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

30 January 2020

Making dikes safer with a bass guitar

Making dikes safer with a bass guitar

Playing a bass guitar on top of a dike. It’s not something you see a TU Delft scientist do every day. Yet this is exactly how post-doc Juan Aguilar-López tested his experiment on dike monitoring with the use of fiber optic cables. A technology which could greatly improve dike safety in the future.

25 January 2020

Plastic-free Rivers

Plastic-free Rivers

The oceans of the world are filling up with plastic waste carried there by rivers. Where it all comes from no one knows. Wim Uijttewaal, professor of Experimental Hydraulics and professor of Resources & Recycling Peter Rem are on a mission to make the rivers plastic free. ‘We want to turn the removal of plastic from rivers into big business. And we want to devise a plastic waste radar that will show where the plastic is, and how it got there.’

22 January 2020

Climate adaptation starts (roof) top down

Climate adaptation starts (roof) top down

TU Delft is going to become a little bit greener on top: the roof of one of the lecture rooms of the faculty of Civil Engineering and Geosciences has been turned into a sustainable ‘polder roof’. The green blue roof can collect, store and discharge rainwater in a controlled manner. For researcher Olivier Hoes (Watermanagement) the roof is a field lab to research how this smart roof deals with heavy rains and heat stress.

16 January 2020

Flatpack Buildings

Flatpack Buildings

Taking apart an entire multi-storey car park in the space of a couple of days and putting it back together again somewhere else without wasting any materials? It may sound like the engineering of a far-away future but it may happen sooner than you think. Recycling materials is common practice nowadays but is it the best solution for the environment? Milan Veljkovic and his team at TU Delft’s faculty of Civil Engineering and Geosciences knew there had to be another way. In partnership with other universities, institutes and companies in the EU they started REDUCE, a project aimed at finding technological solutions which contribute to the circular economy.

12 January 2020

BioXtreme is counting on the supercomputer

BioXtreme is counting on the supercomputer

How do you go about processing an endless amount of data about the DNA material of micro-organisms? When Marjet Oosterkamp was researching industrial wastewater treatment she turned for help to the national supercomputer: it takes over when the human brain and standard computers have to throw in the towel.


Climate Action News

04 July 2022

Jan Kwakkel in diverse media over versnelde zeespiegelstijging

Jan Kwakkel in diverse media over versnelde zeespiegelstijging

De zeespiegel langs de Nederlandse kust stijgt steeds sneller, schrijven wetenschappers Riccardo Riva, Mark Bakker (CiTG), Jos Timmermans en Jan Kwakkel (TBM) in een nieuwe studie. Daarmee is voor het eerst aangetoond dat de zeespiegelstijging langs de Nederlandse kust versnelt. In Nieuwsuur vertelt Riva: 'Sinds begin jaren 90 stijgt de zeespiegel 1 millimeter sneller dan daarvoor.

28 June 2022

7.4 million euros for research into products from wastewater

7.4 million euros for research into products from wastewater

Showering, cleaning, flushing toilets, and industrial production are all processes that use a great deal of water. But what happens to the waste in the water, to everything that is flushed away and disappears into the sewer system together with the water?

28 June 2022

TU Delft researchers: sea level rise along Dutch coastline accelerating

TU Delft researchers: sea level rise along Dutch coastline accelerating

De zeespiegelstijging langs de Nederlandse kust is aan het versnellen. Dat melden wetenschappers van de TU Delft in een nieuwe studie. Uit een uitgebreide analyse van de metingen van acht getijdestations langs de Nederlandse kust (onder meer die van Maassluis, Delfzijl en Vlissingen) blijkt dat de gemiddelde zeespiegelstijging – sinds midden jaren negentig – 2.7 ± 0.4* millimeter per jaar is. In vergelijking tot de zeventig jaar daarvoor is dat een significante stijging van 1.0 ± 0.5 mm/jaar.

24 June 2022

TU Delft students impress in competition with sustainable solution for tenement flats

TU Delft students impress in competition with sustainable solution for tenement flats

Symbiotic Urban Movement (SUM) is the name of the TU Delft student team that won third prize at the Solar Decathlon Europe 21/22 on Friday 24 June. Their solution: an innovative plan to transform all of the Netherlands’ 847,000 tenement flats.

21 June 2022

New TU Delft cavitation tunnel should enhance vessel efficiency and reduce disturbance

New TU Delft cavitation tunnel should enhance vessel efficiency and reduce disturbance

This week the new cavitation tunnel will be opened at TU Delft. The research in this facility, officially called the Multi Phase Flow Tunnel (MPFT), largely focuses on two topics: the problem of cavitation in vessel propellers, on the one hand, and the potential of air lubrication in vessels, on the other.