Scope and Rationale
It is generally accepted that remarkable progress has been achieved in understanding the climate controlling system on the global scale but also that a spatial downscaling of global processes to the regional scale is required. In a first international conference on climate change in the southern Baltic region, held in 2009 at Szczecin, planning agencies and local authorities expressed the need of future climate change projections which may be used for management and decision making on the regional and local level in order to help mitigate negative effects of climate change to the environment and society. The quality of the answers to the questions depends directly on the data available – records of measurements for the past and future projections as the results of climate modelling.
Increasing research activities are expected regarding the cause-effect relation between greenhouse gas emissions, climate and environmental responses in the Baltic Sea basin. Therefore, and to revive the productive scientific atmosphere of the conference in 2009 it was decided to organize a follow-up conference in 2014, dealing with the climate change effects for the southern Baltic region.
Oral or Poster contributions to the conference sessions are welcome:
- Reconstructions of palaeo-environmental change: Geological proxies and numerical modelling
- Modelling of climate change: How reliable are future projections?
- Natural dynamics of the coastal zone and the socio-economic response from prehistoric to recent times
- Climate change and regional planning
- Changing Baltic Sea coasts and their sustainable protection
- Adaption of energy politics to climate change
- Copernicus Symposium (see below)
See also Call for Papers
Copernicus Symposium
In addition to these scientific topics, a one-day international “Copernicus Symposium” is planned within the frame of the conference. This symposium shall honor the 500 years anniversary of Copernicus’ pioneering concept of the heliocentric system. This publication caused the “Copernican revolution” as one of the most important events in history of science. Natural scientists, historians, and socio-economists are invited to discuss on this one-day symposium Copernicus’ ingenious work, embedded into the societal environment of his time.
As a result we expect generalizing answers to the question how a productive and fruitful scientific (and societal) atmosphere can be created today. This is getting increasingly relevant when designing the roof of our European house.
Left: The memorial of Nikolaus Copernicus at Frombork (Photo: Roman Marks).