MARINEM

The MARITEC-X consortium aims to create a Marine and Maritime Research Innovation and Technology Centre of Excellence based in Cyprus to act as an enabler of scientific and business excellence in Marine and Maritime issues in the Eastern and broader South-eastern Mediterranean. The Centre will be aligned to the overall Smart Specialization Strategy for Cyprus (S3CY) and the European priorities on specific pillars with competitive advantages to the Cypriot economy. Focusing on key priority sectors identified within the Smart Specialization Strategy for Cyprus such as energy, tourism, transport and shipping, MARITEC-X Centre of Excellence will seek partnering relationships with well-known European institutions that will assist to the transfer of knowledge, co-develop sustainability and research programs, handover best practices and consult towards the creation of a critical mass of infrastructure and human capital in the region.

With the economic recession behind it, the economy of Cyprus is expanding at a rate comparable to that of the global economy. Despite this welcoming trend, the investment landscape in research, technology development, and innovation (RTDI), a key factor in the economic competitiveness and sustainability of Cyprus — remains stagnant, with bottom-up initiatives towards a change remaining fragmented and underutilised. As a direct result, the innovation and entrepreneurial ecosystem of Cyprus remains at an embryonic stage, leaving Cyprus as a low-performing RTDI country within the European Union. Innovation activities in SSP cannot proceed without a solid scientific and research and technology development foundation. Despite Cyprus hosting three state universities (and a number of private ones) with a wealth of excellent research and scientific expertise, this significant resource remains untapped and rarely exploited beyond the confines of academia. To reverse this ultimately detrimental relation between research and innovation, Cyprus is in dire need of an intermediary to help the country rise out of its RTDI slumber. This proposal seeks the European Union’s support to establish in Cyprus a Centre of Excellence that fosters world-class research, technology development, and innovation activities. This will not be another academic entity but an institution developing practical solutions/products addressing the needs of the economy, and society, in Cyprus, the EU and the rest of the world in activities related to the marine and maritime sector. The proposed project, Marine and Maritime Research, Innovation, Technology Centre of Excellence (MARiTeC-X), seeks to play a key role in the country’s economic and social transformation through RTDI transformation, by setting up the Cyprus Marine and Maritime Institute (CMMI).

Maritime disasters in recent years are a stark reminder of the imperative need for timely and effective evacuation of large passenger ships during emergency. The Lynceus2Market project addresses this challenge through delivering a revolutionary operational system for safe evacuation based on innovative people localisation technologies. The system consists of: 1) Localisable life jackets that can provide passenger location in real-time during emergency 2) Smart smoke detectors that also act as base stations of an on-board localisation system 3) Innovative localisable bracelets able to send activity data to the emergency management team 4) Low cost fire and flooding escalation monitoring sensor notes 5) novel mustering handheld devices for automatic identification and counting of passengers during evacuation 6) Smart localisable cabin key cards 7) Intelligent decision support software able to fuse all localisation, activity and disaster escalation data to provide an integrated real-time visualisation, passenger counting and evacuation decision support 8) Innovative shore or ship-launched Unmanned Aerial Vehicle for localising people in the sea in short time and assisting search and rescue operations when accident occurs in extreme weather, during the night or in a remote location 9) Low-cost rescue-boat mounted radars for people localisation in the vicinity of the boat. The proposed project is based on the promising results developed in the FP7 LYNCEUS project where the innovative technologies were tested in lab and in small scale pilots. Lynceus2Market brings together European global players in the field, such as cruise ship owners, operators, ship builders, maritime equipment manufacturers, a classification society, industry associations and important technology organisations with the aim to implement the first market replication of these technologies and products. The Lynceus2Market will create significant impact by saving passenger lives during maritime accidents.

The objectives of EMERGE are (i) to quantify and evaluate the effects of potential emission reduction solutions for shipping in Europe for several scenarios, and (ii) to develop effective strategies and measures to reduce the environmental impacts of shipping. EMERGE objectives will be achieved through real-world test cases involving measurements and modelling on actual vessels, along main shipping routes and in sensitive European marine regions. Given our unique capabilities, the EMERGE consortium is the only group that can model real world emissions of shipping to air and water for the whole of Europe. The project will collect and synthesize experimental evidence on waste streams to water and emissions to air originating from ships, for different emission control technologies. The measurements will focus on abatement techniques and will include emissions to, and concentrations in water, air and marine biota. The project will especially investigate how effectively available scrubbers reduce the effects of key pollutants. EMERGE includes five geographical case studies, in different ecologically vulnerable regions, and a mobile onboard case study. The case study regions are (i) Eastern Mediterranean (ii) Northern Adriatic Sea, (iii) the region surrounding the Lagoon of Aveiro, (iv) the Solent Strait and (v) the Öresund Strait. The mobile onboard case study will be deployed in various European sea regions. EMERGE will develop an integrated modelling framework to assess the combined impacts of shipping emissions on the aquatic and atmospheric environments, and the effects on marine ecosystems. The assessment will include the benefits and costs of control and mitigation options affecting water quality, air pollution exposure, health impact, climate forcing and bioaccumulation of pollutants. EMERGE will provide recommendations and guidance for stakeholders and decision-makers on cost-beneficial options for sustainable use of shipping on the medium and long term.