Belgium has appointed the world's first Chief Planetary Science Officer. Luc Bas's task is to tell the government what the science says, and what inaction will cost.

When the Planetary Guardians set out to build a global network of Chief Planetary Science Officers, Belgium was the first country to respond. Luc Bas, Director of the Belgian Climate and Environment Risk Assessment Centre (CERAC), now holds the title. Luc is the first Chief Planetary Officer, soon to be joined by other CPSO’s, with new announcements expected in the weeks to come.

Approached by the Planetary Guardians, Bas put the idea to the minister, who appointed him on the basis of the centre's existing mandate. His experience shows what it takes to put science at the heart of decisions.

Supporting decision-makers with scientific expertise

A Chief Planetary Science Officer advises a government on how each planetary boundary is being transgressed, how those breaches interact and how they cascade into one another. The intent is a holistic basis for operating within the boundaries, aiming to get back to a safe and just space for humanity. "It's not a mandate to do the policy," Bas says.

"It's a mandate to advise, without restrictions, and to identify the impacts of not acting.

The role will take different forms from country to country. In Belgium, Bas’ role sits on CERAC's existing mandate to assess climate risks and the risks of other boundary transgressions. What drew Bas to the job, he says, was a less common feature of working with the preparatory committee of the National Security Council.

He considers this feature significant. When environmental impacts become a security matter, "you get a voice at the table." According to Bas, the security community is beginning to see risks beyond disasters, including social erosion when populations are unequally protected from climate impacts. He mentions France's earlier gilets jaunes protests on energy prices as an early signal, but says that adaptation is "not on people's radar at the moment" because they don't see it as an economic hurdle.

Many countries could follow suit worldwide. We would expect countries such as DRC, Brazil, or Canada to also join the network, considering their interest in the subject. For this, awareness-raising is needed for governments to see the role as a source of better information for better policy, not as an immediate commitment to return within the boundaries, which will take time.

Considering the Planetary Boundaries in a local context

The global picture is stark. The Planetary Health Check 2026, published in September by the Planetary Boundaries Science Lab at the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK), finds that seven of the nine planetary boundaries have been breached and continue to deteriorate. Produced by more than 60 scientists, the annual assessment cites record ocean heat, droughts, floods, wildfires and extreme heat as signs of mounting pressure on Earth's life-support systems.

This year's edition places a special focus on carbon sinks and novel entities. It reports that global warming is accelerating, that ecosystems show clear signs of degradation, and that early warning signs of tipping points are emerging in key systems. Two of the risks it highlights, extreme heat and wildfires, have already struck Belgium and are a clear risk to different sectors and the population.. 

These risks have been identified by CERAC's Belgian climate risk assessment, which deliberately includes direct ecosystem threats which are worsened by climate change but not caused by it alone. It ranks 28 risks by priority, urgency and policy readiness, with heat stress at the top. This summer bore that out: proportionally, Belgium recorded the highest heat-related excess mortality in Europe.

A CERAC wildfire-risk analysis published in February 2025 projected major fires within 10 to 15 years, a projection many questioned. This year, a major fire in eastern Belgium destroyed part of the country's little remaining high-value areas. Press attention followed, along with the question of why CERAC had not predicted it for this year.

"Our assessments are starting to be surpassed by reality," Bas says. He argues for precaution: "Uncertainties should make us more cautious, not less."

CERAC downscaled the boundaries to Belgium, including a first social impact assessment, and still uses them as a reference. Bas is also open about their limits: translating global thresholds to a local context is, he says, "often very, very difficult." The situation on water illustrates the point. From a planetary-boundaries perspective, Belgium appears to remain within its allocated share of freshwater use. Yet the country experiences significant water stress, which climate change aggravates but does not cause alone. 

Making the cost of inaction visible

Within its scope of action, Bas supported by the work of CERAC, sets out what policy should achieve.  The centre provides direction rather than prescribing specific measures, offering what Bas describes as 'guidance rather than the hammer and the nail. Its recommendations more often refine existing policy than propose new concepts. Although it is a federal body, it advises across all levels of government, including areas where Belgium's regions hold their own competencies.

Its analyses are published, and Bas says no one has prevented the centre from telling "an uncomfortable story." The gap, in his view, is accountability: governments are under no obligation to explain why they do not follow the advice. "If we put a risk assessment on the table and there is no action, it's also a decision," he says. "A decision to accept the risk." He compares it to insurance: not every risk can be covered, but the level of risk accepted should be explicit.

Political will remains the deciding factor. People may be experiencing mitigation fatigue," Bas says. "But we simply cannot afford adaptation fatigue. Tangible improvements, such as better preparation for next summer's heatwaves, could help rebuild public support.

Bas does not believe behaviour change alone will deliver the necessary shift. He argues that a fair global share would require deep cuts in material and energy use, housing and transport, and therefore regulation and honest pricing.

To reach decision-makers, Bas increasingly frames climate risks in economic terms. A recent CERAC report estimated that heatwaves alone wiped out Belgium's roughly 1% economic growth this year. The European Commission estimates Belgium would need about 2 billion euros a year to adapt to 2°C of warming. 

Bas sees natural capital accounting as a starting point for giving nature a value in those decisions, and stresses that aggregate figures must be broken down by sector and level of government to carry real weight.

Fostering the representation of the biosphere in all types of organisations

Bas notes that the role of Chief Planetary Science Officers in governments should equally exist within a company. A parallel practice is emerging in business: Nature Board Directors, who represent living systems in corporate governance, often with reference to the planetary boundaries. In France, digital services company Norsys has given a nature director a vote and a veto on its board. A growing number of companies are following the same path, including Faith in Nature, Northern Playground or House of Hackney.

Bas welcomes such arrangements when the voice is formal and integrated rather than purely advisory. He sees business and public interest as two complementary routes to change.

"If big business CEOs would advocate for such a role in their company, I'm sure quite a few governments would think it's also good to have it at the government level," he says.

He also welcomes the word "nature" as a return to basics after years of "climate tunnel vision". 

A nature seat should address every pressure a company places on the biosphere, from climate to pollution, not only protection and restoration. "Nature is our ally," he says. "We are dependent on nature."

Whether in government or business, the challenge remains the same: translating scientific warnings into decisions before reality overtakes the assessment.

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Luc Bas has worked at the intersection of science, policy and nature for most of his career. He advised the Belgian Federal and Flemish Governments on international sustainable development and represented Belgium at the UN Commission on Sustainable Development. He went on to represent The Climate Group in Brussels, led IUCN's European region, which counts more than 360 government and NGO members, and headed coordination, networks and strategy at the European Environment Agency. He has spent the past three years building CERAC.