Terms
Terms
Terminology
Building blocks are the economic sectors, such as energy, transport or industry, and cross-cutting areas, such as finance, innovation, and lifestyles, in which transformation is needed to achieve a climate neutral society by 2050, and across which ECNO tracks progress.
Building block assessment
Acceleration factor
Or the ‘required change in speed’ is the ratio of the required change versus the past change on a given indicator. This results in the example formulation: ‘We need to increase our annual emission reductions to at least 4.9 Mt CO2e per year – or 2.6 times faster than the 1.9 MtCO2e per year achieved in the past’.
Benchmarks
Future reference points against which progress for each indicator is compared. ECNO derives benchmarks from official EU sources, such as directives, regulations, strategies, and action plans, including their related impact assessments. Benchmarks often come in the form of quantified policy goals or targets.
Climate neutrality
Stands for the objective of achieving net zero greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. This means that emissions are brought down as close to zero as possible, with remaining, difficult to abate emissions balanced by GHG removals within a given country or region.
Enablers
The supporting conditions and underlying changes needed to meet the objectives in a given building block. They are the opposite of barriers or inhibitors.
Historical data
Includes, but is not limited to, statistics from Member States harmonised and provided by Eurostat or the European Environment Agency (EEA) as well as from international organisations such as the OECD, FAO, or World Bank.
Indicators
Track the historical development and status of enablers and objectives based on quantitative data. An assessment of indicator progress compares the trend against the required development to meet a future reference point, where data and relevant benchmarks are available.
Objectives
Describe what needs to be achieved in each building block to reach climate neutrality.
Required change
The change that underlies a pathway that meets the identified benchmark or target. Where benchmarks are missing, the required change indicates a direction and speed of change.
Trend
The development of an indicator over time based on historical data. ECNO’s trendline is a straight, best-fit line that smooths out the variation in historical developments based on all data points, providing a sense of the general progress over time.
Adaptation
Adapting to climate impacts will require a wide range of adaptation responses across sectors and governance levels. To track progress, the element assesses the implementation of adaptation actions, specifically nature-based solutions in the urban context, land use sectors, and the aquatic environment.
OVERVIEW:
Progress on adaptation has been far too slow
Making firm judgements on progress in the area of adaptation is difficult. The indicators for the objective of becoming a climate resilient society either show significant year-to-year variability or are not yet tracked at the EU level. Some insight can be gained through the enablers which show, for example, a slight increase in the share of wetland area in the EU. This is a positive development, giving insight into the state of aquatic and marine conservation and restoration, but not an overall picture on adaptation. Other proposed indicators are not yet tracked – such as the kilometers of river restoration or the area of green roofs. Developing such indicators would add helpful, though imperfect, measures of various dimensions to climate adaptation in the EU.
INSIGHT ONE
Significant data gaps exist in terms of quality and availability
There is a significant lack of relevant data tracking adaptation across all sectors, and where data is collected, it is not done regularly or made easily available. Improving availability and access is in line with the EU Adaptation Strategy’s objective to generate more and better climate-related risk and losses data. Harmonised monitoring guidelines should be developed for EU member states, regions, and communities in order to improve the both the availability and quality of data.
INSIGHT TWO
Adaptation implementation is severely lacking
Although climate adaptation has generated significant interest in the last decade, and especially so in response to extreme events in the EU, there remains a large implementation gap for adaptation actions and measures. Often, implementation of measures exist in pilot or test projects, as is the case with many urban greening projects. This increase in awareness around climate adaptation now needs to be converted into action.
OBJECTIVES
Objectives describe what needs to be achieved in each building block to reach climate neutrality.
Objective 1
Becoming a climate resilient society
Identifying indicators to track climate adaptation is challenging due to its broad scope. The ND-GAIN index scores countries on various indicators to track climate adaptation. The EU's average score has remained relatively constant over the period 2015-2020, while individual countries have varied scores. Economic losses from climate-related events have fluctuated significantly between 2015-2020, and there have been a few events causing the majority of losses, both of which makes identifying trends is difficult. However, economic costs have generally increased, which indicates that progress towards this objective is heading in the wrong direction.
ND-GAIN country index
This indicator shows past development in the average NG-Gain country index score of EU countries.
The data show an annual decrease of 0.2% between 2015 and 2020. This development was heading in the wrong direction and should be reversed moving forward.
This indicator summarises a country's vulnerability to climate change and other global challenges in combination with its readiness to improve resilience.
Economic losses from climate-related extremes
This indicator shows past development of economic losses from climate-related extremes in Europe.
The data show an annual increase of 6% between 2015 and 2020. This development was heading in the wrong direction and should be reversed moving forward.
The indicator provides a comprehensive picture across the EU of economic losses as a result of climate-related extremes.
ENABLERS
Enablers are the supporting conditions and underlying changes needed to meet the objectives in a given building block. They are the opposite of barriers or inhibitors.
Enabler 1
Greening cities
Green urban areas
This indicator shows past development in the share of green urban areas in 721 European cities.
There is only one data point available.
The percentage of total green infrastructure, green urban areas and tree cover of 37 capitals as a percentage of their respective surface area (averaged for the EU).
Historical data: EEA
Green roofs
For now, there is no EU-wide aggregated data on the area of green roofs available.
The area of green roofs in urban areas.
Enabler 2
Adapting agriculture and forestry
Share of gentle tillage practices
This indicator shows past development in the share of gentle tillage practices on arable land.
There are only two data points which show a decrease from 29% to 26% between 2010 and 2016. This development was heading in the wrong direction and should be reversed. This is underscored by the IPCC, which emphasises the importance of conservation agriculture, including minimum soil disturbance, to help reduce the impacts of climate change on agriculture.
Gentle tillage practices includes conservation tillage and zero tillage. It is compared to the overall tillage practices.
Share of mixed forest area
This indicator shows past development in the share of mixed forest area in total forest area.
The data show an annual decrease of 2% between 2009 and 2018. This development was heading in the wrong direction and should be reversed.
The share of land composed principally of trees, where neither broad-leaved nor coniferous species predominate.
Enabler 3
Blue measures
Share of wetlands
This indicator shows past development in the share of wetlands on total land area in the EU.
The data show an annual increase of 1.9% between 2009 and 2018. This development was heading in the right direction but should accelerate in the future. This is underscored by the EU’s Biodiversity Strategy 2030, which emphasises the importance of restoring free-flowing rivers, wetlands, and floodplains.
The share of land covered by coastal or inland wetlands
River restoration
For now, there is no EU-wide aggregated data on river restoration available.
In order to meet the EU Biodiversity Strategy’s target of 25,000 km of river restoration by 2030, it is suggested that an indicator is developed to track progress towards this goal.
The indicator provides the length of rivers restored to a free-flowing state (without barriers).
report
State of EU progress to climate neutrality
The assessment of progress towards climate neutrality shows that the EU is moving in the right direction, but the pace is too slow. The transition to climate neutrality is essential for ensuring a liveable future.
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