Problem Setting on Energy Risk and Climate Change Adaptation: Topics and Tools

Energy risk management and climate change adaptation strategies have long been targeted as individual and independent challenges, having emerged separately along the European Union (EU) and international agenda and policy history. Nevertheless, the most recent EU initiative in this field, the Global Covenant of Mayors (GCoM), faces mitigation and adaptation strategies simultaneously within the framework of the Sustainable Energy and Climate Action Plans (SECAP) design. A similar approach may lead to a re-definition of energy-related and climate change vulnerability and consequently to developing multi-risk territorial analysis. This would require building a complex and detailed knowledge of the territorial context, thus developing a strongly data-driven local risk and vulnerability assessment (RVA). Moreover, it must be remembered that SECAPs are drawn at the municipal scale, where geometry shows to be extremely various, and large metropolitan areas, as well as fragmented hamlets, coexist. This integrated approach may prove to be particularly critical for small municipalities. The present contribution aims at providing a methodology to plan mitigation and adaptation of local actions based on land use municipal assets and consequent multi-risk territorial mapping.