Ocean Innovators Platform

Panel discussion: Progressing ocean innovation to advance climate action
The ocean is a source of solutions in the face of climate mitigation and climate adaptation.
To address today's challenges, new ocean innovations and technologies are essential and it is crucial to support their emergence and growth. This session will go over the state of innovation in the blue economy and highlight the means to accelerate it further.

Speakers include:
- Dr. Bertrand Piccard - Chairman and Founder, Solar Impulse Foundation
- Daniela Fernandez - Founder, Sustainable Ocean Alliance
- Michal Nachmany - Founder of Climate Policy Radar
- Alexis Grosskopf - Co-Founder and CEO, OceanHub Africa

Financing the RE revolution that has arrived – addressing the challenges for the newer RE technologies

The EIB, in its role of the EU Climate Bank, is increasingly financing new and breakthrough technologies in the transitions onto a low carbon economy. This panel aims to present the various projects where the EIB has demonstrated a leadership role in finding financial solutions, discussing with experts how these new technologies could contribute to the global green energy transition and the practical hurdles, including finance, that countries must overcome in order for their projects to succeed.
 
Speakers include:
- Dr. Bertrand Piccard - Chairman and Founder, Solar Impulse Foundation
- Antoine Sire - Head of Company Engagement, BNP Paribas
- Jean-Christophe Laloux - DG Operations, EIB

Implementation of Technology Needs Assessments of developing countries

The technology framework, adopted at COP 24 in Katowice, guides the work of the Technology Executive Committee (TEC) and the Climate Technology Centre and Network (CTCN) - the two bodies of the Technology Mechanism - under the Paris Agreement. It identifies innovation as a key area of work for delivering environmentally and socially sound, cost-effective and better-performing climate technologies on a larger scale.    
The recent IPCC Sixth Assessment Report on Mitigation for the first time contained a chapter on ‘innovation, technology development and transfer’, highlighting the importance of adopting a systemic approach to innovation as an enabler of accelerated action on mitigation. It emphasizes that innovations occur in dynamic processes emerging from interactions between different actors and between research and development, economic application, and improvisation through learning by doing and learning by using.    

Against this backdrop, innovation is poised to play a central role in the first work programme of the Technology Mechanism for 2023-2027, as a major driver of the development and diffusion of transformative climate technology solutions.  

13:15 - 13:17 |  OPENING
Ariesta Ningrum, Technology Manager, UNFCCC secretariat

13:17 - 13:20 |  WELCOMING
Daniele Violetti, Senior Director, UNFCCC secretariat

13:20 - 13:28  | SCENE-SETTING
Ambrosio Yobanolo del Real, Chair, TEC
Omedi Moses Jura, Chair, CTCN Advisory Board

13:28 - 13:36 |   ENLIGHTENING TALK
Bertrand Piccard, Chairman, Solar Impulse Foundation

13:36 - 14:20  | ROUNDTABLE: PERSPECTIVES FROM INNOVATION LEADERS
Moderator: Rose Mwebaza, Director, Climate Technology Centre & Network (CTCN)
Panelists:

Bertrand Piccard, Chairman, Solar Impulse Foundation
Kirsten Dunlop, Chief Executive Officer, Climate-KIC
Mikko Ollikainen, Manager, Adaptation Fund

14:20 - 14:40  |   Q&A , TESTIMONIALS FROM INNOVATION UNDER THE TECHNOLOGY MECHANISM

14:40 - 14:45  |   CLOSING AND ANNOUNCEMENT OF THE FIRST TM WORK PROGRAMME 2023-2027
Ambrosio Yobanolo del Real, Chair, TEC
Omedi Moses Jura, Chair, CTCN Advisory Board

Daily Pitch - Solutions for the built environment

Each day, the Solar Impulse Foundation gathers a select number of solutions on the buildings pavilion to present several short pitches to attendees.
Where: Social space, Buildings pavillion, COP27 Blue Zone

Sustainable Innovation Forum

The Sustainable Innovation Forum 2022 will run alongside COP27 in Sharm El-Sheik, Egypt, convening heads of state, ministers, CEO’s, investors, UN and multilateral dignitaries, in the largest multi stakeholder event. With a focus on adaptation, mitigation and implementation.

Speakers include:
- Dr. Bertrand Piccard - Chairman and Founder, Solar Impulse Foundation

COP Program

Innovation driving food systems transformation

Our current food systems are outstripping our planetary boundaries and depleting the Earth’s resources. Small changes will not suffice and it is imperative that we radically rethink how food is produced and consumed. By aiming for better production, better nutrition, a better environment, and a better life, we can transform agrifood systems and build forward better by implementing sustainable and holistic solutions that consider development in the long term, inclusive economic growth, and greater resilience.
 
Speakers include:
- Dr. Bertrand Piccard - Chairman and Founder, Solar Impulse Foundation
- Wanjira Mathai - Managing Director for Africa and Global Partnerships, World Resources Institute

Daily Pitch - Solutions for the built environment

Each day, the Solar Impulse Foundation gathers a select number of solutions on the buildings pavilion to present several short pitches to attendees.
Where: Social space, Buildings pavillion, COP27 Blue Zone

Daily Pitch - Solutions for the built environment

Each day, the Solar Impulse Foundation gathers a select number of solutions on the buildings pavilion to present several short pitches to attendees.
Where: Social space, Buildings pavillion, COP27 Blue Zone

Fostering technology innovation to support countries in implementing the Paris Agreement

To achieve the objectives of the Paris Agreement, implementation of climate technologies is necessary on a large scale and in short time. Climate technologies are successfully operating and well proven in many countries. However, climate technologies are still only moderately implemented in many developing countries. Under the Paris Agreement, Parties to the UNFCCC came together to transform their development trajectories, so that they set the world on a course towards limiting warming to 1.5 C above pre-industrial levels.

Technologies already play and will continue to play key roles in these transformations.  Technology Needs Assessments (TNA) of developing countries provide an opportunity to communicate their climate mitigation and adaptation technology needs, with a view of implementing climate technologies. TNAs track evolving needs for new equipment, techniques, practical knowledge and skills to mitigate greenhouse gases and adapt to adverse impacts of climate change.  

This side event aims to bridge political goals with the climate technology ambitions of developing countries, including SIDS and LDCs, with a view to enhancing the implementation of climate mitigation and adaptation technology projects in these countries.  

13:15 - 13:25 |  OPENING

13:25 - 13:35  | INTRODUCTION BY UNEP

Senior management,  UNEP  

13:35 - 13:45 |  TECHNOLOGY SOLUTIONS AND THEIR ROLE IN CLIMATE CHANGE

Mr. Bertrand Piccard  
Solar Impulse Foundation

13:45 - 13:55  | RESULTS OF TNA IMPLEMENTED IN TRINIDAD & TOBAGO

Mr. Kishan Kumarsingh  
Ministry of Planning and Development, Trinidad & Tobago
13:55 - 14:05  |   RESULTS OF TNA IMPLEMENTED IN KENYA

Ms. Anne Omambia  
Ministry of Planning and Development,  Kenya  
14:05 - 14:15  |  RESULTS OF TNA IMPLEMENTED IN FIJI

Ms. Deepitika Chand  
Ministry of Planning and Development, Fiji  

14:15 - 14:45  |   Q&A

Daily Pitch - Solutions for the built environment

Each day, the Solar Impulse Foundation gathers a select number of solutions on the buildings pavilion to present several short pitches to attendees.
Where: Social space, Buildings pavillion, COP27 Blue Zone

Solutions Guide for Cities: Launch Webinar

The Solar Impulse Foundation, fresh from identifying over 1,000 solutions that both protect the environment and are financially viable, have applied them across 50 pain points cities face to engage with the ecological transition and offering almost 200 solutions. Further, this event will look at what else can be done by cities to reduce their environmental footprint, speaking with mayors from leading cities as well as those organizations whose work is critical to helping cities meet their environmental objectives.
Sign up to attend this launch by clicking on the programme.

Speakers include:
- Alexandra Barraquand - Strategic Products Lead, Solar Impulse Foundation
- Dr. Bertrand Piccard - Chairman and Founder, Solar Impulse Foundation
- Carlos Moedas - Mayor, City of Lisbon
- Thomas Osdoba - Programme Director, NetZeroCities Climate-KIC
- Magali Anderson - Chief Sustainability and Innovation Officer, Holcim

EU Official COP27 Side Events Programme

Event with Canadian/Quebec government

More TBA soon

Ministerial: Climate and Clean Air Coalition

The Climate and Clean Air Coalition to Reduce Short-Lived Climate Pollutants was launched by the United Nations Environment Programme and six countries—Bangladesh, Canada, Ghana, Mexico, Sweden, and the United States—on 16 February 2012.
This ministerial level event will serve as a stock-take of progress on this effort.
 
Speakers include:
- Dr. Bertrand Piccard - Chairman and Founder, Solar Impulse Foundation

Biodiversity - Active Restoration of Ecosystems during Global Change

There is no doubt that The Climate Crisis and Biodiversity Crisis are interlinked and that Nature has a key role in mitigation of and adaptation to climate change. In many densely populated countries, natural areas are limited, fragmented, and threatened, not only by development of housing and infrastructure and agriculture but by Climate Change too.
In many cases, Protection and preserving existing nature is no longer enough, and rehabilitating and restoring ecosystems such as winter ponds, marshlands and rivers has become vital. This event is intended to demonstrate how restoration of ecosystems can support mitigation efforts and reduce the risks of climate change. Enhancing urban nature too, plays a key role in adaptation to climate change by providing Nature Based Solutions for heat waves, regulating surface water and preventing floods whilst allowing biodiversity to thrive locally in urban nature sites that are restored to optimal condition.
The event will demonstrate excellent and effective study cases and will provide a fertile platform for learning and sharing of experiences that can further contribute to the world, by "exporting" successful solutions and practices.
These will be demonstrated by countries and organizations that are engaged in providing natural solutions to combating the Climate and Biodiversity Crises. These practices have other social and economic opportunities that will be demonstrated too.

Speakers include:
- Dr. Bertrand Piccard - Founder and President, Solar Impulse Foundation
- Jörg Andreas Krüger - President, NABU Germany
- Dr. Hanan Ginat – Eilot Regional Council, Israel 

Climate innovation and building resilience through technology transfer

We need rapid technological transformation to tackle the climate crisis. But how can great innovation be brought to the market and upscaled to tackle the climate crisis? And how can this be done fast? The panel discussion connects climate innovation (presented by Bertrand Piccard), funding in the form Bill Gates’ Climate Fund (presented by Ann Mettler), research and technology transfer and commercialization, presented by Fraunhofer, one of the largest European research institutes, and collects first-hand experience from the country hosting COP27 with the Egyptian Deputy President of the Egyptian Space Agency as part of the panel. The discussion will explore bottlenecks, and opportunities to upscale technologies to rapidly create technological system change for a climate-neutral society.
The event will explore the opportunities and challenges linked to turning new sustainable and green technologies emerging from research into actual innovations ready for market deployment. It will look at this from a perspective of both advanced and middle-income economies.  
It will consider how policies, technology transfer ecosystems and sustainable financing solutions can drive innovation in Europe, Egypt and beyond.

Speakers include:
- Dr. Bertrand Piccard - Chairman and Founder, Solar Impulse Foundation
- Ms. Ann Mettler - Vice President Europe, Breakthrough Energy Ventures
- Prof. El Askary - Deputy President of the Egyptian Space Agency and Professor of Earth Sciences, Alexandria University (EG) and Chapman University (US)
- Ms. Mathias Rauch - Director of Research Strategy and Policy, Fraunhofer Institute

Watch Live

Unlocking clean mobility in rapidly developing cityscapes: best-practices from Sub-Saharan Africa

Planning effective mobility in cityscapes is one of the most challenging and expensive aspects for any urban planner. Cities evolve on a continual basis, and mobility systems need to be flexible and predictive, but also prescriptive, giving direction to the city's growth and evolution. They must be at once efficient and equitable. Add on to that the need for them to be sustainable and introduce a concept that upends traditional supply chains and requires a rethink of what infrastructure you need.
If you had the choice you would first design a city and then lay a mobility plan on top of it, not build them in parallel. That's obviously not possible.
In this session we will look at the challenges that need to be considered and overcome when developing sustainable mobility plans, from cutting down on travel time and distance to reducing congestion. Furthermore, the necessity to electrify transport means you need to build capacity to serve that purpose - but so too do many other sectors, so which do you favour to ensure that people use the infrastructure you've put in place.
During this panel we will discuss the issues - and opportunities - that rapidly developing and evolving cities face to do so.

Speakers include:
- Dr. Bertrand Piccard - Chairman and Founder, Solar Impulse Foundation
- Ms. Charlène Kouassi - Movin’On
- Ms. Alexandra Barraquand - Solar Impulse Foundation
- Mr Thomas Deloison - Director Mobility, World Business Council for Sustainable Development
- Local Government Representatives
- Ms. Gabriela Okamaru - E-Bikes for Africa

Circular Cities - Decarbonizing the Transport sector

The event format will be a moderated panel discussion.
The event will be moderated by Dr. Magash Naidoo, Head of Circular Development at ICLEI World Secretariat.

Speakers include:
- Mr. Vincent Michelet - Global Head of Communications, Solar Impulse Foundation
- Mr. Andrew Deacon - Global Covenant of Mayors
- Ms. Wei-Shiuen Ng - UN

Energy Transition: Key Insights from GCoM signatories

GCoM signatories have been invited by the European Commission’s Directorate-General for Climate Action (DG CLIMA) to showcase their work and amplify the voices of cities and local leaders in side-events organised at the EU pavilion.
 
Speakers include:
- Dr. Bertrand Piccard - Founder and Chairman, Solar Impulse Foundation
- Frans Timmermans - Executive Vice-President of the European Commission, in charge of the European Green Deal

1000+ Clean and Efficient Solutions for COP 27

The purpose of this session is to provide this evidence to the attending ministers and other decision makers, and to demonstrate that by adopting ambitious environmental targets and putting in place the right enabling conditions, the technologies will be pulled to market and kickstart the clean industrial revolution at the pace and scale that we need to reach the 1.5° C target.
 
Speakers include:
- Dr. Bertrand Piccard - Founder and Chairman, Solar Impulse Foundation
- Sharon Dijksma - Mayor of Utrecht
- Kobie Brand - Regional Director, ICLEI Africa Secretariat
- Gwenaelle Avice-Huet - Chief Strategy and Sustainability Officer, Schneider Electric

How government-business collaboration can drive climate policy? Case: Climate Neutral Finland 2035

Finland is committed to achieving climate neutrality by 2035. What are the key learnings from the Finnish experience in government-business collaboration in setting ambitious climate targets? Can these learnings be translated to useful concepts to benefit other countries too?

Speakers include:
- Dr. Bertrand Piccard - Solar Impulse Foundation
- Ms. Maria Ohisalo - Minister of Environment, Finland
- Ms. Vibha Dhawan - Director General, TERI
- Mr. Charles Héaulmé - CEO, Huhtamäki Oyj
- Ms. Tuuli Hietaniemi - Specialist, Sitra
- Ms. Tuuli Kaskinen - CEO of Climate Leadership Coalition
- Mr. Janne Peljo - Confederation of Finnish Industries