What is Good Local Adapt?
The project named “Good Local Adapt” is an initiative driven by a committee of three companies, a technological center and three town councils, in each of the basque provinces. The project will develop, in the time gap between september 2017 and september 2020, specific solution for city planning, building restoration and the new regulation to adapt to the climate change in small and medium sized municipalities.
You can see below what is the progress of the project, in which phase it is now and all the information of each of the actions.
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C1 Climate change barometer
A climate barometer will contribute to achieve the objective of the project to socialize adaptation to climate change. It will be implemented in the 6 neighbourhood described in form B. The main purposes of the action will be: to identify the concerns and needs of the population to assess their level of climate risk perception
and responses to them a priori; to capture their understanding of climate change adaptation; to identify existing prejudices about the affordability of sustainable urban solutions and rehabilitation; to evaluate its accessibility to subsidies and economic incentives from local and regional government, etc. Results and
causality will be interpreted, by establishing for every neighbourhood, correlations with factors such as social vulnerability.
C2 Participation, Community Involvement and Public outreach towards climate change adaptation in small and medium size municipalities
This action fulfills the project’s need for public outreach and community involvement, through a participation process, in order to build their support towards projects for adaptation to climate change and fulfill the
objectives to:
- raise awareness about the consequences on economy, health,etc. caused by the imminent and unknown issue of water availability in the Basque Country, linked to rising temperatures and consequent rising in demand for water.
- Identify traditional o innovative adaptation solutions about town planning, buildings retrofitting, wáter management, acceptable by the citizen in case of application by a public entity or that he would be willing to apply from its own. The 5 demonstrative neighbourhoods (2 in Amurrio, 2 in Legazpi and 1 in Balmaseda) will select the solutions for each of these and the two prototypes pilot sites (1 in Amurrio and 1 in Balmaseda).
- Correlate adaptation and incentives preferences and key factors of the population.
This action will last 7 months at the beginning of the project. It is linked to Action C1, as both contribute to raise awareness, and results of action C1 will feed sub action C2.1. Action C3 relies on the results of action C2 as the solutions analysed will be proposed in the participatory process. In fact, both actions will overlap at some point to feed one into each other.
C3 Specific Adaptation Solutions and Action Charts Design
This action will last 6 months and is closely linked to action C2 of participation as both will help decide and specify which concrete solutions will be the most adequate for each neighborhood, in terms of adapting to climate change consequences. Thus, this action will focus on proposing specific solutions on ameliorating the consequences of heat island; and optimizing water resources.
As a result, adaptive solutions selected by the 5 demonstrative neighbourhoods (2 in Amurrio, 2 in Legazpi and 1 in Balmaseda) will be customized for these and the two prototypes pilot sites. The customized solutions for these 7 sites will be described through project sheets which will include technical data about the solutions, convenient and ideal locations for implementation, etc.
C4 Prioritisation Methodologies and ownership by the demostrative City Halls
A Multi criteria analysis of the adaptation solutions selected will be developed for assuring the prioritization of the most sustainable options in the municipalities of Amurrio, Balmaseda and Legazpi. At this point the Cost Benefit Analysis (CBA, from now on)) arises as the key element for decision making on adaptation to climate change as its purpose is to compare benefits of the adaptation actions translated in avoided damages caused by climate change and the costs of its implementation, maintenance and sustainability. In addition, this tool incorporates environmental and social assessment from the economic point of view, and allows life cycle perspective (OECD 2006). In order to validate the sustainability global assessment systematic, and ensure methodological consistency, a Life Cycle Analysis (LCA, from now on) of the proposed solutions will be developed.
Action C4 will last 8 months and complements action C3 to prioritize adaptation solutions in Amurrio, Legazpi and Balmaseda demonstrative neighbourhoods and in the two prototypes pilot sites. In addition, it contributes to satisfy the requirement of the project regarding Good adaptation, by fostering the adoption of economically sustainable solutions that avoid collateral impacts, and foster social and environmental benefits. As a result, the project sheets of customized solutions designed in action C3 for the 7 sites of the project will be completed with data about cost and benefits. Results action C4 constitutes an input for actions C7 and C8 through which customized solutions will be implemented in the two prototype pilot sites.
C5 Design of new normative documents to introduce climate change adaptation urban and building-scale design solutions
This action contributes to the aim of facilitating the implementation of viable solutions to adapt. It intervenes subsequently to the prioritization of solutions and is the last step before the actual realization of adaptation solutions, its purpose being to raise the urban barriers whether they are relating to the technical or normative design previous design. It will deal with developing new normative documents in order to introduce climate change adaptation urban and building-scale design solutions for the specific conditions of the public beneficiaries and stakeholders of the project, in order to enhance new green infrastructure and energy refurbishment. Extreme weather events, such as heat waves and droughts are real and have to be considered in the definition of urban design, so this action will enable City Council to mainstream of climate change adaptation into the different urbanistic instruments.
This action will introduce criteria for climate change adaptation in different urbanistic normative documents, such as municipal bylaw of adaptation, urbanization projects, building projects and refurbishment projects. These adaptation measures and criteria will be gathered in different clauses within administrative terms of conditions of future tendering processes for design and execution projects. This action will take place during 5 complete months in the Basque Country and Copenhagen. It will built upon the outputs of the prior actions C2, C3 and C4. The participation action C2 will promote the involvement of citizens in the design of the new adaptive solutions. The C3 action will provide with adaptation solutions, and finally, the C4 action will evaluate and prioritize the most relevant adaptations to implement by City Councils.
C6 Modelling incentives for adaptation in the domestic area and financing solutions for the city council
Action C6 contributes to the aim of the project to facilitating the implementation of viable solutions to adapt to climate change. It constitutes the last step before the actual concretion of adaptation solutions, its purpose being to lift the financial barriers that remain for both private and public sectors.
This action is built on the outputs of action C1 and C2 led in the neighborhoods of Amurrio, Legazpi and Balmaseda through which user story profiles were defined based on population condition, preferred adaptive solutions and incentives. An incentive model will be developed after a robust characterization of each profile/goup of population including the following aspects: what motivational and contextual factors drive individual adaptive decision; what is the most susceptible population segment to adapt to climate change; and what kind of solutions and incentives to adapt are the most promising from the private perspective.
These findings will allow supporting the design of incentives solutions that lead to proactive decision making per each group of population.
C7 Prototype of implementation of climate change adaptation design solutions in a public building in Balmaseda
A Prototype of adaptive refurbishment will be materialized in a patrimonial public building of Balmaseda old town (medium protection) which make the project an architectural challenge. Images and plans of the current state of the building are attached. The building’s will be dedicated to education. Will be studied: examples of renovation of St Kjeld study, UK Climate Impacts Program (UKCIP) for an existing office building adapted to climate change; the Australian document on “Assessing the Climate Change Adaptability of Buildings”; and solutions as passive design principles such as long life-loose fit type, thermal mass, new termal insulation system; new ventilation system to provide healthier air quality and indoor environments, contributing to the resilience of the users of the building; colour of the façade considering the albedo and minimise heatwaves; landscape design will be based on experienced adaptation solutions (i.e. Low Impact Development in Seattle,Vancouver, etc.); experimental nature based solutions (i.e. green solutions for stormwater management system minimising the impact of run-off; mainstreaming of vegetation and recovery of autochthonous plants in the design,to face heatwaves). Options will be explored through an iterative process between citizenship (action C2) and the project team (actions C3 and C4), so to identify these that best fit the needs. Along the process, they will analyse the state of research and experimentation of new adaptive solutions to launch and implement through the prototype (regarding materials, techniques, etc.), that would result appropriate considering the protection character of Balmaseda building. All these strategies will contribute to achieve a replicable reference of an existing building renovated resilient to climate change on the inside and outside. Solutions adopted will be demonstrative enough to be observable and considered emblematic. Citizens not only will be able to see the implementation solutions but to access the results of the project and alternative adaptation solutions affordable for citizens and the private sector.
This action fulfills the need to demonstrate the technical and financial viability of local solutions. Being a publicly owned and managed building adds on to the project’s objective of public outreach and a showcase for municipal initiative towards climate adaptation, that serves as an example to promote it among the private sector. Moreover, having a public space attached to it, brings up more opportunities to contribute to the town. This action will contribute to overcoming the barrier for rehabilitation, and specifically in patrimonial buildings.
It will incorporate and test design solutions proposed in action C2, developed in action C3 and prioritized in action C4; and will drive to the design of normative tendering documents based on action C5 outputs. This action will last 18 months, beginning in august 2018, and ending in June 2019. By phases, the timeline is:
Phase 1. Building execution project.
Phase 2. Tender for construction companies.
Phase 3. Building works and supervision.
C8 Water management viability study and green infrastructure prototype in an urban space in Legazpi
This action deals with the implementation of a prototype solution on green infrastructure and stormwater management in Legazpi to help the City to face three issues that are worsening with climate change: heat waves, drought (and water scarcity), and intense rain/floods. In effect, Legazpi’s pilot neighbourhood is characterized by a high proportion of cement, with very few green spaces and consequently a low rate of water infiltration potential. It is directly linked with other actions of the project as it will incorporate and test design solutions proposed in action C2, developed in action C3 and prioritized in action C4; and will drive to the design of normative tendering documents based on action C5 outputs. The urban space proposed by the Town of Legazpi is located in San Ignacio neighbourhood. It is a 1 hectare urban public space composed by 9 building blocks with very few green areas and with massive concrete-asphalt surfaces. Green infrastructure intervention could also help connect other municipal green areas which are
currently disconnected. Images and plans of the current state are attached. The action will demonstrate the technical and financial viability to implement green infrastructure urban design solutions and will constitute a showcase for adaptation.
C9 Transferability of the project results to stakeholders
Action C9 conditions the impacts of the project. Then, an efficient design and implementation guarantees that the project process and outputs disseminated to a wide audience and effectively replicated across European municipalities. By fostering adaptation investment, it creates attractiveness of the city for investors and of the private sector; it contributes to the action lines of the EU as its Green infrastructure strategy and its new Covenant of Mayors version. The network of stakeholders to the project, under construction, will constitute the receiver of the transferability.These will be led from the Basque Country and reach current and future stakeholders of the project network, mainly municipalities, based in distinct parts of the EU territory. It will take place throughout the project duration and its phase of implementation of the transferability strategy will be executed in concurrency with the Networking events of Action E.1. Since Action C9 will deal with assuring the transferability of the outputs and processes of the present project, it will be closely linked to every implementation action of the project (C1 to C8). As mentioned in form B4, the project already received support from several small and medium sized municipalities and sectoral organizations from the Basque Country (Spain) and Navarra (Spain) and from France. As part of their involvement those will receive information on the actions carried out in the Project and give their feedback on the project focusing specifically on the opportunities for improvement and the potential for replication in their geographic and technical competence areas.