BBVA data in the fight against climate change

2 min reading
Digital transformation / 13 March 2017
BBVA data in the fight against climate change
BBVA data in the fight against climate change

BBVA API Market

BBVA Data & Analytics, BBVA’s center of excellence for the analysis of financial data, is taking part in Data for Climate Action, a big data initiative organized by UN Global Pulse. This is an open-innovation project involving big data and its analysis by the private sector, as part of the fight against climate change.

This initiative is open to data experts, researchers and innovators worldwide, who have until April 10, 2017 to submit their proposals to DataForClimateAction.org.

More details

Data for Climate Action focuses on three areas of the Sustainable Development Goals: mitigation of climate change; adaptation to climate change and the links between climate change; and the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

The project fosters original research and tools that demonstrate how data-led innovation can complement solutions on the ground and transform efforts to combat climate change.

The researchers selected to take part in Data for Climate Action will have four months to carry out their work. A panel of climate change and data analysis experts will assess the final projects, considering their methodology, relevance and potential impact. The winners will be announced in November 2017.

Improving the planet with statistical data

“Driving effective action on climate change requires not only climate data, but also rich information about human behavior,” explains Robert Kirkpatrick, the director of UN Global Pulse.

“Big data can provide dynamic feedback on how communities affect and are affected by the climate system, and enable innovation to increase sustainability and resilience. This data is primarily held by companies, like those participating in Data for Climate Action”, he adds.

In support of this initiative, BBVA Data & Analytics will provide statistical data on transactions with BBVA debit and credit cards in Spanish stores between 2014 and 2016, available through BBVA API Market, its Open API platform. BBVA is thus making essential banking functionality available to the researchers, to foster innovation in issues affecting the climate and the financial sector.

This is the second occasion on which BBVA Data & Analytics has worked with UN Global Pulse, following research last year to assess economic resilience to natural disasters through financial data. This project involved analyzing the economic impact of hurricane Odile in the Mexican state of Baja California Sur. The initial conclusions were presented at the Bloomberg Data for Good Exchange in New York in September 2016.

Working together

The Data for Climate Action project is also being supported by the Western Digital Corporation, and involves companies such as Crimson Hexagon, a company specializing in social network analysis; Earth Networks, a climate sensor operator; the telephone operator Orange; the audience rating company Nielsen; Planet, the satellite imaging operator; Plume Labs, an air-quality analysis company; the engineering company Schneider Electric; and Waze, a traffic and navigation application for cities.

Some of the researchers involved in Data for Climate Action will also receive support from Microsoft (cloud services) and the data visualization tool Tableau.

Visit DataForClimateAction.org for more information and to submit your application.

 

 

 

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