Fugro awarded metocean monitoring contract to safeguard Italy’s marine and coastal ecosystems

Dutch geo-data specialist Fugro has secured a contract from Italy’s Institute for Environmental Protection and Research (ISPRA) to install and operate an offshore wave and current monitoring network (ROCA) to safeguard the country’s coastal and marine ecosystems.

According to Fugro, the two-year project, part of ISPRA’s Marine Ecosystem Restoration (MER) initiative under the National Recovery and Resilience Plan, involves deploying a network of 11 SEAWATCH Wavescan buoys in Italian waters, spanning depths from 210 to 3000 meters across the Adriatic, South Ionian, Tyrrhenian, and Ligurian Seas.

In addition to the buoys, the ROCA network is said to feature two seabed tsunami early-warning stations in the Sardinian Channel and South Ionian Sea. Fugro will design the buoy mooring systems, manage installations, and establish a new data-receiving center for ISPRA. The project is to be executed with Italian partners, Poliservizi and Prisma. 

“The ROCA network represents an indispensable tool to acquire detailed and reliable data and information on climate change that is affecting, and will affect, our countries in the future,” said Giordano Giorgi, ISPRA’s National Coordinator of MER Project and Director of ISPRA’s National Centre for Coasts.

“In fact, today’s climate change scenarios are based on global modelling systems that do not consider specific and proper measured data on currents in the Mediterranean Sea. In this respect, the ROCA network will provide an optimal spatial coverage of Italian waters and Mediterranean Sea.” 

The SEAWATCH Wavescan buoys will continuously gather real-time Geo-data on metocean parameters, including wave height, direction, current velocity, air temperature, pressure, and wind speed, Fugro said. 

Equipped with a redundant two-way satellite communication system, the buoys are to transmit data to ISPRA’s new center, ensuring optimal monitoring coverage of Italy’s marine environment.

“Having implemented many similar real-time metocean monitoring systems for national authorities across the globe and over several decades, we’re looking forward to delivering another important monitoring project based on our world-leading Geo-data solutions,” noted Jørn Erik Norangshol, Fugro’s Regional Service Line Director, Metocean Science for Europe and Africa.

“Marine ecosystems are vital to our planet’s health and this new project for ISPRA aligns closely with our own Towards Full Potential Strategy providing the monitoring data to support urgently needed climate change adaptation to contribute to a safer and more liveable world for everyone.” 

Additionally, Fugro’s services are said to also include seagrass mapping to deliver seabed and habitat data supporting biodiversity preservation, sustainable fishing, tourism, and blue economy growth.

Regarding Fugro’s other recent activities in the marine energy sector, in December, the company secured a role in the EU-backed PLOTEC project, providing sensor technology to support the advancement of ocean thermal energy conversion (OTEC) technology in storm-prone regions.