#SystemsChangeNow

The mission of Deep Demonstrations is to collaboratively develop portfolios of interconnected innovations capable of delivering widespread transformation across all urban systems – from mobility to waste, from energy to health and the built environment. At the heart of the Deep Demonstration methodology is readiness and intent to work differently, to strive for transformative outcomes and adopt a systemic approach. One of the main goals of our Deep Demonstrations is scalability to other locations that need systemic change on their path to sustainability.

To achieve this ambitious goal, we are partnering with European cities such as Madrid, Amsterdam, Copenhagen, Milan, Malmo and others.

EIT Climate-KIC is also working with the city of Vienna to identify climate initiatives and to link them systematically to go beyond incremental change. Vienna’s Deep Demonstration is based on the Austrian government’s commitment to have a carbon neutral Austria by 2040. EIT Climate-KIC is supporting the city of Vienna to meet this challenge by linking energy efficiency and other forms of district renewal with green infrastructure and green mobility.

In Poland, most energy is still derived from coal, resulting in high levels of air pollution and CO2 emissions. The residents of Krakow were the first in Poland to realise that a massive improvement in air quality was needed. This led them to join the Deep Demonstrations programme and take a series of actions towards decarbonisation.

The Deep Demonstrations of Healthy Clean Cities are not just about achieving zero emissions, but also about adaptation strategies, as in the Glasgow City Region which is hosting the COP26 conference this year. Scotland’s largest city faces major challenges such as frequent flooding and other extreme weather events. Glasgow’s Adaptation Strategy and Action Plan, which aims to ensure that the city’s economy, society and environment are more than prepared for the impacts of climate change, sets ambitious goals and aims to increase the resilience of people most vulnerable to the impacts of global warming.

With three-quarters of Europeans living in urban areas, it’s of key importance to drive cities fast to an inclusive and just, 1.5 degree world. Our model of system innovation uses a balanced portfolio of actions in education, technological innovation, civic engagement, policy, finance and other relevant levers of change to catalyse rapid decarbonisation and leaving no one behind in this process.

Selected snapshot stories to dive deeper into this topic:

Glasgow Edinburgh Vienna Krakow Rybnik Leuven Kessel-Lo Madrid | Amsterdam | MilanCitizen Climate Action Deep Demonstrations Explainer Video

Changing the way we do innovation matters most in the yawning gap between our policy commitments to act, even our personal awareness of the need to do something, and the world of solutions already out there – the implementation gap, or what I call the messy middle.  We have solutions. We have ideas. To some extent, we know how to use them but our habits of thinking, acting, investing, decision making do not lend themselves to joining the dots and connecting all those solutions into deliberately designed new social structures and whole systems change.  

This is the work of orchestration, the coordination of the parts to form a new whole – like the coordination our nervous system does for the body. This is the work of active learning and conversion of innovation learning to policy. That “messy middle” is where we join our dots and change the rules and effect new systemic designs – needs to be just as much the focus of innovation, investment and policy as the invention of new ideas and new technologies.  In the “messy middle” is where we reinvent ourselves. 

At the physical UN Climate Change Global Innovation Hub in Glasgow, the work in that “messy middle” can be experienced through conversations about the efforts being made in cities, in land use, in food systems, in water management and in shelter to orchestrate and effect new systemic designs– in the real economy, with communities, in ecosystems and in our financial systems.  

Launch Programme at COP26 The initiative will promote transformative innovations for a low-emission and climate-resilient future. It will expand the global innovation space by facilitating the development and implementation of climate and SDG solutions, that contribute to the satisfaction of the core human needs, through alternative value chains aligned with the climate and sustainability goals. It complements the current incremental, sector-based and problem-oriented approach to innovation for climate with a transformative, need-based and solution-oriented one, that leverages system change.

Specifically, the project will enable the development and deployment of solutions to:

• Build new value‐chains, products and markets aligned with the climate goals, displacing the existing carbon-intensive ones;
• Enhance the efficiency of consumption;
• Reduce waste within the entire value‐chain;
• Provide a collaborative platform where policymakers, financiers, corporates, civil society, technology providers across the different regions of the world can form clumps of climate innovators and co-innovate;
• Support climate solutions start-ups from the global South and provide a platform for the horizontal transfer of climate solutions from the global North and South.

To achieve these objectives, the Global Innovation Hub platform will host:

• A database for the demand of climate solutions;
• A database of climate solutions;
• A database of clusters of climate solutions addressing a specific demand;
• A framework measuring the contribution of a cluster of climate solutions;
• An Artificial Intelligence tool supported by human curation through digitized methodologies;
• A platform for the transfer of climate solutions as well as a virtual marketplace for the trading of integrated digital green bond and Mitigation Outcome Securities;
• Events such as virtual conferences, roundtables and virtual meetings of working groups.

Dive deeper into this topic:

UN Climate Change Global Innovation Hub Website News on Hub Launch at COP26

The Race to Resilience is the UN-backed global campaign to catalyse a step-change in global ambition for climate resilience, putting people and nature first in pursuit of a resilient world where we don’t just survive climate shocks and stresses, but thrive in spite of them.

Led by the High-Level Climate Champions for Climate Action – Nigel Topping and Gonzalo Muñoz – the Race to Resilience aims to catalyse action by non-state actors that builds the resilience of 4 billion people from vulnerable groups and communities to climate risks by 2030.

Through a partnership of initiatives, focus on helping the most vulnerable, frontline communities to build resilience and adapt to the physical impacts of climate change, such as extreme heat, drought, flooding and sea-level rise, in three area types:

Urban: Cities, industrial communities and informal settlements become healthy, safe and thriving spaces that support resilient livelihoods and allow for green recovery post COVID-19.

Rural: Smallholder farmers, rural entrepreneurs, and industries across food and agricultural supply chains are adaptive and are equipped to thrive in the face of climate change whilst protecting nature.

Coastal: Safeguard coastal and riverine cities, communities and businesses through increased investment in adaptation and resilience and protection of natural ecosystems that support those livelihoods and economies.

Dive deeper into this topic:

The Glasgow City Region in the Race to Resilience Climate Change Adaptation in Europe Race to Resilience Website