MSC ENVIRONMENTAL HAZARDS AND RISKS MANAGEMENT

The MSc environmental hazards and risks management program provides skills in risk management, and more particularly in risk modeling, to better predict and manage environmental hazards and risks.

In the southeast region of France the Mediterranean environment combines high population densities, rapid land cover change and extreme climatic events in an IPCC global climate change hotspot. The region is subject to devastating floods and forest fires as well as other ecological hazards. Proximity to the Alps and sea further expose the population to geohazards such as mass movements, earthquakes and coastal flooding. Few areas in the world concentrate as many environmental hazards and risks as southeast France, so it is an ideal place to learn about risk management.

In the Nice Côte d’Azur area, a multitude of field sites can be investigated to discover monitoring and mitigation strategies that are applicable throughout the world. In addition, there is a wide range of digital data available such as high resolution aerial and satellite imagery, Digital Elevation Models, and raster and vector GIS databases describing land cover, building units, vegetation and stream networks. The context is therefore propitious to modeling hazards and risks both spatially and temporally using GIS and remote sensing.

The MSc Environmental hazards and risks management program combines recent research with GIS and remote sensing technologies to train a generation of thinkers capable of anticipating and mitigating a wide range of natural hazards in a multi-disciplinary approach. On completion of the degree, participants will have a comprehensive understanding of risk management components such as: planning, mitigation, monitoring, scenario modeling and warning systems.