Newsletters   Subscription   Contributions       Newsletter issue n° 10 - July 08

 

Announcement: The EUROPEAN WATER RESEARCH DAY at the  EXPO 2008

8 September 2008, Zaragoza, Spain.

Since 1984, seven European Commission RTD Framework Programmes have contributed to the funding of research in Europe. They have all tackled the role of water in the environment and in society. This research has contributed not only to promoting good water management from the technological and institutional points of view but also to developing a sound water knowledge base and an awareness of its political dimensions and of the necessity to actively protect the viability of our aquatic ecosystem. Today, with a better understanding of the context and impact of global change, the aim is to identify ambitious objectives in order to develop new concepts, technologies and tools.

In the framework of the Zaragoza International Expo 2008 "Water and Sustainable Development", the Directorate General for Research organises a one day event – the European Water Research Day - aimed at presenting past, on-going and future EU research activities in this field. The event will be opened by the European Commissioner for Science and Research Janez Potočnik, together with the Spanish Science and Innovation Minister Cristina Garmendia, the Member of European Parliament Philippe Busquin and high-level representatives of the Government of Aragón, the Zaragoza Water Tribune and the European Water Supply and Sanitation Technology Platform. The main findings and impacts of European water-related research activities will be summarised. Six keynote speakers will present the results of previous and ongoing research activities paving the way for the identification of knowledge gaps and future challenges for sustainable solutions.

The contents of the next Call for proposals of FP7 (Cooperation programme) regarding water-related research will be presented, offering the possibility of flash presentations from potential applicants. A brokerage event will be included. The meeting is open to all parties interested in EU RTD water research initiatives, particularly those with responsibilities on dissemination and on research policy. The information/brokerage session related to the next FP7 Call for proposals is particularly addressed to institutions, companies and researchers wishing to build partnerships for responding to the new Call. Participation is subject to registration.

The draft Agenda of the event and the Registration Form are available at:

http://circa.europa.eu/Public/irc/rtd/eesdwatkeact/library?l=/european_research

During the EXPO 2008, accommodation facilities in Zaragoza are limited; participants should thus make their own arrangements as soon as possible. The above link also offers a list of travel agencies; please refer to the European Water Research Day at EXPO2008.

For further information on this event, contact:

Elena Domínguez (elena.dominguez@ec.europa.eu), or

Javier Peinado-Lebrero javier.peinado@ec.europa.eu)

 

FP7 calls for proposals FP7-ENV-2008-1 and FP7-ENV-NMP-2: negotiations to be open

The internal procedures launched by the EC services in view to select the projects for funding are now completed. Accordingly, the members of the Programme committee have been informed about the outcome of the evaluations. It is expected to invite soon the successful applicants to start negotiations for a grant agreement with the EC services.

                                                    Summary evaluation results

Proposals

Call FP7-ENV-2008-1

Call FP7-ENV-NMP-2008-2

 Received:

 425

 35

 Ineligible:

 23

 1

 Evaluated:

 402 (EC reqd. grant €1.142 M)

 34 (EC reqd. grant €74,4 M)

 Above all thresholds:

 225

 16

 Retained for funding:

 64 (EC prop. grant €212.2 M)

 5 (EC prop. grant €9.24 M)

 

Gaining visibility for the outcome of FP6 projects through a newly dedicated platform: the Project Information & Dissemination Service (PIDS):

The PIDS is a 'one stop shop' service that enables FP6 Project Coordinators (COs) and Project Officers (POs) to

To access the PIDS, please go to: http://cordis.europa.eu/pids/index.cfm?fuseaction=main.home

Uploading projects in the PIDS: FP6 projects can be uploaded in the PIDS. The prerequisite is that the project details have already been entered in the Commission's project database by EC Officials and sent to CORDIS to be added to the CORDIS project database.

Once uploaded in the PIDS, some non-contractual information can be added or updated. Any change to be made in non-editable fields should be sent to the project's PO.

When a new project is entered, the PO receives a notification e-mail to validate the project. Once validated, the CO receives in turn a notification e-mail.

Collecting feedback: For every project entered in the PIDS, it is possible to add public outputs (results, news, events, and documents). When a new public output is entered, the PO receives a notification e-mail to validate the public output. Once validated, the CO receives in turn a notification e-mail.

All public outputs (whether results, news, events or documents) linked to a project will be stored in a common repository. Public outputs can be added at any time during the lifetime of the project.

Disseminating public outputs: Public outputs entered in the PIDS, further to the PO approval and provided they have 'public' status, will be disseminated to relevant CORDIS services such as:

The most interesting or significant ones may also be selected for further coverage on CORDIS News.

 

PUBLICATIONS and AVAILABLE DOCUMENTS

 

FP7 - Environmental research - 1st call: A revised version of the catalogue of projects is available:

The catalogue briefly presents the projects resulting from the FP7-ENV-2007-1 call, including a short abstract, the partners involved and the overall grant proposed by the Commission. As consequence of the negotiations' cancellation with the project ATRON, the Commission services have recently opened negotiations with the project 212781 iSoil.

A revised version of the catalogue destined to provide basic information on the selected projects (including the objectives, partners and resources) is available on:
http://circa.europa.eu/Public/irc/rtd/eesdwatkeact/library?l=/projects_information or
ftp://ftp.cordis.europa.eu/pub/fp7/environment/docs/catalogue_projects_2008.pdf .

The preliminary information presented in the mentioned document is based on the proposals' evaluation results and shall be considered as provisional and subject to potential modifications in the course of projects' negotiation.

 

A new TECHNEAU publication available: "Consumer Preferences - An Overview Introduction"

The FP6 Techneau project is concerned with the supply of safe drinking water from source to tap and consumers’ preferences need to be understood if new developments are to be selected and introduced effectively. This report reviews the literature on consumer preferences for water supply services and discusses these in relation to other factors such as risk perceptions.

The primary purpose of the report is to inform the selection of consumer issues for further study in the TECHNEAU case studies. The review will inform discussions with end users and consumer groups in the next phase of the project.

For more information and download of the executive summary or the full report, please visit: http://www.techneau.org/index.php?id=99

The complete list of publications issued by the partners involved in the Techneau project is available at:

http://www.techneau.org/index.php?id=120

 

Water Reuse System Management Manual - AQUAREC", edited by Davide Bixio and Thomas Wintgens.

The project AQUAREC “Integrated concepts for reuse of upgraded wastewater” was funded by the Fifth Framework Programme of the European Commission. Its major aim was to investigate and develop concepts and methodologies supporting rational and knowledge-based waste water reuse strategies.

This publication presents practical information on waste water reuse concepts based on actual and proved management and operational practises. A broad approach has been considered by addressing institutional, organisational, legal, economics, financial, social and environmental issues together with technological aspects. The targeted readers are mainly practitioners concerned with implementation of waste water reuse schemes, but this publication may also become ‘the wastewater reuse manual’ for decision makers, local authorities, consultants and research bodies involved in the area.

The publication is available as printed (catalogue n° KI-76-06-016-EN-C) or as a PDF document (catalogue n° KI-76-06-016-EN-Z) from OPOCE at:  http://bookshop.europa.eu/.

 

From the FP6 SWITCH project - Sustainable Water Management Improves Tomorrow's Cities' Health - A tool for Life-Cycle Cost Assessment (LCCA)

The Eco.SWM is a tool to calculate the so-called "net present value" for different planning scenarios in water management. It was developed within WP2 (Storm water Management) but is applicable in all fields of water related planning. The software is available for download from http://www.sieker.de/english/modules/mydownloads/singlefile.php?cid=0&lid=8 .

Because it is often time consuming to collect prices for different alternatives and to present results properly, Eco.SWM has been developed as an application with access to a web-based database. In the database unit prices, operational cost per unit and lifetime expectancy for many different measures can be stored.

The new version 2.2 offers the following:

Additional information about the SWITCH project is available at: http://www.switchurbanwater.eu/

 

EVENTS

 

AQUASTRESS - PUBLIC PARTICIPATION IN WATER MANAGEMENT,  5 September 2008, Montpellier, France.

This important dissemination AquaStress event will be an unique opportunity to provide feedback to the international community on the achievements of the FP6 AquaStress European Integrated project (http://www.aquastress.net). The main goal of the project (2005-2009) is to develop stakeholder driven, European scale, comprehensive integrated approaches to the diagnosis, prognosis and mitigation of water stress. This event will present the main results of the 6 Work Blocks (Field activities and stakeholder forums; Characterisation of systems and water stress; Water stress mitigation options; Infrastructure to support solutions processes; Testing, Validation and Evaluation; Dissemination and Training) and the eight test sites (Portugal, Netherlands, Sardinia, Poland, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Tunisia and Morocco).

The event is co-organised by the AquaStress partners and the CEMAGREF in collaboration with the 13th IWRA World Water Congress 2008. Interested Congress delegates are requested to confirm their participation in advance; to do so an online form will soon be available on the Congress website (http://wwc2008.msem.univ-montp2.fr/index.php?page=sideevent&codelang=en)

 

Water Reclamation and Aquifer Recharge Final Dissemination Workshop, 5-6 September 2008, Maribor, Slovenia.

In both, industrialised and developing countries, the population has to cope with the emerging shortage of natural resources. Water scarcity and water stress are especially becoming a pressing issue for the global community.

Water reclamation and reuse are major options to cope with these growing problems. For nearly three years now, the RECLAIM WATER team has been exploring new promising approaches and has been working on improving existing technologies to find sustainable water reclamation solutions.

The final RECLAIM WATER workshop will focus on the dissemination of the project results. It will be supported by the European Commission and the Institute for Ecological Engineering in Slovenia.

A wide range of international speakers will cover the following topics:

For more information, please visit: the RECLAIM website: http://www.ivt.rwth-aachen.de/index.php?id=776

 

FP7 3rd call for proposals, Environmental Technologies Information Day, 15 September 2008, Albert Borschette Conference Center, Rue Froissart 36, Brussels, Belgium.

This one-day event will provide information on the various topics of the FP7-3rd call in the activity area of related to Environmental Technologies, within the Environment theme (including Climate Change). Potential participants in consortia will have the opportunity to share project ideas or to propose their specific competence for the creation of project partnerships.

The Information Day is organised in a morning plenary session, with a general presentation on the "Environmental Technologies" activity and on the lessons learnt from the previous calls, followed by an introduction on the 2009 Work Programme of the "Environment (including Climate Change) Theme", and ended by a Questions & Answers session.

The programme will then continue in the afternoon in three parallel sessions on:

1) Technologies for Water, Waste, Soil and Marine Environment

2) Built Environment and Cultural Heritage

3) Technology Assessment, Verification and Testing

These sessions are organised as information and brokerage events. After an introduction on the various areas of the call, participants will be allowed to present a "flash" presentation (3 minutes and 3 slides maximum) related to project ideas, to their competence in the specific field, or to their interest to join consortia on a given subject. An open brokerage event will complete the parallel sessions.

In the Closing Session, the Commission will also respond to questions and give some information about possible subjects for future calls.

The meeting is open to all parties interested in EU RTD research initiatives, particularly those with responsibilities on dissemination and on research policy. The information/brokerage session is particularly addressed to institutions, companies and researchers wishing to build partnerships for responding to the new Call.

Participation is subject to registration, before the 5th of September. The draft Agenda, the leaflet and the registration form of the event can be downloaded from:

http://circa.europa.eu/Public/irc/rtd/eesdwatkeact/library?l=/environmental_technologi_2&vm=detailed&sb=Title

For further information on this event, please contact Javier Peinado-Lebrero (javier.peinado@ec.europa.eu)

 

Boosting Environmental Technologies by Verification, European Research Conference on ETV and Parliamentarian Evening, 15 – 16th September 2008, Brussels, Belgium.

The promotion of innovative environmental technologies is essential for the environment and for the European economy. Proving that new technologies are working through Environmental Technology Verification (ETV) is one way to achieve this.

Therefore, Europe is now heading towards an Environmental Technology Verification System. A proposal for a EU framework on ETV is planned to be launched by the European Commission in autumn 2008. Environmental Technology Verification – an independent assessment of the performance of a specific environmental product or technology – provides quantitative information on the performance of innovative technologies.

In projects all over Europe, first experiences with ETV in technology sectors such as water monitoring and treatment, air pollution abatement and contaminated site remediation have been collected. They provide the basis for this event.

The conference addresses politicians, regulators, technology providers, industry representatives and associations with the aims to:

During a parliamentarian evening on Monday (15th September) and the sessions on Tuesday (16th September), non technical experts are also addressed, whereas a technology approach is taken during the program on Monday.

The conference summarizes the findings out of the ongoing EU FP 6 ETV projects PROMOTE, TESTNET and AIRTV and the Nordic Innovation Centre project NOWATECH.

Main topics addressed are:

Participation is free of charge.

Further information on the conference is available on the internet: www.promote-etv.org, http://www.est-testnet.net/, www.airtv.eu, www.etvnord.org.

Contact: DECHEMA e.V., Dr. Thomas Track, Tel: +49 69 7564-427, E-Mail: track@dechema.de.

 

FP7 Biorefinery Joint Call for proposals - Information Day, 16 September 2008, Albert Borschette Conference Center, Rue Froissart 36, Brussels, Belgium.

The aim of this one-day event is to provide information on the Biorefinery Joint Call launched by Directorates E, G, I, and K from DG Research and Directorate D from DG Transport and Energy.

Underlining the relevance of the subject and the importance of the joint effort among different FP7 Themes, the European Commissioner for Science and Research Janez Potočnik will open the event.

The morning session will continue with a general presentation of the rationale for this Biorefinery Joint Call, its modalities for implementation, the call text and the different aspects that will need to be considered by the potential applicants in order to fully address the integration and multidisciplinary features of the joint call.

The afternoon programme is dedicated to a brokerage event. Participants will be allowed to present a "flash" 5-min. presentation (5 slides max.) related to project ideas, to their competence in the specific field, or to their interest to join consortia.

The Closing Session will be devoted to further Question and Answers and to the final remarks form Commission representatives.

The Information Day is dedicated to all parties – researchers, research institutions, companies, Industry, SMEs, National Contact Points, etc. – interested in the process of responding to the Biorefinery Joint Call.

Participation is subject to registration, before the 11th of September. The leaflet and the registration form of the event can be downloaded from:

http://circa.europa.eu/Public/irc/rtd/susbioref/library?l=/biorefinery_info&vm=detailed&sb=Title

For any additional information, please send an email to RTD-BIOREFINERY-JOINT-CALL@ec.europa.eu

 

A MBR-Network Workshop: Retrofit with MBR and containerised units, demonstration cases, 1 October 2008, Velké Bílovice, Czech Republic.

This one-day workshop is organised prior to the ARDEC waste water conference with the aim to present current developments in the field of MBR technology and applications in municipal sewage schemes. The event is co-organised by partners involved in the FP6 projects composing the MBR-Network and will be an opportunity to present current findings and prospects. The programme of the event is sub-divided in three main sessions:

Additional information about the EU funded MBR-Network is available through http://www.mbr-network.eu/ .

The workshop programme and indications for registrations are available on the conference website: http://www.ardec.cz/ .

 

ETTAR Dialogue Forum: “Sustainable Freight Transport Chains. Goal or myth?”, 9 October 2008, Brussels, Belgium.

ETTAR is a FP6 Co-ordination Action: “Identification and assessment of training needs, methods and activities for the wider use of environmental technologies in key sectors” that has focused on raising the freight transportation industries’ awareness towards sustainable solutions and business opportunities.  This concluding forum will bring together senior executives, political figures, NGO’s and researchers to review the findings of the project and to foster the creation of networks to achieve further progress.

Key note addresses will be delivered by:

The extensive breakout sessions and panel discussion will provide an opportunity for exchange of ideas and suggestions of future actions for the area.  Further information and registration details may be found on www.ettar.eu which also hosts the background documents, policy briefs and reports from the previous workshops that addressed:

A specification for an e-learning tool relevant to the sector will be launched at the forum and will be available to download from the website.

 

Annual Conference of the European Partnership for Alternative Approaches to Animal Testing on "Research for refining, reducing or replacing (3Rs) animal use in regulatory testing" , 3 November 2008, Brussels - CHARLEMAGNE, Belgium - First announcement and Call for Posters

The European Partnership for Alternative Approaches (EPAA) was launched in November 2005 as a joint initiative of the European Commission (DG Enterprise), European trade Associations and industrial companies from seven sectors.

The main objective of this annual Conference is to present the state of current research in the area of 3Rs and new perspectives on alternatives to animal testing at European and international level. The targeted audience includes national, European and international regulatory authorities, policy makers, industry, academia and animal welfare NGO's.

For further information, please visit the following website: http://www.epaa.eu.com

 

RTD RESULTS: USE, EXPLOITATION AND COMMUNICATION EXPERIENCES

 

SAFEMANMIN (Safe Management of Mining Waste) has been an FP6 coordination action that has ended on the 30th of June 2008. The purpose of the project was to review information available in Europe, particularly in the participating countries, and to share the experience on characterisation of mining wastes, risk assessment for mining waste facilities and old and abandoned mining sites, pollution prevention and remediation.

The project reports are public, and can be downloaded from the internet www.safemanmin.eu (alternative address www.biutec.at/safemanmin ). They include, among others:

 

MORE INFORMATION: click here

 

LEGAL NOTICE

The information and views set out in this newsletter are those of the author(s) and do not reflect necessarily the official opinion of the European Communities. Neither the European Communities institutions and bodies nor any person acting on their behalf may be held responsible for the use which may be made on the information contained therein. This newsletter may be freely distributed.

See also http://europa.eu/geninfo/legal_notices_en.htm

 

EDITOR:

European Commission

DG Research, Unit I03

Rue de la Loi 200, B-1049 Belgium                                     © European Communities, 2008

e-mail : Avelino.Gonzalez-Gonzalez@ec.europa.eu            Reproduction is authorized provided the source is acknowledged