PYRMOVE

PYRMOVE is a European project, co-financed by the Interreg VA Spain-France-Andorra (POCTEFA) 2014-2020 program  (https://www.poctefa.eu/), which focuses on the prevention and management of risks caused by landslides that cause most damage in the Pyrenees, through the development of innovative and transformative methodologies.

The study of the conditions of the phenomena called MORLEs (Multiple Occurrence Regional Landslides Events) will be a key step to improve the response capacity of the territorial actors to the risks and to the management of these catastrophes.

Material damage and infrastructure damage

PYRMOVE at a glance

• Title: Prevention and cross-border management of the risk associated with landslides (PyrMove)
• Funding: 1.042.144,82 €
• FEDER contribution: 673.0493,53 € (65% of the cost)
• Start date: 01/11/2019
• End date: 01/06/2022
• Consortium: 5 sponsors from 3 countries
  Spain-Catalonia: Institut Cartogràfic i Geològic de Catalunya, Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya
  France: Centre d'études et d'expertise sur les risques, l'environnement, la mobilité et l'aménagement; Bureau de Recherches Géologiques et Minières
  Andorra: Institut d'Estudis Andorrans
• Coordination: Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya
• Website: http://www.pyrmove.eu
• Program: Project funded by the EU (Interreg V-A España-Francia-Andorra, POCTEFA 2014-2020)

Expected results

• Reduce the exposure of people in areas of major landslides to the associated risks.
• Installation of surveillance and alert systems for large active landslides.
• Create a MORLES simulator to generate possible scenarios and help the Civil Protection authorities.

Project technical actions

Action 1 – Project Management

Careful monitoring of the project through internal execution reports and administrative and financial management guides. A steering committee will evaluate the progress and management of the project.

Action 2 - Communication activities

Raise awareness among the authorities and the population at risk with the dissemination of the activities and results of the project through the different regional media and specific workshops. Cross-border seminars, technical meetings and conference publications will be organized to propose methods of forecasting and risk management, as well as a course of transfer of results.

Action 3 - Transfer of results to the territory

This action responds to the capital importance of transferring the results from the technical to the non-technical sphere when planning the forecast and effective risk management. The technical information of actions 4 and 5 will be synthesized because it is understandable by the risk management, crisis and population actors, facilitating the understanding and acceptance of risk. Workshops, information meetings and support to management plans will be held at local and regional level.

Action 4 - Forecast and management of large landslides that affect infrastructure

This action will develop surveillance and alert systems in the areas of Canillo, Vielha and Gourette. Geological and geotechnical studies will be carried out to characterize and analyze these large landslides. By means of remote control systems, surveillance and alert systems will be proposed that will provide local authorities, civil protections and regional actors with tools to know the imminent occurrence of large landslides with high destructive potential on anthropic elements.

Action 5 - Forecast and crisis management with multiple landslides during rainy events (MORLES)

It aims to plan MORLE scenarios for certain areas of the POCTEFA territory. The reduction of MORLEs is based on the temporal prediction of multiple events and the simulation of possible scenarios. This requires establishing correlations between rainfall characteristics and the generation of MORLEs in areas with different geological and hydrologic contexts. A MORLEs crisis simulation tool will be developed that will be validated in the Cauteres (Hautes Pyrenees) and Aran valleys. Subsequently, this tool will be applied over two other potential areas selected during the project.

ICGC Tasks

The Institute will actively participate in all actions, but especially in action 5. The main realization will be the creation of a MORLEs crisis simulator.

Activities that include action 5:

• Analysis of geological and hydrological factors conditioning MORLEs.
• Estimation of rainfall thresholds triggering multiple events.
• Selection of threshold rainfall scenarios based on the Climate Change projections (according to the CLIM'PY project).
• MORLEs scenario simulation.

For each area the database will be completed. The result of these tasks will be delivered through a user guide of the MORLEs simulator and with maps of danger or potential risk for each area studied.