New EU-scale environmental scenarios until 2050 – Scenario process and initial scenario applications

Abstract

Understanding uncertainties and risks can be considered to be the main motivation behind environmental scenario studies to assess potential economic, environmental, social or technical developments and their expected consequences for society and environment. The scenario study presented in this paper was designed to contribute to the question of how natural capital and ecosystem services may evolve in Europe under different socio-environmental conditions. The study was conducted as part of OpenNESS, an ongoing EU FP7 research project. We present the iterative participatory scenario process, the storylines and drivers, examples for regional applications, as well as initial feedback from stakeholders. In a participatory iterative approach four scenarios were developed for the period to 2050, involving regional and EU-level users and stakeholders. Subsequently, scenarios were successfully contextualised and applied in regional place-based studies under widely differing socio-environmental conditions. Regional teams used different approaches to adapt storylines and drivers to the regional contexts. In an internal evaluation process among regional stakeholders some participants expressed concerns about the scenario method. Suggestions are made how to overcome these limitations. However, most participants approved the scenario method, especially in terms of provoking discussions, and confirmed the usefulness and applicability of the approach.

Future projections of biodiversity and ecosystem services in Europe with two integrated assessment models

“…In the OpenNESS project, the BES-focussed scenarios for Europe were developed through an integrative and participatory development process involving a variety of stakeholders and end-users from both European and regional level, including representatives from the general public, NGOs, economic sectors, authorities and policymakers (for more detail, see Priess et al (2018)). The scenario development entailed the creation of storylines describing plausible future socioenvironmental development pathways for Europe, varying social, technological, economic, environmental and policy developments.…”

“…The four scenarios were developed at the intersection of two main axes representing key uncertainties expected to influence BES: (i) whether future policies are sectoral or integrated across sectors (cross-sectoral) and (ii) whether responsibilities are devolved between European nations or concentrated at the level of the European Union. These two axes resulted in four future worlds (Box 1): (1) United-We-Stand (UWS), (2) Wealth-Being (WB), (3) Eco-Centre (EC) and (4) Rural Revival (RR) (Priess et al 2018).…”

“…In the OpenNESS project (http://www.openness-project. eu/), European scenarios were developed to explicitly assess the conditions leading to changes in BES and providing a framework to assess the consequences of BES-oriented policy measures in the context of plausible socio-environmental futures (Hauck et al 2019;Priess et al 2018). In the present study, we aim to assess the consequences for BES in Europe under four new future socio-environmental scenarios as developed in the OpenNESS project.…”

Bringing the sharing-sparing debate down to the ground—Lessons learnt for participatory scenario development

“…Consequently, with respect to spatial details, we needed a reasonable segregation of the region in homogeneous sub-regions aligned with stakeholders' perceptions of the region for the scenario development process. It requires downscaling procedures to come up with grid resolution data and several rounds of iterations to manage complexity and maintain consistency in a stepwise approach (Priess et al, 2018).…”

“…Scenario analysis has been increasingly used as a tool to envision the future of complex SES, e.g. by looking at changes in ecosystems, ecosystem management and human well-being (Carpenter et al, 2005;Biggs et al, 2007;Priess et al, 2018). The participation of stakeholders is key in most of the integrated scenario studies but their role can vary, from active construction of the scenarios and interpretation of impacts on SES to be only informed about the outcomes (Biggs et al, 2007;Haklay, 2013).…”