Institut für Wasserbau

Blue Green Infrastructure through Social Innovation

Cities cannot cope with more frequent and intense rainfall due to climate change without rethinking their existing concepts for storm water management. Technically it means that in addition to the conventional grey infrastructure, they need blue-green solutions and infrastructure such as green corridors, permeable paving, bio-retentions or rainwater harvesting. Recent researches show that BGI benefits outweigh costs x2-x10 times (TEEB, 2015). Most cities envisage the implementation of the BGI but multiple barriers persist and implementation is hampered by the issues such as: who benefits, pays or maintains solutions.
The overall objective of BEGIN is to demonstrate at target sites how cities can improve climate resilience with Blue Green Infrastructure involving stakeholders in a value-based decision- making process to overcome its current implementation barriers.
The Hamburg University of Technology (TUHH) is working in close cooperation with the Agency for roads, bridges and waters (LSBG) in Hamburg. TUHH will support the LSBG to quantify the benefits of the selected BGI elements utilising numerical and physical models and tools.