Providing major experimental facilities access through HYDRALAB+

Within the Horizon 2020 research and innovation framework programme, the EC has now granted support to HYDRALAB+, the fifth stage of the HYDRALAB consortium, scheduled from 2015 to 2019. The consortium was launched in 1997 – originally with eight members – as a forum for discussion of the future of laboratory experiments in hydraulic and hydrodynamic research. It has now expanded to a total of 33 partners and associated partners from 15 European countries. From the beginning, this effort has been supported by the EC.

The subtitle ‘Adaptation for Climate Change’ stresses that HYDRALAB+ is dealing with the complex interaction of water with environmental elements, sediment, structures and ice. Whether it is sedimentation and biota affecting the general sediment transport, changes in arctic sea-ice formation following global warming, or the effects of an increased water level on the stability of coastal structures, laboratory experiments allow insights that cannot be gained in the field or by pure modelling approaches.

The HYDRALAB+ activities are organised under three headings:

1. Networking - facilitating interaction between consortium partners and other researchers and professionals through themed workshops and meetings to discuss the developments within experimental research and its links to other methodologies (for example, numerical modeling and field studies)
2. Joint research - to improve capability, capacity, experimental tools and methods of environmental hydraulic facilities
3. Transnational access to research infrastructures - giving researchers the opportunity to access 16 unique European experimental facilities in other countries. As part of this program, DHI provides access to its two multidirectional wave basins: a shallow water facility and an offshore (deepwater) basin. European scientists are invited to submit a proposal to apply for free access to the facilities. For more information, please follow the links to the left of this article.