Oceans and coastal zones
Coastal zones are essential for the socio-economic well-being of many nations. Coastal regions, which are the location of large population centres, have multiple uses, needs and opportunities, and are particularly exposed to extreme events and climate change. Many key sectors are affected by long-term effects in these zones, such as the monitoring of public/private infrastructures, cultural/natural heritage preservation, risk management, and agriculture. The combined effects of sea level rise (SLR), tidal evolution, modulated ocean currents and extreme events can have numerous impacts to coastal, river delta, and inland water zones, including water management, which in turn lead to cascading and unpredictable impacts on other sectors. The GREENISH project is the natural extension of the 32294 Dragon IV project, and aims to provide extensive research and development analyses of areas in Europe and China subject to climate change induced (e.g., SLR, flooding, and urban climate threats) and anthropogenic disasters (e.g., ground subsidence over reclaimed-land platforms), with the goal to improve the knowledge and develop new remote-sensing methods. Of great relevance is a detailed understanding of the combined risk of SLR, tidal evolution, storm surges, and ground subsidence in coastal areas and lake-river systems. Global sea-level is rising, and tides are also changing worldwide and these risks are accompanied by increasing concerns about the growing urbanization of the worldÔÇÖs low-lying coastal regions and related coastal hazards (e.g., flooding). Inland water bodies such as lake and river system also experience substantial degradation with rapid economic development.The use of optical, SAR, InSAR, and hyper-spectral data products will be fostered. Selected case-study areas include the Yangtze and Pearl river deltas, Poyang Lake, the Bohai Rim Region (China), the city of Istanbul (Turkey), the Po river delta and the Venice Lagoon (Italy). Flood hazards will be investigated by using satellite SAR and altimeter data, tide gauge data, and by developing proper hydrodynamic models. The results will help provide reliable information for improving the resilience of population centres to coastal disasters.The main goal of the project is the well-use of Earth Observation (EO) data and in-situ monitoring information, to detect the long-term evolution of coastal, deltaic and lake-river systems. More specifically, the project aims:- To study the ground deformation in coastal/deltaic regions with conventional and novel interferometric SAR approaches. – To monitor changes of urbanized areas via coherent and incoherent change detection analyses. – To study interactions between ocean currents and coasts, such as coastal erosion, using high resolution optical and SAR satellite images.- To properly assess SLR, tidal evolution, and hydrogeological risks in urban coastal areas.- To study the interactions between Poyang Lake and its connecting rivers.- To study atmosphere/surface interactions and develop atmospheric phase screen correction methods in multi-temporal SAR images. – To develop methods to integrate satellite- and ground-based RADAR systems to monitor public infrastructures in Shanghai- To develop interactive maps of coastal, urban, and inland zones susceptible to primary and secondary risks via GIS. – To train Young scientists (PhD and post-doc).The project deliverables are papers on peer-reviewed international journals, conference proceedings and new software algorithms to monitor and map coastal risks. The work will be financed from internal resources of the participants. Additional funding will come from National Natural Science Foundation of China, Research Grants of Ministry of Land and Resources of China, High-end Foreign Experts Recruitment Program of China, the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities of China, EU projects and EU-China governmental cooperation.
