The UNITED is a research project co-financed by the European Union Horizon 2020 programme. The acronym UNITED stands for Multi-Use offshore platforms demoNstrators for boostIng cost-effecTive and Eco-friendly proDuction in sustainable marine activities.
The UNITED project will run from 2020 until 2023 and provide evidence for the viability of ocean multi-use through the development of five demonstration pilots in the real European marine environment. UNITED will:
UNITED will enhance the technology readiness levels of multi-use solutions, involving industrial actors and integrating knowledge, technologies and facilities. It will also propose business models to reduce operation costs and generate benefits to all sectors involved.
Demonstrating the success of the UNITED pilots will boost the capacity of the Blue Economy within European waters and increase the efficiency and multi-functionality between traditionally competing interests in these sectors.
The UNITED activities will include a review of the State-of-the-Art of ocean multi-use and the development of Roadmaps for five real-life demonstration pilots.
Find out how UNITED will enhance the viability of ocean multi-use and address current challenges across five key pillars:
Elaboration on the five pillars will be followed by the Implementation Phase and the Assessment and Validation Phase.
The UNITED activities will be based in five real-life ocean multi-use pilot sites, where different combinations of activities are already being carried out or are currently at the implementation stage:
The five UNITED pilot will host different combinations of maritime activities belonging to a wide array of Blue Economy sectors:
The five UNITED pilots are located in three European seas, to best represent the diversity of operating conditions:
The technologies researched and implemented by UNITED will be tested near-shore before implementation offshore and will thus include research of both more subdued conditions near-shore as well as more critical conditions offshore.
The UNITED activities will bring technology in the five pilots across three Technology Readiness Levels (TRL) with the aim of bringing the demonstration pilots to TRL7, showcasing the operations of ocean multi-use and co-location for 1-2 years:
UNITED will elaborate on the five pillars offering solutions to each pilot, which will then be implemented in three phases:
The viability of ocean multi-use solutions will be promoted through the UNITED activities by:
UNITED activities will be articulated across a series of milestones and publications.
Ocean multi-use is the intentional shared use of marine resources in close geographic proximity by two or more maritime activities. It is an umbrella term that covers many combinations of maritime activities and represents a radical change from the concept of exclusive resource rights - to the inclusive sharing of marine resources and space by one or more activities. The degree of connectivity between different maritime uses can vary with respect to spatial, temporal, provisioning and functional dimensions – ranging from two uses merely sharing the ‘same’ maritime space (co-location), to shared platforms and other infrastructure. Therefore, Multi-Use is not limited to the joint use of installations, but also encompasses joint activities.
State of the art multi-platform solutions reviewed
June 2020
Inventory of legal, insurance, risks and governance aspects completed
October 2020
Production and pre-installation of plant components and preparation of offshore-equipment
April 2021
Technological requirements from pilots addressed
June 2021
Installation at pilots
October 2021
Decision Support System developed
June 2022
Pilot environmental impact briefs
June 2022
TRL assessment completed
September 2022
Pilot business briefs
October 2022
Training workshops completed
October 2022
Decommissioning of the platforms
December 2022
UNITED Framework established
June 2023
Synthesis completed of risk governance
June 2023
Commercialisation roadmap established
June 2023