EDEN: a european project on security against terroristic attacks

Currently at its experimental phase, the European EDEN project provides security measures to prevent and manage the potential damage caused by CBRNe (chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear, explosive) materials during terroristic attacks.

The European EDEN project, providing security measures to prevent and manage the potential damage caused by CBRNe (chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear, explosive) materials during terroristic attacks, is now at its experimental phase. In the next few months international in-field exercises and simulations will take place with the involvement of some ENEA research centres along with other international partner States.

With a € 36.5M fund by the European Commission under FP7 (Seventh Framework Programme), the project involves a Consortium of 38 partners, including universities, RTOs (research and technology organisations), end users, small, medium, and large enterprises, mostly from Europe. Besides ENEA, other Italian partners are Tecnoalimenti, Selex, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, and Istituto Affari Internazionali (IAI).

“EDEN’s research phase has just concluded and actually its innovative solutions will be now validated through simulations and demonstration actions, which will start in Poland next June and will deal with a simulated nuclear power plant accident caused by terrorists” says Luigi De Dominicis, an ENEA expert of the Diagnostics and Metrology Laboratory (Technical Unit for the Applications of Radiations). “ENEA, too, will host a couple of demonstrations at its Casaccia and Frascati Research Centres, respectively”, he adds.

This R&D security project marks an unprecedented effort by the European Commission with the aim of introducing tools and practices for preventing and managing emergency situations against all kinds of terroristic attacks, even large-scale. In such a context, ENEA plays a paramount role in developing innovative tools as well as in building on and validating the results achieved with the past EU projects.

Actually, EDEN is the integration of the results achieved in previous European research projects in the field of CBRNe, i.e. the threat posed by terroristic attacks, unfortunately become extremely topical due to the high international societal, political, and economic tensions.

One of the project outcomes is the EDEN Store, a particular software platform specifically developed to integrate innovative tools, protocols and procedures to prevent and mitigate the risk from the accidental or deliberate release of CBRNE materials. The EDEN Store will serve as a reference system to select specific tools allowing to manage the diverse phases of an emergency situation due to CBRNe events.

Started in September 2013, the project will conclude on 2016.

For more information and updates on the EDEN project: http://www.eden-security-fp7.eu

Source: Luigi De Dominicis, Technical Unit for the Applications of Radiations - Diagnostics and Metrology Laboratory, luigi.dedominicis@enea.it