this gap by utilizing a transdisciplinary systems approach to examine the relationship between social-ecological dynamics and GBI's potential to meet multiple goals, including biodiversity conservation and climate change adaptation. The four-year research project, funded by the BiodivERsA network, is led by the Stockholm Resilience Centre and supported by Ecologic Institute and nine other research partners.

Enabling Green and Blue Infrastructure Potential in Complex Social-ecological Regions (ENABLE)

Feb 2017 - May 2020

Funding: Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF), Germany
Partner: Stockholm University, Sweden

Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin (HU Berlin), Germany

Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (UAB), Spain

Norwegian Institute for Nature Research (NINA), Norway

Polish Academy of Sciences, European Regional Centre for Ecohydrology (ERCE), Poland

University of Lodz, Poland

Ecologic Institute, Germany

Dutch Research Institute for Transitions (DRIFT), Netherlands

International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), International

Local Governments for Sustainability (ICLEI), International

The New School, United States
Team: Sandra Naumann

McKenna Davis

Holger Gerdes
Duration: 15 December 2021
Project: Enabling Green and Blue Infrastructure Potential in Complex Social-ecological Regions (ENABLE)
Project ID: 2288
Keywords: Adaptation

Biodiversity

Cities

Climate

Nature-based Solutions and Green Infrastructure

Further Links

PublicationPolicy BriefGreen Refuges for Enabling Cities' Preparedness for Future Pandemics and Global Change

2020: Green refuges for enabling cities' preparedness for future pandemics and global change. ENABLE Policy Brief 3. ... Read more

2020: Green refuges for enabling cities' preparedness for future pandemics and global change. ENABLE Policy Brief 3.

PublicationPolicy BriefLocal Action for Green and Blue Infrastructure – Lessons learned from transdisciplinary and cocreation processes in cities

2020: Local Action for Green and Blue Infrastructure – Lessons learned from transdisciplinary and cocreation processes in cities. ENABLE Policy Brief 2. ... Read more

2020: Local Action for Green and Blue Infrastructure – Lessons learned from transdisciplinary and cocreation processes in cities. ENABLE Policy Brief 2.

PublicationPolicy BriefOperationalising EU Policies for Urban Green and Blue Infrastructure

2020: Operationalising EU Policies for Urban Green and Blue Infrastructure. ENABLE Policy Brief 1. ... Read more

2020: Operationalising EU Policies for Urban Green and Blue Infrastructure. ENABLE Policy Brief 1.

PublicationArticle Enabling Green and Blue Infrastructure to Improve Contributions to Human Well-Being and Equity in Urban Systems

Andersson, E., J. Langemeyer, S. Borgström, T. McPhearson, D. Dagmar Haase, J. Kronenberg, D. Barton, M. Davis, S. Naumann, L. Röschel, F. Baró (2019): Enabling Green and Blue Infrastructure to Improve Contributions to Human Well-being and Equity in Urban Systems. BioScience.

PublicationArticleIntegrating User Preferences into Urban Green and Blue Infrastructure Planning

Ongoing urban densification and the resultant stress on socio-ecological systems necessitate the development of innovative strategies for safeguarding green and blue infrastructure (GBI) and the benefits it provides. Yet, while GBI is increasingly recognised as an... Read more

Röschel, L., Davis, M., Naumann, S., 2019. Integrating user preferences into urban green and blue infrastructure planning: Insights from Halle and Stockholm. Sustainable City 2019. WIT Press.

PublicationReportMethodological Review and Framework: Cultural ecosystem services provided by green and blue infrastructure

A frequent consequence of ongoing urbanization is the loss of green spaces and biodiversity, which has been shown to decrease human well-being and health, amongst other consequences (Regional Public Health 2010). As such, policymakers are increasingly exploring ways to... Read more

Naumann, S., Davis, M., Röschel, L., Barton, D.N. and Langemeyer, J. 2018. Methodological review and framework: Cultural ecosystem services provided by green and blue infrastructure. Deliverable 3.0

PublicationReportCity Level Policy and Institutional Frameworks – A supporting or hindering factor for green and blue infrastructure?

Naumann, S; Röschel, L; Davis, M. (2018). City level policy and institutional frameworks – A supporting or hindering factor for green and blue infrastructure? Insights from five ENABLE cities. Task 2.3, ENABLE.