Risk assessment of sea-dumped munitions in the Baltic Sea

ongoing

The MUNI-RISK project is a major initiative addressing environmental and safety issues in the Baltic Sea, focusing on submerged munitions and utilizing existing cooperation frameworks in particular within HELCOM and CBSS but also from national and international projects as DAIMON I & II, JPI-O, BASTA, CONMAR, North Sea Wrecks and REMARCO. The main objective is to conclusively establish the risks posed by submerged munitions to better protect our environment and support the maritime industry, ensure sustainable development of the blue economy and introduce green energy practices offshore. MUNI-RISK has two overall aims via enhanced collaboration: 1) MUNI-RISK will address the whole of the Baltic Sea in terms of potential environmental risks from submerged munitions and enable a prioritization of areas of greatest environmental concern for remediation; 2) MUNI-RISK will address local site-specific environmental risk assessment needs where infrastructures are being considered. MUNI-RISK will compile public but also other existing data of Baltic Sea States and stakeholders in a federated database approach. We will identify and fill data gaps, support a science and risk-based approach to managing submerged munitions and will prioritize areas of greatest environmental concerns in the Baltic Sea. In addition, we will collect data from the designated sites (bathymetry, chemical & biological analyses, munition classification) for development of marine infrastructure wind farms planned near Bornholm and Estonia where co-creation activities in relation to these case studies will involve relevant stakeholders from local and regional level. By doing so, the project will increase capacity among public and private entities, and inform on how munitions could be incorporated into Environmental Impact Assessments of marine developments. The project will synthesize the learnings and ensure that the framework for dealing with munitions is transferable to other seas i.e. the Black Sea.