• Energy Research

Conventional sectoral management and piecemeal governance are considered less and less appropriate in pursuit of sustainable development. Ecosystem based marine spatial management (EB-MSM) is an approach that recognizes the full array of interactions within an ecosystem, including human uses, rather than considering single issues, species, or ecosystem services in isolation. Marine spatial planning and ocean zoning are emerging concepts that can support EB-MSM. EB-MSM is driven by high-level goals that managers aim to achieve through the implementation of measures. High-level goals and objectives need to be translated into more operational objectives before specific targets, limits and measures can be elaborated. Monitoring, evaluation and adaptation are necessary to ensure that marine management measures are both effective and efficient. Solid monitoring frameworks are the foundation of adaptive management, as they provide the necessary information to evaluate performance and the effectiveness of management actions. Marine protected areas (MPAs) - possibly set up in networks - constitute a key component in EB-MSM policies and practises and have been applied as a cornerstone in conservation of marine biodiversity, management of fish populations, development of coastal tourism, etc. Moreover, MPA experiences have provided methods and concepts (such as zoning) to a wider EB-MSM context. The assignment of values to biophysical features of the marine environment allows the direct assessment of related management choices and may assist EB-MSM. A range of monetary valuation techniques have been proposed to reduce attributes of goods and services to a single metric. However, in the marine environment such an approach is often over simplistic, and thus less reductive techniques may be necessary. Rather than producing a single metric, the results of non-monetary assessments guide policy allowing weight to be given as necessary to potential areas of conflict and consensus. Strategies to take into account climate change effects and geohazard risks in EB-MSM have been applied or proposed worldwide. EB-MSM regimes must be alert to such risks and flexible to account for changes.

This chapter gives an overview of the environmental changes to the European shelf and its marginal seas during the Late Pleistocene to the Middle Holocene. It first explains the regional tectonics of Europe. The age of the consolidation of the basement together with the plate tectonic setting serves as the main parameters determining coastal formation. Next, the chapter reviews the fluctuation of glacial and interglacial stadia as an effect of orbital parameters of the Earth around the Sun. In addition, it examines eustatic change during the Last Glacial Cycle (LGC). The chapter also describes the development of the Baltic Sea, the North Sea and the Atlantic shelf, based on numerical sea-level scenarios constrained by observational data. Finally, it explains the basics of the ECHO-G global climate model, together with an overview of Late Holocene changes in European climate with special attention to wind forces.