Since 2008, the Marine Board European Scientific Diving Panel (ESDP) has acted as a European operational platform to advance underwater scientific excellence and to promote and implement a practical support framework for scientific diving related activities.
Why Scientific Diving?
Scientific diving supports professional research and education as well as the protection, conservation and monitoring of the natural and cultural environment. It is a highly-productive, cost-effective research tool. Scientific diving is quite different from recreational or commercial diving. It provides the technical capability to be an "intelligent monitoring system", greatly extending the possibilities of ship supported/based
monitoring techniques. Scientific diving exists in a health and safety framework that involves certified scientific divers, diving officers,
scientific project leaders, heads of laboratories, administrators and legislators.
Marine Board European Scientific Diving Panel (ESDP) focus on:
- Operational and safety issues related to scientific diving.
- Diving as a tool for scientific research.
Further information
- MB ESDP membership: here
- MB ESDP SD database: here
- ESDP also host their own websites:
- http://scientific-diving.eu/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page
- http://www.scientific-diving.eu/
- Contact at Marine Board Secretariat: Joke Coopman Email
Consultation Documents
ESDP is a focused and technical panel which delivers concrete outputs in the form of European scientific diving standards and consultation documents. Consultation documents are available for download on the following topics:
- Common Practices and EU Competency levels
- Delivery of science through diving
- Scientific Diving from large Research vessels
News and Events
- 18th ESDP Meeting, 11 April, Marseille, France
- 17th ESDP Meeting, 20 December, Brussels, Belgium
- 16th ESDP Meeting, 12 May 2016, Kristineberg, Sweden
- 15th ESDP Meeting, 20 October, Brussels, Belgium
- 14th ESDP Meeting, 4 March 2015, Stuttgart, Germany
- First European Conference on Scientific Diving, 1-3 March 2015, Stuttgart, Germany. More information available here.
- 13th ESDP meeting, 15 October 2015, ESF COST-Office, Brussels, Belgium
- 12th ESDP meeting, 20 March 2014, HCMR Crete, Greece.
- 18-19 March 2014: ESF exploratory workshop “Breakthrough technologies to advance diving-based underwater research in the next decade”, HCMR, Crete, Greece.
- October 2013: International Scientific Diving Symposium, 21-28 October 2013, Curaçao (Dutch Antilles). Europe and the U.S. join forces as the ESDP and the American Academy of Underwater Science (AAUS) co-organize ISOSD4. More information here
- 11th ESDP meeting, 8 October 2013, ESF-COST Office, Brussels.
- 10th ESDP meeting, 20-21 March 2013, Zadar, Croatia, hosted at the International Centre for Underwater Archaeology. See photo below and download the agenda here
- COST / ESDP workshop 2010: Strengthening Synergy and Excellence in Diving Supported Science across Europe. Further details of the workshop jointly organised and funded by the COST office (European Cooperation in Science and Technology) and the ESDP of the Marine Board can be found here.
ESDP Group Picture - 16th ESDP Panel Meeting at Sven Lovén Centre for Marine Sciences, Kristineberg, Sweden, 12 May 2016