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EEA
02 March 2016
Climate-ADAPT „Research projects page submissions – Finalized projects
a) Template Project descriptions
Name of projects:
ECCONET: Effects of climate change on inland waterway networks
Project logo:
The Challenge:
Assessing the impact of climate change on EU inland waterway transport networks properly requires the efforts of
researchers from scientific domains that rarely overlap (climatologists, meteorologists, hydrologists, waterway
infrastructure managers, ship builders, economists and transport network experts). The main challenge in ECCONET was to
coordinate these efforts in a manner that is correct, reliable, with a sufficient degree of certainty and most of all clear and
understandable for policy makers, stakeholders, industries and the general public.
Project objectives:
ECCONET specifically addresses the topic of adaptation to climate change, taking Inland Waterway Transport (IWT) as a
case-study. The project addresses both the impact of climate change on inland waterways as well as the study of
adaptation measures.
The specific strategic objectives of the ECCONET project were
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Provide a coherent overview of the impacts of climate change on the inland waterway transport system, the
affected transport network and the sectors of the shipping industry as well as the shippers themselves;
Identify, analyse and assess adaptation strategies for improved operation of inland waterway vessels under
climate change conditions, leading to targeted recommendations, policy guidelines and a development plan for
the IWT mode;
Communicate the results of our project not only within the consortium and its associated network, but also to a
wider range of stakeholders, industries, policy makers and the general public, in a way that contributes to a
sustainable future for IWT
Methodology:
Describe the methodology in one or two paragraphs, bullet points may be included. Describe the general structure of the
project tasks and methods employed.
The first step of the ECCONET project was to assess the navigation conditions in the future on the Rhine – Main – Danube
corridor, as projected by currently available climate models. As there is no single best climate model, ECCONET uses many
different models to assess the current state of knowledge on climate change, including its uncertainty band. This band is
sampled by selecting relatively dry and relatively wet climate models as scenarios. The wet and dry scenarios reflect the
range of possible future navigation conditions with special emphasis to low water situations.
Low water level situations are emphasised because it was proven empirically (cfr. the situation on the Rhine river in 2003)
to have the most impact on inland waterway transport While both high and low water levels pose problems for navigation,
low water conditions can involve problems for passage of (mainly) larger freight ships for longer periods of time, reducing
their loading capacity. High water can lead to bans for navigation during short time periods (1 – 2 days). Other climate
related changes, such as changed ice formation or a change in visibility due to fog, are assessed only briefly in ECCONET.
The target period for the simulation is 2021-2050. Further, projections with respect to navigation conditions in the “far
future” are provided for the period 2071-2100. All future changes are expressed with reference to a “control period” from
1961 to 1990.
Parallel to the research on navigation conditions, ECCONET has studied the availability of adaptation measures for the
sector. These were subdivided into 4 classes: ship and operation related measures, infrastructure works, improved
prediction methods and changes in logistics and stock keeping.
In a third step, ECCONET attempts to understand the impacts of climate change on the transport sector. For this a
transport-network model is used. ECCONET applies the geographic multi modal transport model NODUS to estimate the
effects of climate change on the modal choice and the use of the different types of boats.
Results:
Our model results show no significant effects on low flow conditions for the Rhine canal and the Rhine Main Danube canal
until 2050. The upper Danube would experience a moderate increase in low flow conditions. In the far future the trend
towards drier summers and wetter winters is confirmed by our models and will gain in importance towards the end of the
century. Statistical evidence points out that the disposition for ice formation on both Rhine and Danube will most likely
reduce over the whole 21st century. Fog is a hard to track problem as there is a large anthropogenic influence, however
the current trend points to a decrease in the occurrence of fog.
In the class of ship and operation related measures, the most promising measures involve weight reducing technologies,
flat hulls (for push boat technology) and the use of coupling convoys (especially on the Rhine river). More experimental
approaches exist, such as the use of adjustable tunnels and inflatable aprons, but their benefit in terms of the expected
climate change could not be confirmed (Heyndrickx C et al, 2012). Flexible 24 hour operation of ships that are currently
operating only 12 hours was negative due to high labour costs. The use of diesel-electric propulsion in combination of an
adjustable tunnel was surprisingly positive and could be an option in the future. As an important side note, we need to
mention that a substantial rise in fuel cost has a significantly larger effect on the transport cost than any climate and
discharge change scenario.
In terms of infrastructure measures we can conclude that large infrastructural works are not justified with respect to
climate change. This is caused by the large investment costs and the limited benefit of such projects until 2050. There is
however, even under current conditions, a strong need for improved maintenance of the waterways.
Improved forecasting, for example in the form of a seasonal forecast of water levels are a responsibility of the
governmental agencies. While a reliable forecast of this type is very hard to make, any improvement in this type of
forecasting is considered very valuable to the sector.
As for the change of production processes and stock keeping, ECCONET has consulted a number of stakeholders. From our
interviews and workshop we can show that forwarder/shipper will usually choose the cheapest solution in the short term,
which is usually waiting or using already available storage capacity. Only when problems continue, the shipper will consider
using another transport mode, usually railway freight, which is generally a more costly and inflexible solution. Investments
in stock keeping and relocation are very costly and are only taken as a final option.
The main input for the model is the distribution of water levels over one year in terms of the expected occurrence of dry
and wet years within the time period, derived from the studied climate scenarios.
Given that the network will be under the influence of exogenous economic factors, planned investments in infrastructure
and climate change at once, an approach an alternate scenario was developed (Chen M. et al, 2011) representing a
plausible situation of the network on the reference year for which the climate change projections are made i.e. 2050.
The analysis performed with NODUS has been completed, currently without taking into account interactions with the use
of ship and operation related adaptation measures described above. Even at this stage it is clear that the possible climate
changes from 2005 to 2050 and their impact on the Rhine hydrology are not likely to be strong enough to induce any
significant shift in modal shares. In fact the impact of the current trends and planned infrastructure in our alternative 2050
transport scenario far outweighs any possible climate related impact.
In terms of total transport costs, the model can affirm that a ‘dry’ year leads to approximately 6-7 % increase in total
transport cost compared to a ‘wet’ year, but these variations are already present under the current climate conditions and
will not be influenced heavily by climate change.
Disaggregating the effect on the level of different ship size classes, a change in the modal share by size class could be
confirmed, as ships from CEMT size class V and above will shift 1-5% of their load to CEMT class IV and below during dry
years. This means that the trend of increasingly larger ships on the Rhine runs against a possible increase in dry periods.
Under the projected climate impact until 2050, it is unclear if the improvements in ship carrying capacity while operating a
large vessel, outweighs its higher vulnerability during dry periods.
ECCONET is a unique project, due to its strong interdisciplinary team and its focus on one specific transport mode: inland
waterways. Unlike other related climate change impact projects, ECCONET derives its results from a large spectrum of
climate scenarios and not from one specific extreme scenario. This results in a balanced view on the future navigability of
the Rhine-Main-Danube waterway area. ECCONET shows that the impact of climate change will be limited until 2050 and
may only lead to a decline in navigation conditions towards the end of the century. In fact it is very likely that the impact of
transport-economic border conditions, such as the price of fuel, infrastructure investments and the dominance of road
transport will far outweigh the impact of climate change. While our expected climate change impact does not justify large
investments in costly adaptation measures, we do stress the importance of good waterway maintenance for a smooth
continuation of waterway transport on the Rhine and Danube rivers. Also we place a cautious question mark while
observing the trend towards increasingly large vessels on the Rhine, as the benefit of increased carrying capacity may
disappear under drier conditions. We also point at various technical and operational measures under development, which
may, while not being cost-effective today, reduce the vulnerability of the mode to the natural variation in weather
conditions.
ECCONET website (deliverables are available on the website): www.ecconet.eu
Heyndrickx C., Breemersch B., Bruinsma F., Cost effectiveness analysis of adaptation strategies, ECCONET Deliverable D4.2
Jonkeren, O. E., “Adaptation to Climate Change in Inland Waterway Transport”, Tinbergen Institute Research Series book
no. 460, http://dare.ubvu.vu.nl/bitstream/1871/15358/5/8921.pdf (2009)
Schweighofer, J., Hartl, T., Nilson, E., Klein, B., Klein Tank, A., Prozny, T., Balint, G., Gnandt, B., Horanyi, A., Szépszó, G.,
ECCONET Deliverable 1.1: “Selected navigation routes and present climate conditions”, 2010.
Simoner M., Schweighofer J., Nilson E., Lingemann I., Klein B., ECCONET Deliverable 2.1.2, Overview of infrastructure
adapaptation measures and resulting discharge scenarios
Alternative shorter version:
In its analysis of climate change impacts, ECCONET focused on a detailed study of climate models and their input to
hydrology. Unlike other related climate change impact projects, ECCONET derived its results from a large spectrum of
climate scenarios and not from one specific extreme scenario. This results in a balanced view on the future navigability of
the Rhine-Main-Danube waterway area. Performing a transport economic analysis on the basis of the predicted evolution
of navigability, we demonstrated that the possible climate changes from 2005 to 2050 and their impact on the Rhine
market, as modelled by two long term dry and wet scenarios, are not likely to be strong enough to trigger any significant
shift in modal shares away from inland waterway transportation. In fact, it is more likely that the impact of transporteconomic background conditions, such as the price of fuel, will outweigh the impact of climate change. For the longer term
(up to 2100), climate change could affect transport conditions more significantly. Due to the limited value of economic
projections so far into the future, however, no assessment was made.
In parallel, ECCONET aimed to identify a number of adaptation measures. These fell broadly into 4 classes: technology and
operational measures, infrastructure and maintenance, production and logistics processes, and improved water level
forecasting. These adaptation measures were verified by a combination of literature review, transport economic modelling,
cost-effectiveness analysis, and stakeholder consultation.
•
•
•
•
In the class of ship- and operations- related measures, the most promising measures involve weight reduction
technologies and the use of coupled convoys (especially on the River Rhine). More experimental approaches exist,
such as the use of adjustable tunnels, flat hulls (for towboats) and inflatable aprons, but their benefit in terms of
the expected climate change could not be proven. Flexible 24-hour operation of ships that are currently only
operating for 12 hours was not beneficial, due to high labour costs.
In terms of infrastructure measures we can conclude that large infrastructural works are not justified with respect
to climate change. This is caused by the large investment costs and the limited benefit of such projects until 2050.
Even under current conditions, however, there is a strong need for improved maintenance of the waterways,
especially on the Danube.
Improved forecasting, for example in the form of a seasonal forecast of water levels, is the responsibility of
governmental agencies. While a reliable forecast of this type is very hard to make, any improvement in this type
of forecasting is considered very valuable to the sector.
As for the change of production processes and stock keeping, we found that the forwarder/shipper will usually
wait out a dry period, or use presently available storage capacity. If problems persist, the shipper will consider
using another mode of transport, generally railway freight, which is a more costly and inflexible solution.
Investment in stock keeping and relocation is only considered as a last resort.
While the expected climate change impact until the middle of the century does not justify large investments in costly
adaptation measures under the navigability conditions predicted at present, we do stress the importance of good waterway
maintenance for a smooth continuation of waterway transport on the Rhine and Danube rivers. Furthermore, we question
the trend towards increasingly large vessels on the Rhine, as the benefit of increased carrying capacity may disappear under
drier conditions. We point to the various technical and operational measures under development, which may, while not
being cost-effective today, reduce the vulnerability of inland shipping to the natural variation in weather conditions in the
near future. We also point to the limitations of our study, as results indicate that beyond 2050 the effects of climate change
may intensify. In conclusion, there is a need to constantly monitor the state of the rivers, and further research is
encouraged.
See project website: www.ecconet.eu
Project partners:
via donau (Austria), VU-FEWEB (The Netherlands), NEA Transport Research and Training (The Netherlands), FUCaM, BfG
(Germany), VITUKI (Hungary), OMSZ (Hungary), DST (Germany), KNMI (The Netherlands)
b)
Template Facts
Funding instrument: FP7
Start Date: 01/01/2010
End date: 31/12/2012
Duration: 3 years
Project coordinator: Transport & Mobility Leuven
Project website: www.ecconet.eu
Contact: Christophe Heyndrickx
[email protected]
+32 16 74.51.21
c)
Further advice and contact:
Examples of project sheets can be found at: http://climate-adapt.eea.europa.eu/research-projects
In case of questions please contact Andreia Gonçalves Sousa ([email protected]).