Water-Oriented Living Labs Workshop Coming Up in January 2024
Under the umbrella of the ULTIMATE project and in collaboration with the AquaSPICE project, Water Europe is pleased to announce the organisation of a Water-Oriented Living Labs workshop scheduled for January 27th in Livorno, Italy. This collaborative effort involves active participation from various case-study partners.
The focal point of the workshop will be an in-depth exploration of the insights and experiences gained from the Rosignano case study, particularly regarding “Water-Smart Industrial Symbiosis” (WSIS). The session will delve into the developments of the Rosignano case study, shedding light on its transformative journey toward the establishment of a WSIS Living Lab.
For additional details on this event, please click WOLL – Day 2
Read MoreThe ZeroPollution4Water Cluster: Full Steam ahead after successful launch
After its inaugural appearance at the Water Knowledge Europe event on October 19th in Brussels, the ZeroPollution4Water Cluster is moving forward with its activities. As a coalition of seven projects, the ZeroPollution4Water Cluster aims to increase collaboration and work towards preventing groundwater contamination due to climate change impacts, safeguarding drinking water quality, with a focus on DBPs, through innovative monitoring and treatment solutions.
The Cluster brings together six Working Groups dedicated to different topics: Research and Innovation, Management and Coordination, Policy Development, Communication, Technology and Innovation, and Data Management and Sharing. The work within the Working Groups harmonizes the results and outputs of all the projects, avoiding duplication of efforts and facilitating the achievement of the Cluster’s goals.
The Cluster is coordinated by Water Europe, with the support of the European Commission’s Research Executive Agency (EC REA), and adopts a holistic approach through the potential integration of other initiatives towards the achievement of the Zero Pollution strategy.
Stay connected with the Cluster’s developments through its website, LinkedIn page, X and YouTube.
Read MoreEC publishes new tools to help predict and adapt to sectoral drought impacts
New forecasting and foresight tools have been published by the Commission to enhance the EU’s preparedness to combat droughts and water scarcity. The two tools, the European Drought Impacts Database and the European Drought Risk Atlas, are available to the public as part of the Risk Assessment on water scarcity and droughts of the European Drought Observatory.
The Drought Risk Atlas uses machine learning to simulate the impact that an increase of temperature of +1.5, 2 and 3 Degrees Celsius can have in the future. Developed by scientists at the Commission’s Joint Research Centre, the projections show in which regions of the European Union water will become scarcer than elsewhere and which economic sectors and subsectors will be most affected.
“To make Europe water resilient, we first need to better understand drought risks. Forewarned is forearmed, and these new tools do just that. The reasons for water scarcity are, however, often man-made. We all must act to stop illegal abstractions of groundwater, reduce the pollution of rivers and increase water efficiency.” said Commissioner for Environment, Oceans and Fisheries, Virginijus Sinkevičius. For more information, please click here.
Read MoreEditorial article by Günter Liebel, Secretary General, Federal Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry, Regions and Water Management, Austria
Europe is highly developed in water policy and water services but we are more and more facing the effects of climate change on our water resources on our continent. Water stress affects 20 % of the European territory and 30 % of the European population on average every year, while droughts cause economic damage of up to 9 Billion Euro annually and additional unquantified damage to ecosystems and their services.
Back in June, the new Water-Smart Strategy for Europe was presented at the Water Innovation Europe Conference 2023. It is aiming at three key objectives: water security, water sustainability and water resilience. We have to take care for current and future generations to look after our water treasure and manage water resources responsibly.
For Austria, a landlocked country, in the heart of the Alps and fortunate to be blessed with rich natural water resources, this responsibility means investing into a set of different actions.
One is, to invest in innovations to deploy state of the art technologies in fresh water and waste-water infrastructure. In Austria investments of 67 Billion Euros over the last 60 years into water supply and wastewater treatment infrastructure ensure highest drinking water quality for our population and good bathing water quality of lakes. To keep the high standard of Austrian water services, we realised that not only continuous investments in infrastructure are necessary but even more depends on high qualified human capital. Therefore a broad set of training courses for water-works-supervisors and sewage-works-operators was established over the last decades.
Another activitiy is to establish dense monitoring networks on water quality and water quantity for rivers lakes and groundwaters because: you can not manage what you do not measure. Alone the hydrographic monitoring network in Austria comprises around 6.500 hydrological facilities in the fields of precipitation, surface water, groundwater and springs. Furthermore around 2.000 monitoring sites on groundwater quality as well as some hundred monitoring sites on river and lake water quality distributed all over the country had been established during in the mean time. Appropriate monitoring networks, early warning systems and mechanisms can detect and prevent water-wastage, pollution and natural disasters such as floods.
Interconnection of several policy areas like water, agriculture, nature protection and spatial planning is crucial. Natural water retention measures (NWRM) in rural areas but also sponge-city-approaches in urban areas provide a huge field of opportunities with positive effects for our environment, human health and wellbeing but also the economy. Nature based solutions have to be prioritized wherever possible.
Science and research must explore and invest in opportunities where water can be an enabler for other sector‘s goals, such as the transition to renewable energy systems. Financing is an important issue. The Republic of Austria is thus making a significant contribution to protecting the climate and preserving an environment worth living in.
What underlies all these activities is cooperation at all levels, and a comprehensive water legislation combined with good water governance.
In fact, we are not starting from scratch. Today within the EU and its Member States comprehensive water legislation is in place. But water is still dealt as a sector policy. We now together have to highlight the importance of water as common denominator for all other sectoral policies and therefore to raise water higher on the political agenda.
Our objectives must be water security, water sustainability and water resilience for Europe.
Read MoreHow to secure drinking water quality? The new ToDrinQ project is here
On 15-16 December 2022, the partners of the new EU-funded project, ToDrinQ convened in Delft, the Netherlands, for its kick-off meeting. Climate change and increased pollution from, among others pesticides, pharmaceuticals and heavy metals, present drinking water operators with an increasing challenge to monitor and ensure the quality of our drinking water.
Due to the increased risk and complexity of pollution, the EU revised the drinking water directives and sharpened the risk assessment. As a result, drinking water operators face the challenge of collecting more information on drinking water quality in order to take timely action. In particular, real-time data on compounds and organisms of emerging concern such as pesticides, pharmaceuticals, disinfection by-products, heavy metals and micro-organisms are often not available.
The project ToDrinQ is here to investigate this further. Led by TU Delft, the new project brings together 16 partners from 8 countries to develop new technologies for real-time detection and monitoring of water quality and test innovative treatment systems especially suitable for small-scale treatment plants. Water Europe is glad to be among the partners leading the project’s Communication, Dissemination, and Clustering activities.
Interested in following ToDrinQ’s updates? Follow its social media (Twitter, LinkedIn)
Read MoreNew event coming up: Water efficiency in industry- Register by 02/01
Join us on January 12th and take part in a discussion on how industry can mitigate and overcome the challenges of water in a sustainable and efficient way.
Water is an essential resource for our society, nations and the industries supporting the growth we aim for. While water scarcity is discussed as global resource challenge, it is today also becoming a European issue with water scarcity and droughts emerging across Europe and in some areas have become the new normal. The water scarcity issue poses threats to our people, nature and not least our economy as it a vital input to our production of food, building material and industries.
According to the UN, industry today represents 50% of the total water consumption in Europe. Therefore, when meeting the demands of our European societies in the future, water resources in industries need to be utilised in a more efficient and sustainable way. Not only to meet the demands but also to minimise the rising risks of water shortage as input for the production of goods and infrastructure.
The technical potential to save water in industrial processes is 75%, but today only a few percent of water is being reused. To catch the untapped potential of water efficiency in industries, ambitious regulatory frameworks and goals need to be addressed by the EU. How can industry really contribute to a water-smart society?
Registrations open until 02 January 2023. Check the full programme and register here.
Read MoreNew EU-funded project WATERVERSE has started its activities
How can we make water data management accessible, affordable, secure, fair, and easy to use? This autumn, a new EU-funded project saw the light, committed to do exactly that. WATERVERSE project, funded by European Union’s Horizon Europe programme, aims at developing a Water Data Management Ecosystem (WDME) for making data management practices and resources in the water sector accessible, affordable, secure, fair, and easy to use, improving the usability of data and the interoperability of data-intensive processes.
Digitalisation is a key enabler for the water sector, which can be leveraged to implement strategic policy commitments and directives at national, European and international levels. Data-intensive technologies are being adopted in the water sector but the actual use of data is hindered by strong data ownership approaches due to the perception that data sharing is a risk for confidentiality leakage, security aspects of critical infrastructures, unclear business models, poor quality of data, as well as the fragmentation and conservative attitude of the end-users.
The three-year project is now stepping in to blend together competencies from the water domain technology providers and innovation companies, as well as the technical community that is driving the development of data spaces, thus increasing the resilience of the water sector and water utilities, as a whole. The project will be demonstrated in 6 countries (Cyprus, Spain, Germany, the Netherlands, Finland and the UK), establishing clear and measurable indicators to assess data equity in water-related data spaces and ensuring feasibility and the sustainability of the ecosystem, as well as its replicability, scalability and business applicability.
WATERVERSE brings great expertise on board, combining the skills of 17 partners from 10 European countries, including research organizations, water service companies, technology providers and innovation companies. Water Europe is among the consortium’s partners, leading the Communication and Dissemination activities. The kick-off meeting of the project was held on the 11th and 12th of October 2022, in Thessaloniki, Greece, hosted by the project’s coordinator CERTH.
Interested in the project’s developments? Follow its social media LinkedIn, Twitter.
Read MoreNew WE Position Paper for a Water-Smart Nutrient Management Action Plan
In the context of the public consultation on Nutrients – action plan for better management, Water Europe released a policy-oriented paper to encourage a water-smart Nutrient management action plan. The water sector and particularly the utilities are key actors to recycle and recover nutrients but it needs to be supported by:
- Raising Awareness through efficient monitoring to better understand the impact of nutrients on water and our environment
- Reducing nutrients uses with targets and a clear framework for legislative clarity, that includes to:
- Close the nutrient cycle to stop nutrient loss, recover and recycle through nature base solutions for instance
- Reduce the exploitation of natural (virgin) resources to reduce the dependency of importations
- Enable recovery and recycling of materials with good quality and efficient function suitable for their applications
Have a look to Water Europe policy-oriented paper here and all the different related projects.
Read MoreWater Europe present at the World Water Week 2022
Last week, Loic Charpentier, our WE Water Innovation Policy Manager joined the World Water Week 2022, held from the 23rd to the 1st of September in Stockholm.
During the session ”Creating New Champions: Enhancing Links to Achieve SDG 6 Across”, Loic spoke on behalf of the EU Water Alliance, presenting the work done over the previous couple of years by the EUWA. The session, overall, provided information and evidence-based recommendations about how to increase the political prioritization of the #water and #sanitation agenda, both within other sectors and with high-level decision-makers around the world.
This was a great opportunity to exchange with Water Europe members, partners and other key stakeholders, especially, at this timing, in light of the recast of the Industrial Emissions Directive and the Urban Wastewater Directive.
Read MoreWE WOLLs Workshop at the IWA World Water Congress & Exhibition
Water Europe is hosting a dedicated Water-Oriented Living Labs Workshop during the IWA World Water Congress and Exhibition, happening from the 11 to the 15th of September in Copenhagen, Denmark.
Under the title ‘ Water-Oriented Living Labs as a mean to engage stakeholders in the development and demonstration of water technologies’, the workshop will present cases and discuss WOLLs as a mean to engage stakeholders to co-develop water technologies and speed up the demonstration of innovation. In particular, WOLLs and lessons learnt will be presented from different European regions and sectors:
- Water Europe, Belgium: Overview of European WOLL’s Atlas and mechanisms to promote its development, presented by the association leading this effort
- Scottish Water Horizons will present the Water Test Network, offering testing facilities for SMEs to develop new technology. Partners are from Scotland, Ireland, Germany, Netherlands, France, and Belgium
- REWAISE will present activities of 24 partners demonstrating innovative processes and governance models at WOLL’s in three hubs (Mediterranean, Atlantic and Continental).
- Sweden Water Research will present Oerewise, the Greater Copenhagen Living Lab focusing on climate change adaptation in urban areas of the Oeresund Region.
The workshop will take place on the 14th of September from 15.45 – 17.15. Check the full event’s programme.
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