News

Wrecks, waste and biodiversity in the depths of the Mediterranean

The seabed has always fascinated man and until a few decades ago what lay beyond 50 meters was shrouded in mystery. Thanks to a series of new underwater technologies developed in recent decades, such as 3D mapping, it is possible to obtain detailed images of submerged wrecks. Observing what is at great depths allows us to study biodiversity hotspots, facilitating actions to restore marine habitats.

Health, environment and climate change. Perspective 2030

The 1st national congress “Health, environment and climate change. Perspective 2030" is configured as an event of national importance - focused on the importance of openly addressing and discussing climate change and pollution - capable of underlining the crucial link between environment and health, highlighting how care for the environment constitutes a essential means for promoting health.

World Water Forum. Bali 18-25 May 2024

The 10th World Water Forum will be held in Bali, Indonesia from 18 to 25 May. The theme of this edition is Water for shared prosperity. The World Water Forum brings together political and civil society representatives, public authorities, academics and the private sector to address global challenges related to the management and sustainability of water resources.

ISPRA opens its doors to the University of Roma Tre

On April 9th, a meeting was held in the ISPRA conference room with the teachers and students of the Cartography Course of the Department of Humanistic Studies of the RomaTre University.

An opportunity to present the history of geological cartography with a view to the evolution of scientific, technological and cultural knowledge that has developed from its origins to the present day and to present research, studies, analyzes and valorization and dissemination projects in close connection with the territory.

PNRR - MER Project. Environmental monitoring in aquaculture: an underwater wireless communication network in the Gulf of Follonica

11 APRIL – NATIONAL SEA DAY

An underwater wireless communication network for environmental monitoring in the Gulf of Follonica, one of the most important production centers for national aquaculture. It is the project that Ispra is carrying out as part of the PNRR's MER (Marine Ecosystem Restoration) plan. The activities of the project began last March 14th, financed with a budget of half a million euros which will allow the monitoring of approximately 3,000 hectares in the offshore fish and shellfish farming plants in the area between Livorno and Grosseto thanks to a sort of "neural network" submarine. A project applied for the first time in Italy and unique in the Mediterranean Sea.

Press release (ita)

Environment and artificial intelligence

ISPRA at the 11th edition of Riscarti Festival: 500 artists, talks and themed days in Rome to promote anti-waste culture and sustainable development with creativity

Also this year ISPRA participates in Riscarti Festival, the creative recycling festival held in Rome, from 13 to 28 april.

Reduce impacts on the coast. Erosion, storm surges, sea level rise, heat waves

The conference, organized by the Municipality of Rome, is the fourth appointment in a series of public meetings dedicated to consulting citizens on the proposed Climate Adaptation Strategy of Rome, the capital.

The activities of ISPRA and the Presidential Estate of Castelporziano

The Castelporziano Presidential Estate is a natural area that extends for 6000 hectares and is just a few kilometers from the center of Rome. It is a unique territory, one third covered by one of the few remaining examples of mixed lowland forest. The area is home to many animal species, representing a stopping point for many species of birds. There is also a complex community of wild ungulates: roe deer, wild boar, fallow deer and deer.

Various Innovative Technological Experiences (VITE)

The “Various Innovative Technological Experiences” (VITE) conference is back, in its second edition, which will take place from 15 to 19 April 2024 in Monte Porzio Catone, organized by INAF – Astronomical Observatory of Rome and INFN – National Laboratories of Frascati , in collaboration with ISPRA, ENEA and CNR.
The protagonists of the conference will be innovative technologies for the public engagement sector, capable of guaranteeing greater public involvement and greater effectiveness in communicating science. Other themes will be virtual reality, educational robotics and the most new and high-performance currently available and the applications of these technologies in different contexts - from teaching to scientific dissemination, to inclusion, to the valorisation of cultural heritage, to educational laboratories, to games , visualization and presentation of scientific data.

Posidonia Friend

The municipality of San Vincenzo (LI) is also promoting a project this year on the theme of environment and sustainability which has Posidonia as its protagonist, a marine plant that is very present along the Tuscan coasts and of fundamental importance for the marine ecosystem.
The events will start on Friday 12 April with researchers from the ISPRA headquarters in Livorno who will hold a lesson dedicated to middle school students, and will end on 21 June with an evening open to all: the protagonist will always be Posidonia, a plant to get to know and protect

Presentation of the results of the MAPP Project

On April 19th in Ferrara, the presentation of the results of the MAPP project (Monitoring Applied to Plastics of the Po) promoted by the Po River District Basin Authority and the Foundation for Sustainable Development will take place. The project, started in June 2021, used different tools and methodologies - some completely innovative at European level - to increase understanding of the plastic litter phenomenon in the Po, integrating the knowledge already acquired in recent years with the "Po d'Amare" project and “Manta River Project”.

From reclamation to restoration: Sustainable environmental restoration

The remediation of reclaimed sites and the activities to bring them back to a second life and make them an added value for the surrounding areas: this is the focus on which the second edition of the conference "From remediation to remediation" will take place, organized by the Environment, Energy and climate, civil protection of the Lombardy Regional Council.

CARG project: geological cartography towards the future

The Geological Cartography project at the 1:50,000 scale (CARG project), after a long phase of stasis linked to the absence of financing, was able to resume its activity in 2020, thanks to important contributions contained in the 2019-2022 budget laws , in a more innovative way, through the launch of a collaborative and multidisciplinary model established between different components of the geological community: a strategic and homogeneous infrastructure present throughout the Italian territory. The geological knowledge summarized in the CARG project provides, in fact, an indispensable tool to respond to many of the sustainability objectives established in the United Nations 2030 agenda.

Canoe excursion in the Tevere river: where to find molluscs

As part of the City Nature Challenge 2024, the Italian Canoe Association (AICAN) proposes a canoe excursion in the stretch of the Tiber river between Monterotondo and Settebagni.
The initiative is aimed at monitoring molluscs in the Tiber river and is part of the activities of the participatory science project #teveremolluschifantastici...and where to find them coordinated by ISPRA.

INVISIBILIA – THE HIDDEN PLANET

A project of participatory science and immersion in nature

INVISIBILIA is a proposal for immersion in nature to promote knowledge of the Park's habitats. Thanks to the contribution of experts and the collaboration of some scientific research projects, the invisible worlds that make up the Sasso Simone and Simoncello Park will be explored with the aim of collecting useful data for the study and conservation of species of flora, fauna and fungi. The data will be collected through specific instrumentation and the use of the iNaturalist App will be encouraged through which participants will be able to send their reports in the "Biodiversity Project" of the National Biodiversity Network (NNB) of ISPRA.

National Day for the Prevention and Mitigation of Hydrogeological Risk

Climate change and challenges for land protection

The increasingly frequent extreme events present institutions, researchers and technical professionals with new challenges in the field of risk prevention and mitigation techniques. During the conference the topic of hydrogeological instability will be discussed by addressing it from different points of view in order to map the needs and offer concrete ideas.

3rd National Summit on the Economy of the Sea - Blue Forum

Investing in the Sea Economy

At the 3rd National Summit on the Economy of the Sea Blue Forum in Gaeta from 10 to 13 April 2024, National Sea Day will be celebrated.
Four days of work with all the stakeholders of the sea and national and European politics with the aim of sharing an Italian investment program for 2025-2027 on the Sea Economy, with its own Action Plan and providing contributions to the future Connected to the Sea and on the Blue Economy. Starting from the Sea Plan and the implementation proposals, the drafting of the 2024 Blue Paper will begin.

Roma the city garden

As part of the Festival of the Green and Landscape Festival which will take place from 5 to 7 April at the Auditorium Parco della Musica "Ennio Morricone", the conference "Rome the garden city" will be held on Friday 5 April.

Rome has a usable ecological heritage of great importance, characterized by a complex system of habitats that includes a vast system of protected natural areas, parks and gardens and historic villas, river floodplains, agricultural areas and urban vegetable gardens.
Its territory is in fact characterized by 22 protected natural areas and 40 historic villas (around 5,000 hectares in total) located both in the central areas and in the more peripheral areas.

We're the environment, you're the environment!

The ISPRA General Director, Maria Siclari, opened the FloraCult event today by participating in the talk "The Environment is us, the Environment is YOU!" dedicated to the discovery of the people and actions carried out every day by the Institute to understand and protect the environment.
"ISPRA produces data that it makes available to everyone, because without knowledge it is not possible to protect the environment - declared the General Director - the Ecoatlante is the tool that makes them understandable and usable. Climate changes that cause extreme events, monitoring and restoration of the marine environment with the PNRR MER project, geological cartography for a deeper investigation of the territories and their history, are just some of the many activities we carry out in ISPRA". 

Until April 28th it will be possible to visit a specially set up space to get an idea of ​​the activities that concern the Environment at 360°. Visitors will be able to move between exhibition panels, where they will find geological maps, data on emerging environmental themes and stories in images of geologists at work. Furthermore, they will be able to speak directly with ISPRA researchers and travel in the EcoAtl@nte and among the geological maps of the CARG Project, simply using their smartphone.

The event has the scientific patronage of ISPRA

Photo gallery

Further information 

Sinkhole in Rome in the Quadraro area

The Quadraro neighborhood is an area with numerous underground tunnels built in ancient Rome to extract building materials. Stefania Nisio ISPRA said: "Rome is among the cities most at risk of land sinking with 100 sinkholes every year; in 2018 alone there were more than 170 sinkholes in the capital".

Citizen science in the Aniene Valley Nature Reserve

As part of the City Nature Challenge, the international Citizen Science initiative which since 2016 allows citizens from all over the world to compete with each other to report the greatest number of data on biodiversity, the National Biodiversity Network is promoting a day of meeting between ISPRA experts and citizens at the Aniene Valley Nature Reserve.

Interpretation of subsurface investigations for seismic microzonation purposes

The Institute of Environmental Geology and Geoengineering of the CNR (CNR-IGAG) and ISPRA have stipulated a collaboration agreement aimed at the interpretation of the subsoil data collected by ISPRA within the framework of the Law of 4 August 1984 n. 464, to be able to classify them according to the Guidelines and Standards of computer representation and archiving (latest version 4.2) for Seismic Microzonation studies.

ISPRA’s participation in the activities of the EU projects MARINE SABRES and MARBEFES

From March 19 to 20 ISPRA was invited as a stakeholder to the workshop organized as part of 2 European projects funded by the research and innovation programme Horizon Europe: MARINE SABRES and MARBEFES concerning regulation and governance measures for the protection of the marine ecosystem.

The Birds of the Countryside

Birds, especially the common nesting species, represent excellent ecological indicators, thanks to some of their peculiar characteristics: they are animals sensitive to environmental changes, they are easily contactable especially during the reproductive period (when they show evident territorial behaviours, including singing), they allow the monitoring of habitats on a large scale and, occupying high levels of the food chain, reflect the changes also undergone by other taxa that occupy lower trophic levels.

Initial seminar of the A.M.MI.R.ARE project

The launch of the project focused on the resilience of beaches in the western Mediterranean area, will be held in Pisa on Monday 25 and Tuesday 26 March at the Headquarters of the Scuola Superiore Sant'Anna, with the active involvement of the National Center for Characterization and Protection of the coast, marine climatology and operational oceanography of ISPRA.
The event aims to organize the project activities that have obtained funding from the INTERREG Italy-France Maritime programme.

Sea robot - The challenges of marine exploration

The documentary in English "Sea robot - The challenges of marine exploration" is now also available on the website of EuroGOOS, an association of national government agencies, research bodies and private companies involved in oceanography within the intergovernmental Global Ocean Observing System (GOOS), of which ISPRA is part. The documentary recounts the technological progress of recent decades applied to marine research. New technologies have revealed the splendor and richness of deep ecosystems, allowing researchers to acquire valuable data and information for the study of these environments. In addition to the extreme richness and beauty of nature, the images also show the signs of human activities: mysterious wrecks, archaeological finds and, unfortunately, waste and abandoned fishing gear

World Water Day. In Italy in 2023 the availability of water will be reduced by 18% compared to the annual average calculated since 1951

Drought, record rainfall and floods. Better situation than in 2022

ISPRA analyzes on the availability of national water resources
The availability of water resources in the year 2023 confirms the negative trend recorded for several years in Italy, although as shown by the BIGBANG estimates (the national hydrological model created by ISPRA) it can be considered a year of recovery compared to 2022.

In Italy, the availability of water resources for the year 2023 is estimated at 112.4 billion cubic meters, compared to a total precipitation value of 279.1 billion cubic meters. However, during the year there was a certain recovery compared to 2022, the year in which the availability of water resources reached 67 billion cubic metres, the historic minimum since 1951 and corresponding to approximately 50% of the average annual availability (137 .8 billion cubic meters), calculated over the period 1951–2023.

The year 2023 recorded a nationwide reduction of approximately 18% in availability compared to the annual average of the same long period 1951–2023, the result of the combined effect of a rainfall deficit - especially in the months of February, March, September and December - and an increase in direct evaporation water volumes from bodies of water and from the ground.

ISPRA's IdroGEO platform awarded at the European Public Sector Award

The EPSA - European Public Sector Award 2023-2024 awards ceremony was held today in Maastricht. IdroGEO, ISPRA's national platform for consulting, sharing and downloading maps and data on hydrogeological instability, has received the "Good practice certificate" in the "Innovation in public administrations" category. EPSA is a European-wide awards program for public sector bodies, organized by the European Institute of Public Administration - EIPA.

IdroGeo

The European Environment Agency towards 2030

The President of ISPRA and SNPA Stefano Laporta participated today in the Management Board of the European Environment Agency - EEA, the European environmental agency.
Among the topics of the meeting are the objectives between the Management Board, Eionet National Focal Point and the Scientific Committee scheduled for Copenhagen on 12 June 2024.
The June meeting will represent the beginning of the process of reviewing the 2030 strategy of the European Environment Agency and EIONET, the European environmental information and observation network.
It will also be an opportunity to implement the involvement of different groups of stakeholders, as highlighted by President Laporta during his speech.

The measurement of sea level

Sea level in the era of climate change, the tools for its measurement, the evaluation of coastal erosion, subsidence and the risks for the Emilia-Romagna coast are the themes of the seminar "Mean sea level: impact on the territory", organized by Arpae.

The meeting presents a reflection on the latest technical-scientific studies carried out in Emilia-Romagna and the Northern Adriatic.