Climate Action

There is no doubt that the anthropogenic emissions of greenhouse gases are changing our living environment. Climate change is in our hands. We need to both work on limiting it as much as we can (mitigation), but we will also have to learn to adapt to new circumstances. TU Delft will harness its innovative powers to support the world-wide transition to non-fossil resources, and adaptation of the living environment to the consequences of global warming.

The problem is complex and urgent – but we have no other choice than to be optimistic and use all of our capacity to face the challenge, through our education programs and our research.

For more information, see:

In the Climate Action research programme, we start from four themes we consider to be paramount for future Climate Action:

The TU Delft vision on Climate Action is deeply founded in preceding decades of university wide climate action research. The goal of the Climate action research programme is to build on current strengths and identify the areas where there is a need to strengthen our capacities to keep up our (inter)national reputation as climate action university.

Climate Action News

05 September 2023

Clearing up the sky: reducing the uncertainty caused by clouds in the climate system

Clearing up the sky: reducing the uncertainty caused by clouds in the climate system

Wolken zijn verantwoordelijk voor een groot deel van de onzekerheid in klimaatprojecties. Met een Starting Grant van de European Research Council (ERC) wil Franziska Glassmeier de evolutie van wolken en hun invloed op het toekomstige klimaat beter begrijpen. Glassmeier is Assistant Professor atmosfeerwetenschappen aan de faculteit Civiele Techniek en Geowetenschappen van de TU Delft: "Als we de onzekerheid veroorzaakt door wolken kunnen verminderen, zouden we een veel beter idee hebben van hoeveel de planeet opwarmt door antropogene emissies."

01 August 2023

Premiere of “Dancing in the Desert”

Premiere of “Dancing in the Desert”

The premiere of Dancing in the Desert will take place on Wednesday, 23 August, at 2 pm on the Delft Markt town square. Admission is free. In this beautiful documentary, a team of filmmakers including Bram van Splunteren follow the student team working on the Nuna 11. It’s an exciting job, especially when you realise that the Nuna 10 caught fire during the previous Solar Challenge in Australia. Will these students succeed in designing and building an entirely new Nuna from scratch? Will it finish the race through the Moroccan desert and maybe even win it?

31 July 2023

Expedition to the Norwegian Trench to explore carbon burial

Expedition to the Norwegian Trench to explore carbon burial

To explore the role of the North Sea in the global climate system, the NIOZ research vessel Pelagia embarked on an expedition to the Norwegian Trench. On 15 June, the ship docked back at the NIOZ port on Texel, with on board Anna Enge, PhD student Hydraulic Engineering at TU Delft.

17 July 2023

TU Delft launches online course Sustainable Building with Timber

TU Delft launches online course Sustainable Building with Timber

“The way we construct our buildings needs to change.” says Arjan van Timmeren professor of Environmental Technology & Design at TU Delft. Over 35% of our global greenhouse gas emissions are attributable to the built environment. A third of that amount is specifically related to the production of abiotic (non-renewable) materials such as concrete, metals and plastics. The associated challenges are not only climate related, but also concern resource scarcity, health and housing provision.

07 July 2023

Extra-resilient crops through integration of plant biology, simulation models and AI

Extra-resilient crops through integration of plant biology, simulation models and AI

The Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO) announced its contribution of 15 million euros to PlantXR, a CropXR research programme into 'smart breeding' of extra resilient crops (eXtra Resilient, XR). This impulse brings CropXR's total budget to over €90 million for the next 10 years. NWO’s grant marks the start of the new Dutch institute CropXR, which integrates plant biology, computational modelling, and artificial intelligence into 'smart breeding methods'. Those will be used to develop crop varieties that are more resilient to climate change and less dependent on chemical crop protection. In CropXR, TU Delft works together with Utrecht University, Wageningen University and Research, the University of Amsterdam and dozens of plant breeding, biotech and processing companies on basic scientific research, data collection and data sharing, education, and advancing broad application of the results.


Climate Action News

16 February 2024

Green steel programme receives final approval, marking its official start

Green steel programme receives final approval, marking its official start

On 12 February, the Growing with Green Steel programme received official approval for a grant of more than 100 million euros from the National Growth Fund. Around 22 million euros of the total sum is destined for TU Delft. The programme aims to develop scientific knowledge and technology for sustainable steel production.

12 February 2024

Robust reactor design to simplify biomolecule production

Robust reactor design to simplify biomolecule production

TU Delft and Delft Advanced Biorenewables (DAB) are engaged in a long term development of a low cost and robust integrated bioreactor especially for the production of biofuel precursors as well as chemical and other building blocks that have a common ‘oily’ behaviour of immiscibility with aqueous phases such a fermentation broth. Research of Rita da Costa Basto focused on the important elements of the integrated production process of hydrocarbons by the fermentative route such as coalescence and phase separation. She has defended her PhD thesis on this topic Thursday 11 January 2024 in Delft.

08 February 2024

How social science can make the energy transition more fair

How social science can make the energy transition more fair

‘People living near an airborne wind energy test site in Germany experience noise, ecological and safety impacts from the airborne wind energy system similar to those from the nearest regular wind farm. The airborne system did score better on visual impacts.’ These are the main conclusions from a pioneering study into the social impacts of airborne wind energy conducted by Helena Schmidt, a PhD candidate at TU Delft in collaboration with Medical School Hamburg.

01 February 2024

Minimising contrails through altitude diversions of aircraft

Minimising contrails through altitude diversions of aircraft

On 30 January 2024, PhD candidate Esther Roosenbrand’s study on contrails and air traffic management was featured in an article from the New Scientist, presenting a simple yet effective operational solution to reduce the climate impact of aviation.

30 January 2024

Art Science Festival | CityClimate meets CreativeCoding

Art Science Festival | CityClimate meets CreativeCoding

Last year, Juliana Goncalves and Carissa Champlin collaborated with City Science Lab at HafenCity University to co-curate the CityClimate meets Creative Coding festival in Hamburg. The aim of the festival was to bring science, the arts, data and planning support tools together to explore new approaches for addressing the climate crisis. I am delighted to share that the Festival was a big success!