Alessandro Sarretta

• Environmental Sciences
• Researcher at Italian National Research Council

This document reports the results of a survey promoted by the Technical Expert Group (TEG) on Data for MSP to gather information on how the national MSP processes have taken into account the national MSFD implementation and, specifically, the dataset collected and produced under MSFD. The results of the survey indicate a medium level of coherence (...

Editorial: Proceedings of the OSM Science at State of the Map Europe 2023

OpenStreetMap (OSM) started as a project in 2004 aiming at creating a digital and open map of the world via collaborative mapping. The open, flexible and collaborative nature of OSM leads to the emergence of a living ecosystem and a new scientific discipline among the diverse and ever-growing OSM communities, including academic researchers investig...

The role of Volunteered Geographic Information (VGI) to integrate, update or complement authoritative datasets released by governments has become increasingly important. This work analyses the contribution of OpenStreetMap (OSM), the most popular VGI project, as one of the input sources that the Military Geographic Institute (IGM), one of the Itali...

This document presents the conceptual framework proposed to be applied to identify and structure the data necessary for the development of maritime spatial plans. The MSP data framework provides the structure to organise input spatial information and data that needs to be considered within the full MSP process. The required input data has been orga...

The multiple anthropogenic threats to marine ecosystems and the increasing spatial conflicts in the Adriatic-Ionian Region (AIR) require transnational, integrated and efficient planning of coastal and marine spaces at macro-regional level. This research presents the Geoportal of the Adriatic-Ionian Region (GAIR), a common platform for information,...

Data and digital technologies have been at the core of the societal response to COVID-19 since the beginning of the pandemic. This work focuses on the specific contribution of the OpenStreetMap (OSM) project to address the early stage of the COVID-19 crisis (approximately from February to May 2020) in Italy. Several activities initiated by the Ital...

This Policy Brief succinctly presents the Ecological Observing System of the Adriatic Sea (ECOAdS), aimed at integrating the ecological and oceanographic dimensions within the conservation strategy of the Natura 2000 network, and to propose a way to go for its future development and maintenance. After a definition of marine ecological observatories...

In this study, a new tool for quantitative, data-driven susceptibility zoning (SZ) is presented. The SZ plugin has been implemented as a QGIS plugin to maximize its operational use within the geoscientific community. QGIS is in fact a commonly used open-source geographic information system. We have scripted the plugin in Python, and developed it as...

Europe’s digital transformation of the economy and society is one of the priorities of the current Commission and is framed by the European strategy for data. This strategy aims at creating a single market for data through the establishment of a common European data space, based in turn on domain-specific data spaces in strategic sectors such as en...

The Lagoon of Venice covers a surface area of about 550 km2, roughly 80% of which is covered by water, about 10% by salt marshes and 5% by islands. The mean depth of the water column is about 1.2 m, with only 5% of the lagoon deeper than 5 m. It is connected to the Adriatic Sea through three inlets (Lido, Malamocco, Chioggia), which allow tidal flu...

The aim of this document is to present existing developments and to propose a solution for sharing maritime spatial plans in common formats that enable the preparation of a harmonized pan-European MSP map.

Digital transformation is at core of Europe’s future and the importance of data is well highlighted by the recently published European strategy for data, which envisions the establishment of so-called European data spaces enabling seamless data flows across actors and sectors to ultimately boost the economy and generate innovation. Integrating data...

This work presents a practical case study of the Open Science principles applied to the valorization of a long-term marine dataset collected in the Northern Adriatic Sea, one of the Long-Term Ecological Research (LTER) sites of the LTER-Italy network. The dataset covers a temporal range of 50 years (1965–2015), and it is composed of abiotic, and ph...

DG MARE and EASME, with the support from the MSP Assistance Mechanism, formalized the establishment of the Technical Expert Group (TEG) on MSP data, to agree on and propose common standards in terms of MSP-related data collection, and to support the delivery of harmonized and interoperable geospatial maps of national MSPs. As a first step, two “rea...

Gathering systematic information on the effects of extreme weather events (e.g., flooded areas, shallow landslide and debris flow activations, windthrows) is a fundamental prerequisite for local authorities to put into practice management strategies and establishing early-intervention priorities. The collection of these data is a resource-demanding...

Aquaculture is the fastest growing food production industry in the world yet research and guidance demonstrating strategic multi-objective zoning for sector expansion is scarce. Quantifying and mitigating conflicts and impact on sensitive coastal environments through jointly-optimized objectives for aquaculture and biodiversity simultaneously has n...

In this paper we describe a 50-year (1965–2015) ecological database containing data collected in the northern Adriatic Sea (NAS) at one of the 25 research parent sites belonging to the Italian Long Term Ecological Research Network (LTER-Italy, http://www.lteritalia.it, last access: February 2020). LTER-Italy is a formal member of the International...

This research aims to support multiscale maritime governance in the Adriatic-Ionian Macro-region (AIR) through the analysis of Maritime Spatial Planning (MSP) relevant governance schemes. The research is based on a four-step analytical framework aimed at the systematic collection of spatial and non-spatial data to characterize multiscale maritime g...

In this paper we describe a 50 years (1965–2015) ecological database containing data collected in the Northern Adriatic Sea, one of the 25 research parent sites belonging to the Italian Long Term Ecological Research Network (LTER-Italy, http://www.lteritalia.it). LTER-Italy is a formal member of the international (https://www.ilter.network) and Eur...

The concept of multi-use of the sea has gained popularity in recent years as a result of ocean space (coastal areas and regions with relatively small sea space in particular) becoming increasingly crowded due to the development of the maritime economy. Competing claims for space can be a source of conflict, however this may also lead to mutual bene...

Recommendations from case studies for actions to promote MU development. (DOCX)

This paper represents a review of the practical application, work done and near-future perspectives of an open scientific lifecycle model. The EcoNAOS (Ecological North Adriatic Open Science Observatory System) project is an example of the application of Open Science principles to long term marine research. For long term marine research we intend h...

Presentazione in occasione dello workshop "Scienza libera tutti!" organizzato da Successione Ecologica, il 26 Novembre 2018 presso l'Università di Milano Bicocca. Il contributo presenta il progetto EcoNAOS: un esperimento di Open Research Project Lifecycle applicato a dati ecologici marini a lungo termine (LTER) nella zona Nord del Mare Adriatico....

European seas are subjected to a magnitude of concurrent commercial and non-commercial activities seeking sea space as fundamental driver for their existence. An emerging concept to better address sustainable resource exploitation and sea space allocation is Multi-Use (MU). Multi-Use sea spaces are geographic domains where joint use of resources oc...

In the framework of the European Commission Blue Growth Strategy, a joint process among European countries has been put in place since 2014 to promote and implement research and innovation actions to increase the number of jobs in the marine and maritime sectors, commonly named ‘blue’, and pursue a sustainable growth in the Mediterranean area. The...

This paper presents the Tools4MSP software package, a Python-based Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) for geospatial analysis in support of Maritime Spatial Planning (MSP) and marine environmental management. The suite was initially developed within the ADRIPLAN data portal, that has been recently upgraded into the Tools4MSP Geoplatform (data.too...

Multidisciplinary monitoring of coastal and deep marine environments, with high temporal resolution, for a number of marine and atmospheric variables.

To solve conservation and planning challenges in the marine environment, researchers are increasingly developing geospatial tools to address impacts of anthropogenic activities on marine biodiversity. The paper presents a comprehensive set of built-in geospatial webtools to support Maritime Spatial Planning (MSP) and environmental management object...

The morphology of scour holes at tidal channel confluences was investigated through high-resolution acoustic mapping of the channel network in the Venice Lagoon (Italy). Our investigation identified 29 confluence scours ranging in depth from 7 to 26 m and characterized by different confluence geometry and scour properties. Scours were found at the...

The Italian Fixed-point Observatory Network (IFON) integrates well-established ocean infrastructures managed by various national research institutions (CNR, OGS, and ENEA). The implementation of this network was one of the aim of the SP5-WP3 of the Flagship Project RITMARE. In the first four years of the project, the state of art of the 15 operativ...

The creation of marine ecological observatories, able to arrange and maintain integrated, harmonized and coherent long-term ecological observations, is stressed as a relevant step at the European level, for sustaining European marine policies. The Italian national flagship project RITMARE (“Italian research for the sea”, ttp://www.ritmare.it/en/) f...

The Italian Fixed-point Observatory Network (IFON) integrates well-established ocean infrastructures managed by various national research institutions (CNR, OGS, and ENEA). The implementation of this network was one of the aim of the SP5-WP3 of the Flagship Project RITMARE. In the first four years of the project, the state of art of the 15 operativ...

The implementation of the EU Directive on Maritime Spatial Planning (2014/89/EU) in the Adriatic and Ionian region (AIR) presents some peculiar aspects that are related to i) The EU and non-EU countries surrounding its coast, with different cultures and economies; ii) its semi-enclosed characteristics, with intense land-sea interactions; iii) the w...

Tidal channels are crucial for the functioning of wetlands, though their morphological properties, which are relevant for seafloor habitats and flow, have been understudied so far. Here, we release a dataset composed of Digital Terrain Models (DTMs) extracted from a total of 2, 500 linear kilometers of high-resolution multibeam echosounder (MBES) d...

Digital humanitarians represent the current generation of volunteers, providing timely contributions in the form of digital map data in the aftermath of natural disasters. Starting from the tragic 2010 earthquake in Haiti and thanks to the success of the OpenStreetMap (OSM) project, the presence and coordination of these volunteers have grown incre...

This research presents a set of multi-objective spatial tools for sea planning and environmental management in the Adriatic Sea Basin. The tools address four objectives: 1) assessment of cumulative impacts from anthro pogenic sea uses on environmental components of marine areas; 2) analysis of sea use conflicts; 3) 3-D hy drodynamic modelling of nu...

Maritime spatial planning (MSP) is envisaged as a tool to apply an ecosystem-based approach to the marine and coastal realms, aiming at ensuring that the collective pressure of human activities is kept within acceptable limits. Cumulative impacts (CI) assessment can support science-based MSP, in order to understand the existing and potential impact...

Classes of local sensitivity confidence index (LSCI) in the AIR. Values of LSCI are grouped from 0.8–1.0, which represent the maximum confidence expressed by expert judgement and 0.2–0.4, which represents the minimum confidence. (DOCX)

Ranking sensitivity scores with respect to their contribution and weight for the AIR in the CI model output. The 60 sensitivity scores which contribute the most in the AIR are ranked according to the their total score; the confidence related to the EUP associated score expressed by the experts is reported as well. (DOCX)

List of pressures according to Marine Strategy Framework Directive (MSFD, 2008/56/EC), annex III, tab. 2 (DOCX)

List of environmental components and related datasets for the CI calculation. The list of environmental components considered for the CI is correlated with the data owners and data providers acronyms. (DOCX)

Criteria evaluated by experts to express the EUP sensitivities. Criteria used within the expert survey to calculate the sensitivity score of environmental components to pressures deriving from maritime uses, adapted from Andersen et al. (2013). (DOCX)

Data availability per human uses U for different geographical areas. (DOCX)

Data coverage of environmental components (E) and human uses (U). Data coverage is mapped for a. environmental components (E) and b. human uses (U) for the AIR, from which the Data Availability Index (DAI) is calculated. Dark blue indicates that all dataset are available, while light blue to red means that not all datasets are available. (DOCX)

List of human uses and related datasets for the CI calculation. The list of human uses considered for the CI is correlated with the data owners and data providers acronyms. (DOCX)

Cumulative impacts uncertainty matrix for the AIR. The subjects who have declared the different sub-locations, levels and nature of uncertainty, are indicated as M = modelers (authors of the paper), SE = stakeholders and experts (through interviews, workshops and survey), L = literature. (DOCX)

Gazetteer of spatial coverage of input dataset. A vocabulary of geographical areas was composed to characterize the geographical scope of each dataset. It consists of 22 terms, which can be modified and new terms can be added. Each term was associated to a specific geometry and related boundary, which was input in the model to calculate the data av...

Percentage of the Italian Adriatic region area for the least (a) and most (b) impacted area over the number of Monte Carlo simulations. The x-axis represents how often each cell was in the least or most impacted area (% of simulations). (DOCX)

Locations and sub-locations of uncertainty identified for the CI assessment model. Locations are identified according to Walker et al. 2003. Sub-locations are identified by the modellers within the level 1 of the general uncertainty analysis. (DOCX)

Behaviours of sensitivity score errors (SC) and pressure distance errors (D) factors curves. For factors sensitivity score errors (SC) and pressure distance errors (D), we adopted the beta-distribution (B(s, c)) assuming the modal values from expert judgment on sensitivities (s), and the variance from the confidence (c). (DOCX)

The Italian Fixed-point Observatory Network (IFON) integrates well-established ocean infrastructures managed by various national research institutions (CNR, OGS, and ENEA). The implementation of this network was one of the aim of the SP5-WP3 of the Flagship Project RITMARE. In the first four years of the project, the state of art of the 15 operativ...

This paper describes the activities in ISMAR (Institute of Marine Sciences of the Italian National Research Council) for the creation of an in-situ observational network able to: gather data from a distributed network; allow an efficient visualization of time-series data; access and share harmonised data through interoperable and standard services.

Availability of up-to-date geographic datasets, including the information voluntarily created by ordinary people, is crucial for disaster management in areas affected by catastrophic events and humanitarian crises. OpenStreetMap (OSM) is the most popular Volunteered Geographic Information (VGI) project that has been extensively used for collaborati...

This paper describes an open source suite of libraries and tools to support research activities on marine and coastal environment. The suite was initially implemented for the ADRIPLAN portal, an integrated web platform aimed at supporting Maritime Spatial Planning (MSP) activities and other activities concerning the managing of marine environment f...

This paper describes an open source suite of libraries and tools to support research activities on marine and coastal environment. The suite was initially implemented for the ADRIPLAN portal, an integrated web platform aimed at supporting Maritime Spatial Planning (MSP) activities and other activities concerning the managing of marine environment f...

This paper describes an open source suite of libraries and tools to support research activities on marine and coastal environment. The suite was initially implemented for the ADRIPLAN portal, an integrated web platform aimed at supporting Maritime Spatial Planning (MSP) activities and other activities concerning the managing of marine environment f...

Thesis dissertation on "Techniques of image processing from Landsat-ETM and Ikonos satellites for the classification of wet areas in correlation with the assessment of wells presence and field irrigation (Venice region, Northern Italy)." (in Italian)

Thesis dissertation on "Integration of grain-size data and environmental information in the Lagoon of Venice for seabed habitat studies". (in Italian)

Thesis dissertation on "Techniques of image processing from Landsat-ETM and Ikonos satellites for the classification of wet areas in correlation with the assessment of wells presence and field irrigation (Venice region, Northern Italy)." (in Italian)

Thesis dissertation on "Integration of grain-size data and environmental information in the Lagoon of Venice for seabed habitat studies". (in Italian)

Maritime Spatial Planning (MSP) is a practical way to create and establish a more rational organisation of the use of marine space and the interactions between its uses, to balance demands for development with the need to protect marine ecosystems, and to achieve social and economic objectives in an open and planned way (Ehler and Douvere, 2009). T...

p>The Mediterranean Sea is complex in its physiography (the average depth is 1,500 m, the deepest point is 5,267 m, with large shallow areas, like in the North Adriatic), in its ecology, in its social dimensions, in terms of interconnections between human activities and environmental characteristics. Surrounded by 22 countries, the coasts of the Me...

A thorough understanding of marine and ocean phenomena calls for synergic multidisciplinary data provision. Unfortunately, much scientific data is still kept in drawers, and in many cases scientists and stakeholders are unaware of its existence. At the same time, researchers lament the time consuming nature of data collection and delivery. To overc...

Maritime Spatial Planning (MSP) is a practical way to create and establish a more rational organisation of the use of marine space and the interactions between its uses, to balance demands for development with the need to protect marine ecosystems, and to achieve social and economic objectives in an open and planned way (Ehler and Douvere, 2009). T...

RITMARE is a Flagship Project by the Italian Ministero dell’Istruzione, dell’Università e della Ricerca (MIUR) and coordinated by the National Research Council (CNR). It aims at the interdisciplinary integration of national marine research. In pursuing a Linked Open Data (LOD) vocation, the RITMARE sub-project 7 is building the necessary domain-rel...

Integrated classification maps were produced by combining sediment grain-size and hydrological data (water renewal time, WRT) from two Mediterranean lagoons, Lesina (LL) and Varano (LV), Italy. The geophysical characteristics of the two basins, derived from detailed bathymetric charts, are quite distinct: ∼ 30% of LL (mean depth ∼ 1 m) but only 3% o...

RITMARE is a Flagship Project by the Italian Ministry of Research, coordinated by the National Research Council (CNR). It aims at the interdisciplinary integration of Italian marine research. Sub-project 7 shall create an interoperable infrastructure for the project, capable of interconnecting the whole community of researchers involved. It will al...

StarterKit (SK) e? una suite software open che permette di erogare dati geografici e osservazioni da sensori, attraverso servizi web diversi che seguono gli standard OGC. SK permette di annotare le risorse con metadati conformi agli standard (INSPIRE, SensorML), arricchiti semanticamente.

Chapters 1 and 2 set the scene for the scenarios of possible futures, presented modelling results and identified a typology of rural urban regions. The next set of chapters in Part 2 focus on the case studies and what can be learned from them. Before examining each case study it will be useful to provide an overview of the various models and tools...

The hydrological consequences of historical, contemporary and future human activities on a coastal system were investigated by means of numerical models. The changes in the morphology of the Lagoon of Venice during the last century result from the sedimentological response to the combined effects of human interventions on the environment and global...

New data collected from twenty-six sites during 2008 in the contaminated Site of National Interest (SIN) of Porto Mar-ghera within the Lagoon of Venice (Italy), which has been affected by the presence of an industrial zone for the last 80 years, were compared with data from a campaign performed in the same site 30 years before (1976-1978). The SIN...

A comparison of 1927, 1970 and 2002 bathymetric surveys in the Lagoon of Venice was used to reconstruct historical changes in sedimentation. A detailed GIS-based analysis of the charts revealed the timing and pattern of geomorphic changes and allowed calculation of sediment deposition and erosion for the entire lagoon and each of its four sub-basin...

A comparison of 1927, 1970 and 2002 bathymetric surveys in the Lagoon of Venice was used to reconstruct historical changes in sedimentation. A detailed GIS-based analysis of the charts revealed the timing and pattern of geomorphic changes and allowed calculation of sediment deposition and erosion for the entire lagoon and each of its four sub-basin...

The hydrological consequences of historical, contemporary and future human activities on a coastal system were investigated by means of numerical models. The changes in the morphology of the Lagoon of Venice during the last century result from the sedimentological response to the combined effects of human interventions on the environment and global...

Several INSPIRE spatial data themes have been specified so that their scope, in addition to classical geographic information, includes measured, modelled or simulated data. The FprEN ISO 19156 standard on Observations and Measurements (O&M) was designed for the explicit purpose of creating application schemas for such data, and thus shall be used i...

The Water Framework Directive (2000/60/EC) requires member states to classify and enhance the ecological quality of water bodies in accordance with their type. To estimate the effect on type of the natural variability of lagoons, we applied a two-dimensional hydrodynamic model to the lagoon of Venice. The model calculated the mean annual spatial di...

A comparison of 1927, 1970 and 2002 bathymetric surveys in the Lagoon of Venice was used to reconstruct historical changes in sedimentation. A detailed GIS-based analysis of the charts revealed the timing and pattern of geomorphic changes and allowed calculation of sediment deposition and erosion for the entire lagoon and each of its four sub-basin...

A comparison was made of shallow water sediments from the Lagoon of Venice (LV) and the Lagoon of Cabras (LC), comparing depositional environments and exploring the relationships between hydrodynamics and sedimentological parameters. The two water bodies are very different in size (LV: 360 km2; LC: 22 km2), and the sediments predominantly consist o...

Radium is considered to be an excellent tracer of submarine groundwater discharge (SGD). The four isotopes of Radium (223,224,226,228Ra) are all enriched in groundwater when compared to seawater and display conservative properties in waters with brackish to marine salinities. For these reasons, the isotopes of Ra have been extensively used to quant...

A detailed comparison was made of two bathymetric charts of the Lagoon of Venice (LV) from 1970 and 2000, in tandem with a comparison of sediment grain size data. Analysis of the data revealed marked changes in both morphology and sedimentation, with more than 50% of the 400 km2 assessed in this study 15-20 cm shallower in 1970 than in 2000. The fo...

A textural classification of sediments collected in input channels, shallow lagoon beds and navigation channels of the Lagoon of Venice is presented. Some variables describing both the hydrodynamics and the transport time scales of the Lagoon are compared with bottom sediment distribution inside the basin. A high correlation between residence time...

A detailed comparison was made between morphological features of sea bottom and salt-marshes from 1970 to 2000 in the Lagoon of Venice:

The grain-size distribution of sediments is a fundamental characteristic in understanding the earth's surface environments and an essential tool in classifying sedimentary environments. Grain-size data provide important information on the energy and dynamics of depositional environments and aid our understanding of sediment transport. Ternary diagr...

Dioxins and furans (PCDD/Fs), polychlorobiphenyls (PCBs) and hexachlorobenzene (HCB) in the ecosystem of the Lagoon of Venice were studied, in order to provide a general picture of conditions in the lagoon in terms of contamination by persistent organic pollutants (POPs). We present here novel data on atmospheric deposition, water, sediment and cla...

The rapid deterioration of the world’s major ecosystems has intensified the need for effective monitoring and development of operational indicators of ecosystem health, and the extension of health to describe regional ecosystems is a response to accumulating evidence that human-dominated ecosystems have become highly dysfunctional. The Lagoon of Ve...