Dr. Benedikt Gräler, Managing Director, Research, at 52°North Spatial Information Research GmbH and representative of DDGI at EUROGI, participated as a speaker at the European Climate Change Adaptation Conference (ECCA) 2025, held in Rimini from 16 to 18 June. During the event, he showcased the progress of two Horizon Europe projects: I-CISK and DIRECTED, both of which aim to strengthen climate adaptation services, improve risk modelling, and promote data interoperability across governance systems.
I-CISK
The European project Innovating Climate Services through Integrating Scientific and Local Knowledge (I-CISK) is designed to co-develop climate services with end users across seven Living Labs situated in Europe and beyond. These use cases span various domains including agriculture, water management, and tourism.
Focusing on climate change adaptation, ECCA 2025 offered an ideal setting to present and discuss the I-CISK project’s outcomes. Alongside sister projects LOCALISED, ReachOut, and RethinkAction, I-CISK co-organised a high-level scientific session aimed at fostering dialogue between presenters and the audience.
The project also took part in the Special Brokerage Event, a networking platform that encouraged informal exchanges and matchmaking between researchers, policy actors, practitioners, and funders to explore actionable tools and potential collaborations.
Throughout the conference, visitors were welcomed at the joint exhibition booth, where the I-CISK project was presented, insights were shared, and prototypical Climate Services from the Living Labs were introduced. Attendees also received access to the project’s latest policy briefs and publications.
In addition, the team introduced the Agentic AI Climate Service Generator—an innovative tool that allows users to interactively access climate-related information from the Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) and generate tailored services through a Jupyter Notebook powered by a natural language interface. This represents a key step toward making climate data more user-driven, accessible, and interactive.
DIRECTED
The DIsaster Resilience for Extreme ClimaTe Events providing interoperable Data, models, communication and governance (DIRECTED) project is a Horizon Europe Innovation Action dedicated to enhancing Europe’s disaster preparedness and climate resilience. It emphasizes the need for interoperable data, cross-sector models, effective communication strategies, and robust governance frameworks.
The project relies on a strong co-production approach where stakeholders from four Real World Labs, located in Emilia-Romagna (Italy), the Capital Region of Denmark, the Rhine-Erft area (Germany), and the Danube Region are an integral part of the design and development process, offering invaluable real world insights making our innovations usable in real world situations.
At ECCA 2025, the DIRECTED team project had the opportunity to present its tools and methodologies at a dedicated exhibition booth, sparking interest and discussion among researchers, stakeholders, and policymakers.
DIRECTED also contributed to the main conference programme with a scientific session titled “Turning scientific research into actionable solutions by tackling challenges of interoperability in DRM and CCA”. This session fostered dialogue between project members and participants, exploring the real-world application of research outcomes.
Additionally, the team hosted a side event, “Learning exchange on extreme flooding in Rimini using interoperable tools and governance frameworks,” using interoperable tools and governance models. A key highlight of this session was the first-hand contribution from local and regional civil protection authorities, who shared practical insights and took an active role in discussions.
The current prototypes of the co-produced Data Fabric, a tailored Spatial Data Infrastructure (SDI), are available to explore at https://directed.dev.52north.org/. Further information about the project is accessible via https://directedproject.eu/.
