Project description
Setting sail for climate neutrality
Oceans face numerous challenges, from plastic pollution to rising sea levels. It is possible to solve these environmental problems by mobilising cities close to water. This is the goal of the EU-funded BoSS project. Project work will result in transformational demonstrators across different regions and aquatic ecosystems in Portugal, Italy, Sweden, Germany, the Netherlands and Belgium. The overall aim is to achieve a sustainable and inclusive transition, keeping aesthetics at the centre and working with communities. The pilots will provide examples of mission-oriented approaches that are impactful and measurable. The project will introduce an ecocentric narrative both cosmopolitan and rooted in nature-based solutions.
Objective
"The vision of the BoSS project is to demonstrate and archive solutions for climate neutrality with a particular focus on coastal cities as an interface to healthy seas, ocean and water bodies envisioning a new triangle of sustainability, inclusion, and design focused on the most important global natural space. The BoS will offer opportunities to engage with communities for an environmentally sustainable, socially fair, and aesthetically appealing transition. Seven lighthouse demonstrators, located in four different regions and aquatic ecosystems in Portugal (estuary), Italy (lagoon and gulf), Sweden/Germany (strait / north sea / river), and the Netherlands/Belgium (delta) will showcase the transformational and uptake impact at the EU level serving as lighthouse pilots for the implementation of Horizon Europe mission objectives and showcase innovative solutions. The seven pilots will all provide tangible examples of mission-oriented approaches that are impactful, measurable, and targeted. The action plan includes the deployment of ""drops"" in all pilots designed to generate ""ripple"" effects at the local (demonstrator) level but then also at the city/region levels (demonstrating effects of scale) and at a broader level (demonstrating the replication. The BoSS, therefore, introduces an ecocentric narrative both cosmopolitan and rooted in nature-based solutions, plural, and testimonial, proposing to apply a design approach to complex socio-technical-ecological and more-than-anthropocentric problems. An agenda that moves from fixing to caring, from growth to nurture, from certainty to contingency, will enable designers, architects, and engineers to think about assemblages instead of systems and change the outcome from extinction to precarious flourishing. The design of these interactions generates the emergence of new aesthetics and, most decisively, a critical awareness of the history, contemporary, and future: designing beyond humans as a way to sustain our future."
Fields of science
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Programme(s)
Funding Scheme
HORIZON-CSA - HORIZON Coordination and Support ActionsCoordinator
1000-043 Lisboa
Portugal