Abstract

The chapter describes the utilized procedures for sharing incident information with the national competent authorities, public bodies and civil protection in cases of serious security-related incidents on critical infrastructure facilities. Emphasis is given on operational cases of natural gas critical infrastructures, since sharing information with the public is an integral part of the adopted resilience and disaster risk management cycle applied to the mitigation, preparedness and planning, response and recovery stages for such security incidents. The principles of the internationally renowned M/ETHANE model are analyzed and applied at the development of a dedicated software tool for incident information exchange, which provides a reliable, accurate and efficient means of communication between the natural gas operators and the public authorities regarding emergency incidents. This novel software tool and the underlying operational procedures provide a common structure for first responders to share major incident information, while communication to additional stakeholders could also be supported, including Civil Protection authorities, third parties and the general population.