Initiated by the Conservatoire du littoral, adapto is a project supported by the European Union through the LIFE program. Adapto explores solutions to the impacts of climate change on the coast, like sea level rise and the increasing frequency of extreme weather events.
On 10 pilot sites owned by the Conservatoire du littoral, adapto experiments adaptive coastal management. It helps demonstrate the ecological and economic benefit of improving the resilience of coastal areas to protect human activities by opening more space for the the coastline.
These 10 experimental sites, nine in metropolitan France and one in French Guiana, are typical of five different coastal environments: low and sandy Atlantic coasts, polderised low Atlantic coasts, Mediterranean barrier beaches, Mediterranean salt marshes, mangroves.
On each of the 10 sites, the adapto project helps local authorities, managers and users to build their territory project. To this purpose, adapto offers them an interdisciplinary approach (economic, sociological, biodiversity...).
It will be possible to replicate and transfer the implemented coastline mobility methods to other similar French or foreign coastal sites.
The objectives of the project are:
- To provide a better understanding of the dynamic nature of the coastline and the need to adapt to it rather than to hold the line.
- To create methodological tools allowing to initiate, support and asses nature-based adaptation solutions for coastal areas.
- To develop knowledge about these solutions and their acknowledgment at a national and international levels.
- To define the role of natural environments in the organization of an effective land-sea interface in relation to adaptation to climate change.
- To allow the state of the art to progress through concrete actions on a wide range of geographical contexts representative of the diversity of ecosystems and coastal areas in Europe.
