BIOGAIN Enabling biodiversity-positive transformation of energy planning towards climate neutrality

Paradigm change towards sustainable transition to a climate-neutral society requires forward-looking ways of curbing and meeting energy demands (connected particularly to spatial and mobility planning) at strategic levels AND prioritize nature-positive decision-making, explicitly accounting for nature’s contribution to people. In practice, planners face increasing intensity of competing societal demands and strong pressure on land as a resource. At the same time, they are confronted with a lack of reliable and recent data to base their decisions upon. BIOGAIN surveys how far novel (digital & AI supported) data and knowledge on changes in ecosystems reflecting complex dynamics are a way out of these deficiencies towards net-gain planning. BIOGAIN enhances transparency of how predicted effects of renewable energy on species and their habitats are integrated with preference-trade-offs to inform planning decisions. It investigates what prioritization is needed to follow a net-gain strategy reflecting the various competing interests and need for multi-functional land use. Additionally, it surveys the acceptance of models accounting complex interferences occurring due to multiple land use changes related to energy transition and evolving preferences, values and trade-offs related to societal transformation. To this aim BIOGAIN identifies and analyses social tipping points towards a net-gain planning system in a transdisciplinary actors-centred approach. BIOGAIN seeks efficient use of economic resources to achieve net gain in biodiversity (as encouraged by the Taxonomy) instead of no-net-loss (i.e., mitigation, compensation). Involving private companies, consultancies and public authorities in a real-planning-simulation both in the development and the testing of a serious game prepared by a collaborative decision analysis and accompanied by a DCE as well as in a “living-lab setting” with explicit spatial-optimization in three case study regions, that employ digital biodiversity data and models within, allows for investigating deep leverage points in public-private cooperation along with barriers and opportunities from a procedural, values/ mindset, power-dynamics and also economic perspective.