Report

Teaser, summary, work performed and final results

Periodic Reporting for period 1 - EXERTER (Security of Explosives pan-European Specialists Network)

Teaser

EXERTER, Security of Explosives pan-European Specialists Network,is a Horizon 2020 funded project connecting 21 practitioners from 13 EU member states into a network of explosives specialists. There are many ongoing and completed research initiatives on SoE at both national...

Summary

EXERTER, Security of Explosives pan-European Specialists Network,is a Horizon 2020 funded project connecting 21 practitioners from 13 EU member states into a network of explosives specialists.
There are many ongoing and completed research initiatives on SoE at both national and European level, but there is a lack of common view on exploitation potential and research results are often not commercialised, leading to limited technology uptake and limited awareness in the end-user community of which new technologies and products are being developed.
By enabling the exchange of information about the challenges of countering current and emerging terrorist threats, the related operational requirements on methodologies, tools and technology and the status in Research and Innovation, EXERTER will provide practitioners with the operative knowledge and tools for enhancing the security of our society. The advantages are three-fold:

• Immediate knowledge sharing and matching of needs with currently existing tools and methodologies
• Problem focused, operationally sound directions for standardisation, certification and regulations
• Stimulation of future innovation and commercialisation by identification of exploitation potentials

The objectives of EXERTER are:
1. To provide solutions to practitioners in the field by extrapolating terrorist threats and attack strategies from recent incidents and matching these with existing and emerging technologies and tools.
2. To ensure the practice-relevance of R&D activities by defining end-user requirements and pinpointing existing capability gaps.
3. To support practitioners as well as academia, developers and innovators in their search to find potential industrial partners who have the capability to exploit the innovations into products.
4. To enhance practitioner’s operability by supporting standardisation and certification bodies as well as regulators with standardisation and certification priorities in order to facilitate comparison of SoE products and procurement.
5. To enable a long-term cooperation among explosives specialists in the security area beyond EXERTER

Work performed

Each year, EXERTER follow a cycle of defining a scenario in order to highlight important aspects from it and use them while gathering requirements and gaps from practitioners and other stakeholders. Based on these results, research findings and issues related to certification and standardisation connected are identified and brought up for discussion and presentation to practitioners. EXERTER has during the current project period, M1-M12, completed it’s first cycle. The scenario had been decided before the project start to be the Breivik/Oslo 2011 scenario, and a scenario description was written and distributed within the consortium. EXERTER covers the four counter-attack domains Prevent, Detect, React and Mitigate, and important aspects from each domain, connected to the scenario, were highlighted. A questionnaire was constructed and sent out to partners and practitioners, asking for input regarding requirements and gaps in all four domains. At a workshop, the questions from the questionnaire was further discussed among all partners, and further details could be included.

The work then continued with reviewing finished and ongoing research initiatives, and match these to the aspects of importance for this year’s scenario. A large list of projects including details of technologies and tools were gathered, and will be used and extended when relevant during the coming years. Some of the highlighted projects were presented at the Annual Stakeholder Workshop at the end of the first year, and some additional were discussed with practitioners in the project at the connecting project meeting.

Simultaneously, work was started with reviewing and consolidating relevant initiatives in standardisation and certification, and identifying other issues on regulation and guidelines connected to this year’s scenario. This included for example the EU regulation on precursors, which was also presented at the Annual Stakeholder Workshop.

In the work towards exploitation and innovation, efforts have been put into increasing the involvement of industry in the project, and several new members from industry have joined the End user and Expert community, and also participated in the annual workshop. A review has also been made of technologies and tools which are being or have been developed or on the market, this will be further explored in the coming period.

An Annual stakeholder workshop has been held, bringing together project partners and about 20 external participants. During this workshop, important facts, research and actions were shared in the context of the four counter attack domains. The End user and Expert community, EEC, together with several other interested parts were invited to the workshop. The EEC has also received the first newsletter and other information on EXERTER.

The results from the work carried out have been summarised and analysed in two deliverables during the first project period.

Final results

EXERTER is a network project, which do not focus on developing any technologies or tools. The focus in instead on lifting interesting research or identifying issues which hinders development, and thereby contribute to among other an increased exploitation of results and increased knowledge among practitioners of what is being developed. The Expected results and potential impact are:
- Increased collaboration and lasting dialogues between different goups; academia, practitioners, industry and research institutes.
- Highligted standardisation and certification issues, with suggestions for improvements and ways forward.
- Assistance to SME:s and Industry with support in standardisation and certification issues
- Increased exploitation of academic research and the relevance to current needs by bringing together researchers, practitioners and industry

Website & more info

More info: http://www.exerter-h2020.eu.