SUNRISE is an EU-funded Horizon Europe project that aims to ensure greater resilience of critical infrastructures in Europe such as water, transport and health.

In our newsletter, you’ll find an overview of the latest news, events, and developments from the SUNRISE project partners as well as general discussion from the critical infrastructure sector.

This edition will look at the first round of project pilots that took place over the summer, SUNRISE’s participation in the FEDCSIS conference and the latest round of national and EU-level workshops

If you have any questions relating to the project please get in contact: oisin@carrcommunications.ie

SUNRISE Piloting Work

Over the summer months, piloting work took place across the four SUNRISE technical work packages, testing out the Risk Based Access Control Tool, the Demand Prediction Management Tool, the Cyber Physical Resilience Tool and the Remote Infrastructure Inspection Tool – the last of which proved to be the most visual of all the pilots.

The SUNRISE Tool for Remote Physical Infrastructure Inspection aims to deliver a solution for continuous, data-driven physical infrastructure inspection using satellite images, Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) and machine learning methods for anomaly detection.

Using these technologies, it will help detect any issues and rectify them without the physical presence of workers in the area under inspection, improving safety for the people involved.

The piloting work began in Slovenia where partners worked with electricity utility company ELES and Slovenian Railways. The next location was in Italy working with hydroelectricity company Hydro Dolomiti Energia (HDE). The final pilot was implemented in Marbella, Spain with water utility company ACOSOL.

SUNRISE at the FEDCSIS Conference

In September the SUNRISE project participated in the 19th Conference on Computer Science and Intelligence Systems (FedCSIS 2024) in Belgrade, Serbia hosting the thematic track on Resilience in Critical Infrastructure.

The event brought together experts in computer science and intelligence systems from across Europe, highlighting the challenges and innovative strategies shaping the future of our critical infrastructures.

As digitalization accelerates and off-the-shelf IT components become the norm, the cyber-attack surface for Critical Infrastructures (CI) has expanded significantly. RCIS 2024 was a powerful reminder of the need for unified prevention, protection, data processing, and rapid recovery measures across interdependent CI systems.

The RCIS Thematic Track featured contributions from a host of SUNRISE project partners including UPM, LSE, Eviden and Netcompany – Intrasoft.

SUNRISE National & EU Level Workshops

The most recent round of SUNRISE national workshops took place on May 22, (Italy), and May 23, (Spain and Slovenia) and was titled “Building Tomorrow: Strategy and Tools for European Infrastructure’s Resilience in Future Pandemic and Climate Scenarios.”

The main goals of these workshops were to perform “What if” analyses and risk analyses, all with the idea of contributing to SUNRISE’s general strategy and considering the goals of the strategy itself and the 2029 pandemic scenario.

The workshops focused on in-depth discussions with CI providers to understand the role of individual CI operators in each sector and their interdependence with other CI sectors.

The participants’ expertise greatly helped further our understanding of these matters and how different CIs deal with such issues. The productive discussions, exercises, and considerations will aid the SUNRISE project’s ongoing efforts to improve and tackle the various challenges it faces.

In addition to the national workshops, in June an international workshop focused on cross-border cooperation among CI managers across Europe was held online.

Participants engaged in discussions to promote cross-border cooperation, exchange best practices, address common issues, and explore ways for CI managers to support each other during crises.

Thank you for reading and we look forward to keeping you up-to-date about SUNRISE and CI resilience in future editions.

– Team SUNRISE