1. Background

This Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) is developed under a European Commission Funded I-CISK Project, entitled, “Innovating Climate Services Through Integrating Scientific and Local Knowledge.” Climate change is one of the defining issues of the 21st century. The climate is becoming more variable, and extreme weather events such as floods, droughts and extreme heat are occurring more frequently, increasing the risk of harm and damage such events bring. This affects all sectors; including agriculture, energy, forestry tourism, health, and land-use; and requires policy makers, public agencies, businesses and citizens to adapt. To take climate smart decisions in the face of the extreme events of today and the changes of the future climate, all actors need tailored climate information that is relevant to their needs. Climate science developed globally, however, rarely takes local needs, local knowledges and perceptions into account.

The European Green Deal seeks to support efforts by citizens, government and businesses and adapt to change, while working towards a carbon neutral EU by 2050. As part of the Research and Innovation actions that underpin the Green Deal, the innovating climate services through Integrating Scientific and local Knowledge project, I-CISK in short, aims to bridge this gap by innovating how Climate Services are developed, through co-producing these with local stakeholders and citizens. For example, forecasting drought is a climate service that is useful to water dependent sectors such as tourism, but also to agriculture, though each of these sectors may be impacted differently, and the sector specific needs and knowledges will influence how climate information is used, interpreted and acted on.

This MOOC is underpinned by the key outputs and exploitable assets generated by the I-CISK project such as co-creation framework, pre-operational climate services and a web-based climate service platform. Moreover, I‐CISK has developed a number of knowledge products, such as research outputs, models and tools, and communication materials that can be exploited by a series of knowledge providers such as universities, but also entities targeting practitioners and end users to support the co-creation of next generation climate services and building resilience towards climate‐related risks. This MOOC developed from the key results from I‐CISK serves the societal educational goals by providing unlimited and free access. The main goal of this course is to share knowledge, raise awareness and facilitate co-creation of user centered climate services contributing to improvement of society's resilience to the impacts of climate change, with users empowered and well-informed to understand, process, and use climate information in decision-making.