Climate Change & Security
Advanced Course 2026

Untitled design

Building Climate-Security Decision-Support Competence for Complex Operational Environments

  • Dates
  • Online Session: August 31, 2026
  • In-person Sessions: September 7-15, 2026
  • Follow-up Session: TBC
  • Location
  • Centre for Excellence Encironmental Protection (CoEEP)
  • Via dei Forestali 1, 04016
    Sabaudia (LT) Italy
  • Language
  • English
  • Tuition
  • Free
  • Application deadline
  • July 24, 2026

Organised by the NATO Climate Change and Security Centre of Excellence (CCASCOE) , the European Security and Defence College (ESDC), and the Carabinieri Centre of Excellence for Environmental Protection (CoEEP).

Download Course Agenda
Download Invitation Letter
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NATO Climate Change and Security Centre of Excellence

European Security and Defence College logo
European Security and
Defence College

Carabinieri Centre of Excellence for Environmental Protection

About the Course

Climate change is increasingly affecting the conditions in which defence, security, crisis-management, civil protection, and resilience actors operate.

For practitioners, the key question is no longer only whether climate change matters for security. The key question is how climate-related risks affect planning assumptions, infrastructure, logistics, mobility, readiness, civilian response systems, governance, and decision-making.

The Climate Change and Security – Advanced Course 2026 is designed for experienced military and civilian professionals who already have a basic understanding of climate change and security and who want to apply this knowledge in more complex operational and institutional settings.

The course is based on a simple starting point:

Climate change is rarely the crisis itself. More often, it creates the conditions in which existing vulnerabilities, dependencies, and limited capacities can develop into wider security challenges.

Participants will therefore not only examine climate-related hazards. They will look at what these hazards do to systems, institutions, infrastructure, operations, and coordination arrangements.

How the Course Works

The course follows a structured learning rhythm: Interpret → Analyse → Anticipate → Decide → Adapt

Each phase builds on the previous one. Participants first establish a common baseline and then apply climate-security concepts to an evolving scenario-based learning environment.

The course combines expert inputs, practitioner exchange, case-based discussions, decision laboratories, scenario work, decision deep dives, learning challenges, and lessons identified sessions.

Detailed scenario information will be introduced in the Pre-Online Session and progressively during the course. This is deliberate. Participants will work with information step by step, like real decision environments where conditions change, information is incomplete, and decisions still need to be made.

What Participants Will Practice

During the course, participants will practise how to:


  • identify climate-security risks in complex environments;
  • analyse climate-sensitive dependencies and vulnerabilities;
  • recognise cascading second- and third-order effects;
  • assess escalation pathways;
  • manage uncertainty and incomplete information;
  • prioritise competing risks and requirements;
  • consider trade-offs between response, resilience, and adaptation;
  • communicate findings in a structured and decision-relevant way;
  • support decision-makers with climate-informed analysis.
The focus is not on perfect prediction. The focus is on better decisions under uncertainty.

Application Process

Full administrative details, including accommodation, meals, transport, dress code, insurance, selection, certification, and arrival instructions, are provided in the Invitation Letter.

All applicants are required to be nominated through the ESDC nomination process and to complete the CCASCOE online application form. Only applications that follow below described 2-step application process (ESDC nomination and submission of CCASCOE application form) can be considered complete: 

1. All applicants must be nominated through the ESDC process. The deadline for submissions is July 24, 2026 (COB). 

a) Applicants from EU Member States, EU institutions, bodies and agencies, as well as CSDP missions and operations, must be nominated through the ESDC secure internet system ENLIST by their designated national or institutional nominators.

Applicants are kindly asked to contact their designated nominator directly, indicating the relevant Activity number 26-27/pilot/3. A list of ENLIST nominators is available on the ESDC website.

b) Applicants from non-EU Member States and international organisations are required to contact their diplomatic representation or their IO’s respective representation / Liaison Office to the EU, providing the email address of the course training manager (Esther Breffka; esther.breffka@eeas.europa.eu) and course activity number.

The diplomatic representation / Liasion Office to the EU will then contact the relevant training manager to submit the nomination, using the following subject line “Nomination for ESDC Activity: 26-27/pilot/3”, and stating: the full name of the candidate; personal email address (functional mailboxes cannot be accepted); institution; and the reason why the applicant would benefit from this course.

2. CCASCOE Application Form 

All applicants are required to complete and submit the CCASCOE online application form in addition to the ESDC nomination. This form collects information on the applicant’s professional background, current responsibilities, relevant experience, and motivation for attending the course. This information will be used as part of the participant selection process.

Application Form

Points of Contact

For inquiries related to applications, registration, and nominations, please contact:

Benedikt Brammer, Course Director, CCASCOE: education@ccascoe.org

Esther Breffka, Climate Security Coordinator, ESDC: esther.breffka@eeas.europa.eu

FAQ

Climate-related risks increasingly affect the operating environment in which military forces plan, deploy, sustain, protect, and support missions.

Extreme weather, environmental degradation, infrastructure stress, and pressure on civilian response systems can affect readiness, mobility, logistics, force health protection, host-nation support, communications, situational awareness, and civil-military cooperation.

For military practitioners, these risks can change assumptions, expose hidden dependencies, create additional constraints, and reduce available options.

The course helps military participants identify these dynamics earlier, assess their relevance, and translate climate-security analysis into useful input for commanders, planners, staff officers, and senior decision-makers.

Climate-security challenges rarely fit neatly into one institutional area of responsibility.

Many relevant capabilities sit outside traditional security institutions. At the same time, civilian authorities may depend on military support, logistics, infrastructure, situational awareness, or coordination mechanisms during climate-related emergencies.

The course therefore brings together civilian and military perspectives. This exchange supports shared understanding across national, multinational, and interagency contexts.

The course is tuition-free.

Participants are responsible for their own travel and accommodation costs. Further details are provided in the Call for Applications.

Yes.

The course includes a mandatory online workshop and an e-learning phase to establish a common baseline before the residential phase.

Yes.


A certificate of completion will be awarded to participants who successfully complete the required course components.

Attendance at the Basic Course is helpful but not necessarily required.


Applicants should, however, have prior knowledge of climate change and security through training, professional experience, academic background, or relevant work in defence, security, crisis management, resilience, or related fields.

The course moves beyond general awareness. Participants will not only discuss why climate change matters for security but will apply climate-security analysis to an evolving scenario.

The advanced character of the course lies in the complexity of the scenario, the need to work with uncertainty, the focus on cascading effects, and the requirement to prioritise risks and communicate findings in a decision-relevant way.

Participants will consider not only immediate impacts, but also second- and third-order effects, institutional dependencies, coordination challenges, and longer-term implications for resilience and adaptation.

The course uses an evolving climate-related crisis scenario in a southern European context.


The scenario is fictionalised for training purposes, but it is built around realistic climate-security dynamics and decision challenges. Detailed scenario information will be introduced progressively during the course.

No.


The course does not teach technical emergency-response procedures. The scenario is used to explore broader security, resilience, coordination, and decision-support challenges.

No.

The course does not teach a formal operational planning process and does not require participants to develop operational plans or military courses of action.
The focus is on assessment, prioritisation, structured judgement, and advisory input in support of decision-makers.

Participants will produce practical group outputs linked to the course scenario.


These may include short assessments, prioritisation products, advisory notes, briefings, or decision-support inputs. The purpose of these outputs is not formal testing, but the practical application of climate-security analysis.

No formal examination or ranking is foreseen.

Learning will be supported through active participation, group work, facilitated discussion, practical outputs, and feedback from instructors, facilitators, and peers.

Participants are expected to attend the full course and contribute actively to the scenario work.

Participants should leave the course with a stronger ability to analyse climate-security risks in complex environments, identify cascading and second- or third-order effects, work with uncertainty, and communicate findings in a structured and decision-relevant way.


They will also gain a better understanding of civilian-military coordination challenges in climate-related emergencies and wider security contexts.

Accepted participants are kindly requested to make their own accommodation arrangements in Sabaudia and to cover any associated costs individually. To support this process, the following nearby hotels are provided for consideration: Participants who prefer alternative accommodation may choose from the following nearby hotels:

  1. Mami Hotel, single room 55 euro per night, breakfast included. Distance from CoEEP: 150 meters: https://www.mamisabaudiahotel.it/
  2. Hotel il Gabbiano, single room 65 euro per night, breakfast included. Distance from CoEEP: 150 meters: https://www.ilgabbianosabaudia.it/
  3. Hotel il Gioiello, single room 50 euro per night, breakfast included. Distance from CoEEP: 1 km: https://www.ilgioiello.it/

A course dinner on the evening of the first day will be provided free of charge. Meal costs outside this course dinner are not included and must be covered by participants individually. Coffee and light refreshments will be available during scheduled course breaks. Additional information on meal arrangements will be provided once the logistical arrangements have been confirmed.

The course is preceded by a mandatory one-day online workshop (August 31, 2026) and an e-learning phase. The workshop provides initial framing of the course approach, scenario structure, and analytical expectations.

Participants will complete preparatory e-learning modules to establish a common baseline and ensure readiness for the residential phase. Completion of both components is required.

A follow-up session may be offered after the course to support continued learning, exchange lessons identified and discuss how participants have applied course insights in their own professional contexts.


Further information will be provided during the course.

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