Funded Projects 2014-2020
Project APP4SEA
| Project Acronym | APP4SEA |
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| Project Title | Arctic Preparedness Platform for oil Spill and other enviromental Accidents |
| Project subsite |
Summary
APP4SEA is a transnational competence project, which aims to strengthen the preparedness of environmental authorities and the awareness of general public in the coastal areas of the NPA region regarding oil spill response. Combating oil spills in harsh, northern conditions is challenging with current technologies. Oil spills do not recognize national borders, and inefficiencies are brought by different practices and methods, which are used by different countries, as well as the challenges due to different sea and environmental conditions, and the variety of oil types used and transported by ship across the NPA region. APP4SEA will unite coastal authorities, pool their competences and data on oil weathering, share best practices in oil spill response technologies and models. By learning from each other, the authorities can response faster and more efficiently in order to minimize environmental and social impacts of oil-in-water accidents. The project will produce an interactive smart map, which will be an open access platform showing search and rescue centers along the NPA coastline, their equipment and level of preparedness for oil spill accidents, weather conditions in accident zones, as well as information about important ecological areas and species that can be affected by oil spills. The smart application will also have a predictive function to advise in case of accident what equipment of deploy considering the place and scale of spill and environmental conditions. The project will also produce a gap analysis and improvement suggestions to improve OSR infra and preparedness level in the NPA region. The end users of the project are local authorities responsible for oil spill response; social groups, educational institutions and the general public. APP4SEA will also involve local entrepreneurs, to support northern entrepreneurship and attract interest to environmental issues. In addition the general public will be provided access to illustrative educational tools.
Objectives
1.Transfer of technological best practices to upskill localauthorities: Introduce local coastal authorities to state-of-the-arttechnologies, best practices and international locally discoveredknow-hows to improve their overall organizational awareness,operational performance and preparedness to protect localnature.
2.Pooling competences across the region in oil spill response, toincrease organizational knowledge: Form a transnational expert pool to share best practices andorganizational knowledge on oil spill response methods andbest practices.
3.Development of an on-line platform and mobile applicationwith a decision-making tool: Provide local authorities and communities with an open accessknowledge bank, which offers decision-making tools as well asinteractive educational materials on efficient response methodsaimed at minimizing ecological risks
Impacts
Tangible
| Improved access to services: | APP4SEA has developed a public online interactive smart map, that includes information about various oil spill response (OSR) methods and technologies, live and static weather, climate and oceanographic data, information about the characteristics of different oil types and how they behave in water, ecologically sensitive areas, and others. The map also includes information about actual and past oil spill accidents and simulations demonstrating the drifting of oil. This information helps authorities in planning and conducting of oil spill response activities, improves response efficiency and reduces response time.
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Intangible
| Building institutional capacity: | With the help of OSR experts and other sources, the project has reviewed OSR practices carried out in NPA region and prepared recommendations about which practices should be employed in the NPA in case of oil spill. The increased maritime traffic in the Arctic poses new threats to the fragile environments. APP4SEA analysed the shipping trends, what kinds of oil spills are connected to them, and the current OSR infrastructure and preparedness level. Based on the findings, the potential gaps were identified and suggestions for improvement were formulated to meet the increasing risks. The brochure, Seabirds and oil, allows everyone to understand the risk of oil spills to seabirds within the north-eastern Atlantic and Arctic region.
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| Raising awareness: | Throughout its “Cool Facts“ and infographics, the project tried to raise awareness in coastal communities about the risks associated with increased marine traffic. In 2019, the project was selected as a finalist at the Interreg Project Slam in Brussels. Although it did not win, Penny the Puffin has brought the attention to what is happening in the Arctic.
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Lead Partner
- University of Oulu
Finland
Niko Hänninen
phone +358 40 704 5512
e-mail: niko.hanninen@oulu.fi
Partners
- Finnish Environment Institute
Finland - North Highland College UHI
Scotland - Norwegian Meteorological Institute
Norway - University of Iceland
Iceland
Project Info
| Theme Marine, maritime, coastal zones, waterways |
| Priority 4 Natural and Cultural Heritage |
| Objective 4 Increased capacity for sustainable environmental management |
| Project duration 30-04-17 to 29-04-20 |
| Total budget 1 414 143 EUR |
| NPA co-financing 868 923 EUR |
| Target groups local public authority interest groups including NGOs education/training centre and school higher education and research General public regional public authority national public authority enterprise, including SME sectoral agency |
| Joint Secretariat Desk Officer Christopher Parker |