OUTLINE
OF THE PROJECT
ECO-GEOWATER is an initiative
jointly promoted within the WATER-GIS thematic network by the
Associations GISIG and Techware (TECHnology for WAter REsources).
It is a pool of High Level Scientific Conferences in the frame of
the IHP (Improving Human Potential) programme of the Fifth
Framework Programme. ECO-GEOWATER structures its events to assess
and present the state-of-the-art of the scientific research in
the GIS discipline as support to the analysis and solution of the
problems related to the water domain sciences.
It creates a scientific forum for experts, scientists and young
researchers, open to the users.
BACKGROUND
Water is the fundamental
resource for human life, with uses often conflicting one another
and with environmental preservation. Most of the water issues
incorporate a spatial dimension: Geographical Information (and
GIS) is then able to support many activities of the water domain.
That suggests an effort for co-operation among experts, promoting
the integration and the development of research in the geo-related
aspects of the Water domain together with GI science and its
tools.
PROJECT
STRUCTURE AND REFERENCE
According
to the IHP programme the proposal foresees three kinds of events:
EuroConferences, Euro Workshops, EuroLabCourses. From an
operational point of view the proposal is structured by
constituting Working Groups on selected areas of the water domain,
where to focus the different water issues as regards the use of
GIS and by considering the catchment paradigm, based on GIS, as
the common target approach for the whole Network.
ECO-GEOWATER
individuates then three leading streams (Working Groups), with
key-note speakers covering these fields in a multidisciplinary
way:
- Water
Resources assessment and GIS
This Working Group concerns the activities aimed at
monitoring and controlling freshwater resources as a
support to their sustainable management. In this working
group hydrologists, hydro-geologists from academic and
application environments will mutually discuss, also in
the perspective of a co-operation with private or public
water management organisations.
The aim is to assess in a comprehensive way the
potentiality (quality and quantity) of water as a
resource and how the management of the resource along the
whole natural hydrological cycle is affected by its use
for the various kinds of human activity, with a special
regard to the issues of the quality of water, superficial
and underground and to the assessment of aquifers
vulnerability (e.g. vs. agricultural use) and of mountain
water catchments.
- Water use
management and GIS
This Working Group concerns the cycle of water as it is
used for civil, industrial and agricultural activities,
to assess the effects of this use (raw water intake,
drinking water treatment, distribution systems, waste/
rain water collection and waste water treatment), therein
including the domain of technological networks. In this
domain the degree of exploitation of GIS vary
significantly from country to country and within the same
country depending on the local conditions under which the
private or public water management organisations operate.
- Natural
hazards and GIS
This Working Group faces the problem of predicting and
monitoring natural hazards caused by flooding and
landsliding both derived from meteorological extreme
events. The applications of GIS tools to the prediction
of landsliding are relatively frequent; however, most of
these experiences are still in experimental stage and no
regulations exist on the matter. GIS applications are
even more uncommon in the domain of flooding.
The actors would be hydraulic or geotechnical engineers,
geologists and geomorphologists with a strong link with
the research environment. They would be also operators in
Spatial Planning (DSS) and in Civil Protection.
These
streams will be integrated in a “catchment perspective”,
for addressing Catchment Information Systems (CIS) and
contributing to River Basin Management Plans (RBMP), the current
research approach in line with the EU policies (e.g. the EU Water
Framework Directive).
The
E-ESDI aims at making available relevant, harmonised and quality
geographic information for the purpose of formulation,
implementation, monitoring and evaluation of Community
environmental policy-making through the establishment of
integrated spatial information services, based upon a distributed
network of databases, linked by common standards and protocols to
ensure compatibility.
ECO-GEOWATER
links also with the "CATCHMOD" initiative, the cluster
of EU-funded projects dedicated to the harmonisation of
integrated catchment modelling, funded under the Fifth Framework
Programme by the Key Action "Sustainable management and
quality of water", with the aim to support the
implementation of the EU Water Framework Directive.
To
reinforce the interdisciplinary aspects of the project and some
specific technological aspects on tools that can play an
important role in the addressed scientific fields a particular
attention will be paid to some Information Technology issues such
as also with contribution to the Working Groups of experts in
these respective fields. These IT aspects are Earth Observation
Remote Sensing, Spatial Data Modelling, Interoperability, User
Centred Design (UCD) and User Validation.
AIM
AND EXPECTED IMPACT
ECO-GEOWATER
answers the need of a transfer of knowledge and experience about
GI and Water Resources and their mutual link, in particular on
the equilibrium preservation/exploitation of resources.
The aim is to train young researchers on GI approaches, methods
and techniques, with the purpose to improve their capacity in
water resource evaluation and management.
The training impact is an increased knowledge of GIS technology
and usability in the field, opening to young researchers a range
of techniques and holistic tools to develop research in the Water
domain.
The project impacts on attitude to European collaboration at
different levels among:
- institutions
of different kinds and roles, eploiting the
multidisciplinary aspects of the GI and water domains;
- researchers
of different countries (with a link among EU and Central
Eastern European Countries, as a contribution to the EU
integration process in the field);
- senior and
young researchers, with a generational transfer of
knowledge.
ADDRESSEES
OF THE PROPOSAL
Senior
scientists and young researchers are the main target of
the EuroEvents.
The ECO-GEOWATER aims to establish an operational network
of researchers that, thanks to the organic
structure of the Working Groups and the possibility of
well timed events, is able to play a role of introducing
young researchers to a highly qualified training
environment. Moreover, it will be for scientists an
active forum for knowledge update and for discussing in
an interdisciplinary way the issues of their field and of
the related research domains.
The project, while maintaining a high scientific level,
targets also the world of users, both to exploit their
experience/needs as input to the activity, and to ensure
the best fall-out of the project achievements.
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SCIENTIFIC
COMMITTEE
- Istvan Ijjas
- Budapest University of Technology and Economics,
chairman of the Working Group "Water Resources
Assessment"
- André Van
der Beken – Free University of Brussels, chairman of
the Working Group "Water Use Management"
- Alberto
Carrara – CNR-CSITE, Centre of Research for
Informatics and Telecommunications Systems, chairman of
the Working Group "Natural Hazards"
- James
Bathurst – University of Newcastle upon Tyne
- Osvaldo
Conio – AMGA SpA, Azienda Mediterranea Gas e Acqua
- Bianca
Falcidieno – CNR-IMA, Institute for Applied
Mathematics
- Roland
Hiederer– JRC/IES, Institute for Environment and
Sustainability
- Leonardo
Lojelo – TECHWARE, Technology for Water Resources
- Roger Moore
- NERC, National Environment Research Council
- Emanuele
Roccatagliata – GISIG, Geographical Information
Systems International Group, Scientific Coordinator