REST COAST will demonstrate to what extent upscaled coastal restoration can provide a low-carbon adaptation, reducing risks and providing gains in biodiversity for vulnerable coastal ecosystems, such as wetlands or sea grass beds. By overcoming present technical, economic, governance and social barriers to restoration upscaling, REST COAST will develop the large-scale river-coast connectivity and increase the nearshore accommodation space for the resilient delivery of coastal ecosystem services (ESS). The selected ESS (risk reduction, environmental quality and fish provisioning) touch urgent coastal problems such as the erosion/flooding during recent storms or the accelerating coastal habitat degradation that seriously affects fisheries and aquaculture. By enhancing these ESS under present and future climates at 9 Pilots that represent the main EU regional seas (Baltic, Black, North, Atlantic and Mediterranean) we shall increase the commitment of citizens, stakeholders and policy makers for a long-term maintenance of restoration. Such commitment will go together with a transformation of governance and financial structures, supported by evidence-based results on restoration benefits for the welfare of coastal societies and assets. This transformation will build upon the results from hands-on restoration at the Pilots, steered by the multidisciplinary project advances. Combining new techniques, risk assessments, innovative financial/governance arrangements and homogeneous metrics for ESS and biodiversity, REST-COAST will develop a systemic approach to coastal restoration based on a scalable coastal adaptation plan. The plan will underpin a transformative change in governance and policies, proving the importance of the coastal dimension in the EU Green Deal for adaptation/mitigation under climate change. The proposed adaptation will facilitate replicating large scale restoration and introducing coastal ESS into national and international policies.

Within European coastal zones, intertidal areas consisting of soft sediment emerging during each low tide, form complex seascapes covering more than 10 000 km2 along the 35 000 km of the tidal coastline. These habitats provide multiple ecosystem services with great potential to cope with the biodiversity-climate crisis by contributing to carbon neutrality, climate resilience and biodiversity support. Nevertheless, these seascapes continue to be fragmented and threatened, resulting in a decrease of their provision of services. Rewilding, a nature-based solution, is a new concept for seascapes to reverse this situation and to “let (again) Nature do the job” ensuring climate resilience, biodiversity support and societal benefit of the future European shoreline. Within a network of 10 demonstrators and 25 partners from 11 European states, including 8 with a tidal coast, plus the UK, Canada and the USA, REWRITE will bring an interdisciplinary consortium of natural and coastal environment and social sciences and humanities experts to address the current ecological and social challenges regarding intertidal seascape rewilding. Expanding innovative approaches, REWRITE will focus on the climate-biodiversity-society nexus, to reach 4 specific objectives: -identify environmental, social and cultural drivers and barrier parameters to rewild intertidal sediment seascapes within the context of climate change; -strongly engage stakeholders to achieve a step-change in their appreciation of the natural function of these seascapes and integrate their interests within a co-design of scenario for future European shoreline; -estimate and upscale trajectories of intertidal seascapes from the local to the European level, following rewilding (passive), restoring (active), “business as usual” or “do nothing” options; -establish tools and methods for successful rewilding to ensure a high ecological and societal co-benefit/low-cost ratio for a climate-neutral and resilient European shoreline.