CoastAdapt: Building Resilient Coasts Through Science and Innovation

     CoastAdapt unites research, engineering, and stakeholders to develop sustainable adaptation strategies for coastal regions.

CoastAdapt is a knowledge and innovation ecosystem for coastal engineering and coastal research in Lower Saxony. The initiative brings together universities, research institutions, public authorities, industry partners, and civil society to collaboratively address current and future challenges in coastal regions. Coastal areas are increasingly affected by climate change, economic development, and population dynamics, requiring continuous adaptation strategies. While valuable expertise already exists across many institutions, it is often distributed among individual activities. CoastAdapt strengthens cooperation by connecting scientific knowledge, practical experience, and data across disciplines. By bundling these capacities, the initiative supports the development of sustainable, science-based solutions for resilient coastal environments and communities.

CoastAdapt aims to establish a scientific area for coastal engineering and coastal research that enables coordinated responses to the growing challenges faced by coastal regions.

Climate change, economic development, and population dynamics require continuous social, economic, and technical adaptation measures involving a broad range of stakeholders.

The initiative promotes a knowledge and innovation ecosystem connecting universities, research institutions, specialised authorities, businesses, and civil society.

 

The overarching objectives are:

  • Securing coastal protection as an essential public service
  • Maintaining and improving ecological conditions of coastal environments and residential areas
  • Strengthening coastal regions as attractive living and economic spaces

CoastAdapt develops innovative coastal protection strategies that increasingly incorporate nature-based solutions. Achieving this requires a comprehensive understanding of coastal landscapes and their governing processes. Research focuses on analysing and predicting the temporal and spatial development of coastal systems, including sediment dynamics as well as surface water and groundwater interactions. The initiative investigates coastal landscapes along profiles extending from dune coasts and barrier islands across tidal flats and salt marshes to dyked coastal areas, marshes, moors, and mainland regions. Historical knowledge, long-term data archives, and interdisciplinary expertise are combined with modern monitoring and modelling methods to develop sustainable solutions for future coastal adaptation. Scientific collaboration is strengthened through intensive networking, including monthly hybrid meetings, joint field and laboratory activities, and annual working meetings.

Addressing future coastal challenges requires a new generation of interdisciplinary experts capable of working across engineering and natural sciences. CoastAdapt responds to regional and international labour market demands through the development of an English-language Master’s programme, currently titled “Sustainable Coastal Engineering and Science.”


The initiative is developing the curriculum, piloting joint teaching activities, and preparing the implementation of this interdisciplinary study programme. Scientific findings generated within CoastAdapt are transferred into practice through technical guidelines as well as political and economic advisory activities. Close cooperation with Lower Saxony’s state-owned enterprises and the National Park Administration ensures direct application of research outcomes for societal and economic benefit.