Removal of dumped war ammunition in the North Sea

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Initiator(s):

Flemish government, Department of Mobility and Public Works (MOW), Maritime Access division

Theme:

Other

Domain:

Mobility

Active state:

In preparation

Contact:

Maritime Access
Youri Meersschaut
T +32 477 58 12 76

PIP
Erwin Dewallef
T +32 472 72 40 48

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Challenge

The sandbank De Paardenmarkt, located in the North Sea at about 1.5 kilometres from the coast of Knokke, contains an estimated 35,000 tons of dumped ammunition (mainly) from WWI, including both conventional and chemical ammunition. To date, there is no danger to the marine environment or public health, but there is a constant risk of the (chemical) ammunition oxidising or tearing through (because of ship collisions), resulting in heavy (chemical) pollution. Moreover, the ammunition dump site at De Paardenmarkt could in the future be an obstacle to coastal safety in general and to further developments around the port of Zeebrugge in particular.

Within the framework of this PIP project, the Maritime Access division (Maritieme Toegang) of the Department of Mobility and Public Works (MOW) of the Flemish government wants to carry out a test which should demonstrate in what innovative way this ammunition dump could be cleaned up safely and time- and cost-effectively. The following topics will be addressed: precision detection of the location of the ammunition, continuous monitoring of the environment, removal of the sediments on top of the ammunition, bringing the ammunition to the surface and transporting it safely to the mainland using robot technology.

The aim of the test is to locate a piece (or unit) of ammunition as precisely as possible a few metres below the seabed within the wider dumping site and, regardless of the type or condition of the piece, to bring it to the surface and ashore (further clean-up or processing of the collected ammunition is not part of the test). This will require the development and/or testing of the necessary survey systems and robot technology to minimise the risks to humans and the marine environment. If successful, the tested solutions can be purchased and used for a full clean-up operation on a large scale.

Preparation

Market consultation

In order to further focalise the challenge, a market consultation was started in mid-January 2018 in collaboration with Addestino.

The market consultation took place in phases.

First, a scoping session was held on 13 February 2018 in order to define the scope of the project as well as possible. This session resulted in the first mission brief that can be consulted below (document available in Dutch only).

munitieopruiming_mission_brief.pdf

munitieopruiming_mission_brief.pdf

On 13 March 2018, an announcement session was held with a number of stakeholders (from the various levels of government involved, as well as from the scientific community).

Subsequently, in two sessions (on 14 September 2018 and on 10 October 2018), a number of use cases were drawn up and prioritised. The aim was to confront demand and supply on the basis of these use cases during the 'actual' market consultation.

The various working sessions described above revealed a number of conflicting requirements, which can largely be attributed to four areas of tension:

The representativeness of the test versus the safety of the operation;
The final responsibility versus the absence of applicable safe threshold values of concentrations of substances present;
Only the armed forces are allowed to touch and remove ammunition, whereas DOVO only wants to take over ammunition safely on the beach;
No storage situation of explosives may arise versus one (or more) unit(s) of ammunition must be brought ashore.

In order to get out of this conflict situation and (re)direct this PIP project, a reflection session was held on 13 December 2018.

The outcome of the reflection session was written down in a revised mission brief that can be consulted below (document available in Dutch only).

munitieopruiming_mission_brief_revised.pdf

During the reflection session, it was decided to continue the PIP project but with a modified scope, whereby the following choices were made:

The aim of the PIP project is to carry out a test that is representative 'as far as possible';
The Flemish government determines the framework conditions for the test in consultation with all parties involved;
Each unit of ammunition to be salvaged must be safely retrieved and safely left ashore;
It is not an aim within this PIP project to obtain results on the processing of the retrieved ammunition for disposal purposes.

Based on these choices, Addestino wrote an adapted scoping document in preparation for the market consultation and also carried out a state-of-the-art analysis. The 'actual' market consultation finally took place on 10 October 2019. The report of the market consultation (in Dutch) and a summary (in English) are available below.

munitieopruiming_marktconsultatie_rapport.pdf

ammunition_removal_market_consultation_report_english_summary.pdf

Results

Based on the outcome of the market consultation, Maritime Access together with a number of stakeholders considered possible next steps towards the intended test. One option that was considered, was the set-up of a 'replica site' with inert material ('empty shells') in which (new) technologies for monitoring, detection, retrieval, etc. could be tested without the explosion risks on the 'real' De Paardenmarkt site. In parallel (and outside the PIP project), there are (further) initiatives to further map the De Paardenmarkt site itself, a.o. the Strategic Basic Research (Strategisch Basis Onderzoek - SBO) project Dumpsites of munitions: Integrated Science Approach to Risk and Management (DISARM) of the Flanders Marine Institute (Vlaams Instituut voor de Zee - VLIZ). DISARM could also provide important information to set up a replica site as accurate and representative as possible.

Due to the lack of support from various crucial stakeholders and of a legal and judicial framework in which the creation of a replica site (and ultimately an actual test) would be possible, Maritime Access has decided not to continue the PIP project.

Should DISARM detect new needs, opportunities and/or insights for the clearance of the De Paardenmarkt site, then Maritime Access will gladly (co-) respond to these.