Call: Critical Infrastructure Protection topic 4: Protecting potentially hazardous and sensitive sites/areas considering multi-sectorial dependencies

• Health, demographic change and wellbeing;
• Food security, sustainable agriculture and forestry, marine and maritime and inland water research, and the Bioeconomy;
• Secure, clean and efficient energy;
• Smart, green and integrated transport;
• Climate action, environment, resource efficiency and raw materials;
• Europe in a changing world - inclusive, innovative and reflective societies;
• Secure societies - protecting freedom and security of Europe and its citizens.

This Subprogramme aims to achieve a resource- and water-efficient economoy and society that is also resilient to climate change. Furthermore, it seeks to promote the protection and sustainable management of natural resources and ecosystems. Lastly, the Programme also supports the sustainable supply and use of raw materials, in order to meet the needs of a growing global population within the sustainable limits of the planet's natural resources and eco-systems.

Extreme weather and climate events, interacting with exposed and vulnerable human and natural systems, can lead to disasters. According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), some types of extreme events (e.g. flash floods and related landslides, storm surges, heatwaves, fires, including vegetation fires) have increased in frequency or magnitude, and in the meantime populations and assets at risk have also increased, leading to greater disaster risks. In order to better forecast and manage the immediate consequences of weather- and climate-related disasters, in particular regarding emergency responses, improved measures and technologies are needed.

There is a need to better understand how society as a whole might be affected by risks of accidents, natural disaster or terrorist attack on sensitive sites/areas (involving potentially hazardous substances), in order to enable effective protection measures to be developed. In this respect, the breadth of impacts from Seveso type sites/areas has to be investigated, considering multi-sectoral (inter-)dependencies (notably transport, energy, communications, water). This implies developing knowledge on multiple types of sectors and socio-economic conditions around Seveso type sites/areas that might be affected by accidents, taking into account the type of sites/areas, CBRNE substances of concern, the vulnerability of various sectors and their dependencies/interactions and of the population, risk evaluation based on advanced decision making techniques and scenarios mimicking different levels of severity of impacts.