Workshop, workshop, COP26

Boy, what a week! 🤕

I knew it would be an exhausting one. Interesting too, but exhausting. And I almost didn't make it. But first things first.

I had a wonderful trip last weekend with my two friends Christian and Valentin to Christian's family cabin in Holtdalen. There was even some snow already and we really enjoyed sitting by the warming fire. The bus on Sunday from there back to Trondheim was delayed, resulting in me rushing up to my place by Theisendammen, taking a quick shower, packing my stuff, and rushing down again to uni to meet some other PhDs and PostDocs who were already waiting for the latecomers. For I was about to spend a few days with them at a workshop, all organised by FME NTRANS, the Norwegian Centre for Energy Transition Strategies that finances our academic positions.

As soon as I got to the meeting place, we left by bus to drive to the venue of our workshop, a cozy hotel on Inderøy, Trøndelag's "inner island" which offers the "golden detour" - something to enjoy perhaps in another season. Anyway, we arrived there right on time for dinner, but it was too dark to see the surroundings. That had to wait until the other day. It was worth the wait.

When I got up and out after the first night, there was a beautiful sunrise with colours ranging from light-blue to deep-orange, reflected in the glassy surface of the sea which lay there calmly, separated from the hotel only by the lawn and some tall trees. Deep-hanging clouds were moving on the horizon, partly covering the hills on the other side of the fjord. What a start into the day!

Following a rich breakfast, we got started with why we were actually here. Tomas Moe Skjølsvold and Marius Korsnes, both of the NTRANS management team, kicked it off with an intro and some get-to-know-each-other games - which were so much fun! After that we were on and an interesting 3-day workshop commenced. We had presentations, some games, more presentations, tried to contribute a little to NTRANS' dissemination work, and enjoyed a powerpoint karaoke session. Inspired by the latter, we also had a real karaoke session at some point as well. Aside from all this, we enjoyed the good company, ate good food, and had some refreshing plunges into the cold sea.

Wednesday, the last day of the NTRANS workshop was a busy day for me, because another workshop started. The SHAPE project, which my PhD work will contribute to, held one of its online partner meetings, lasting from Wednesday through Friday. Since I was still at the hotel, I could easily join in, but when we had to drive back to Trondheim in the afternoon, it got a little difficult to follow all SHAPE sessions. Still remarkable, though, that I could join at all. Imagine how that would have been without all the online-conferencing tools! Anyway, this other workshop was also really interesting and I feel I learned so much in such a short time. And that was just the first day!

The two other days of the SHAPE partner meeting were filled with so many deep dives into the field of integrated assessment modelling and the interface to the industrial ecology world, that I found it hard to get out of the deep again 🧐 The whole workshop made me excited to contribute to all this with my own work. And that's important, given that my supervisors suggested to define my PhD project in more detail. This means in effect that I will have a few hard days ahead of me where I have to batter my brain. And all that falls - of course! - together with some other big event: COP26.

The 26th Conference of the Parties (COP) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change will be held in Glasgow, UK starting tomorrow and lasting until 12 November. Expectations are high, hopes are higher, but fears are even greater. After a draft of the third part of the IPCC's AR6 has been leaked last week, there should be enough pressure on our global leaders to act accordingly and mitigate climate change. However, looking at current politics paints a rather bleak and disappointing picture. So, let's see...