Energy- & climate change

Implementation of NEXOGENESIS project started

As of September 1, 2021, we have started the implementation of a new project NEXOGENESIS; transcription of the acronym – facilitating the next generation of effective and intelligent water-related policies utilising artificial intelligence and reinforcement learning to assess the water-energy-food-ecosystem (WEFE) nexus.

Project aims to help improve policies related to water, energy, food and ecosystems. Artificial intelligence and machine learning are among tools to be used to assess the water-energy-food-ecosystem (WEFE) nexus.

Water, energy, food, and ecosystems form an interconnected nexus that is central in providing resources and services needed to sustain human activity. The nexus is affected by changes in climate, precipitation, and land cover as well as economic development, agriculture, and urban growth. Currently, humans are extracting resources at a faster rate than they are replaced, thereby deepening resource and ecological deficits. Through the four-year NEXOGENESIS project, which starts 1 September 2021, IHE Delft and 19 partners will support the development of policies that address the nexus interconnectedness at several levels to manage resources effectively and avoid conflicts between users.

The complex water-energy-food nexus is poorly understood, and ecosystems are often not considered as an integral part of the system. In addition, policies for each sector are often developed in isolation, with insufficient consideration of the impact on the WEFE nexus. This poses a challenge that stakeholders, policy makers and academics engaged in NEXOGENESIS will help address by developing and validating a coherent cross-sectoral policy-making framework that addresses climate and socioeconomic change, as well as stakeholder behavior and transboundary issues.

In total, the project will involve 20 organizations from different countries: Latvia (Baltic Environmental Forum as the only project partners in Latvia); Netherlands, Italy, Germany, Spain, Greece, France, Sweden, South Africa, Romania, Bulgaria, Belgium.

On September 20 and 21, the project partners will meet virtually at the project kick-off meeting.
More information about the project and its activities available here: https://www.bef.lv/projekti/nexogenesis-2/


The NEXOGENESIS project is funded by the European Union’s research and innovation program Horizon 2020.
Project number: 101003881.