Fragiles Erbe/ Kruche dziedzictwo: New climate change adaptation measures in the field of archaeological heritage

The effects of climate change affect many aspects of life, including the archaeological heritage in the ground. More frequent forest fires and flooding as well as increased surface erosion can, in the worst case, even lead to the complete loss of the cultural layers preserved in the soil. Added to this is the strong expansion of infrastructure to generate renewable energy – an additional encroachment on agricultural land and forests, where 80% of the archaeological heritage in Saxony and Poland lies in the ground. Considering this situation, safeguarding the archival function of the soil and the measures to be developed to adapt to climate change in this area become highly topical. The ‘Fragiles Erbe / Kruche dziedzictwo’ project was created in response. The project team – consisting of the State Office for Archaeology of Saxony (Lead Partner) and the Wrocław University of Environmental and Life Sciences (Project Partner) – set itself the task of developing criteria for assessing the degree of endangerment of archaeological monuments as well as exemplary conservation measures and a catalogue of criteria in which the solutions found can be applied in practice. In addition, the project partners are developing two guidelines for action plans for the adaptation of the archaeological heritage to climate change in order to cooperatively accompany the implementation measures of the energy transition and to integrate the consideration of the archaeological heritage into the adaptation to climate change. This will be accompanied by numerous cross-border events with the aim of communicating this action plan to the responsible authorities and all interested parties. The core-consult supports the project consortium in the role of external project and financial management. core-consult had furthermore supported the project development and the successful application for funding.

Lifetime: 10/2024 – 09/2027