Nature-Based Solutions to Address Climate Change for Sustainable Development
A special issue of Sustainability (ISSN 2071-1050). This special issue belongs to the section "Resources and Sustainable Utilization".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: 31 December 2025 | Viewed by 6022
Special Issue Editors
Interests: nature-based solutions against flooding, drought, and urban heat islands
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
Nature-based solutions (NbS), and more specifically ecosystem-based disaster risk reduction measures (Eco-DRR), have been promoted as adaptive measures against predicted increasing hydrometeorological hazards (HMHs), such as heatwaves and floods which have already caused significant loss of life and economic damage across the globe and are expected to worsen under adverse climate change conditions. Nature-based solutions (NbS) can be beneficial to human communities by helping them to build resilience to climate change by managing and mitigating the impacts of hydro-meteorological hazards (HMHs). Even though substantial research has been carried out in the past on the detection and assessment of HMHs and their derived risks, knowledge around the performance and functioning of NbS to address them is severely lacking. The latter is exacerbated by the lack of practical and viable approaches that would help to identify and select NbS for specific problems. The design and implementation of environmentally, economically, technically, and socioculturally sustainable NbS requires inter- and transdisciplinary approaches which could be achieved by fostering co-creation processes by engaging stakeholders across various sectors and levels, inspiring more effective use of skills, diverse knowledge, workforce and resources, and connecting and harmonizing adaptation aims. Furthermore, underpinning factors such as policy framework, end-users’ interests and participation for NbS design and operationalization are yet to be established. The aim of this special issue is to address these open research issues and provide a comprehensive roadmap to the co-design, operationalization, and monitoring of sustainable NbS, mitigating a wide range of climate-change-induced hydrometeorological hazards.
In this Special Issue, original research articles and reviews are welcome. Research areas may include (but are not limited to) the following:
- NbS co-design and operationalization;
- Financial considerations and NbS sustainability;
- NbS performance monitoring;
- NbS social context and public acceptance;
- Modeling aspects of NbS.
We look forward to receiving your contributions.
Dr. Michael Loupis
Dr. Christos Spyrou
Guest Editors
Manuscript Submission Information
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Keywords
- nature-based solutions
- hydro-meteorological hazards
- risk mitigation and adaptation
- NbS policies
- green infrastructure
- ecosystem-based management
- stakeholder participation
- co-creation
- ecological engineering
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