Here is the link to the EPIZ-Organisation (The Berlin Development Education and Information Center) that was presented to us by Mary Kay Prinzler on Thursday.

At the subsite of the library you can find lists of the litrature (you have to register first).

Here you can find the presentation of EPIZ.

Field research on Tourism, climate change and sustainability

Berlin is one of the most favorite touristical spots in Europe.

Tourists and Congress-Delegates spent more than 182 Million Person-nights in Berlin in 2011. 76% of them where daytrips.

The average time of the hotel-visitors in Berlin was 2,3 days in 2011.

The gross volume of the tourism-industry in Berlin in 2011 was more than 10 Billions of Euros, with growth-rates of up to 10% per year.

More than 40% of the hotel-guests came from foreign countries. Biggest group from UK, followed by USA and Italy. Each Tourist and Congress-Visitor spends more than 200€ per day in average in Berlin.

Ten Million visitors spent in 2011 22 Millions Nights in Hotels in the town. In the last ten years the tourist-numbers have been more than doubled. Berlin is Europe’s number three in Town-Tourism after London and Paris.

Hotel prices in Berlin are very cheap – nearly half of the average hotel-prices in London.

The Berlin Airports reached 2012 the 25 millions passenger-mark, even with the old airports running over and above their maximum capacity.

Traffic is one of the most important reasons for climate change. One fifth is caused by traffic in Germany.

In comparison the bus is the most climate-friendly way of motorized traveling. Number two is the railway, with a big distance followed by the car and then the plane, that is ten times more climate-destructive than the Bus. If you consider the other toxical dangers like fine dust pollution, the car and the plane are as well the most destructive ways of traveling.

The Questions are:

Do tourists think about that problems?

Do day make decisions regarding that issue?

What are tourists expecting from their trips to Berlin and do they reach it?

We want to get further information about that. It’s your task to go to some touristical spots and ask the people in short interviews.

1. Why did you come to Berlin?

2. What do you want to do here?

3. How long are you staying?

4. Are you on a round-trip?

5. Which transportation did you use to get here?

6. Did you think about environmental questions concerning your trip?

=> If you like, you can use a audio-recorder and/or a photo-camera additionally.

Background-information on the topic of Tourism and climate change – focused on Berlin.

• atmosfair is a climate protection organisation with a focus on travel. Atmosfair is located in Berlin. The website of the organization gives a wide spectrum of data and project-options concerning traveling and climate protection. You can find here a index of airlines regarding their environmental impacts. They provide background informations about the climate-effects of air travel and informations about environmental friendly traveling and companies who provide this.
• Here you can find the outline of the Input given to you, regarding the Berlin-case.

In addition to Prof. Miranda Schreurs lesson on 2.nd July here are some links and informations as well as the Powerpoint-presentation that we saw.

• Prof. Schreurs in an Interview at EESC-Conference talking about who to acchieve sustainability.
• The website of the Environmental Policy Research Centre (FFU) at the Freie Universität Berlin – Miranda Schreurs is the head of the institute.
• The Powerpoint-presentation from Ms. Schreurs.

Here are some Informations concerning the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research that we visited on 1. July.

• Website of the PIK-Institute
• Climate Impact Online-Tool made by Potsdam Institute for Climate Reaseach
• Infos about the paedagogical project “Wetterküche” that we tryed out.

Here is the Mail from Gregor, who showed us the project with some additional links for us:

Hello!

During the guided tour this morning you were asking for some ideas on communicating about climate change.

The main communication platform of the PIK is the climate media factory: http://www.climatemediafactory.de/ which produced the popular Earthbook video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GBrLOlTbJQc

Then there is the crowdfunding campaign for the board game on climate change: http://www.startnext.de/en/keep-cool-das-klimaspiel

And finally some of you were interested in the possibility to compensate carbon emissions by reducing emissions elsewhere. The most reputable web sites are https://www.atmosfair.de/en/home/ and http://www.myclimate.org/ There might be other webpages for you respective countries.

I really enjoyed meeting your interested and well-informed group! Please contact me when you have more questions or ideas!

Kind regards,

Gregor Schwerhoff

Here are some links and Informations about the Vattenfall open-cast-minings in the Lausitz-area.

• Vattenfalls promotion-page with explanation of the minings-process
• Informations about the mining-field that we visited (in German)
• Information flyer about Jänschwalde powerplant, that we saw (in German)
• The upcoming mining-field of the village Atterwasch (lunch-site)
• Critical informations about the mining and coal-industry in the Lausitz by the ecological NGO Grüne Liga and as well from Greenpeace (PDF).
• Website with some good Photos of the site
• Here is the map of the Mines in the Lausitz
• And the website of our partner Spreescouts

Our guided tour lead us at the 3. July to “Lieberose Solar Powerplant”. Here are some background informations about the solar-park:

• Infos from the Installation and Managing Company in English
• Informations of the PV-Modules Producer First Solar about the power plant (in German)
• Wikipedia in english and german

Benedict Haerlin, our referent at 2.nd July afternoon is the Autor of this article in the “Global Agriculture-Report”

• The report on global agriculture “Agriculture at a Crossroads” contains a chapter about the agricultural impact on climate change. You can find the english version on the website:

http://www.globalagriculture.org/index.php?id=2149

• Very intresting informations are mentioned in the Greenpeace-study “Cool Farming”.
• Wikipedia gives general informations about Community Supported Agriculture.