Sea, Sand and People. An Environmental History of Coastal Dunes

Project Information

DUNES

Grant agreement ID: 802918

DOI

10.3030/802918

Project closed

EC signature date 24 October 2018

Start date 1 November 2018

End date 30 April 2024

Funded under

• EXCELLENT SCIENCE - European Research Council (ERC)

Total cost

€ 1 062 330,00

EU contribution

€ 1 062 330,00

Coordinated by

Faculdade de letras da Universidade de Lisboa
Portugal

Periodic Reporting for period 4 - DUNES (Sea, Sand and People. An Environmental History of Coastal Dunes)

Reporting period: 2023-05-01 to 2024-04-30

Summary of the context and overall objectives of the project

Coastal dunes are unique ecosystems located between the sea and the land and can be found at almost all latitudes. They perform multiple environmental functions and supporting a variety of socio-economic activities. Because of their instrumental value, dunes are now considered ecosystems to be preserved. However, this was not the case in the past. For centuries dunes were regarded as unproductive and dangerous. Wind-blown sand was carried inland, invading fields, silting up rivers and destroying villages. So, in the 18th century, a strategy was developed to fight the dunes: trapping them with fences, vegetation and trees, with the dual purpose of preventing the destruction of arable land and increasing their economic value by converting them into forest areas. Governments of different countries supported the large-scale stabilization of dunes with this in mind. This policy, developed in Europe, was adopted in other parts of the world. These works caused profound changes in many coastal zones, transforming active open sand dunes into stable green areas. They have also left a legacy: in some regions, forested dunes are preserved as national parks, in others, the introduction of exotic plants threatens local ecosystems and native species.
Due to the demographic and urban pressure on the coasts worldwide and the consequences of global climate change, dune intervention has become a priority, as dunes have been found to be the best natural defense against sea flooding, and are also relevant ecosystems to endangered species. In this sense, dunes are being rebuilt and reinforced as nature-base solutions to protect the infrastructures and activities developed on the shore, and are being restored to foster endemic biodiversity. Combining knowledge from both the Humanities and Social Sciences with the Natural Sciences, the DUNES project recovered historical information from archives to provide new insights about dunes, questioning standardized solutions and identifying the problems of managing dunes according to human goals. The project also produced compelling histories about these hybrid landscapes, highlighting dunes as both natural and cultural assets. These outcomes, which provide a deeper understanding of today’s coasts as the result of long-term interactions with people, can stimulate environmental citizenship, and assist coastal managers and policy makers in designing and implementing strategies for the future of European integrated coastal management.

Work performed from the beginning of the project to the end of the period covered by the report and main results achieved so far

During the five-year duration of the project, the work performed consisted mainly on the following:
a) Training of a transdisciplinary team. The team consisted mainly of recent PhDs graduates from different disciplines (History, Anthropology, Coastal Dynamics, Geography, Biology, and Forestry), with some research experience, but only in their own areas of expertise. The biggest challenge was to get everyone to work together, to learn the methods and practices of each other’s fields, and to build a common ground of understanding to foster collaboration in data analysis, results discussion and paper writing.
b) Data collection, analysis, discussion, and publication. On a daily basis, the team collected historical information from physical and digital archives, as well as scientific data from published sources. They selected, analysed and discussed the information, according to their specific skills and different points of view, with the ultimate goal of producing new knowledge on the selected case-studies, explaining how the threatening sands become protected dunes, and linking local histories to global networks and concerns.
c) Results dissemination. The team published several papers in scientific journals, participated in conferences and workshops, gave presentations and promoted roundtables to discuss their results with peers in order to disseminate their findings and include other perspectives in their research. In addition, significant efforts were made to communicate the DUNES outcomes to a broader non-academic audience through the development of a website, short publications on social media networks and blogs, the production of storymaps, and collaboration with high schools.
The main results of the project are then:
1. The Coastal History Open Archive database, which brings together scattered historical information, but not only, about dunes worldwide, collected from many archives and libraries.
2. The book A Global Environmental History of Coastal Dunes, to be published by Routledge, in 2024;
3. The team’s transdisciplinary papers published in several top journals, in collaboration with colleagues from other institutions and different backgrounds.
4. The dissemination activity “Telling stories of dunes at school”, resulting from a partnership with high schools in Portugal and Brazil, involving teachers and students, ranging from the 12 to 18 year-old.
The database and the publications are available in open access in the DUNES webpage.

Progress beyond the state of the art and expected potential impact (including the socio-economic impact and the wider societal implications of the project so far)

Interdisciplinarity is at the heart of DUNES. The project approached coastal areas through the lens of its team different disciplines – which are not usually combined – to propose a kaleidoscopic view of dunes, highlighting their human and non-human features and contexts. This was done at a global scale, taking into account multiple variables, analysing political, economic, social, cultural issues in relation to climate, geomorphology, geology, and vegetation. Past examples were recovered to illustrate the evolution of coastal areas, explain present situations and inform future management strategies. DUNES publications represent a significant advance in coastal history research, as this is a fairly new research area. They are also a step beyond the state of the art for the ecological and geological sciences interested in beach-dune systems. There has been plenty of science on dunes, but not much on their history, until now. The papers published sought to fill this gap by providing new or more complete information on dune evolution, mobility, and stabilization in the last three centuries. In addition, the book A Global Environmental History of Coastal Dunes, drinking from the five-year collective developments of the project, narrates in an accessible language the history of several coastal dune fields in the five continents, explaining their many interrelationships, making comparisons and reflecting, in the light of their past contexts, on their present situation, and questioning, given their co-evolution with humans, the current management strategies aimed at using them for coastal protection, enhancement of native biodiversity, and tourism/recreational areas. To foster the outreach of DUNES, the information collected during the project was inserted in the Coastal History Open Archive, which is an important tool for scientists and all of those interested in past information about dunes and coastal areas to complement and support scientific studies, technical reports, and the preparation of legislation, courses, touristic guides, etc. In summary, the greatest achievement of DUNES is to show how history, namely the history of coastal dunes, is fundamental to having a complete picture of present coasts and their evolution, to provide past examples that speak to current concerns, and to make available historical data that most coastal scientists and managers were not aware of and now are able to use.

Hybrid dunes in Barril Beach, Portugal

Forest in the dunes and coastal erosion in Maceda Beach, Portugal

Human uses of the dunes in Cape Cod, USA

Dune intervention in Barril Beach, Portugal