The risk-based method for assessing environmental risks from wrecks

Chalmers University of Technology has in cooperation with the Swedish Maritime Administration developed a risk analysis method/tool for assessing environmental risks from wrecks, VRAKA. This is one of the research focuses within the Swedish work with wrecks that I write about in my last post (here).

Challenging aspects of this risk assessment model is must probably the uncertainties, but also the fact that it must cover a complicated combination of environmental consequences from oil to explosives and chemical weapons. These have both short term and long term effects that need different considerations in general and dependent on the specific conditions for every wreck. This generally is a demanding task for any risk assessment approach.

But don’t take my word for it, read a PhD thesis on the topic by one of the persons that have been working with the approach… (Environmental risk assessment of shipwrecks – Model development and application by Hanna Landquist)

Hanna Landquist is a PhD-student at Chalmers until Novenber 11 (2016) when her dissertation is planned to be held.