Climate Change, Projections and Services

The First summer school of UM6P-IPSL-IP-Paris on “climate change, projections and services” will be devoted to climate projections and information to support risk management and adaptation.

Climate information is increasingly gaining in both temporal and spatial resolution as well as in complexity and diversity. On the other hand, sector communities, decision makers and different stakeholders are requesting more and more detailed and tailored information and services to inform their planning activities and decisions. However models and observations are not always in capacity to address stakeholder’s questions due to the state of science. Hence the need of co-constructing common actionable knowledge and data on future climate risks.

Climate services provide climate information in a way that assists decision making by individuals and organizations. When carefully designed and appropriately used, climate services can increase the feasibility and effectiveness of adaptation responses to improve, for example agricultural practices, water management, energy efficiency/use, income diversification and urban and infrastructure planning.

The course aims to expose the participants to the state-of-the-art learning and activities to gain a better understanding, co-design and use of climate information and services in tackling climate change and impacts on socio-economic sectors with a specific focus on climate projections and what can and cannot be used from them. Participants will also learn about climate models and projections, emissions scenarios, and the most advanced methods processing of these projections, including downscaling methods, bias adjustment, model selection, and extreme events handling; three of the main tools required for climate change assessment and projections as well as for providing climate information and services required for vulnerability and adaptation studies.

Through several examples and practical exercises, the participants will be able to discover a wide range of available climate information, attribution and projection of extreme events, and learn on how to define and choose the appropriate information depending on the targeted topic and their objectives.

This course is designed for master and PhD students, researchers, engineers, scientists, practitioners, and decision makers (from Africa, MENA region and elsewhere) interested in improving their skills in the field of climate change, projections, and services.