Horizon 2020 Secure Societies Event

22 Oct 2015 10:02 AM

Horizon 2020 is the biggest EU Research & Innovation programme with nearly €80 billion in funding available over 7 years (2014 to 2020).

There is barely any societal sector, which is not to some extent concerned by disasters and related resilience and security issues. The Secure Societies pillar is worth approximately €1.7Bn and aims to fund research and innovation activities required to protect the security of Europe & its citizens.

Topics covered by the calls in this area that may be of interest include:

• CIP-01-2016-2017: Prevention, detection, response and mitigation of the combination of physical and cyber threats to the critical infrastructure of Europe (mentions space radiation as a possible threat)
• SEC-01-DRS-2016: Integrated tools for response planning and scenario building (specifically mentions satellite-based integrated monitoring and enhanced cooperation between autonomous systems entities: satellite-, sea-, land- and air-based systems, including but not limited to the Copernicus, Galileo and EGNOS systems)
• SEC-02-DRS-2016: Situational awareness systems to support civil protection preparation and operational decision making (includes space weather events as a potential risk)
• SEC-16-BES–2017: Through-foliage detection, including in the outermost regions of the EU (specifically mentions the use of satellite based systems)
• SEC-19-BES-2016: Data fusion for maritime security applications (specifically mentions the use of satellite systems, including but not exclusively Copernicus, Galileo, and EGNOS)
• SEC-20-BES-2016: Border Security: autonomous systems and control systems (specifically mentions the use of satellite based systems)
• SEC-21–GM-2016-2017: Pan European Networks of practitioners and other actors in the field of security (mentions the functioning of space based systems)

The primary aims of the Secure Societies Challenge are:

• to enhance the resilience of our society against natural and man-made disasters, ranging from the development of new crisis management tools to communication interoperability, and to develop novel solutions for the protection of critical infrastructure;
• to fight crime and terrorism ranging from new forensic tools to protection against explosives;
• to improve border security, ranging from improved maritime border protection to supply chain security and to support the Union's external security policies including through conflict prevention and peace building; and
• to provide enhanced cyber-security, ranging from secure information sharing to new assurance models.

The UK has already had considerable success with significant funding in the first call coming to UK academics & industry and the 2016-17 Secure Societies programme has now been published here.

To encourage UK participation in these calls, the Knowledge Transfer Network are holding two briefing events to provide information & answer questions. The morning sessions will be general information whilst the afternoon ones will be designed around 2 of the 4 specific themes to allow attendees to network, make contacts & explore the individual calls.

H2020 Secure Societies Briefing Event: Disaster Resilience and Fighting Crime and Terrorism on Tuesday 3rd November 2015. Agenda and registration link here. A webinar option is available for this event.

H2020 Secure Societies Briefing Event: Border Security and Cyber Security on Tuesday 10th November 2015. Agenda and registration link here. A webinar option is not available for this event.