For the first time, all major European modelling and infrastructure efforts are coordinated within a dedicated project to develop and deploy a sustainable and unified system for delivering future emissions and land-use scenarios, and climate and impact projections. This system is referred to hereafter as the’climate pathways system’. It is designed to support climate research, international assessments, and climate policy for the coming decades. FUTURA explores how to design a new cyclical scenario generation protocol built from process-resolving models complemented by emulator and AI approaches. It shifts from causal-chain modelling workflows to a unified system that unifies multi-annual process-driven iterations complemented by the ability to run fast annual iterations. We address how to best align this system with policy timeframes, and how to effectively leverage the model and data multiverse to advance understanding while supporting researchers, practitioners, and policymakers. The FUTURA climate pathways system represents a significant step towards the sustained and responsive delivery of climate projections in support of climate assessment and policy.
4 years from 01/06/2026 to 30/06/2030
General aims
Objective 1: Develop and carry out coordinated climate projections and scenarios that enhance cross-community research and deliver responsive support to climate assessments and policy.
Align process-resolving modelling of Earth system, impacts, and emissions pathways alongside ML/AI emulators, across international modelling efforts, e.g. CMIP, CORDEX, ISIMIP, IAMC and initiatives e.g. GCP, IGCC. Advance the European federated data infrastructure for greater data interoperability, documentation and integration between communities. A coordinated and timely contribution to AR7.
Objective 2: Evaluate the plausibility, risks and impacts of future climate pathways, including the potential reversibility of temperature overshoot.
Understanding the consequences of exceeding the temperature goals of the Paris Agreement, stabilisation and return, including feasibility. Includes (un)avoidable and (ir)reversible changes in mean climate, variability, and extremes, feedbacks and abrupt change, the carbon cycle, sea level, species loss, human and natural system impacts.
Objective 3: Explore future climate pathways using the climate data multiverse and demonstrate its value in delivering actionable science for policy and decision-making.
Analysis and guidance on leveraging the breadth of modelling efforts to develop scientific insights to support climate policy, connecting emission, climate, and impacts, exploring knowledge and the uncertainty cascade. Co-design case studies and use storylines to address policy questions.
Objective 4: Establish a multidisciplinary mode of working that reduces fragmentation, fosters inclusiveness, and builds a coherent and collaborative European climate science community.
A paradigm shift and design of an integrative climate pathways system through collaborative multidisciplinary, cross-community efforts and culture better connected to policy and society. Inspire next generation scientists working across disciplines.
CMCC role
Coordination of cross community efforts for the development of the next generation climate scenarios and projections system including infrastructure, advances emissions pathways, Earth system modelling, regional downscaling, high resolution modelling, data distribution including a new CMCC-CINEA CORDEX ESGF node, strategic communication at the science-policy interface and actor engagement.
Partners
University of Leeds
University of Reading
Internationales Institut für Angewandte Systemanalyse (IIASA)
Potsdam-Institut für Klimafolgenforschung (PIK)
Agencia Estatal Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas (CSIC)
Ministerie van Infrastructuur en Waterstaat
Met Office
UKRI-STFC
CICERO Center for International Climate Research
Vrije Universiteit Brussel
Deutsches Klimarechenzentrum GmbH (DKRZ)
Centre Européen de Recherche et de Formation Avancée en Calcul Scientifique (CERFACS)
Météo-France
Sveriges Meteorologiska och Hydrologiska Institut (SMHI)
Barcelona Supercomputing Center – Centro Nacional de Supercomputación (BSC-CNS)
University College London (UCL)
Universität Leipzig
Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt e.V. (DLR)
Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)
Meteorologisk institutt
NORCE Research AS
Danmarks Meteorologiske Institut (DMI)
Max-Planck-Gesellschaft zur Förderung der Wissenschaften e.V. (MPG)
University of Hamburg
Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule Zürich (ETH Zürich)
Imperial College London
CINECA Consorzio Interuniversitario
Koninklijk Nederlands Meteorologisch Instituut (KNMI)
Climate Resource S GmbH
Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche (CNR)
Wageningen University & Research (WUR)
Eidgenössische Forschungsanstalt für Wald, Schnee und Landschaft (WSL)
Institut de Recherche pour le Développement (IRD)
Uniwersytet Szczeciński
Stichting Deltares
Pensoft Publishers
Infodesignlab AS
Università degli Studi di Trento
Alfred-Wegener-Institut, Helmholtz-Zentrum für Polar- und Meeresforschung (AWI)
Helmholtz-Zentrum GmbH