The online hackathon "The Climate Challenge", organised by the Goethe-Institut together with Scientists4Future Heidelberg and The Hackathon Company, took place on the last weekend of October 2020.
© Lena Ziyal
Are you tired of just talking about the climate change? Do you want to take action instead? That was the call for the online hackathon "The Climate Challenge" organised by the Goethe-Institut together with Scientists4Future Heidelberg and The Hackathon Company from 30 October to 1 November 2020.
For one weekend, around 250 developers, designers, creatives, scientists, problem solvers and digital entrepreneurs from 24 European countries worked together in 30 teams across different online platforms to develop innovative solutions in four thematic areas to help EU citizens - and everyone else - tackle the climate challenge. They were supported and accompanied by 28 scientific experts.
These thematic areas were specified:
Raising awareness
e.g.
How can we achieve behavioral changes that support climate protection? (e.g. by nudging)
How can we make traveling more eco-friendly?
Communication
e.g.
How can we communicate climate change to the public in a way that encourages people to take concrete environmental actions?
How can we counteract fake news around climate change effectively?
Social perspective
e.g.
How can we adapt measures that were developed in the context of the Corona crisis to achieve sustainable climate protection?
How can we emphasize the benefits of a reduced digital CO₂e footprint?
Big Data
e.g.
Which possibilities does big data offer to evaluate climate mitigation measures?
How can we enable local authorities to access climate data and to develop solutions that help them overcome risk factors associated with their geographical conditions?
If you are interested in how the hackathon went, you can read about it in the agenda.