Problem Statement

The globally important topic of climate protection is increasingly becoming an issue at the municipal level. The state of Baden-Württemberg, for example, passed a comprehensive climate protection law on February 1, 2023, which aims to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, with certain reduction targets also falling within the scope of municipal responsibilities. Since municipalities lack qualified employees for climate protection, among other things, and many municipalities have little experience with implementing climate protection measures, they would like to have advisory help and support from the scientific side.

Objective

The project aims to determine where the need for support is greatest among the municipalities and at which points a "Municipal Climate Protection" inspection body can effectively intervene in the decision-making process of the municipalities in the implementation of climate protection measures in order to support them.

Methods

First, the effectiveness of climate protection measures already known from different areas such as transport, heat and energy supply will be compiled. Next, selected pilot municipalities are to be consulted to determine whether they could imagine implementing the proposed measures or whether important aspects required for implementation have yet to be taken into account by KIT. This will be done iteratively to meet the needs of the municipalities best. In order to support the decision-making process of the municipalities, a graphical database is to be created, which will select reasonable and suitable climate protection measures from the entire catalog of measures collected based on the specific characteristics of the pilot municipality. The climate protection measures will also be described regarding their social, economic and temporal impacts to address hurdles in implementing them in advance.