Periodic Reporting for period 2 - SOCIO-BEE (Wearables and droneS fOr CIty Socio-Environmental Observations and BEhavioral ChangE)
Periodo di rendicontazione: 2023-04-01 al 2024-09-30
Green Deal project SOCIO-BEE ambitions the scalable activation of changes in citizens’ behaviour in support of pro-environmental action, that may involve citizens, action groups, local sponsors, academia and policy makers in cities. The project focuses on the Air Quality (AQ) in the urban environment in Europe. Αir pollution is one of the key threats for the inhabitants of many European cities, which constitute the home of 75% of the European population i.e. a total of approximately 340 million people.
The main drivers behind air pollution is energy demand and mobility. An indicative example of the relation between mobility and pollution have been offered during the COVID-19 crisis. The forced behavioural change due to COVID-19 pandemic, showed a change in energy demand patterns and a 17% drop in CO2 emissions during the lockdown due to the reduced surface transport. Such cases provide strong indications that policy measures and human action have great potential on emission reduction.
Reducing air pollution requires technological innovation and a behavioural shift. Such changes in order to be effective on a long-term basis should rely on the collaboration between citizens and stakeholders such as businesses, volunteers and decision makers.
SOCIO-BEE is a Citizen Science project, not a project about bees. It adopts the metaphor of beehives to shape its Citizen Science approach i.e. the methodology to engage and organize all interested parties. Through an example taken from nature, the project builds on the metaphor of bee colonies to develop effective behavioural and engagement strategies with a wide range of different roles of the participants and stakeholders, namely, Queen Bees, Drone Bees, Worker Bees, and Bears, and to co-create through Citizen Hives long-lasting solutions against urban air pollution supported by emerging new technologies such as drones or wearables.
The SOCIO-BEE hives tested in three pilot sites in the cities of Zaragoza, Ancona and Maroussi, with different target population and different behavioural change challenges.
The main objectives of the project are:
1. To support air pollution reduction initiatives in cities through citizen involvement that will create long lasting effects and behavioural change.
2. Development of a low-cost wearable hardware and a Citizen Science-based web platform to allow CS Hives in the active collection of environmental data
4. To establish an open and sustainable decision-making process with a data analysis platform for the overall CS process.
5. To bridge the gaps in pollution understanding in urban environmental monitoring and remediation actions.
6. To address the data protection and privacy and other legal, ethical and societal concerns related to wearable-based air quality monitoring
7. To develop sustainable exploitation models around the SOCIO-BEE platform to ensure economic and environmental feasibility and sustainability of the overall CS platform.
The main drivers behind air pollution is energy demand and mobility. An indicative example of the relation between mobility and pollution have been offered during the COVID-19 crisis. The forced behavioural change due to COVID-19 pandemic, showed a change in energy demand patterns and a 17% drop in CO2 emissions during the lockdown due to the reduced surface transport. Such cases provide strong indications that policy measures and human action have great potential on emission reduction.
Reducing air pollution requires technological innovation and a behavioural shift. Such changes in order to be effective on a long-term basis should rely on the collaboration between citizens and stakeholders such as businesses, volunteers and decision makers.
SOCIO-BEE is a Citizen Science project, not a project about bees. It adopts the metaphor of beehives to shape its Citizen Science approach i.e. the methodology to engage and organize all interested parties. Through an example taken from nature, the project builds on the metaphor of bee colonies to develop effective behavioural and engagement strategies with a wide range of different roles of the participants and stakeholders, namely, Queen Bees, Drone Bees, Worker Bees, and Bears, and to co-create through Citizen Hives long-lasting solutions against urban air pollution supported by emerging new technologies such as drones or wearables.
The SOCIO-BEE hives tested in three pilot sites in the cities of Zaragoza, Ancona and Maroussi, with different target population and different behavioural change challenges.
The main objectives of the project are:
1. To support air pollution reduction initiatives in cities through citizen involvement that will create long lasting effects and behavioural change.
2. Development of a low-cost wearable hardware and a Citizen Science-based web platform to allow CS Hives in the active collection of environmental data
4. To establish an open and sustainable decision-making process with a data analysis platform for the overall CS process.
5. To bridge the gaps in pollution understanding in urban environmental monitoring and remediation actions.
6. To address the data protection and privacy and other legal, ethical and societal concerns related to wearable-based air quality monitoring
7. To develop sustainable exploitation models around the SOCIO-BEE platform to ensure economic and environmental feasibility and sustainability of the overall CS platform.
The project builds upon two main pillars: the engagement strategy and the technological base consisted of a prototype wearable sensor device, the web and mobile front-ends and the platform that powers the overall SOCIO-BEE solution.
In the first year of the project, the work focused on design activities for the technological base and the preliminary analyses of various potential roles in the SOCIO-BEE ecosystem.
The engagement methodology developed in the second year, as a thorough actionable approach to support the building of the Citizen Science (CS) hives at the city level. It is backed by the SOCIO-BEE Toolkit, a procedural instrument aiming in the process of building the hives.
The prototype wearable sensor device developed in the 2nd year of the project. It integrates sensors for 3 pollutants into a wearable device. The mobile and web front-ends enable the users to interact with the SOCIO-BEE platform. The platform offers the functionality to collect the AQ data, analyse and visualise them and extract insights for the entire life cycle of data.
During the third year intense work conducted for pilot planning, pilot site preparation, development of training material and definition of the pilot evaluation framework through a set of Key Performance Indicators (KPIs).
The project created nine (9) innovative outcomes:
- Co-creation and Campaign Blueprints Tool (CCBT). It enables collaborative campaign planning and citizen science project designs,
- Micro-volunteering recommendation engine (MVE). It connects volunteers to micro-actions that improve air quality, fostering local involvement and environmental accountability.
- City Pollution, Citizen Exposure, and Behaviour Analytics (CAPE). It analyses urban pollution and citizen exposure data, providing insights into behaviour patterns and supporting targeted environmental interventions and policies.
- Bee-MATE Audio-visual Crowdsourcing Tool. It allows users to capture and share images and videos related to air quality.
- The Wearable Sensor Node for AQ Measurements (WSN), a device that takes air quality measurements through wearable technology.
- The Engagement and Citizen Science Implementation Methodology (SECM). It provides structured methodologies to guide effective citizen engagement in science projects.
- The SOCIO-BEE Repository. It includes the SOCIO-BEE tools and instructional content such as the Toolkit Catalogue & Training Materials.
- Guidelines for the Evaluation of Citizen-Science Projects (GECS). It provides public authorities with structured guidelines to assess CS projects.
- The SOCIO-BEE App. It enables users to participate in data collection, view pollution levels, and receive recommendations.
The above outcomes were identified as Key Exploitable Results (KERs) of the project and their perspectives for exploitation were analysed. A joint exploitation plan for each outcome and for the complete SOCIO-BEE platform has been elaborated, aiming to specify and shape the market potential of each outcome as well as for selected combinations of them.
The project ongoing dissemination is conducted through its presence in the social media and the website. Further, we organised many targeted events such as the final event of 18 September 2024 “Empowering communities with SOCIO-BEE: a journey to sustainable engagement battling air pollution” and clustering events with sibling projects.
In the first year of the project, the work focused on design activities for the technological base and the preliminary analyses of various potential roles in the SOCIO-BEE ecosystem.
The engagement methodology developed in the second year, as a thorough actionable approach to support the building of the Citizen Science (CS) hives at the city level. It is backed by the SOCIO-BEE Toolkit, a procedural instrument aiming in the process of building the hives.
The prototype wearable sensor device developed in the 2nd year of the project. It integrates sensors for 3 pollutants into a wearable device. The mobile and web front-ends enable the users to interact with the SOCIO-BEE platform. The platform offers the functionality to collect the AQ data, analyse and visualise them and extract insights for the entire life cycle of data.
During the third year intense work conducted for pilot planning, pilot site preparation, development of training material and definition of the pilot evaluation framework through a set of Key Performance Indicators (KPIs).
The project created nine (9) innovative outcomes:
- Co-creation and Campaign Blueprints Tool (CCBT). It enables collaborative campaign planning and citizen science project designs,
- Micro-volunteering recommendation engine (MVE). It connects volunteers to micro-actions that improve air quality, fostering local involvement and environmental accountability.
- City Pollution, Citizen Exposure, and Behaviour Analytics (CAPE). It analyses urban pollution and citizen exposure data, providing insights into behaviour patterns and supporting targeted environmental interventions and policies.
- Bee-MATE Audio-visual Crowdsourcing Tool. It allows users to capture and share images and videos related to air quality.
- The Wearable Sensor Node for AQ Measurements (WSN), a device that takes air quality measurements through wearable technology.
- The Engagement and Citizen Science Implementation Methodology (SECM). It provides structured methodologies to guide effective citizen engagement in science projects.
- The SOCIO-BEE Repository. It includes the SOCIO-BEE tools and instructional content such as the Toolkit Catalogue & Training Materials.
- Guidelines for the Evaluation of Citizen-Science Projects (GECS). It provides public authorities with structured guidelines to assess CS projects.
- The SOCIO-BEE App. It enables users to participate in data collection, view pollution levels, and receive recommendations.
The above outcomes were identified as Key Exploitable Results (KERs) of the project and their perspectives for exploitation were analysed. A joint exploitation plan for each outcome and for the complete SOCIO-BEE platform has been elaborated, aiming to specify and shape the market potential of each outcome as well as for selected combinations of them.
The project ongoing dissemination is conducted through its presence in the social media and the website. Further, we organised many targeted events such as the final event of 18 September 2024 “Empowering communities with SOCIO-BEE: a journey to sustainable engagement battling air pollution” and clustering events with sibling projects.
The SOCIO-BEE vision is to integrate all supporting technologies and engagement strategies to motivate citizens to co-create and co-execute air pollution monitoring campaigns, while driving the behavioural change to reduce air pollution.
It is lifetime the project developed and validated in three pilot sites the abovementioned innovative outcomes, which consist steps beyond the state of the art.
The project impacts cover a wide spectrum of societal implications as follows:
a. Development and strengthening of citizen science initiatives to activate and engage citizens in the collection of environmental data.
b. Provision of the means to access personalized information to citizens and consumers about their environmental impact.
c. A better monitoring of the environment by embedding citizen science projects in the public decision process.
d. Facilitation of behavioural change processes on the part of citizens, consumers and communities towards more sustainable patterns in reducing their carbon and environmental footprint, changing their consumption and lifestyle choices.
It is lifetime the project developed and validated in three pilot sites the abovementioned innovative outcomes, which consist steps beyond the state of the art.
The project impacts cover a wide spectrum of societal implications as follows:
a. Development and strengthening of citizen science initiatives to activate and engage citizens in the collection of environmental data.
b. Provision of the means to access personalized information to citizens and consumers about their environmental impact.
c. A better monitoring of the environment by embedding citizen science projects in the public decision process.
d. Facilitation of behavioural change processes on the part of citizens, consumers and communities towards more sustainable patterns in reducing their carbon and environmental footprint, changing their consumption and lifestyle choices.