Understanding and avoiding maladaptation to climate change
Horizon Europe · Grant topic
Summary
A Polish company can use this call for R&D.
Funds researchers and companies generating evidence, assessment frameworks and tools to prevent or correct harmful climate adaptation outcomes.
- Who can apply
- Companies can lead: SME, large company, research org, university.
- Amount
- €5M – €6M per projectTotal budget €18,000,000
- Deadline
- 04 Mar 2027 01:00 CETin 131 days
- Status
- Forthcomingopens 17 Nov 2026
Machine-classified from the call text; check eligibility at the source.
Description
Expected Outcome:
Project results are expected to contribute to all of the following outcomes:
• Existing evidence on maladaptation is retrieved comprehensively, and new knowledge is generated for incorporation into main EU repositories, such as Climate-ADAPT or the portal of the EU Mission on Adaptation to Climate Change;
• The risk and adaptation assessment frameworks are improved by better integrating the maladaptation dimension;
• Guidelines and tools for maladaptation prevention and correction strategies are made available to adaptation stakeholders at relevant scales and inform the design and implementation of adaptation strategies and plans of the EU and Member States.
Scope:
Recent climate records, showing unprecedented temperatures and extreme weather events, underscore the urgent need for rapid, systemic and comprehensive adaptation to address the escalating impacts of climate change on all natural and managed systems. However, while adaptation is essential, not fully informed measures can backfire, leading to severe unintended consequences or to short-term gains that are not sustainable. In this context, maladaptation refers to adaptation actions unintentionally leading to increased risk of adverse climate-related outcomes, including via increased greenhouse gas emissions or air pollutants, socio-economic, biodiversity and environmental trade-offs, increased or transferred vulnerability and greater social inequity.
Most of the adaptation plans and implemented actions are relatively recent, so even if the cases of maladaptation are increasingly documented, the evidence is still scarce and sparse, as the latest IPCC reports confirm. There is a need to learn from the increasing evidence of maladaptation across sectors and regions, both in Europe and globally, to prevent maladaptation in policy design and implementation (e.g. of the EU Adaptation Strategy).
Actions should address all the following aspects:
• Advance the understanding and identification of drivers that lead to maladaptation for a wide range of systems, socio-economic and environmental conditions. The analysis should be comprehensive and consider an integrated and systemic approach (including insights from Social Sciences and Humanities (SSH) to maladaptation causes and drivers of very diverse nature, such as trade-offs and feedbacks with other priorities and sectors, poor decision making and implementation practices and the inherent uncertainty and other features of the adaptation process). The analysis should also integrate the perspectives of public and private stakeholders and end-users, apply intersectional approach and include data disaggregated by gender, where relevant and feasible.
• Map and analyse evidence to identify and validate effective adaptation practices that prevent maladaptation and help to identify maladaptive ones. Case studies should be used for this purpose, for monitoring and evaluation of the adaptation measures, policies, and actions at a local, regional, and national scale, and from regions and sectors with diverse characteristics and environmental conditions. Engagement of end-users is encouraged to ensure robust and realistic characterisation of maladaptation experiences. Among other sources, integrating evidence from and for the EU Mission on Adaptation to Climate Change is encouraged. Evidence and insights gained should be systematized and incorporated into main EU repositories.
• Strengthen the methodological and analytical toolbox for complex climate risk and adaptation assessments to increase public understanding and policy awareness of maladaptation risks, and to advance both qualitative and quantitative understanding of the most important complex risk feedbacks, particularly when they may result in significant constraints on options for climate action.
• Study and propose corrective responses for the identified maladaptation cases and provide systematised prevention guidelines and best practice examples to avoid maladaptive outcomes.
Coordination and collaboration with most relevant on-going projects from Mission Adaptation, Cluster 5 Destination 1 “Climate Science and Responses" and from relevant Destinations from other Clusters is encouraged, especially for evidence retrieval, national scale assessment and methodological consistency. Specific resources should be devoted to this purpose and project scientific boards should cross-fertilised. Actions’ results should also contribute to future European Climate Risk Assessments.
Who can apply, in detail
- Applicant types
- SME, Large company, Research org, University
- Purpose
- Research and innovation
- R&D relevance
- 2 of 3
- Poland eligible
- Yes
- Country limit
- —
- Region
- Any
- Consortium
- Unclear
- Readiness level (TRL)
- —
- Topics
- Climate maladaptation
- Adaptation risk assessment
- Climate adaptation tools
- Adaptation planning
- Evidence synthesis
Machine-classified from the call text; check eligibility at the source. 23 Oct 2026
Conditions
Typed facts extracted from the source documents by Scindu's grant-data review. Each value keeps its own conditions. Unknown means unstated, not zero or unlimited.
- Consortium required
- Yes
General Annex B baseline for RIA, subject to any topic-specific exceptions recorded separately. The application consortium must include at least three mutually independent legal entities in different countries: at least one established in an EU Member State and at least two others established in different EU Member States or Associated Countries. Affiliated entities do not count toward the minimum.
- Other condition
- Research and Innovation Action.
- Other condition
- If a project uses satellite-based Earth observation, positioning/navigation or related timing data/services, beneficiaries must use Copernicus and/or Galileo/EGNOS; other sources may also be used.
- Other condition
- The topic does not state a lump-sum exception in its specific conditions; standard Grant Agreement and General Annex G conditions govern the grant form and eligible actual costs. The final form and amounts are set in the signed grant agreement.
No distinct actual payroll entitlement or salary level is published by the topic.
- Other condition
- The overview expects around 3 project(s) to be funded under this topic. This is an indicative planning number, not a guaranteed award count or consortium-size condition.
Scope is funded projects under this topic; not beneficiaries, consortium members, or award entitlement.
- Other condition
- Actions must address all four stated aspects: drivers of maladaptation with integrated SSH and stakeholder perspectives; evidence and cases of effective/maladaptive practices; improved complex-risk/adaptation methods; and corrective responses and prevention guidance.
- Other condition
- Maladaptation means adaptation actions that unintentionally increase adverse climate-related outcomes, including emissions/pollutants, socio-economic, biodiversity or environmental trade-offs, transferred vulnerability or inequity.
- Other condition
- Coordination with relevant Mission Adaptation and Cluster 5 Destination 1 projects is encouraged; specific resources should be devoted to coordination and results should contribute to future European Climate Risk Assessments.
Amounts and costs
- Indicative budget
- €18,000,000
Topic budget as stated in the portal's budget table. Lump-sum and per-project limits are in the call conditions.
- Eligible cost
- Natural persons under direct contract and third-party seconded persons may qualify as personnel only if assigned to the action and working under employee-like conditions, the work result belongs to the beneficiary unless agreed otherwise, and the rate reflects costs actually incurred without significant difference from comparable employees. The Grant Agreement may allow this personnel cost category when every Article 6 condition is met; the call does not promise a position, headcount, salary level or individual wage entitlement.
- Eligible cost
- Employee personnel costs may be included only for people employed by the beneficiary (or equivalent appointing act), assigned to the action, meeting all general eligibility conditions, and calculated under the grant rules. The Grant Agreement may allow this personnel cost category when every Article 6 condition is met; the call does not promise a position, headcount, salary level or individual wage entitlement.
- Eligible cost
- Unpaid SME owners and natural-person beneficiaries may claim personnel costs only under the applicable Annex 2a unit-cost method and the general eligibility conditions. The Grant Agreement may allow this personnel cost category when every Article 6 condition is met; the call does not promise a position, headcount, salary level or individual wage entitlement.
- Eligible cost
- Subcontracting estimates/costs and purchase costs are governed by the relevant grant form. Under actual-cost rules, subcontracting must meet general eligibility and usual purchasing practices ensuring best value for money (or lowest price) and no conflict of interest. The signed grant agreement fixes the final permitted categories and amounts.
- Funding intensity, maximum
- 100 percent of eligible costs
RIA maximum rate under General Annex G; final rate and amounts are fixed in the grant agreement.
- Expected project funding, up to
- €6,000,000
Upper endpoint of the Commission estimated per-project contribution range; the topic text does not make it a binding maximum.
- Expected project funding, from
- €5,000,000
Lower endpoint of the Commission estimated per-project contribution range; the topic text does not make it a binding minimum.
- Topic allocation
- €18,000,000
Indicative topic allocation; separate from per-project EU contribution and not an individual award or grant cap.
Personnel and services
General eligible personnel cost category only; not a call-promised hire.
Other role · Staff cost the grant can fund
The Grant Agreement may allow this personnel cost category when every Article 6 condition is met; the call does not promise a position, headcount, salary level or individual wage entitlement. The person must be assigned to the action, work under employee-like conditions, the work result must belong to the beneficiary unless otherwise agreed, and costs must correspond to actual costs without significant difference from comparable employees.
General cost category permitted by applicable MGA rules; no specific job or hire asserted.
Other role · Staff cost the grant can fund
The Grant Agreement may allow this personnel cost category when every Article 6 condition is met; the call does not promise a position, headcount, salary level or individual wage entitlement. Eligible only when assigned to the action and all MGA Article 6 conditions are met.
Conditional cost category, not an advertised role.
Other role · Staff cost the grant can fund
The Grant Agreement may allow this personnel cost category when every Article 6 condition is met; the call does not promise a position, headcount, salary level or individual wage entitlement. Costs must follow the Annex 2a unit-cost method and general eligibility conditions; no call-specific hire or salary is stated.
Source documents
Call facts
- Opens
- 17 Nov 2026
- Deadline model
- Single-stage
- Programme
- Horizon Europe · 2021 - 2027
- Call
- HORIZON-CL5-2027-01 · CLIMATE
- Types of action
- HORIZON Research and Innovation Actions
- Source
- ec.europa.eu
- Checked
- 24 Oct 2026
- Portal updated
- 7 Oct 2026
- Review status
- Partial review
- Reviewed
- 23 Oct 2026
This is a summary of the source page, not the official text. Eligibility, conditions and the submission system are at the source.