The project aims at sustainable coastal risk management in the North Sea Region through exchange of experience and common evaluation and pilot studies. It will address the following aspects of risk management: Improvement of policies and strategies, common strategic planning tools, participation methods and performance indicators as well as common technical methods.

There are many low lying areas in the North Sea region and they are home to 12 million people and include major cities and harbours. All of them need to be safeguarded to minimise the risk and reduce the effects of flooding. This cannot be achieved solely through technical flood control measures.?Common Strategies to reduce the risk of storm floods in coastal lowlands? (COMRISK) aims to provide greater protection from coastal floods through the transfer and evaluation of knowledge, methods and common pilot studies, and to ensure a sustainable, harmonious and balanced development in the coastal lowlands of the North Sea region.

Expected Outcomes

Each of the subprojects from the pilot study will undertake workshops with local authorities and experts invited to study progress made and discuss local topics with the various participants, with the final outcomes of the pilot subprojects evaluated and a COMRISK brochure published. This brochure will be discussed at an international conference of experts, administrations, research institutes and private companies and the results used to produce a publication containing principles and recommendations for innovative and integrated risk management strategies in the North Sea Region (a good practice guide). Additional outcomes include a website and policy papers by the relevant coastal authority on ways to improve coastal risk management based on the results of the good practice guide.

Activities

The COMRISK project is an umbrella for a number of subprojects that focus on exchanges of experience and the co-ordination and integration of the various projects. However, the entire COMRISK project can be divided up into three main phases. The first phase sees the establishment of the secretariat, public awareness raising, production of a flyer, the formation of a project team and the working out of details for the second phase. The second phase includes the pilot studies, the distribution of flyers for an international conference, the production of a COMRISK brochure with a synthesis of the subprojects aiming to inform the public about project activities and results and the evaluation and management of the various subprojects. The eight subprojects cover the evaluation of policies and strategies for coastal risk management, risk assessment and strategic planning, public perception and participation in coastal risk management, performance of flood management measures, common approaches to establish the hydraulic boundary conditions for technical measures, and three pilot studies covering Flanders, the Wadden Sea and Lincolnshire coastal flood units. The final phase of COMRISK will see results will be disseminated through an international conference, production of a brochure and a press conference.

Reported Outcomes

The COMRISK project is into its second stage of implementation. During this stage the main activities have been related to concluding on the links between the subprojects and initiating work on the subprojects. More specifically work has been carried out related to subproject Policies and Strategies for Coastal Risk Management; Public Perception and Participation; Risk Assessment for the Flanders Coastal Flood Unit. A state of-the-art of risk assessment methodologies under the Flanders pilot study was prepared, and a permanent contact group for Denmark was established, which would work on risk assessment for the Wadden Sea. About 2000 household questionnaires were distributed as part of the work under SP "Public perception and participation", which achieved about 25% return rate. The results of a risk assessment study for Langoog were presented during a workshop and the subproject results were summarised in three reports regarding: ?Microscale valuation for the island of Lageoog?; ?Drinking water supply for Langeoog?; and ? Flooding of a dune area-numerical simulation of the impact of the freshwater body.? A book and a CD-rom related to the theme of public perception and participation in coastal defence have been produced in German as part of educational materials for schools and were presented to the public by the Minister of the Interior for Schlezwig ? Holstein. With the project entering its final phase, the outcomes from the subprojects are being finalised. These will be presented during the final project conference to be held in April 2005 (for more information and if you are interested in participating please visit the project?s web site: www.comrisk.org). Furthermore some of the project achievements concern the development of recommendations for improving the perception and participation in coastal risk management; a report on the flood risk for the Ribe area, which is to be used as decision support framework for future risk management; a matrix for comparison of risk case studies based on comparing different sets of data; and the development of GIS-based flood hazard maps.