Offshore energy infrastructure (OEI) plays a central role in the EU’s energy transition strategy. As offshore wind and other marine energy systems expand into deeper waters and sloping seabeds, their exposure to geohazards such as seismic submarine landslides (SSLs) increases. These hazards can induce large permanent seabed deformations, excess pore water pressure generation, and progressive failure mechanisms that are not adequately captured by current design and assessment approaches.
Existing methods for evaluating OEI performance under SSLs are either overly conservative (pseudo-static approaches) or computationally demanding and impractical for routine engineering applications. This limits the ability of designers and decision-makers to perform efficient, risk-informed assessments and may lead to either unsafe designs or unnecessary overdesign.
The overall objective of PRO-SLIDE is to develop a reliable and low-computational-cost framework for simplified resilience and damage assessment of offshore energy infrastructure subjected to submarine landslides. The project bridges the gap between simplified and advanced numerical methods by extracting physically meaningful insights from calibrated numerical and centrifuge-based models and translating them into predictive and probabilistic tools.
PRO-SLIDE integrates numerical modelling, benchmark centrifuge testing, data-driven prediction, and fragility analysis to quantify OEI deformation and damage probability under submarine landslide hazards. The expected outcomes include simplified predictive models and fragility curves that support early-stage design, screening-level hazard assessment, and performance-based decision-making. By reducing uncertainty while maintaining physical realism, the project contributes to safer, more cost-effective, and resilient offshore energy systems, aligned with EU priorities on sustainable energy infrastructure and climate resilience.
