An innovative design platform that facilitates the analysis and mapping of massive volumes of twitter data in near real-time to support emergency response activities during flooding disasters has won the 2nd edition of the Australia-Netherlands Water Challenge.
The solution called "Operational Twitelligence" by a team of students from RMIT and the University of Melbourne was presented at the International Riversymposium in Brisbane on 25 September. The team consisting of Paul Munro, Dan Peade and Damian Meoli competed for the award against three other teams who had emerged as finalists after a 5-month competition that involved students from 9 universities across Australia. The award was presented to the winners by Julie McLellan, CEO of Healthy Waterways and chair of the judging panel.
A prominent group of organisations from the Dutch water sector is announcing the first Indonesia-Netherlands Water Challenge.
Under the theme Coasts & Ports Indonesia: People, Planet & Profit, the program aims to engage young Indonesian talent with the important challenges of sustainable coast and port development in their country. They will be given the opportunity to contribute their own ideas and develop these together with professional experts from the Dutch experts.
Lead partners of the challenge are Van Oord, BAM International, Deltares and Royal HaskoningDHV. They will each take ownership of a specific topic, related to their area of expertise, and support the student teams to develop and present their ideas.
Singapore/Amsterdam, 28 May 2013
After six months of competition, two winners have been announced of the 2nd Singapore-Netherlands Water Challenge: Mr. Yorick Broekema, Masters student at TU Delft and a team from Hong Kong consisting of Leng Ling, Fan Jingyu, Wu Junhao and Lu Ka Kit.
In his proposal on The Use of Blue Energy in a Delta Environment, Yorick Broekema explores the potential of generating blue energy by using excess flood water. He evaluates the applicability and value of his ideas for Singapore and the Netherlands, considering the specific circumstances in both countries. Yorick is currently enrolled in the NUS/TU Delft double degree program in Water Resources Management en Hydraulic Engineering.
Brisbane/Amsterdam, 15 May 2013
The 2nd Australia-Netherlands Water Challenge kicked-off under the theme Australia Water Smart. The Australia-wide campus promotion campaign was launched at the University of Queensland today, attended by more than 30 students from the IWC Masters of Integrated Water Management program.
Buiding on the success of last year, the Challenge aims to actively engage young talent with the cooperation between the water sectors of Australia and the Netherlands.
A key area in which Australia and the Netherlands are interested to work together is building a strong information chain for water and climate related problems. This chain consists of data collection, data processing, data storage, data analysis and modelling and the development of smart applications to support decision-making for water managers, policy makers, citizens, farmers, etc.
Several cooperative initiatives are already underway between Australian and Dutch organisations to establish this information chain, building on platforms such as HydroNET (www.hydronet.com) and Delft-FEWS (www.delft-fews.com).
The Challenge is inviting ideas that focus on two specific dimensions of this information chain:
(1) The collection of data through social media (crowd-sourcing), and
(2) The development of smart decision-support applications (water apps)
More details and the Call for Entries at: www.hollandwaterchallenge.nl/Australia
The 2nd Australia-Netherlands Water Challenge is an integral part of the joint market strategy of the Dutch water sector under the Partners for International Business (PIB) program, supported by:
Singapore, 20 November 2012
The 2nd Singapore-Netherlands Water Challenge, going under the theme of Adaptive Solutions for Climate Change, has clearly struck a chord with the next generation of water leaders.
Abstracts outlining innovative solutions were submitted by students and young researchers from around the world, including Hong Kong, Singapore, the Netherlands, India, Malaysia and Australia. The proposed solutions cover a broad range of topics, including flood resilience, water scarcity, water treatment, blue energy and urban development.
After a thorough review by an expert committee, ten promising ideas have been selected to be further developed in the next round of the challenge.
During the next phase, the BlueSpring Water Community platform provides participants a dedicated and secure "workspace" that gives them direct access to a team of professionals experts who can support them with advice.
Deadline for submission of full proposals is 15 February 2013. The Grand Final is expected to take place in Singapore in April 2013.
