TY - JOUR
T1 - Current status, advancements and development needs of geospatial decision support tools for marine spatial planning in European seas.
AU - Depellegrin, D
AU - Hansen, HS
AU - Schröder, L
AU - Bergstrom, L
AU - Romagnoni, Giovanni
AU - Steenbeek, Jeroen
AU - Patrocinio Goncalves, Magali D. do
AU - Carneiro, G
AU - Hammar, L
AU - Palsson, J
AU - Schmidtbauer Crona, J
AU - Hume, D
AU - Kotta, J
AU - Fetissov, M
AU - Milos, A
AU - Kaitatanta, J
AU - Menegon, S
N1 - Funding Information:
The Tools4MSP Modelling Framework was partly financed by the PORTODIMARE Project ( Adriatic-Ionian Programme – ADRION ). Symphony contribution was part financed by FORMAS through the ClimeMarine project. JK was financed by the Estonia-Russia Cross Border Cooperation Programme project “Adrienne”, the RITA1/02–60 project “Innovative approaches to monitoring and assessing marine environment and nature values in Estonian sea area” and the BONUS MARES project funded by the European Union's Seventh Framework Program for research, technological development and demonstration though BONUS, the joint Baltic Sea research and development Program (Art 185). MSP Challenge Simulation Platform was developed by Breda University of Applied Sciences co-funded through the NorthSEE project (2016–2019), ( Interreg North Sea Region program of the EU-RDF ), the Baltic LINes project (2016–2019), ( Interreg Baltic Sea Region program of the EU-RDF ); The Scottish Government , Marine Scotland and the Scottish Coastal Forum through SIMCelt ( EU Directorate General for Maritime Affairs and Fisheries ) (2015–2018). The design and development of MEL was funded by the Ministry of Infrastructure and Water Management /Rijkswaterstaat, the Netherlands; further thanks to everyone involved in the different projects ( https://community.mspchallenge.info/wiki/Credits ). Recent developments in the BSII CAT were enabled through the EU Pan Baltic Scope project, co-funded by the European Maritime and Fisheries Fund of the European Union . The development of Mytilus has been supported by the project ‘BONUS BASMATI – Baltic Sea Spatial Planning for sustainable Ecosystem Services’ (2017–2020), which has received funding from BONUS (Art. 185), jointly funded by the European Union , Innovation Fund Denmark , Swedish Research Council Formas , Academy of Finland , Latvian Ministry of Education and Science , and Forschungszentrum Jülich GmbH, Germany , as well as from the NorthSEE project (2016–2019), which has received funding from Interreg North Sea Region program of the EU-RDF .
Funding Information:
For the purpose of this research, we adopt a definition of a geospatial DST for MSP, based on Sprague and Carlson (1982) as an interactive system, that 1) is designed to analyse problems and processes relevant for MSP, 2) provides mechanisms to evaluate spatial and non-spatial data and information of different formats and sources, 3) represents spatial relations and structures in the sea and the adjacent land; 4) provides techniques for spatial and geostatistical analyses and processing; and 5) supports a variety of graphical output formats.Notwithstanding the growth in literature, most of the studies lack on conclusions on how the efforts taken in research and the software development community have contributed to recent advancements in DSTs. In particular, alongside a generally increased demand for spatial analyses to support marine management, the EU MSP Directive was a significant policy driver for the development of marine data platforms and marine monitoring campaigns aiming at the systematic collection of geospatial data on human activities, and on ecological and physical features. As a result, manifold initiatives across European seas emerged in the last years that aimed to design geospatial information platforms oriented to MSP and ecosystem-based management (PORTODIMARE, 2020; SIMCELT, 2017; EMODnet, 2020).Six DSTs supporting different aspects of MSP were analysed through the lens of the DST developers (Fig. 1): Mytilus (Hansen, 2019), Tools4MSP (Menegon et al., 2018a and b), Symphony (Hammer et al., 2020), Baltic Sea Impact Index (BSII; Bergström et al., 2019), PlanWise4Blue (Kotta et al., 2020) and the MSP Challenge Simulation Platform (Abspoel et al., 2019). We selected these DSTs because (1) they were considered as the most long-lasting and advanced DST for MSP-oriented geospatial investigation applied at European level; (2) they were applied and tested across different stakeholder groups, including experts and non-experts, and at national and transboundary levels in their respective study domains; (3) they can be flexibly applied for both national marine spatial plans and macro-regional studies and (4) they all include a Cumulative Effects Assessment (CEA) tool in their functionality. Table 1 provides an overview of the six DSTs, in terms of application domains, the tools implemented and key references to the DSTs. To notice is that Mytilus and Tools4MSP incorporate also a Maritime Use Conflict analysis tool (MUC; Menegon et al., 2018) and Conflict-Synergy analysis instrument respectively. Also to notice is that both BSII CAT and Mytilus are applied on Baltic Sea level, Tools4MSP is applied in the Adriatic-Ionian Region (Mediterranean Sea), MSP Challenge Simulation Platform is applied in the North Sea, Baltic Sea and Firth of Clyde, while PlanWise4Blue and Symphony are applied on national level, respectively in Estonia and Sweden.The Tools4MSP Modelling Framework is an open source software based on Free and Open Standard Software (FOSS) developed by the National Research Council – Institute of Marine Sciences (CNR-ISMAR, Italy). Tools4MSP has the aim to support MSP-oriented analysis through geospatial functionalities, such as CEA and maritime use conflict analysis in the Adriatic-Ionian macro-region (Menegon et al., 2018a; Depellegrin et al., 2017). The tool is accessible to users under two modes: (1) the stand-alone geopython library (code repository: https://github.com/CNR-ISMAR/tools4msp) and (2) the Tools4MSP Geoplatform (www.tools4msp.eu), for more user-friendly geo-tool applications. The DST has been developed since 2014, within national and EU-wide project clusters such as ADRIPLAN (ADRiatic Ionian maritime spatial PLANning, 2015), RITMARE (Italian Research for the Sea, 2017) and PORTODIMARE (geoPortal of Tools & Data for sustainable Management of coAstal and maRine Environment, 2020).Fig. 3 illustrated the conceptual aspects taken into consideration when developing the DSTs. According to the results of the analytical framework application, DSTs are designed to target multiple-objectives. Among the objectives identified, the most recurrent are: (1) Supporting ecosystem-based management (Mytilus, Tools4MSP, MSP Challenge, BSII-CAT), (2) contribute to the national MSP process (PlanWise4Blue, BSII CAT); (3) support decision makers in building planning scenarios (Mytilus, MSP Challenge); (4) increase MSP knowledge through a data platform (Tools4MSP and BSII CAT) and (5) provide means for CEA analysis (Mytilus, PlanWise4Blue).Mytilus was developed in order to provide maritime spatial planners with a user-friendly tool, which could support the ongoing maritime spatial planning processes. Although, Mytilus is primarily developed in a Baltic Sea context, it is independent of location and scale and can thereby be applied from regional to local scale all over the world. Among the central features, Mytilus applies a scenario-based approach to facilitate a comparison of the effects on the marine environment from various plan proposals. In addition to the cumulative impacts on the environment, Mytilus can also assess the potential conflicts and synergies from new maritime activities. Furthermore, the rapid calculation speed of Mytilus supports the active involvement of stakeholders by making the different calculations and map-based scenarios visible immediately.The PlanWise4Blue instrument was developed to address a set of limitations in CEA tool development and application. The majority of marine areas are impacted by multiple concurrent stressors, which rarely act in isolation but instead produce interactive effects on multiple nature values (e.g. Stockbridge et al., 2020). Surprisingly, the most of cumulative impact tools are still limited to a simplified pressure-response system (i.e. single pressure on single or multiple nature assets) (e.g. Krueger and Schouten-de Groot, 2011; HaV, 2018; HELCOM, 2018) as well as they only rarely use empirical data to define response functions. These limitations render the guidance of ecosystem-based allocation of human activities at sea highly biased, thereby undermining any assurance that societal environmental and socio-economic sustainability objectives will be achieved. This is also very relevant in the MSP context where planners often seek for the best combinations of co-uses in different seascapes; however, if antagonistic/synergistic effects on ecosystems cannot be evaluated, the sustainable planning solution cannot be reached. The PlanWise4Blue tool incorporates the majority of regional scientific evidence in a way that its algorithm is capable of quantifying both single and synergistic effects of most important human activities on a broad range of nature assets. Nevertheless, the important challenge remains as the CEA tool need a regular updating of the input data, i.e. nature data layers and information concerning impacts, and refinement to the model algorithms. Such research should be carried out in a collaborative manner resulting into more harmonized and efficient tools characterized with enhanced predictive capacity and a reduction in uncertainty. As the effectiveness of CEA to provide robust information centres on the use of scientific knowledge and data on different nature assets and specific pressure effects, adoption of observational and experimental evidence into the CEA framework should be encouraged. However, many aspects lack both knowledge and data. But even then, the CEA tools can be used to inform managers of the current gaps in knowledge in order to address these limitations more effectively. Through such principles the CEA tools allow knowledge from empirical marine science to be applied effectively in decision-making, bridge the divide between science and management and support sustainable development.The Tools4MSP Modelling Framework was partly financed by the PORTODIMARE Project (Adriatic-Ionian Programme – ADRION). Symphony contribution was part financed by FORMAS through the ClimeMarine project. JK was financed by the Estonia-Russia Cross Border Cooperation Programme project “Adrienne”, the RITA1/02–60 project “Innovative approaches to monitoring and assessing marine environment and nature values in Estonian sea area” and the BONUS MARES project funded by the European Union's Seventh Framework Program for research, technological development and demonstration though BONUS, the joint Baltic Sea research and development Program (Art 185). MSP Challenge Simulation Platform was developed by Breda University of Applied Sciences co-funded through the NorthSEE project (2016–2019), (Interreg North Sea Region program of the EU-RDF), the Baltic LINes project (2016–2019), (Interreg Baltic Sea Region program of the EU-RDF); The Scottish Government, Marine Scotland and the Scottish Coastal Forum through SIMCelt (EU Directorate General for Maritime Affairs and Fisheries) (2015–2018). The design and development of MEL was funded by the Ministry of Infrastructure and Water Management/Rijkswaterstaat, the Netherlands; further thanks to everyone involved in the different projects (https://community.mspchallenge.info/wiki/Credits). Recent developments in the BSII CAT were enabled through the EU Pan Baltic Scope project, co-funded by the European Maritime and Fisheries Fund of the European Union. The development of Mytilus has been supported by the project ‘BONUS BASMATI – Baltic Sea Spatial Planning for sustainable Ecosystem Services’ (2017–2020), which has received funding from BONUS (Art. 185), jointly funded by the European Union, Innovation Fund Denmark, Swedish Research Council Formas, Academy of Finland, Latvian Ministry of Education and Science, and Forschungszentrum Jülich GmbH, Germany, as well as from the NorthSEE project (2016–2019), which has received funding from Interreg North Sea Region program of the EU-RDF.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2021 Elsevier Ltd
PY - 2021
Y1 - 2021
N2 - The implementation of marine spatial plans as required by the Directive on Maritime Spatial Planning (MSP) of the European Union (EU) poses novel demands for the development of decision support tools (DST). One fundamental aspect is the need for tools to guide decisions about the allocation of human activities at sea in ways that are ecosystem-based and lead to sustainable use of resources. The MSP Directive was the main driver behind the development of spatial and non-spatial DSTs for the analysis of marine and coastal areas across European seas. In this research we develop an analytical framework designed by DST software developers and managers for the analysis of six DSTs supporting MSP in the Baltic Sea, the North Sea, and the Mediterranean Sea. The framework compares the main conceptual, technical and practical aspects, by which these DSTs contribute to advancing the MSP knowledge base and identified future needs for the development of the tools. Results show that all of the studied DSTs include elements to support ecosystem-based management at different geographical scales (from national to macro-regional), relying on cumulative effects assessment and functionalities to facilitate communication at the science-policy interface. Based on our synthesis we propose a set of recommendations for knowledge exchange in relation to further DST developments, mechanisms for sharing experience among the user-developer community, and actions to increase the effectiveness of the DSTs in MSP processes.
AB - The implementation of marine spatial plans as required by the Directive on Maritime Spatial Planning (MSP) of the European Union (EU) poses novel demands for the development of decision support tools (DST). One fundamental aspect is the need for tools to guide decisions about the allocation of human activities at sea in ways that are ecosystem-based and lead to sustainable use of resources. The MSP Directive was the main driver behind the development of spatial and non-spatial DSTs for the analysis of marine and coastal areas across European seas. In this research we develop an analytical framework designed by DST software developers and managers for the analysis of six DSTs supporting MSP in the Baltic Sea, the North Sea, and the Mediterranean Sea. The framework compares the main conceptual, technical and practical aspects, by which these DSTs contribute to advancing the MSP knowledge base and identified future needs for the development of the tools. Results show that all of the studied DSTs include elements to support ecosystem-based management at different geographical scales (from national to macro-regional), relying on cumulative effects assessment and functionalities to facilitate communication at the science-policy interface. Based on our synthesis we propose a set of recommendations for knowledge exchange in relation to further DST developments, mechanisms for sharing experience among the user-developer community, and actions to increase the effectiveness of the DSTs in MSP processes.
KW - Cumulative effects assessment
KW - Decision support instruments
KW - Ecosystem-based management
KW - Geospatial tools
KW - Maritime spatial planning
U2 - 10.1016/j.ocecoaman.2021.105644
DO - 10.1016/j.ocecoaman.2021.105644
M3 - Article
SN - 0964-5691
VL - 209
JO - Ocean and Coastal Management
JF - Ocean and Coastal Management
ER -