Effects of extreme weather on ports and marinas in the mediterranean: Towards a model-enabled risk management prospective

Storm events are becoming increasingly severe and frequent with major impact on our coasts, coastal defences and infrastructures. Recent storms have caused significant damages to ports and marinas in the Mediterranean, focusing the attention of stakeholders on the need for suitable risk management and mitigation systems. Metocean predictive models provide a key asset in risk management of ports and marinas, an invaluable tool for hindcasting and forensic in coastal engineering, empowering set of information for stakeholders at all levels: from the general public to asset managers, including investors and more generally decision makers. The paper describes a state- of-the-art metocean regional model of the Mediterranean Sea developed as part of the SmartWave research projects. The model, coupled to well established prediction methods for hydraulic performances of coastal structures, provides a strategic tool for the assessment and the management of storm induced risk to ports and marinas. Example applications are illustrated of the use of the SmartWave risk assessment framework to forensic engineering of damages suffered by ports and marinas during recent storms. The framework can be used in forecasting mode to support smart port operations and more generally real time decisions making.