High temperatures and heatwaves in the summer pose increasing risks to people living in Slovakian cities. In particular older people and children, those living on top floors in poorly insulated buildings, and those relying on facilities such as nurseries, schools or care homes are prone to heat stress. The Carpathian Development Institute, in collaboration with local authorities in Trnava and Košice, carried out an assessment of vulnerability to high temperatures and heatwaves in residential environment, taking into account the social aspects.

During the 1980s and 1990s, the neighbourhood of Augustenborg in Malmö was an area of social and economic decline and was frequently flooded by an overflowing drainage system. Between 1998 and 2002, the area was regenerated. The physical changes in infrastructure included the creation of sustainable urban drainage systems (SUDS), including 6 Km of water channels and ten retention ponds.

The City of Tatabánya has a Local Climate Change Strategy and Action Plan, approved in 2008, which have been implemented to address diverse climate hazards, which mainly impact people’s health (e.g. heatwaves and heat stress, UV radiation, forest fires).

Stuttgart’s location in a valley basin, its mild climate, low wind speeds, industrial activity and high volume of traffic has made the city highly susceptible to poor air quality. Development on the valley slopes has prevented air from moving through the city, worsening air quality and contributing to the urban heat island effect. A Climate Atlas was developed for the Stuttgart region, presenting the distribution of temperature and cold air flows according to the city’s topography and land use.

The former industrial area “Luciline” in Rouen, along the Seine river, has been profoundly re-designed into an ecodistrict covering 9 hectares in total and including both climate change adaptation and mitigation solutions. Sustainable living is the core principle of the neighbourhood re-design. Sustainability solutions are implemented in fields playing an important role in climate change adaptation and mitigation, such as energy, water, biodiversity, transport and planning.

Jena is a city of about 108,000 inhabitants and – due to its specific geographic location – is exposed to various climate change-related risks, whereas heatwaves are the most relevant. Climate projections for Jena expect a substantial increase of this risk in the future.

91% of Italian municipalities are currently under risk of river and pluvial flooding, an important increase as compared to 2015 when 88% of municipalities were at risk (ISPRA, 2018). These already fragile hydrogeological conditions are worsened by the growing consumption of soil, which occurs more in Northern Italy than in the rest of the country.

Mosquito Alert is a cooperative, non-profit citizen science project coordinated by different Public Research Centers, focusing on the development of predictive models and methods that combine citizen data (big data) with data from authoritative sources (Public monitoring or control Entities, Universities, ...). These models thus become key public health management tools for assessing and controlling the presence of species of mosquitoes that carry arboviruses (arthropod-borne viruses), causing global diseases such as zika, dengue and chikungunya, that require dynamic global solutions.

The European LIFE CERSUDS project (Ceramic Sustainable Urban Drainage System) is developing sustainable urban drainage systems (SUDS) that use ceramic materials of low commercial value as a filter system for construction or paving. Its main objective is to improve the capacity of cities to adapt to climate change and to promote the use of green infrastructures in their urban planning for the rehabilitation of such urban areas. To achieve this, LIFE CERSUDS has developed and implemented a sustainable urban ceramic drainage system with low environmental impact.

This case describes the steps taken towards achieving more balanced management of Cork Harbour, through the establishment of a strategic alliance (couplet) between the local authority and multidisciplinary academic experts. This innovative partnership resulted in the adoption of an Integrated Management Strategy. A stakeholder group – Harbour Management Focus Group (HMFG) – comprising statutory and non-statutory organisations was established to implement the management strategy.