Tackling Europe’s Water Crisis from Space
The PCP WISE project, funded by the European Union’s Horizon programme, has selected five promising projects to help address Europe’s water crises. A total of 25 proposals were submitted in response to the call published at the end of last year, and the selected ones were assessed as best meeting the requirements.
The Finnish company Aquaspace Finland is also involved, with a proposal based on the use of space data. The consortium is led by Sitowise Oy, and also includes Aalto University, the University of Turku, the Finnish Geospatial Research Institute FGI of the National Land Survey of Finland, and the Finnish Meteorological Institute, all of which also participate in the SpacEconomy project.
From this point onward, the procurement process will proceed in three consecutive phases, through which innovations will be refined from concepts into ready-to-use prototypes. First, the selected suppliers will develop detailed concepts for their solutions over a four-month period.
Then, the best entries in the competition will proceed to building and testing a prototype in a controlled environment. At this stage, the functionality of the solution will be verified in practice.
Finally, the prototypes will be tested and demonstrated in real-world conditions at five pilot sites across Europe. Malmi in Helsinki is one of the key test areas, particularly for solutions related to urban drought.
Helsinki benefits as one of the project’s pilot sites
Helsinki is one of the five pilot sites in the project. This means that the city will be able to test and validate cutting-edge water data management systems in real conditions. In particular, Helsinki’s Malmi area plays a key role in testing solutions related to urban drought and soil moisture monitoring. City experts act as co-developers, ensuring that the results directly support Helsinki’s strategic goals in climate change adaptation.
The solutions developed for cities and the urban pilot activities are supported by a total funding of €12 million.
In the first phase, all five selected consortia will receive €300,000 each to develop their plans. In the second phase, the three best consortia will each receive €2.4 million in funding to develop pilot solutions. In the third phase, the two best consortia will receive an additional €1.5 million each for field testing and validation, which will be carried out in all five pilot cities.
Satellite data supporting urban resilience
The PCP WISE project develops systems that utilize satellite and Earth observation data to improve cities’ resilience to climate change. The goal is to provide real-time information on the status of water resources and to predict future threats, enabling more effective preparedness and rapid response in crisis situations.
The results and plans from the first phase of the process will lay the foundation for future innovations that help Europe manage its water resources more sustainably in a changing climate.
This news article is based on a press release by Forum Virium, the City of Helsinki’s innovation company.