Data-Gouv-ML/pcri-actions-marie-curie-participations-et-projets-laureats huggingface dataset:
Projet TradePoliciesClimate (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2020)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Economic Sciences
Statut du projet : SIGNED

Climate Change and Trade are two examples of public goods that call for international cooperation and coordination. The threats due to changes in climate conditions and the losses potentially due to adverse (or extreme) weather events have induced countries to look for common solutions. Moreover, trade and climate change are not only two global scale issues, but they are also tightly connected: trade is a major economic activity, climate is a major exogenous factor in economic production. Trade and climate change have direct and indirect links: trade impacts climate either through the emissions of the transport industry, and by favoring (or disfavoring) emissions-saving productions; climate change directly impacts trade by modifying comparative advantages, and indirectly by legitimating trade as an adaptation strategy. Trade is fostered by trade policies, which are also tightly connected to the dynamics of climate change. Thus, environmental and trade policies tend to be connected, and research to deepen on these links would be beneficial. The proposed research aims at investigating how climate change influences trade (volumes, values, and patterns) and how trade policies are evolving and are likely to evolve due to climate change. The research will focus on the effects of climate change on trade and trade policies. More precisely, the project intends to achieve the following two goals: (i) analyse the links between, trade and climate change, and quantify the impacts; (ii) investigate the path dependencies in trade, trade regulations and climate change, so to evaluate co-benefits and side-effects of seemingly unrelated policies on climate change and trade. The methodological approach that I will follow stands out against previously adopted methods. I propose an econometric analysis to investigate the links between climate change, trade and policies, and a multidiscplinary approach to better model and interpret these links.

Mots clés : agricultural economics, agricultural production, climate change, international policies

Participants :
- European University Institute (Italie) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 175673.28 €
Projet GTCLC-NEG (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2020)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Information Science and Engineering
Statut du projet : SIGNED

Climate Change is the major global challenge of this century, with significant ramifications on human life. Unfortunately it is unlikely that agreed climate targets can be met without removing CO2 from the atmosphere. Negative Emissions Technologies are needed. The specific objective of the current project is thus to develop a carbon negative technology which can produce power and heat at low cost and which can be implemented rapidly. Chemical Looping Combustion (CLC) of biofuels (such as: pyrolysis oils, biogas, solid biomass) can be such a process and is the basis of the project. Biomass absorbs CO2 during growth and releases it when burnt; but if CO2 is captured after combustion this will result in a net flow of carbon out of the atmosphere, i.e. Carbon Negative Technology, or Bioenergy with Carbon Capture and Storage (BECCS). CLC is a form of unmixed combustion which uses an oxygen carrier to transfer oxygen from air to fuel and permits to have a pure flow of CO2, which can be easily captured at a low cost. The aim of the project is to develop a multifuel CLC combustor which can be coupled with a Gas Turbine (GT). The combustor will work with new multi-metals oxides, to be used as oxygen carriers. These will be prepared and characterized with respect to their structural and microscopic properties, and finally tested in a pilot plant, based on circulating fluidized bed reactor. Particular attention will be focused on biofuels injection, combustor design and reaction kinetics modeling. An approach that will analyze first the oxygen carrier particle behavior, then the reactor performance will be adopted. Finally the results will be used to scale up the process and couple the combustor with a gas turbine, designing an innovative power plant together with a leading industrial partner, which will exploit the results. It is expected that the project will generate important results, in order to implement an ambitious concept, needed for earth and society.

Mots clés : chemical looping, oxygen carriers, redox reactions, fluidised bed, gas turbine, combustion, chamber, beccs, biofuels

Participants :
- Spanish National Research Council (Espagne) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 160932.48 €
Projet CONCLIMA (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2015)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Environment and Geosciences
Statut du projet : CLOSED

Climate change due to anthropogenic forcing is expected to have significant societal consequences. The magnitude of changes important to humanity, such as sea-level rise and global warming, will be determined by the evolution of continental and global components of the Earth system. Many large-scale feedbacks between such coupled components are not well understood, however, and thus represent some of the largest sources of uncertainty in climate projections. Using a combined data analysis and modelling approach, this project will investigate past interactions between three key coupled elements in the Earth system: the continental ice sheets, global oceanic circulation and the global carbon cycle. Ensembles of transient simulations will be performed from the Last Glacial Maximum (~21 ka ago) to present day – a period of significant, and often abrupt, natural climate change – using the computationally efficient Earth system model of intermediate complexity CLIMBER-M3. A new ice-sheet component will be coupled to the model to be able to simultaneously simulate all major past and present ice sheets on Earth for the first time, which will allow large-scale feedbacks to be properly analysed. In parallel, an extensive database of paleoclimate proxy data from ice and sediment cores will be created to facilitate data analyses and data-model comparison. Statistical evaluation of the model simulations against the paleoclimate proxies will be used to generate probabilistic estimates of model parameters and to constrain model performance. This analysis will address open questions related to the deglaciation of the Northern Hemisphere ice sheets, abrupt changes in ocean circulation and global climate sensitivity, as well as provide constraints on the strength of large-scale climate feedbacks. This project will therefore lead to new insight into the physical mechanisms behind long-term climate changes and lay the foundation for more robust climate projections.

Mots clés : cryosphere, abrupt climate change

Participants :
- National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (Grèce) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 164653.2 €
Projet Ko-Tsah-To (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2015)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Environment and Geosciences
Statut du projet : CLOSED

Climate change increases the frequency and intensity of vegetation fires around the world. Fire can considerably increase the landscape’s vulnerability to flooding and erosion, which is in part caused by fire-induced soil damage and hydrological changes. While it is known that plants can alter the fire environment, there is a major knowledge gap regarding the fundamental mechanisms by which vegetation mediates fire impact on soil physics and hydrology. I will address this gap by considering for the first time the cascading effects of plants on fire and soil hydrology, focusing on two important factors in post-fire hydrology: soil heating and ash. My hypothesis is that plant structural and chemical traits vary within the landscape and control fire impact on soil physical properties by affecting heat and ash production. I will test this hypothesis with a combination of spatial sampling, lab experiments and modeling, using contrasting plant species and soils from watersheds in Portugal and the USA. Multiple regression and principal component analysis will be used to relate fire impacts to the various plant traits. This project can help predict and mitigate fire risk and impact across landscapes, facilitate development of risk maps, and generate knowledge with implications for nature conservation, land use planning, fire management and potential policy making. Aside from helping safeguard soil and (drinking) water resources, the project can also change a European braindrain into a braingain, supporting reintegration of a successful interdisciplinary scientist and her large network after three years in the USA. Additional benefits for Europe include transfer of knowledge gained in the USA and knowledge exchange from southern to northern member states. Through training and research, this project will enhance my success of getting a permanent position in academia and create new opportunities to incorporate hydrology and scale in above-belowground interaction research.

Mots clés : fire, soil, water, plant traits, spatial scales

Participants :
- Wageningen University & Research (Pays-Bas) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 177598.8 €
Projet MAPAPAIMA (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2017)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Chemistry
Statut du projet : CLOSED

Climate change is affecting the hydrodynamics of the world’s oceans and lead to an increase of the ocean stratification. This ocean stratification tends to trap phytoplankton in the nutrient depleted surface layer. To survive to this extreme environmental condition, some phytoplanktons can activate a set of enzymes (such as alkaline phosphatase) and use the dissolved organic matter as a nutrient source. Although measurement of the alkaline phosphatase activity can be performed with accuracy, no existing method can follow in real-time and at the single cell level the physiological adaptation such as the release of alkaline phosphatase by phytoplankton. As a consequence, no experimental evidence can directly link the alkaline phosphatase enzyme activity found in a sample to an individual. In this context, we plan to develop a new complete microfluidic system in order to better examine which species release alkaline phosphatase, in which extend and how the environmental conditions predicted in the future (Temperature and CO2) modify this enzymatic activity. This new microfluidic system will integrate in a same chip, a screening procedure based on the cell morphology, an incubation system, and an enzyme assay at a single cell level. Measurements of the kinetic of alkaline phosphatase will be performed by using two enzyme labelled fluorescence methods and time-lapse analyses. Three main results are expected from this project. Firstly, the microfluidic device will be capable to encapsulate a wide spectrum of plankton species in single microenvironment. Secondly, the development of the automatic identification system based on the new image processing algorithm will create an easy method to classify planktons depending on their morphologies. This method could be purposed as valuable commercial application. The third technology developed in this study will be the creation of new tunable microenvironment capable to maintain target plankton alive during enzyme analyses.

Mots clés : microfluidic, plankton, phosphorus limitation, alkaline phosphaste activity, real time image processing

Participants :
- Centre national de la recherche scientifique (France) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 185076.0 €
Projet RECOVERY (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2019)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Environment and Geosciences
Statut du projet : CLOSED

Climate change is currently one of the major challenges for our society. Observations from past time intervals marked by climatic and environmental instabilities are crucial to predict the consequences of current global warming and the feedback mechanisms that would allow the biosphere to return to steady-state conditions. The Toarcian Oceanic Anoxic Event (T-OAE, Early Jurassic) was one of the most extreme hyperthermal events in Earth history. It is well constrained that volcanic activity triggered the cascade of environmental feedbacks associated to this event, whereas the evolution in the middle–late Toarcian and the recovery phase are still poorly understood. With RECOVERY, I will fill this gap by giving a holistic appraisal of the palaeoclimatic and palaeoenvironmental evolution in the aftermath of the T-OAE and of the feedback mechanisms, which helped the biosphere to recover. RECOVERY will follow a multi-proxy approach combining sedimentological observations, and mineralogical and geochemical analysis to (i) provide a high-resolution carbon isotope stratigraphy and trace carbon cycle dynamics, (ii) reconstruct the palaeoenvironmental conditions and constrain the climate-carbon cycle feedback mechanisms, (iii) evaluate changes in nutrient level and primary productivity, (iv) track the causality link between volcanic activity and environmental changes, (v) constrain continental weathering rates and evaluate the potential impact on global climate. The originality and innovative aspects of RECOVERY builds at the intersection of advanced analytical tools and theoretical concepts to provide an unprecedented comprehensive understanding of the feedback mechanisms implied in Earth system recovery after extreme palaeoclimatic and palaeoenvironmental changes, taking the aftermath of the T-OAE as a case study. RECOVERY will hence provide a crucial backdrop to glimpse our future and the response of Earth system to current climate change.

Mots clés : mineralogy, geochemistry, biogeochemical cycles, feedback mechanisms, toarcian

Participants :
- Université Claude Bernard - Lyon 1 (France) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 184707.84 €
Projet ClimActiv (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2020)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Social Sciences and Humanities
Statut du projet : CLOSED

Climate change poses ethical challenges to political activists. On the one hand, climate change threatens hundreds of millions of human lives. On the other hand, activists who want to prevent such a catastrophe may need to resort, in despair, to political means that seriously harm innocents. This project will assess in what circumstances, if at all, harming innocents in climate activism is morally justified. The project uniquely combines political philosophy methods (analogical reasoning, conceptual analysis, and proportionality assessments) with insights from climate-science and political-science studies on the effects of climate change and activism. The research outcomes will be disseminated to academic audiences (three articles; three international conferences and workshops; two online opinion notes) and the wider public (newspapers and online blog notes, a general public conference at a public library). LSE’s Department of Government provides optimal infrastructure (the world’s largest social sciences library, researchers working on closely related topics, dedicated staff for project management assistance). The supervisor is a leading expert in political activism. I have expertise in the key fields (political lesser evil, ideal/nonideal theory), a strong familiarity with the methods, experience in dissemination (international conference and workshop organisation, media appearances), and a network with researchers in influential institutions (UCL, Frankfurt University, Princeton University). With this Fellowship, I will expand my research network, acquire new research skills and knowledge from LSE researchers (in political activism, democratic theory, and human impacts from climate change), and publish articles in leading journals, increasing my chances of getting a permanent academic position in the European Research Area. I will transfer to the hosts knowledge (on global poverty, political lesser evil), as well as networking and conference organisation skills.

Mots clés : political activism, climate change, harm, democracy, political compromises, protests

Participants :
- University of London (Royaume-Uni) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 224933.76 €
Projet SLOPETEMP (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2020)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Environment and Geosciences
Statut du projet : SIGNED

Climate change will alter the frequency and patterns of landslides, increasing the risk to people, infrastructures, and ecosystems in many regions worldwide. Scientists mainly draw this conclusion from predicted changes in precipitation, ice covers, sea level, and land use. The direct effect of temperature on slope stability is usually neglected, even though a mechanical failure in various soils appears to be dependent on their thermal state. Temperature-dependent behaviours in soils have been documented in several laboratory experiments and field studies. I plan to use for the first time a coupled thermo-hydro-mechanical (THM) soil model based on the theory of hypoplasticity to better quantify the effects of climate patterns on slope stability. By this model, implemented in an in-house code, I expect to be able to reproduce complex hydro-mechanical responses caused by changes of temperature, including effects on water pressures, water retention, and swelling/shrinkage. I will perform short- and long-term parametric analyses under climate scenarios, to compare the direct role of temperature with that of other forcings. In this way, I expect to quantify how much local warming/cooling and altered patterns of temperature can control some types of landslides, and consequently affect current landslide hazard assessments. I plan to investigate an actual case study as well, to verify the model performance under complex boundary conditions, and demonstrate its applicability to practical slope-scale problems. Finally, I will conceptualise an upscaled model, to unlock the possibility of regional assessments. This project is in line with the EU strategy on adaptation to climate change as well as with the Sendai Framework of the UNDRR because, by improving the knowledge on the behaviour of soil slopes under climate forcing, it will offer physically-based tools for hazard assessment that could be integrated into national and European risk management systems.

Mots clés : landslide, modelling, climate change, temperature, thermo hydro mechanical coupling, landslide hazard assessment

Participants :
- Charles University (Rép. Tchèque) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 156980.64 €
Projet COCLIMAT (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2014)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Environment and Geosciences
Statut du projet : CLOSED

Climate models of the sort used by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) all predict global warming over the next century, but differ widely in their detailed predictions for any specific region of the globe. The state of the art is just to run the models separately and form a weighted average of their outputs. A new approach put forward by the applicant is that of “supermodeling”: instead of just averaging the outputs of the models, the models are allowed to influence each other in run time. One must specify how much weight a given model gives to corresponding data in each other model. In a supermodel, the weights, or “connection coefficients” are given by a machine learning algorithm. That is one would use a collection of historical data to train the connections in the supermodel, so that the most reliable dynamical features of each model would be combined. Supermodeling is an instance of “chaos synchronization”, the phenomenon wherein chaotic systems can be made to follow corresponding trajectories by exchanging surprisingly little information. In prior investigations with supermodels, it was determined that they are particularly useful for predicting variability, like that in the El Nino cycle in the Pacific. The proposed project would use a supermodel to predict variability in the Atlantic sector due to changes in the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC), which has a large effect on climate in the surrounding region on multi-decadal time scales. Existing climate models differ widely in their predictions for AMOC. The proposed application will require changes in the way supermodels are formed and trained so as to focus on the positions and gross characteristics of coherent structures such as ocean currents. The models that will be used to build the supermodel will be a) a collection of European models, and b) a combination of U.S. and European models from which a supermodel is already being built.

Mots clés : chaos synchronization, connectionism, interactive ensembles, multi model, atlantic meridional overturning circulation  amoc, coherent structures

Participants :
- University of Bergen (Norvège) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 196400.4 €
Projet WarmTraits (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2019)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Environment and Geosciences
Statut du projet : SIGNED

Climate warming is changing vegetation across the Arctic tundra region. Warmer temperatures enhance plant photosynthetic uptake of atmospheric CO2 but warming also promotes microbial decomposition of the vast permafrost carbon pool, releasing greenhouse gases to the atmosphere in a positive feedback-loop. In addition to temperature, changes in plant composition also strongly affect carbon and nutrient cycling rates through species-specific differences in leaf and root characteristics. These so-called plant functional traits provide an essential link between vegetation change and ecosystem functionality, and understanding how climate warming affects tundra plant traits is therefore vital for accurately forecasting ecosystem impacts over the coming century. Climate-change manipulation experiments allow for process-based investigations into how ecosystems respond mechanistically to warming. However, lack of long-term experimental warming studies in the Arctic currently impedes our ability to predict future climate responses accurately over decadal time-scales because extrapolation of short-term data consistently leads to faulty long-term predictions. In WarmTraits, I will utilize a unique opportunity to destructively sample in a long-term experiment where greenhouses have warmed tundra plots for one, 11, and 21 years, respectively. Thereby, I will quantify the mechanistic effects of increasing climate-warming duration on a very comprehensive suite of above- and belowground plant functional traits. In addition, I will directly link functional trait changes to ecosystem functionality by measuring important ecosystem carbon and nitrogen cycling processes using stable isotope labelling. I have the required expertise in ecosystem ecology and biogeochemistry to implement the project objectives successfully, and my host’s expert knowledge ensures that I will receive top-tier research training in plant physiology and stable isotope techniques.

Mots clés : functional traits, stable isotopes, ecosystem function, carbon cycling, experimental manipulation, warming, above  and belowground interactions

Participants :
- University of Copenhagen (Danemark) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 207312.0 €