Our proposed research builds on the solid methodological foundations laid in the EU FP6 IP ‘Millennium’. We take full advantage of the lessons learned in the ‘Millennium’, yet want to go a significant step further in our research agenda. With the CLIMPOOL project we plan: (1) to address an internationally recognized gap that is significant for European climate research; (2) to take advantage of newly discovered varved lakes in NE Poland that are among the very best paleoclimate archives and located precisely in one of the most significant areas of Central/Eastern Europe; (3) to master cutting-edge methodologies for top-quality climate reconstructions; (4) to transfer these methodologies to an interdisciplinary network of Polish and Swiss researchers and combine it with their recognized expertise and (5) generate collaborative genuine products that are expected to have a sustained international scientific impact.

Methodological/technological innovations will include:
• Development of novel proxies, e.g. chrysophyte cysts as the only known natural proxies that allow quantitative cold season climate reconstructions, a combination of biogenic silica and chironomids for warm season temperatures.
• Development of analytical techniques for high-resolution lake sediments, e.g. cost-effective rapid scanning techniques to detect biogeochemical compounds. Of particular interest are reflectance-spectrometric techniques in the visible and infrared spectrum (IR and VIS-RS) where we have made first very successful experiments. They have shown the great potential for this very low-cost technology and have created large interest in the international scientific community but also in the industry. We spot the greatest potential for innovation in the development, testing of methods and standards for data acquisition and data analysis routines (algorithms, calibration). With our novel technology, we expect to reduce the often very high costs for analytical laboratory work substantially.
• Advanced statistical methods for proxy calibration and comprehensive reconstruction techniques, e.g. Transfer Functions for biological proxies, Calibration-in-Time for abiotic and biological proxies, Ensemble Reconstructions that allow to produce probabilistic, well-calibrated quantitative paleoclimate data sets with realistic error estimates.
• Novel methods to make effective use of paleoclimate information to reduce uncertainty within climate model projections, e.g. model scoring techniques that help selecting the most likely climate model runs from a series of climate model experiments, thus constrain the likelihood of projected future climate change trajectories with paleoclimate data to reduced uncertainty for future climate projections.

We also expect to carry out and document a ’Model Methodology’ starting with site and proxy selection and ending with an assessment to constrain future climate projections and reduce uncertainty and risks in an issue of great public concern. There are currently a number of similar collaborative research initiatives under way or at planning stages; however, a comprehensive and demonstrated ’Model Methodology’ is missing.

Given (1) the state-of-the-art methodology, (2) the carefully selected lake sites in NE Poland, (3) the experience of the research team and (4) the demonstrated lack of data in one of the most important areas to document and investigate European climate change, we expect from our research three data sets (products) of prime quality that will be relevant for a wider scientific community and will stimulate further research in the future:

Product 1: Transfer Functions (TF) will be established for a number of paleoclimate and paleoenvironmental proxies, which allows for a quantitative assessment of climate and ecosystem dynamics (climate, climate-ecosystem interactions, human alterations of ecosystems through eutrophication, etc.).

Product 2: There is the potential to produce ensembles of 1000 years long seasonally resolved (summer and winter) quantitative time series for temperature at exceptional quality for the area of NE Poland that is among the best and most important places for a predictor of European (winter) temperature variability.

Product 3: Future climate projections with reduced uncertainties based on state-of-the art and new climate model runs.