Securing the Baltic Seas: Built Seascapes

The Baltic Sea is transitioning into a 'built seascape' characterized by an increase in human-made infrastructure such as offshore wind farms and subsea cables. While these developments support renewable energy and digital connectivity, they introduce vulnerabilities to sabotage and cyberattacks, necessitating new governance and security strategies to manage dual-use technologies and environmental impacts.

• The Baltic Sea is shifting from a natural marine ecosystem toward a 'built seascape,' where the environment is increasingly defined by human infrastructure including digital monitoring systems, subsea cables, and offshore wind farms.
• There is a fundamental paradox where the offshore infrastructure required for sustainability and economic growth is simultaneously highly vulnerable to geopolitical tensions, cyberattacks, and sabotage.
• The infrastructure in these seascapes often serves dual purposes for both defense and civilian actors, creating a need for governance and security approaches that can keep up with technological change.

APA

Stockholm Environment Institute (2025). Securing the Baltic Seas: Built Seascapes. https://www.sei.org/publications/securing-the-baltic-seas-built-seascapes/

Chicago

Stockholm Environment Institute. Securing the Baltic Seas: Built Seascapes. 2025. https://www.sei.org/publications/securing-the-baltic-seas-built-seascapes/.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |author=Stockholm Environment Institute |title=Securing the Baltic Seas: Built Seascapes |date=7 April 2025 |url=https://www.sei.org/publications/securing-the-baltic-seas-built-seascapes/ |access-date=17 August 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{stockholmenvironmentinstitute2025securing, author = {{Stockholm Environment Institute}}, title = {{Securing the Baltic Seas: Built Seascapes}}, institution = {Stockholm Environment Institute}, year = {2025}, month = apr, url = {https://www.sei.org/publications/securing-the-baltic-seas-built-seascapes/}, urldate = {2026-08-17}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }