ARIANNA

Adriatic–Ionian Nature Based Solutions enhancement: a transnational initiative to prevent urban flooding and strengthen climate resilience through jointly developed NBS strategies, pilot actions and open knowledge tools.

Funding: Interreg VI-B IPA Adriatic Ionian (IPA ADRION) Duration: 36 months
Project illustration or key figure
ARIANNA develops a joint transnational strategy, pilots and a digital knowledge hub to scale nature-based solutions (NBS) for flood prevention across the Adriatic–Ionian region.

Project Overview

ARIANNA (IPA-ADRION00530) addresses a common challenge in the Adriatic–Ionian programme area: the increasing risk of natural disasters—especially urban flooding—affecting environmentally rich but fragile territories. The project focuses on releasing the untapped potential of Nature-Based Solutions (NBS) to deliver environmental, social and economic benefits while strengthening resilience to climate change and disasters.

The project delivers a Joint Transnational Strategy and Action Plan on NBS for flood prevention, supported by a transnational toolkit and three jointly implemented pilot actions: (i) a Lamination Tank pilot for hydrological invariance and heat-island reduction; (ii) a multi-risk vulnerability assessment methodology and NBS practices for flood defence infrastructures (including earthquake risk and land-take/urbanisation drivers); and (iii) enhancement of firefighters’ flood-response capabilities through training, equipment and coordination mechanisms.

Pilots are monitored and consolidated into a Transnational Joint Position Paper, and sustained through the ARIANNA NBS Network and the TN Open NBS Lab (a digital knowledge hub) to enable transferability and long-term cooperation beyond the project lifetime.

Key Facts

  • Project ID: IPA-ADRION00530
  • Project title: AdRIAtic-ionian Nature based solutioNs enhAncement
  • Programme priority: Supporting a greener and climate resilient Adriatic–Ionian region
  • Specific objective: SO 2.1 – Enhancing resilience to climate change, natural and man-made disasters
  • Lead Partner: ASSET (Puglia Region) – Italy
  • Consortium: 8 partners across IT, HR, EL, RS, AL, ME
  • Project duration: 36 months
  • Total budget: €1,497,820.22 (Interreg Funds: €1,273,147.18; co-financing rate: 85%)
  • NTUA (VELTION) role: Project Partner – AI support for pilots (digital twin, geomorphological analysis, multi-risk assessment)
  • NTUA eligible budget: €180,000

Objectives

Joint transnational strategy on NBS

Co-develop and operationalise a joint transnational strategy and action plan on nature-based solutions (NBS) for flood prevention, including guidelines and actions to be tested through pilots.

Three pilots to demonstrate impact

Jointly implement and monitor three pilot actions (lamination tanks, multi-risk vulnerability assessment of flood defences, and firefighters’ flood-response capability enhancement) and consolidate evidence into a transnational joint position paper.

Scale, transfer and sustain results

Establish the ARIANNA NBS Network and the TN Open NBS Lab (digital knowledge hub) with capacity-building and stakeholder engagement, enabling transferability and long-term cooperation across the programme area.

Work Plan & VELTION Contribution

WP1 – Joint methodology & strategy

State-of-the-art analysis, focus groups and co-definition of the Joint Transnational Strategy and Action Plan on NBS for flood prevention, aligned with programme SO 2.1.

WP2 – Transnational NBS pilots

Implementation and monitoring of three pilot actions: (1) NBS lamination tank interventions for hydrological invariance; (2) multi-risk vulnerability assessment of flood defence infrastructures and NBS practices; and (3) enhanced firefighters’ flood response capability through training, equipment and coordination.

WP3 – Capitalisation, capacity building & legacy

Stakeholder mapping and capacity building, creation of the ARIANNA NBS Network (MoU) and deployment of the TN Open NBS Lab (Digital Knowledge Hub) to ensure durability and transferability of project outputs.

VELTION / NTUA contribution

  • Enhance the analysis of geomorphological information to support landscape evolution understanding and flood-risk mitigation planning.
  • Support feasibility and executive planning of the Lamination Tank pilot using AI to optimise planning and resource allocation.
  • Develop and analyse a Digital Twin to compare scenarios with/without pilot solutions and strengthen decision-making on NBS for water management and climate resilience.
  • Contribute to the multi-risk vulnerability assessment of flood defence infrastructures and co-author the corresponding reports.
  • Participate in the TN Open NBS Lab and ARIANNA Network, and support capacity-building and awareness-raising activities.

Consortium

ARIANNA brings together 8 organisations (public agencies, universities, emergency services and civil society) to co-develop, pilot and mainstream NBS for flood prevention across the Adriatic–Ionian region.

Lead Partner

ASSET (Puglia Region), Italy — overall coordination; leads pilot action on NBS Lamination Tanks.

Public authorities, agencies & emergency services

AFR (Emilia Romagna Regional Agency for Reconstruction – Earthquake 2021), Italy — WP3 coordination and pilot 2 testbed.
FDP (Fire Department Petrinja), Croatia — WP1 coordination and pilot 3 coordination.
PRD (Ministry of Interior – Protection and Rescue Directorate), Montenegro — policy uptake and stakeholder engagement.
DARC (Development Alternative Resource Center), Albania — civil-society engagement and dissemination.

Universities & research partners

VVG (University of Applied Sciences Velika Gorica), Croatia — technical support and data.
NTUA (National Technical University of Athens / VELTION), Greece — AI, digital twin and multi-risk assessment support for pilots.
UNSPMF (University of Novi Sad – Faculty of Sciences), Serbia — scientific support and analytics.

Results & Outputs