Within the framework of the Open Italy 2023 Program, Italferr, a company of the Infrastructure Hub of the Ferrovie dello Stato Italiane Group, participated, among others, in a co-innovation project focused on the development of a tool with the objective of extracting predictive data from the main climate models available while providing a statistical analysis of the data obtained.

These results are of fundamental importance in designing climate change adaptation solutions, as well as useful for hydrogeological risk management with the aid of high-tech tools.

The actors involved in Open Innovation logic were Elis Innovation Hub, as promoter of the initiative, and the start-up company Waterjade, active in the field of hydrological modelling for the prediction of water resources.

The PoC (Proof of Concept) Climate 4 Vulnerability, in which Italferr was involved through its Energy Saving and Climate Change and Innovation & Technical PoC structures, stems from Italferr's need to design infrastructure that is more resilient to the extreme events caused by climate change with a probabilistic framework.

The project consisted of 12 weeks of work, during which the site of interest was identified, historical and future-projected climate data were analysed and in turn scaled locally and processed to derive high information content parameters. In addition, a digital application was developed that can be queried in various ways and has a number of functions and variable parameters that facilitate consultation as well as interpretation and use by the user.

The results obtained during the PoC therefore fulfil the set objective in that the developed tool innovatively provides site-specific climate forcings corresponding to future IPCC scenarios useful to feed, in particular, climate change vulnerability assessments and to support the design of adaptation solutions for railway infrastructure.