Final Report Summary - STREAM (Sustainable technologies and research for European aquatic management)
Executive summary:
The STREAM project aimed to bridge the gap between research, policy and industry by bringing water technologies to the interest of potential uptakers through a diversified series of dissemination and communication actions tailored to the needs of the different categories of stakeholders.
The STREAM project has mediated with the coordinators of 439 projects from the main European support programmes (Sixth Framework Programme (FP6), FP7, LIFE, LIFE+, INTERREG and CIP; started after 1 January 2006) to draft easy-to-read factsheets providing concise information on their projects accessible for all stakeholders. This resulted in 140 research project factsheets that were provided by these projects and that form the basis for the activities of STREAM to disseminate the results of European projects on water, including:
- An e-learning course consisting of modules on European Union (EU) legislation, Innovation and Research and concluded with a final self-assessment module. This e-learning program provided a selection of learning material supported with videos and presentations in an interactive learning platform and attracted about 50 % researchers from universities, private companies and public agencies and 50 % equally divided among policy advisors and project managers.
- Summer schools which focused on bringing young researchers together with participants of SMEs to discuss European research efforts on water.
- Policy Seminars which focused on bringing together researchers and politicians to make sure politicians are able to base their activities on the latest research results and research is policy driven. The topics were on 'Urban water management' 'Innovative technologies to reduce water consumption' and 'Climate change and flood risk management'. Each of the seminars attracted participants from (EU and national) policy, researchers and business representatives. the seminars were concluded with a final conference.
- Audiovisual production: A selection of EU water research projects were supported by developing short videos that provide easily-accessible communication of the projects outcomes. A series of interviews were organised with water experts, especially those involved in water research projects. Conferences of selected EU projects on water research were broadcast live on the internet in the form of webinars to allow for a much broader audience.
- Policy factsheets were prepared to give an easy-to-read overview of EU policies, which are crucial for research and business activities. These policy factsheets were further developed to include an overview of the impacts of the policies on industry. The factsheets were distributed to policy makers and policy implementers, among others using WISE-RTD.
- The website and social media pages were the backbone of the communication. In order to reach a wide audience, further dissemination was done by newsletters to a wide number of e-mail contacts including the various categories of stakeholders: policymakers, researchers, industry, science communication and media and by utilising social media tools (Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, YouTube).
The results and recommendations of STREAM were published at the end of the project as the roadmap for uptake of EU water research in policy and industry prepared in collaboration with the other two science policy interfacing (SPI) water cluster projects STEP-WISE and WATERDISS2.0.
This publishable summary gives a more detailed overview of the results and impact achieved by the STREAM project.
Project context and objectives:
The EU has invested considerable resources over the last decade to support the development of water technologies. As it often is the case with innovative technologies, there are currently few resources to pursue this process in the needed scale, and the uptake potential of water technologies and other environmental technologies resulting from EU-funded research seems limited due to insufficient awareness of their developments and the opportunities they offer. Raising awareness among researchers, policy makers, businessmen and industries, as well as the large public (young people in particular) is paramount to the full exploitation of these technologies which are able to boost economic growth and social welfare.
The STREAM project aimed to tackle this issue by bringing water technologies to the interest of potential uptakers through a diversified series of dissemination and communication actions tailored to the needs of the different categories of stakeholders. These include 3 policy seminars and a final symposium at the European Parliament in Brussels, 2 summer schools, e-learning course composed of 4 modules on policy, research, innovation and self-assessment, audiovisual materials, including 5 videos and 10 interviews, 7 webinars for research events and participation in sectorial events. A web platform was set up from the very start of the project serving as a repository for all its activities and for the updated documentation material on latest research and policy progress in the field of water.
A group of highly qualified actors were involved in such an ambitious project to perform all variety of activities foreseen: STREAM consortium gathered partners with specific capabilities and backgrounds and established relations in the field, like specialists in water issues, experts in communicating science and carrying out innovative dissemination activities to transfer the knowledge gathered to the target audiences.
The STREAM project aimed in general at reducing the gap between research on water, policy making and industry, by bringing together actors from these three most relevant stakeholders in knowledge exchange dedicated events but also through target knowledge sharing experiences such as e-learning addressed to the three groups and summer schools addressed especially to researchers and industry / small and medium-sized enterprise (SME).
Three main stakeholders groups were the targets of STREAM: young researchers, SMEs / businesses and policy makers.
- Policy makers need to be provided with clear-easy-quick information on the current and future challenges and the available technologies to implement new policies and legislation.
- Researchers need to be aware of recent research to avoid duplication, join efforts at EU level and enable continuous progress of the knowledge base. A link needs to be established with the politicians to ensure a policy-driven approach in their research.
SMEs / businesses are the main up-takers and developers of new water technologies; they have an urgency to be aware of the latest research results and policy developments and they need to take active part in the conception of new technologies.
- Finally, water consumers need to be aware of the latest developments in water technology that could affect their everyday life and influence decision making processes.
Considering the needs of specific stakeholders, STREAM objectives have been set as the following:
(a) to identify a relevant number of actual research and technological developments on water. STREAM focused on the results of projects under the FP6 and FP7 programmes, but also under other European programmes as well (LIFE+, CIP, EIP, EUREKA, COST, ERANET);
(b) to improve the dissemination of the results of water-related research among all stakeholders and to facilitate their uptake;
(c) to foster a better coordination between policy level, research sector and business sector to contribute shaping an even more research-based policy and policy-driven research;
(d) to raise awareness among all stakeholders on the need of actively disseminating these results and work together for their implementation, thus by contributing to address Europe's water challenges.
STREAM aimed to contribute to the following indirect objectives in the long run:
(a) to develop and implement policies and technologies to lower water consumption by consumers and industry;
(b) to stimulate the adoption of new technologies to lower water consumption in agriculture and to set the policies in order to facilitate the efficient use of water in agriculture and the uptake of enabling technologies;
(c) to promote policy guidelines to improve water management systems in urban areas, improving the efficiency of existing infrastructures.
Project results:
Work package (WP)2: The showcase of water technologies and dissemination activities
This WP covered communication and dissemination activities to promote the STREAM activities and ensure the visibility of the project, as well as using the necessary tools and actions to provide dissemination support to the EU-funded water research projects. A detailed communication and dissemination plan was strategically developed at the beginning of the project and defined the action plan for all the activities foreseen in the framework of this WP.
A web platform (see http://www.stream-project.eu online) was set up from the very start of the project serving as a repository for all its activities and for the updated documentation material on latest research and policy progress in the field of water. The website worked in close connection with the social media pages led by STREAM to attract the stakeholders to the online repository.
The website used the key features such as news section disseminating STREAM news as well as EU-funded water research project news, photo galleries (including photos from the realised activities), programmes of events (with PowerPoint presentations, recordings and short biographies of speakers that can be easily downloaded), audio-visual materials (videos, interviews and webinars produced in the framework of the project), registration forms to STREAM activities. The Media corner provided all kinds of communication materials of the project as well as press releases, news and photos from STREAM events that are of interest to media and stakeholders. The website was regularly updated with the newly produced and revised STREAM research projects factsheets and STREAM policy factsheets. The website hosted the webinars organised by STREAM and provided link to the STREAM E-learning platform.
With all these features, the STREAM website allowed users to get information and download all relevant material about the activities realised and events organised by the project, as well as accessing the updated information about the EU water research projects.
STREAM offered its online newsroom facility (integrating the website, quarterly digital newsletter and social media channels) to the EU funded water research projects as a tool for the dissemination of their information and results. Throughout the project, STREAM assisted many projects to promote the events or results with the integrated use of these online tools.
Besides the online tools, STREAM project also utilised basic communication and dissemination tools such as project logo, PowerPoint template, project leaflet, poster, roll-up, project folder, participants kit and A4 promotional sheets for specific STREAM events.
The STREAM communication and dissemination actions were well linked to the SPI-Water Cluster: STREAM, STEP-WISE and WaterDiss2.0 projects collaborated in several events to create a platform to promote the EU water research results.
The STREAM project, throughout its timeline, established a network of contacts including a diversity of stakeholders targeted by the project such as research centres and universities, industries and SMEs, policymakers and EU water research projects. This also included the media specialised in scientific issues, as well as the general media in different EU countries. The STREAM messages regularly reached the stakeholders through press releases and newsletters and plus others through social media channels.
In achieving its target of increasing the uptake of EU water research in policy and industry, STREAM created synergies among different projects and between different stakeholders during its communication and dissemination activities.
A continuity study for the sustainability of the results achieved by STREAM was also a part of this WP. At the final stage of the project, the 'Roadmap for uptake of eu water research in policy and industry' was developed together with the other two SPI water cluster projects with a nice layout and distributed during the European Parliament session of the final conference on 4 December 2012.
The STREAM website and STREAM E-learning platform will stay online at least for the upcoming 2 years following the end of the project and all factsheets and videos produced by STREAM were made accessible and downloadable also from the WISE-RTD website for ensuring long term continuity.
WP3: European water technology and research watch
The 'European water technology and research watch' was the main investigation and observation body of STREAM to gather the content to be disseminated through the communication channels set up in the dissemination WP.
During the two years of the STREAM project a list of all projects on research and water started in the main EU funding programmes (including FP6, FP7, LIFE, LIFE+, CIP, Eureka, Cost, JRC and Interreg) was compiled which at the end of the project included a total of 420 projects.
In three phases, these projects were contacted with a specifically designed questionnaire to develop factsheets with concise and up to date information. Throughout the duration of the project STREAM gathered a total of 140 questionnaires and transformed them into factsheets which were used for dissemination in the other WPs.
The action of sending questionnaires and editing factsheets was done in three rounds; the first round started on June 2011 and ended on January 2012, the second round started in February ending on May 2012 and the third round started in August and ended onn October 2012. Also the list of projects was reviewed and updated every round and coordinators were asked to update earlier provided information. The results of the first year of the project were evaluated in the beginning of 2012, resulting in little changes in the work, e.g. the questionnaires were better organised for the second round.
At the start of the project, the intention was to request the identified state-of-the-art projects to provide a targeted message for each of the projects. As explained in the year reports however, it proved inefficient and impossible both to select state-of-the-art projects and to target the message of each project to the three stakeholder groups (business, politicians and research sector). Instead, therefore, the dissemination activities (e-learning, audiovisual material, summer schools and policy seminars) were used to both require the project coordinators to target their message at the audience of these activities and provide them with the chance to give this message to a gathered group of stakeholders.
Overall, the European Water Technology and Research Watch has been successful in:
(a) gathering up-to-date research results in a single database. The response of 30 % can be considered quite high seeing the fact that a large number of the projects were already finalised, and there was no financial reimbursement for the time the project coordinators had to spend on the questionnaires;
(b) providing the projects that did send in questionnaires with further opportunities to disseminate their results via STREAM tools and actions in a tailored manner towards their stakeholders;
(c) effectively transferring the research results to participants of STREAM training activities such as e-learning and summer school.
Apart from being used in the other STREAM WPs, the 140 STREAM research projects factsheets created at the end of the process were made available online on the STREAM website, which will stay open at least until 2 years after the end of the STREAM project. Furthermore, the information included in these factsheets will continue to be available online on the WISE-RTD platform. Therefore the sustainability of the information is ensured. Logically however, the updating of the information will be up to project coordinators and future updating work to be done at the WISE-RTD platform. See also the roadmap for uptake of EU research in policy and industry.
At the start of the project the STREAM scientific advisory committee was set up. In the first year this scientific advisory committee was used to select the state-of-the-art projects from those that had sent their questionnaires in the first round and identify which projects would have the most impact on business, research or politics. The messages of these projects would then be shared with these specific audiences using the STREAM tools like summer schools, policy seminars, etc.
After the first year, this process has been evaluated and it was decided that this approach was impractical and not efficient. First of all, this is because most projects have different messages and do not focus on one of the specific STREAM target groups alone. Secondly, within the framework of STREAM, the tools to be used were 'pre-defined', meaning that the topics of the summer schools, the policy seminars and the e-learning courses were already defined in the proposal phase. Thirdly, there is a limited amount of 'tools' available and STREAM could not give a place to everybody within the remaining planned activities: 2 policy seminars, one e-learning course and one summer school, already on pre-defined topics, limiting the outreach we can achieve. Lastly, the EU projects are already evaluated on their being 'state of the art' during the evaluation of the project proposals. Evaluating whether they are state of the art by the STREAM experts therefore leads more to an evaluation of the progress already achieved, which is unfair to projects recently started. This has been reported in the first year report of STREAM.
Taking these four points into account, the approach of STREAM was discussed within the consortium and changed during the second 'investigation phase'. Instead of generating information on the projects and selecting the state-of-art (by SAC), STREAM asked them to target their message by offering them the use of the STREAM tools and called the projects that fitted the topic of the e-learning, summer school or policy seminar to take part in these tools so that they can spread the message to the audience of these tools. By predefining the audience of these activities, the projects had to target their message to these audiences.
All STREAM research projects factsheets are available here: http://www.stream-project.eu/water-technology-watch/research-projects-factsheets
WP4: The European water policy observatory and policy seminars
WP4 of STREAM included two main elements: First, the European Water Policy Observatory, which focused on gathering information on the European legislation and policies related to water and water technologies and preparing the information to be disseminated in an easily comprehensible way, targeted to each stakeholder group. The second element was the organisation of four policy seminars, including the final event in the European Parliament. These events aimed to bring the research and policy sectors together to promote effective and efficient cooperation.
In the first year of the project, a set of policy factsheets was set up which list concisely the most important information on each EU policy related to water. Each factsheet contains the objective of a policy, its background, a summary of the contents of the policy and provides links to find more detailed information. The factsheets were updated with the most recent information on two occasions during the project, the last being in October 2012.
All STREAM policy factsheets are available here: http://www.stream-project.eu/water-policy-observatory/policy-factsheets
These factsheets were used as background information and learning material in the E-learning (specifically the module on legislation), the summer schools and the policy seminars.
Throughout the project, three policy seminars were organised and one final seminar at the European Parliament as part of the STREAM final conference organised together with the STEP-WISE project. The three policy seminars were:
- November 2011, Amsterdam, 'State of the Art in Urban Water Management'
- March 2012, Marseille, 'Innovative Technologies to Reduce Consumption'
- December 2012, Brussels, 'The Climate Change Challenges and Managing Flood Risks in Member States'.
Detailed reports of these seminars were given in deliverables 4.2 4.3 and 4.4. The three policy seminars together attracted a total of 90 participants. The second seminar during the World Water Forum in Marseille suffered from the large competition for participants at the Forum and the location of the room provided by the organisation and only attracted around 20 participants.
WP5: Summer schools
The results achieved in WP5 are related to the entire process of conception, design, preparation, and implementation and follow up of the 2 summer school courses that have been specifically addressed to higher education students, young researchers in water technology and other stakeholders linked with water SME.
Being one of the core activities of the project, both summer schools have been held by prestigious institutions, able to host and welcome the students from different European countries and assuring the smooth preparation and implementation of the courses.
The 1st Summer School has been hosted by the Agency for Competitiveness in Catalonia (ACC1Ó) - from 26 to 30 September 2011 in Barcelona. The 2nd STREAM summer school has been hosted by Roma TRE University from 24 to 28 September 2012 in Rome and sponsored by ENEA, BIC Lazio and CNR - IRSA.
Both summer schools have been organised as short courses of 1 full week (five working days-excluding travels) with a total of up to 50 participants, from different European countries selected from all the requests received during the application campaign.
All the participants had the possibility and opportunity to interact and share experiences and activities with high level experts in the thematic.
Results, in terms of science and technology (S&T) achievements, are measurable in terms of opportunity to share a 'consensus' around the issues of water, both from a technological and policy aspect and involving local actors and international water technologies stakeholders. Both courses had a practical hands-on approach and stimulated further cooperation among students also in the aftermaths: 2 FP7 projects conceived during the first summer school have been submitted in March 2012 and 2 FP7 Projects conceived during the second summer school were under submission in January 2013.
The speakers recruited for both summer schools have addressed and therefore stimulated discussion about S&T water related topics - wide range of issues covered by the programme, stimulating participation and discussion among the participants and exposing them to speeches and presentations divided in 3 main modules:
- Module 1: Water management, governance and policy
- Module 2: Innovative water technologies
- Module 3: Research and innovation support to young researchers and SMEs.
During the 2 summer schools participants have joined both theoretical and practical scientific sessions. In Spain they visited Fundació CTM Centre Tecnològic facilities in Manresa, Aigues de Manresa - the Water Public Authority in Manresa and the most important desalination plant in Europe located in Llobregat. During the 2nd, 3rd and 4th days of the second summer school in Rome, they went to visit ENEA laboratories in Casaccia, Business Innovation Center in Colleferro and CNR laboratories in Montelibretti. The last day of the 1st summer school has stimulated discussion among all participants and 4 workgroups have been created. Each group has worked on a project idea, presenting results to the class and discussing them together.
Speakers of the last day of the 2nd Summer School presented concepts, methodologies and tools for developing and improving their ideas. Particular attention has been put on intellectual property rights (IPR), technology transfer and green business instruments for companies.
WP6: E-learning course
The STREAM e-learning course aimed at explaining and disseminating the main themes related to water management through providing updated contents and knowledge in the fields of: EU legislations, research results and innovative technologies developed and applied for sustainable use of water resources.
The e-learning course has been applied as complementary communication tool in the framework of STREAM project addressed at raising awareness on the state of the art of water technologies research and at bringing it to the interest of policy makers and potential up-takers.
To this end, the course involved different typologies of stakeholders (including higher education students, young researchers, representatives of industries and other types of stakeholders) and allowed them working together to share their different perspectives and exchange experiences and knowledge. The expected impact was to bridge the communication gap between the policy makers, researchers and industry sectors. According to this, participants of the e-learning course were not necessarily required to be specialists of water research, but might needed to get a sound overview of water research developments and water management related issues across Europe or at least worked in water management and innovation sectors.
The course has been delivered following this calendar:
- 1st Module EU legislations, delivered from November 2011 to February 2012 addressed to introduce EU water legislations providing EU official documents and STREAM Policy Factsheets.
- 2nd Module Research results, delivered from March 2012 to April 2012 addressed to illustrate updated research results in the field of reducing water consumption and using water resources in a sustainable way by the use of STREAM research projects factsheets and with the contribution of research project coordinators, who were available to answer questions from course participants.
- 3rd module innovation and new technologies, delivered from May 2012 to June 2012 addressed to illustrate innovative and new technologies in water with particular attention on how to overcome barriers to bring them into the market (in collaboration with the INNOWATER project).
- 4th module problem based activity for self-assessment, implemented from September 2012 to November 2012 specifically addressed to allow participants working together based on the simulation of research projects design trying to apply what they have learned.
The course was uploaded on a MOODLE platform through which the course has been designed, organised and delivered. The MOODLE tool was used to make participants working together and specific solutions were adopted:
(a) tests (in particular in the Policy module);
(b) FORUM sessions (applied in the policy, research, innovation and in the final practical project based activity) where participants have been able to discuss and to share ideas, opinions and experiences;
(c) wIKIs collaborative working space (applied in the policy, research, innovation and in the final practical project based activity) where participants have been able to write together brief documents as final outcome for each module;
(d) CHAT tool for online synchronous discussion applied in the 4th final module to allow participants having direct and quick communication among them.
The learning contents provided were mainly:
(a) 2 power point presentations, (one provided in the policy module and the other one in the Innovation module);
(b) 10 video presentations (recorded during the first policy seminar and provided in the research module);
(c) 11 video lectures (delivered by INNOWATER experts and provided in the innovation module);
(d) 19 official documents from the European Commission (EC) (in particular provided in the policy module);
(e) 18 STREAM policy factsheets (provided in the policy module through direct link to STREAM website);
(f) 55 STREAM research project factsheets (provided in the Research module);
(g) Several direct links to EC websites related to water sector.
The e-learning course was applied as communication tool and thus it has been carried out in a tight cooperation with the other STREAM activities (such as summer schools in which some participants of the e-learning course attended at), as well as in collaboration with other research projects (firstly with STEP-WISE but also with other project coordinators of running projects in the field of water).
Special mention shall be given to the collaboration with STEP-WISE project that has been smooth and fruitful for the implementation of both e-learning course (STREAM course and WISE-RTD portal course). In particular, the collaboration was based on a 'win-win relation': The WISE-RTD Portal has been introduced to STREAM e-learning participants as useful digital library where participants could find additional or further contents and the e-learning course uploaded on it was useful for STREAM participants on order to learn how to use the WISE-RTD portal.
As additional value of this collaboration, STREAM e-learning participants provided qualitative comments and feedback on the usability of the WISE-RTD portal and its tutorial exercise to STEP-WISE partners.
The total amount of participants registered for the STREAM e-learning course was of 87 people of whom 20 participants attended the entire course and did the final module based on group work and self-assessment.
The outcomes of participants according to each module have been the following:
- 1st module EU legislations: participants were divided in two groups and each group developed one complete brief document.
- 2nd module research results: participants were divided in 6 groups according to water sectors of their interest, they were asked to choose one project and try to design a follow up project. 4 of the 6 groups developed 9 brief documents.
- 3rd module Innovation and new technologies module: participants were divided in 4 groups. Only 1 group managed to design a complete brief document.
- 4th module Project based work: participants were divided in 3 groups, they were asked to work together in a simulation activity focused on the design of a research project based on European needs in water sector. Only 1 group managed to fulfil this task; however the other groups asked to leave the platform open and available because they wanted to work on it even beyond the end of the module.
WP7: Interactive audiovisual production
The audiovisual materials in traditional and interactive format are one of the significant tools to support dissemination activities. Under this WP 'Interactive materials' were developed in the form of 'webinars', whereas 'traditional audiovisual materials' are produced in the form of project videos and interviews with water experts.
Within this framework, STREAM produced:
(a) 5 videos of 5 minutes to inform about 5 flagship projects on water technologies;
(b) 11 interviews with water technologies and policies experts;
(c) 3 interactive webinars organised in the occasion of a high level seminar or conference on water technologies planned by other EU funded projects.
All audiovisual production is available at: www.stream-project.eu/audiovisual/audiovisual-production
STREAM has produced videos for the following 5 selected projects: (1) INNOWATER is a competitiveness and innovation FP (CIP)-funded project aiming to establish and implement a water innovation partnership that develops and tests new and better innovation support tools and delivery mechanisms for innovative SMEs and first-user industries. Shootings of interviews were made on 17 June 2011 at the offices of European Water Partnership in Brussels during a project meeting.
(2) AQUAFIT4USE is an FP7 project aiming at making industries more independent of the supply of fresh drinking water for their production processes and obtaining water qualities that are tailored to suit product and process demands and quality standards, in other words 'water fit-for-use'. Shootings of interviews were made on 13 - 14 September 2011 in Munich during the project WPs meeting and onsite visit to Trostberg papermill.
(3) AQUAREHAB is an FP7-funded project aiming at developing rehabilitation technologies and approaches for multipressured degraded waters and the integration of their impact on river basin management. Shootings of interviews were made on 15 November at VITO premises in Mol, on 16 November during the pilot injection in Aarschot and 23 November in Munich during a project meeting.
(4) SIRIUS is an FP7 project which aims at developing satellite-assisted services for efficient water resources management in support of food production in water-scarce environments. Shootings of interviews were made on 4 - 6 June 2012 in Manisa and Izmir cities of Turkey. The occasion was the SIRIUS local stakeholder workshop. Therefore, it was possible to interview both the SIRIUS partners and stakeholders (public officials, farmers, irrigation associations).
(5) TRUST is an FP7 project aiming to research innovations and tools for urban water services to create a more sustainable, low-carbon water future. Shootings of interviews were made on 4 - 5 October 2012 in Basel, Switzerland during the TRUST workshop sustainability roadmap where all TRUST member cities were present.
The selection was made to provide this dissemination support to projects addressing diverse topics of water research, having large impact for industry and consumers and being at an advanced stage so that they have concrete results to disseminate but still having some years to go, in order to be able to benefit longer from the audiovisual material.
Besides project videos, 42 interviews with water experts were realised during the two years of the project and among them 11 were selected to be produced and made available on the STREAM website.
Videos presenting project results are an efficient tool to transform scientific content into an easily understandable format, while interviews with water experts provide an exchange of opinions. In the videos, the shootings realised in laboratories, pilot areas and implementations are accompanied with a story based on interviews with a simple language. On the other hand, the interactive webinars give the event access to a larger public, facilitate live interaction, further access and larger dissemination of results.
The main dissemination tool for the audio-visual production of STREAM was its website and YouTube channel.
The videos produced were submitted to several water film festivals and web portals such as:
- the water channel (around 800 views per video until the end of 2012): http://thewaterchannel.tv/
- reel Water Film Festival 2012: http://reelwaterfilmfest.org/
- choices from the Waters Film Festival 2012: http://www.voicesfromthewaters.com .
(The films were not selected for screening during these two festivals)
In addition, the videos produced by STREAM were shown during the following water related events:
- At the EC booth during the 6th World Water Forum, Marseille, March 2012
- At the STREAM Satellite event 'FILM SESSION: Water technologies transfer from research to policy and industry', during the Green Week, Brussels, May 2012
- At the STREAM room of the SPI-Water Cluster training sessions during the 2nd CIS-SPI 'Water Science Meets Policy' event, Brussels, November 2012
- At the video corner during the STEP-WISE and STREAM Final Conference, Brussels, December 2012.
STREAM found it important to benefit from the dissemination opportunities provided by major water related events. For example in 2012, the annual Green Week took place from the 22nd to the 25th of May in Brussels with the theme 'The Water Challenge - Every Drop Counts' and on 23 May the STREAM project organised a satellite event entitled 'Film session: Water technologies transfer from research to policy and industry' to show films of EU water research projects supported by STREAM. This event, which has been selected together with 10 other satellite events in Brussels and 50 all over Europe, aimed at showing 5 project videos from different water research projects: INNOWATER, AQUAREHAB, BIOFRESH, IMPRINTS, and AQUAFIT4USE. After each video, the audience had the chance to directly ask the project representatives for questions, especially on how the water research technologies can be further used by policy makers and industries. Therefore a very interesting and lively discussion on video production and its dissemination potential to involve and reach the general public was undertaken. This event was realised to disseminate not only project videos produced by STREAM, but also other videos on water research projects such as BIOFRESH and IMPRINTS. These videos were submitted to the contest organised by STREAM among water research projects to benefit from the video dissemination opportunity during this session in the Green Week.
This session organised in an informal atmosphere within the framework of a highly attended event and gathered several projects together proved that creating synergies among different projects and using a common dissemination opportunity for several project results can be interesting and effective.
Besides videos and interviews, STREAM provided webinar support to 3 major events of selected EU water research projects:
- PREPARED project: Alliance Forum meetings on 14 May 2012, in the framework of the International World Congress on Water, Climate and Energy, Dublin, Ireland. (followed by 62 online viewers).
- IMPRINTS project: 'Implementing the EU Flood Directive in Flash Prone Areas' on 27 September 2012, Brussels, Belgium (followed by 60 online viewers).
- NOVIWAM project: 'Water Resources Management - Adaptation to Climate Changes' on 15 October 2012, Limassol, Cyprus (followed by 52 online viewers).
All the webinars were widely promoted by the STREAM project starting from a few weeks before the webinar to attract the interested participants. The selected projects also announced the webinar throughout their own networks.
The webinars were first made available live during the events and then recordings of the sessions were uploaded on the STREAM website for further viewing after the events.
The main opportunity provided by the webinars to online participants was the possibility to watch the speakers along with the presentations, the possibility to download meeting documents and to be able to ask questions and join the interactive debate. STREAM has received positive feedbacks from the projects about the effectiveness of the webinar tool. The interaction with the online audience is still an aspect that should be further encouraged and improved as generally online participants do not ask questions or make comments through the webinar although this opportunity was provided in all STREAM webinars.
Potential impact:
Collection of data about the EU water research results
The work of the STREAM project in WP3 resulted in a large database of up-to-date information on recent European research projects on water. As outlined in the STREAM continuity study (roadmap) it is of the highest importance that one repository of concise and up to date information on European research projects is set up and maintained. The STREAM project developed a 2 page research projects factsheet template including the main information and gathered this information in one central place for around 30 % of the projects of the last 6 years.
These factsheets have also proven their worth in the other dissemination and training activities of STREAM, like the E-learning, the summer schools and the policy seminars. Participants in these activities value the easy and accessible overview of ongoing and recent projects.
This work provides a good basis to further develop the required central database. The WISE-RTD website could provide the central point, where the STREAM factsheets have already been uploaded. However, for this information to remain updated, it is crucial that the providing of information and regular updating is made mandatory for the Project Coordinators and can be covered by the project budgets. If the provision of updated information is not made mandatory by the EC, a large number of project coordinators will not provide the information for lack of time or budgets.
The approach to ask project coordinators to target the messages from their projects to the respective audiences in activities like the summer schools, the e-learning modules and the policy seminars proved to be a strong approach to promote focused discussions between projects and stakeholders on a specific topic. Especially in the policy seminars it however proved difficult to reach a large number of stakeholders due to the large competition of the enormous amount of water-related events.
During the work in WP3 the main contacts were between STREAM and the Project Coordinators of the EU projects. In total 420 projects were contacted on a minimum of three occasions. 30% of these replied with a filled in questionnaire. A reply rate of 30 % can be considered quite high, seeing the fact that a large number of projects had already ended and therefore the Project Coordinator was either working on other topics or not employed by the same organisation anymore and seeing the fact that we could not provide reimbursement for extra efforts within the normally already tight project budgets.
Dissemination of research results with training activities and policy seminars
1st summer school has gathered a total of 21 participants from the EU, as well as its associate and neighbouring countries. Researchers, SMEs, water practitioners and stakeholders have discussed and shared best practices on water and environmental technologies with 28 experts coming from the following important EU research centres, companies and organisations, as well as the EC: Gate2Growth, Gencat, Politecnico di Torino, IRTA, ACC1Ó, Amphos21, CTM, ICRA, REDINN, SOST, AGBAR, CENTA, CSIC, WssTP and CWP.
2nd summer school has gathered a total of 30 participants that have discussed and shared best practices on water and environmental technologies with 27 experts coming from the following important EU research centres, companies and organisations, as well as the EC: ENEA, BIC Lazio, IRSA - CNR, CERTE, CTM, SOST, Leeds Metropolitan University, Hydroscan, Watercycle Waterschap Vallei & Veluwe, OSV srl, Laboratorio di Scienze della cittadinanza Rome, Simploil srl, Enrico Mattei and Euro - Mediterranean Centre for Climate Change. The 2nd summer school also represented an opportunity to share consensus about water with project coordinators of other water research projects: during the first day of the course STEP-WISE, CB-WR-MED, WATERBEE, XEROCHORE, EPI-WATER AND WATER2ADAPT were presented by each respective project coordinator to share their experiences with summer school participants and exchange ideas with them in an interactive manner. A mailing list of participants and a Facebook group has been created and will be used to keep participants of both schools informed about future initiatives.
E-learning course attracted a total of 138 registrations even if only 87 people were really interested and motivated to attend the entire course. All participants were advanced learners, who had background of high level studies in water (PhDs, universities researchers, professors) and/or active in water policies and innovation technology (national or local policy decision makers, industry representatives). The profiles of participants were:
(a) around 51 % researchers or PhD students;
(b) around 14 % policy advisors;
(c) around 12 % project managers;
(d) remaining 23 % with diversified profiles, all of them being active in water management and use.
The lessons learned from the application of the e-learning course as communication tool, thanks to the implementation of STREAM e-learning course, are the following:
- Due to the fact that the courses was free for all, the modules have to be designed in a way to keep the level of the engagement of the participants always high, meaning providing learning and dissemination contents while fostering the share of ideas and experience among participants through collaborative tools (FORUM and WIKI).
- Tutors have to give assignments and deadlines in order to guide and motivate participants in working together and providing inputs, but in the same time tutors should be flexible to give extension of deadlines since participants have their professional life with busy schedules and sometime they have other priorities and have no time to enter in the platform and contribute with feedback.
- E-learning courses provide 'space' and 'moment' in which different stakeholders can meet, discuss, create a dialogue and exchange experiences, knowledge and expertise.
- Contents, activities, assignments have to be always relevant to participants' job activity and to be adapted according to their commitments. This means that the programme has to be defined before the start of the course but after closing the registration the programme has to fit with the profile of participants.
- Plan, promote, foster and encourage participants to work together in small groups (maximum of 5 members), to facilitate the tutors' activity of monitoring, motivating and supporting the participants.
In addition to these recommendations, the e-learning course, as a communication tool, can be seen as a way to further stimulate the exploitation of research results of successful projects and can be proposed as a useful way to keep updated and informed in depth potential uptakers of research results. The STREAM e-learning platform will stay open for other two years with all content accessible, in order to allow existing participants and future users to keep on working together. This direct link is available on the STREAM website and MENON website.
3 policy seminars and a final conference were set up to bring research (projects) and policy together on a specific theme, to discuss how to improve the cooperation between research and policy to address the challenges on this specific theme. This concept provides added value to the discussions as there are different EU research projects on related themes discussing with and learning from each other and providing the EC with specific input into policy debates in a focused discussion. The concept showed its value in the content of the discussions at the events. It proved however difficult to attract sizeable audiences to the events. One of the main causes is the overload in number of events on water, with each EU water related project organising its own workshops and conferences. Therefore, the STREAM continuity study (D.2.5.) proposes to the EC to organise thematic events in which the EU research projects on that theme come together to discuss their (intermediate) results with the Commission and thereby provide concrete input from different angles into one specific water-related policy issue.
The three policy seminars together attracted around 90 participants from the policy makers, researchers, NGOs and businesses (Further information on these events available in D4.2 D4.3 D4.4). The webinars for the 1st and 2nd policy seminars attracted a total of 572 online viewers. The 2nd policy seminar could not be web streamed, as the WWF6 venue did not have high speed internet facility, but the recordings were made available on the STREAM website.
The SPI water cluster projects STEP-WISE and STREAM organised a joint final conference, including input from the ongoing WaterDiss2.0 project. This took place in Brussels on 3rd and 4th December 2012. This conference was attended by 67 participants from 12 countries, representing 16 from Policy, 21 from Research and 17 from Industry and consultancy and 13 from other areas (NGOs, media, communication, education). The second day of the conference was web streamed: 123 online participants viewed the session during the day of the event; the webinar was made available also after the event, by the end of December the total number of viewers reached up to 251. (Further information available on D.4.5)
Therefore, a total of 157 onsite participants and 823 online viewers followed the STREAM policy seminars and final conference. As the presentations, recordings and speakers biographies of Policy Seminars and Final Conference are available online on the STREAM website, further audience is reached.
Dissemination by the use of online tools
The website is the backbone of the communication of the STREAM project and the major instrument to promote in particular STREAM main outputs: http://www.stream-project.eu
According to Google Analytics, during the two years of the project 10 576 unique visitors from 147 countries have visited STREAM website, for a total of 18 765 visits and 66 704 page views. The top 5 visits were from Belgium (4 293), Italy (2 397), Spain (1 300), Germany (993) and the United Kingdom (UK) (973).
In order to reach to diverse group of stakeholders that are actively using internet, STREAM created profiles / pages on Facebook (June 2011), Twitter (June 2011) and LinkedIn (October 2011). Each page has been updated on a daily basis in order to inform followers about news and upcoming events about STREAM, as well as other water research related events in EU and all over the world.
The social media tools allowed STREAM project partners and its followers to be linked to other water groups and networks active at European and International levels. Examples of these organisations and networks with whom STREAM has been in contact are: http://Water.org Association of Women in Water, Energy and Environment, Euro-Mediterranean Water Information System, Water Engineering Professionals, Global Water Partnership, International Water Resources Association (IWRA). STREAM also followed the social media pages of milestone water events taking place in 2012 such as 6th World Water Forum and UN World Water Day.
STREAM posted news about its upcoming activities and actual news about water research and technology in the EU not only to its own social media pages, but also to those of other groups and networks.
The project also opened a channel on YouTube where all videos and interviews produced by the STREAM project are made available.
STREAM has developed and effectively utilised an e-mailing list consisting of stakeholders and media contacts to send digital newsletters and press releases. As of December 2012, STREAM newsletters and press releases reached to a total of 4 401 contacts. The contact list of STREAM consists of following categories: project stakeholders (researchers and universities, policy makers, industry and SMEs, water related EU research projects, EC contacts) and media contacts (journalists and communication contacts related to water, science and environment). The contact list covers all the stakeholders targeted by the project from EU-27.
During the two years:
- A total of 22 press releases were prepared and sent for the promotion and dissemination of results of the stream policy seminars, summer schools and e-learning course. For the 2nd summer school in Rome, an Italian press release was also prepared and sent to local media, as well as to the media offices of the three institutions / research centres involved in the programme for further dissemination in their networks: ENEA, BIC and CNR.
- A total of 7 quarterly newsletters were produced and disseminated.
Dissemination by audiovisual tools
The 5 project videos and 11 interviews with water experts were used as effective tools to reach a broader audience in a visually attractive manner with a simple language. STREAM took the following dissemination steps to increase the impact of audiovisual tools:
- The final version of videos were sent to project coordinators, as well as STREAM partners, so that they can disseminate them in their own networks.
- The videos were uploaded to the STREAM e-learning platform and were especially used in the 2nd module on research that took place February - March 2012.
- The videos and interviews are made available online at the STREAM website as well as at the STREAM project channel on YouTube. The videos and interviews uploaded by STREAM were viewed in total for 1 100 times as of January 2013.
- The videos produced by STREAM were shown during the following water related events:
(i) t the EC booth during the 6th World Water Forum, Marseille, March 2012;
(ii) At the STREAM Satellite event 'FILM SESSION: Water technologies transfer from research to policy and industry', during the Green Week, Brussels, May 2012;
(iii) At the STREAM room of the SPI water cluster training sessions during the 2nd CIS-SPI 'Water Science Meets Policy' event, Brussels, November 2012;
(iv) At the video corner during the STEP-WISE and STREAM final conference, Brussels, December 2012.
Videos produced by STREAM were also submitted to several web-based video portals and film festivals including: The Water Channel (see http://www.thewaterchannel.tv online for further details), Voices from the Water International Film Festival (see http://www.voicesfromthewaters.com online for further details) and Reel Water Film Festival (see http://reelwaterfilmfest.org online for further details).
The webinars were very important to reach a broader audience as they allowed interested people to follow a major water related conference from their computers without travelling. The recordings of the webinars were as well made available on the STREAM website after the events are web streamed, therefore reaching more people. A total of 174 viewers followed the PREPARED, IMPRINTS and NOVIWAM events web streamed with the support of the STREAM project.
Conclusion
The STREAM project managed to create a series of communication tools through an integrated approach to reach the three types of stakeholders.
The various types of communication actions and tools complementing each other created a full communication package that was offered to water research projects. A group of qualified organisations were involved in such an ambitious project to perform all variety of activities foreseen: STREAM consortium gathered partners with specific capabilities and backgrounds and established relations in the field, like specialists in water issues, experts in communicating science and carrying out innovative dissemination activities to transfer the knowledge gathered to the target audiences.
The tools and actions were tailored and diversified according to the various types of stakeholders and partners received positive feedback on the tools provided to the supported projects.
As a result, it is foremost important to say that transforming the scientific content into an accessible language is a must and creating interactions between different groups of stakeholders is of prominent importance. In order to do that, types of projects like STREAM with its tools and those proposed by the other SPI water cluster projects are fundamental for supporting and sustaining the achievement of these results.
As final outcomes of the STREAM activities, the following could be listed:
- Researchers were informed about the policy and industry priorities and therefore have been trained to be able to make policy and industry driven research that will have practical outcomes.
- Policy makers were made aware of the latest research and scientific data: they have the tools to make their policy more industry and research oriented.
SMEs / industry representatives were informed about what research projects may offer to industry and got to know about some research results that can be implemented in their field.
The STREAM project directly reached to around 300 stakeholders during its training activities (Summer Schools and E-learning Course) and Policy Seminars. Among the participants, around 35 % were researchers, 25 % were from industry/SMEs, 18 % were policy makers and the rest were from other fields (non-governmental organisations (NGOs), media, communication, education, consultancy, project management).
During its webinars, STREAM reach to almost 900 online viewers from Europe and all over the world through the webinars it organised and attracted 10 576 unique visitors to its website from 147 countries during two years. The STREAM press releases and newsletters were regularly sent to around 2 500 stakeholders in the first year and 4 500 stakeholders in the second year.
STREAM also provided a future vision for the dissemination of EU water research results in Europe based on its experience. To learn more about the recommendations for the future, please check roadmap for uptake of EU water research in policy and industry prepared in collaboration with the other SPI water cluster projects STEP-WISE and WaterDiss2.0. The Roadmap is also attached to this report.
List of websites: http://www.stream-project.eu
Project coordinator: Hinano Spreafico: hinano@minerva-communication.eu
Project manager: Tugce Tagmat: tugce@minerva-communication.eu
The STREAM project aimed to bridge the gap between research, policy and industry by bringing water technologies to the interest of potential uptakers through a diversified series of dissemination and communication actions tailored to the needs of the different categories of stakeholders.
The STREAM project has mediated with the coordinators of 439 projects from the main European support programmes (Sixth Framework Programme (FP6), FP7, LIFE, LIFE+, INTERREG and CIP; started after 1 January 2006) to draft easy-to-read factsheets providing concise information on their projects accessible for all stakeholders. This resulted in 140 research project factsheets that were provided by these projects and that form the basis for the activities of STREAM to disseminate the results of European projects on water, including:
- An e-learning course consisting of modules on European Union (EU) legislation, Innovation and Research and concluded with a final self-assessment module. This e-learning program provided a selection of learning material supported with videos and presentations in an interactive learning platform and attracted about 50 % researchers from universities, private companies and public agencies and 50 % equally divided among policy advisors and project managers.
- Summer schools which focused on bringing young researchers together with participants of SMEs to discuss European research efforts on water.
- Policy Seminars which focused on bringing together researchers and politicians to make sure politicians are able to base their activities on the latest research results and research is policy driven. The topics were on 'Urban water management' 'Innovative technologies to reduce water consumption' and 'Climate change and flood risk management'. Each of the seminars attracted participants from (EU and national) policy, researchers and business representatives. the seminars were concluded with a final conference.
- Audiovisual production: A selection of EU water research projects were supported by developing short videos that provide easily-accessible communication of the projects outcomes. A series of interviews were organised with water experts, especially those involved in water research projects. Conferences of selected EU projects on water research were broadcast live on the internet in the form of webinars to allow for a much broader audience.
- Policy factsheets were prepared to give an easy-to-read overview of EU policies, which are crucial for research and business activities. These policy factsheets were further developed to include an overview of the impacts of the policies on industry. The factsheets were distributed to policy makers and policy implementers, among others using WISE-RTD.
- The website and social media pages were the backbone of the communication. In order to reach a wide audience, further dissemination was done by newsletters to a wide number of e-mail contacts including the various categories of stakeholders: policymakers, researchers, industry, science communication and media and by utilising social media tools (Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, YouTube).
The results and recommendations of STREAM were published at the end of the project as the roadmap for uptake of EU water research in policy and industry prepared in collaboration with the other two science policy interfacing (SPI) water cluster projects STEP-WISE and WATERDISS2.0.
This publishable summary gives a more detailed overview of the results and impact achieved by the STREAM project.
Project context and objectives:
The EU has invested considerable resources over the last decade to support the development of water technologies. As it often is the case with innovative technologies, there are currently few resources to pursue this process in the needed scale, and the uptake potential of water technologies and other environmental technologies resulting from EU-funded research seems limited due to insufficient awareness of their developments and the opportunities they offer. Raising awareness among researchers, policy makers, businessmen and industries, as well as the large public (young people in particular) is paramount to the full exploitation of these technologies which are able to boost economic growth and social welfare.
The STREAM project aimed to tackle this issue by bringing water technologies to the interest of potential uptakers through a diversified series of dissemination and communication actions tailored to the needs of the different categories of stakeholders. These include 3 policy seminars and a final symposium at the European Parliament in Brussels, 2 summer schools, e-learning course composed of 4 modules on policy, research, innovation and self-assessment, audiovisual materials, including 5 videos and 10 interviews, 7 webinars for research events and participation in sectorial events. A web platform was set up from the very start of the project serving as a repository for all its activities and for the updated documentation material on latest research and policy progress in the field of water.
A group of highly qualified actors were involved in such an ambitious project to perform all variety of activities foreseen: STREAM consortium gathered partners with specific capabilities and backgrounds and established relations in the field, like specialists in water issues, experts in communicating science and carrying out innovative dissemination activities to transfer the knowledge gathered to the target audiences.
The STREAM project aimed in general at reducing the gap between research on water, policy making and industry, by bringing together actors from these three most relevant stakeholders in knowledge exchange dedicated events but also through target knowledge sharing experiences such as e-learning addressed to the three groups and summer schools addressed especially to researchers and industry / small and medium-sized enterprise (SME).
Three main stakeholders groups were the targets of STREAM: young researchers, SMEs / businesses and policy makers.
- Policy makers need to be provided with clear-easy-quick information on the current and future challenges and the available technologies to implement new policies and legislation.
- Researchers need to be aware of recent research to avoid duplication, join efforts at EU level and enable continuous progress of the knowledge base. A link needs to be established with the politicians to ensure a policy-driven approach in their research.
SMEs / businesses are the main up-takers and developers of new water technologies; they have an urgency to be aware of the latest research results and policy developments and they need to take active part in the conception of new technologies.
- Finally, water consumers need to be aware of the latest developments in water technology that could affect their everyday life and influence decision making processes.
Considering the needs of specific stakeholders, STREAM objectives have been set as the following:
(a) to identify a relevant number of actual research and technological developments on water. STREAM focused on the results of projects under the FP6 and FP7 programmes, but also under other European programmes as well (LIFE+, CIP, EIP, EUREKA, COST, ERANET);
(b) to improve the dissemination of the results of water-related research among all stakeholders and to facilitate their uptake;
(c) to foster a better coordination between policy level, research sector and business sector to contribute shaping an even more research-based policy and policy-driven research;
(d) to raise awareness among all stakeholders on the need of actively disseminating these results and work together for their implementation, thus by contributing to address Europe's water challenges.
STREAM aimed to contribute to the following indirect objectives in the long run:
(a) to develop and implement policies and technologies to lower water consumption by consumers and industry;
(b) to stimulate the adoption of new technologies to lower water consumption in agriculture and to set the policies in order to facilitate the efficient use of water in agriculture and the uptake of enabling technologies;
(c) to promote policy guidelines to improve water management systems in urban areas, improving the efficiency of existing infrastructures.
Project results:
Work package (WP)2: The showcase of water technologies and dissemination activities
This WP covered communication and dissemination activities to promote the STREAM activities and ensure the visibility of the project, as well as using the necessary tools and actions to provide dissemination support to the EU-funded water research projects. A detailed communication and dissemination plan was strategically developed at the beginning of the project and defined the action plan for all the activities foreseen in the framework of this WP.
A web platform (see http://www.stream-project.eu online) was set up from the very start of the project serving as a repository for all its activities and for the updated documentation material on latest research and policy progress in the field of water. The website worked in close connection with the social media pages led by STREAM to attract the stakeholders to the online repository.
The website used the key features such as news section disseminating STREAM news as well as EU-funded water research project news, photo galleries (including photos from the realised activities), programmes of events (with PowerPoint presentations, recordings and short biographies of speakers that can be easily downloaded), audio-visual materials (videos, interviews and webinars produced in the framework of the project), registration forms to STREAM activities. The Media corner provided all kinds of communication materials of the project as well as press releases, news and photos from STREAM events that are of interest to media and stakeholders. The website was regularly updated with the newly produced and revised STREAM research projects factsheets and STREAM policy factsheets. The website hosted the webinars organised by STREAM and provided link to the STREAM E-learning platform.
With all these features, the STREAM website allowed users to get information and download all relevant material about the activities realised and events organised by the project, as well as accessing the updated information about the EU water research projects.
STREAM offered its online newsroom facility (integrating the website, quarterly digital newsletter and social media channels) to the EU funded water research projects as a tool for the dissemination of their information and results. Throughout the project, STREAM assisted many projects to promote the events or results with the integrated use of these online tools.
Besides the online tools, STREAM project also utilised basic communication and dissemination tools such as project logo, PowerPoint template, project leaflet, poster, roll-up, project folder, participants kit and A4 promotional sheets for specific STREAM events.
The STREAM communication and dissemination actions were well linked to the SPI-Water Cluster: STREAM, STEP-WISE and WaterDiss2.0 projects collaborated in several events to create a platform to promote the EU water research results.
The STREAM project, throughout its timeline, established a network of contacts including a diversity of stakeholders targeted by the project such as research centres and universities, industries and SMEs, policymakers and EU water research projects. This also included the media specialised in scientific issues, as well as the general media in different EU countries. The STREAM messages regularly reached the stakeholders through press releases and newsletters and plus others through social media channels.
In achieving its target of increasing the uptake of EU water research in policy and industry, STREAM created synergies among different projects and between different stakeholders during its communication and dissemination activities.
A continuity study for the sustainability of the results achieved by STREAM was also a part of this WP. At the final stage of the project, the 'Roadmap for uptake of eu water research in policy and industry' was developed together with the other two SPI water cluster projects with a nice layout and distributed during the European Parliament session of the final conference on 4 December 2012.
The STREAM website and STREAM E-learning platform will stay online at least for the upcoming 2 years following the end of the project and all factsheets and videos produced by STREAM were made accessible and downloadable also from the WISE-RTD website for ensuring long term continuity.
WP3: European water technology and research watch
The 'European water technology and research watch' was the main investigation and observation body of STREAM to gather the content to be disseminated through the communication channels set up in the dissemination WP.
During the two years of the STREAM project a list of all projects on research and water started in the main EU funding programmes (including FP6, FP7, LIFE, LIFE+, CIP, Eureka, Cost, JRC and Interreg) was compiled which at the end of the project included a total of 420 projects.
In three phases, these projects were contacted with a specifically designed questionnaire to develop factsheets with concise and up to date information. Throughout the duration of the project STREAM gathered a total of 140 questionnaires and transformed them into factsheets which were used for dissemination in the other WPs.
The action of sending questionnaires and editing factsheets was done in three rounds; the first round started on June 2011 and ended on January 2012, the second round started in February ending on May 2012 and the third round started in August and ended onn October 2012. Also the list of projects was reviewed and updated every round and coordinators were asked to update earlier provided information. The results of the first year of the project were evaluated in the beginning of 2012, resulting in little changes in the work, e.g. the questionnaires were better organised for the second round.
At the start of the project, the intention was to request the identified state-of-the-art projects to provide a targeted message for each of the projects. As explained in the year reports however, it proved inefficient and impossible both to select state-of-the-art projects and to target the message of each project to the three stakeholder groups (business, politicians and research sector). Instead, therefore, the dissemination activities (e-learning, audiovisual material, summer schools and policy seminars) were used to both require the project coordinators to target their message at the audience of these activities and provide them with the chance to give this message to a gathered group of stakeholders.
Overall, the European Water Technology and Research Watch has been successful in:
(a) gathering up-to-date research results in a single database. The response of 30 % can be considered quite high seeing the fact that a large number of the projects were already finalised, and there was no financial reimbursement for the time the project coordinators had to spend on the questionnaires;
(b) providing the projects that did send in questionnaires with further opportunities to disseminate their results via STREAM tools and actions in a tailored manner towards their stakeholders;
(c) effectively transferring the research results to participants of STREAM training activities such as e-learning and summer school.
Apart from being used in the other STREAM WPs, the 140 STREAM research projects factsheets created at the end of the process were made available online on the STREAM website, which will stay open at least until 2 years after the end of the STREAM project. Furthermore, the information included in these factsheets will continue to be available online on the WISE-RTD platform. Therefore the sustainability of the information is ensured. Logically however, the updating of the information will be up to project coordinators and future updating work to be done at the WISE-RTD platform. See also the roadmap for uptake of EU research in policy and industry.
At the start of the project the STREAM scientific advisory committee was set up. In the first year this scientific advisory committee was used to select the state-of-the-art projects from those that had sent their questionnaires in the first round and identify which projects would have the most impact on business, research or politics. The messages of these projects would then be shared with these specific audiences using the STREAM tools like summer schools, policy seminars, etc.
After the first year, this process has been evaluated and it was decided that this approach was impractical and not efficient. First of all, this is because most projects have different messages and do not focus on one of the specific STREAM target groups alone. Secondly, within the framework of STREAM, the tools to be used were 'pre-defined', meaning that the topics of the summer schools, the policy seminars and the e-learning courses were already defined in the proposal phase. Thirdly, there is a limited amount of 'tools' available and STREAM could not give a place to everybody within the remaining planned activities: 2 policy seminars, one e-learning course and one summer school, already on pre-defined topics, limiting the outreach we can achieve. Lastly, the EU projects are already evaluated on their being 'state of the art' during the evaluation of the project proposals. Evaluating whether they are state of the art by the STREAM experts therefore leads more to an evaluation of the progress already achieved, which is unfair to projects recently started. This has been reported in the first year report of STREAM.
Taking these four points into account, the approach of STREAM was discussed within the consortium and changed during the second 'investigation phase'. Instead of generating information on the projects and selecting the state-of-art (by SAC), STREAM asked them to target their message by offering them the use of the STREAM tools and called the projects that fitted the topic of the e-learning, summer school or policy seminar to take part in these tools so that they can spread the message to the audience of these tools. By predefining the audience of these activities, the projects had to target their message to these audiences.
All STREAM research projects factsheets are available here: http://www.stream-project.eu/water-technology-watch/research-projects-factsheets
WP4: The European water policy observatory and policy seminars
WP4 of STREAM included two main elements: First, the European Water Policy Observatory, which focused on gathering information on the European legislation and policies related to water and water technologies and preparing the information to be disseminated in an easily comprehensible way, targeted to each stakeholder group. The second element was the organisation of four policy seminars, including the final event in the European Parliament. These events aimed to bring the research and policy sectors together to promote effective and efficient cooperation.
In the first year of the project, a set of policy factsheets was set up which list concisely the most important information on each EU policy related to water. Each factsheet contains the objective of a policy, its background, a summary of the contents of the policy and provides links to find more detailed information. The factsheets were updated with the most recent information on two occasions during the project, the last being in October 2012.
All STREAM policy factsheets are available here: http://www.stream-project.eu/water-policy-observatory/policy-factsheets
These factsheets were used as background information and learning material in the E-learning (specifically the module on legislation), the summer schools and the policy seminars.
Throughout the project, three policy seminars were organised and one final seminar at the European Parliament as part of the STREAM final conference organised together with the STEP-WISE project. The three policy seminars were:
- November 2011, Amsterdam, 'State of the Art in Urban Water Management'
- March 2012, Marseille, 'Innovative Technologies to Reduce Consumption'
- December 2012, Brussels, 'The Climate Change Challenges and Managing Flood Risks in Member States'.
Detailed reports of these seminars were given in deliverables 4.2 4.3 and 4.4. The three policy seminars together attracted a total of 90 participants. The second seminar during the World Water Forum in Marseille suffered from the large competition for participants at the Forum and the location of the room provided by the organisation and only attracted around 20 participants.
WP5: Summer schools
The results achieved in WP5 are related to the entire process of conception, design, preparation, and implementation and follow up of the 2 summer school courses that have been specifically addressed to higher education students, young researchers in water technology and other stakeholders linked with water SME.
Being one of the core activities of the project, both summer schools have been held by prestigious institutions, able to host and welcome the students from different European countries and assuring the smooth preparation and implementation of the courses.
The 1st Summer School has been hosted by the Agency for Competitiveness in Catalonia (ACC1Ó) - from 26 to 30 September 2011 in Barcelona. The 2nd STREAM summer school has been hosted by Roma TRE University from 24 to 28 September 2012 in Rome and sponsored by ENEA, BIC Lazio and CNR - IRSA.
Both summer schools have been organised as short courses of 1 full week (five working days-excluding travels) with a total of up to 50 participants, from different European countries selected from all the requests received during the application campaign.
All the participants had the possibility and opportunity to interact and share experiences and activities with high level experts in the thematic.
Results, in terms of science and technology (S&T) achievements, are measurable in terms of opportunity to share a 'consensus' around the issues of water, both from a technological and policy aspect and involving local actors and international water technologies stakeholders. Both courses had a practical hands-on approach and stimulated further cooperation among students also in the aftermaths: 2 FP7 projects conceived during the first summer school have been submitted in March 2012 and 2 FP7 Projects conceived during the second summer school were under submission in January 2013.
The speakers recruited for both summer schools have addressed and therefore stimulated discussion about S&T water related topics - wide range of issues covered by the programme, stimulating participation and discussion among the participants and exposing them to speeches and presentations divided in 3 main modules:
- Module 1: Water management, governance and policy
- Module 2: Innovative water technologies
- Module 3: Research and innovation support to young researchers and SMEs.
During the 2 summer schools participants have joined both theoretical and practical scientific sessions. In Spain they visited Fundació CTM Centre Tecnològic facilities in Manresa, Aigues de Manresa - the Water Public Authority in Manresa and the most important desalination plant in Europe located in Llobregat. During the 2nd, 3rd and 4th days of the second summer school in Rome, they went to visit ENEA laboratories in Casaccia, Business Innovation Center in Colleferro and CNR laboratories in Montelibretti. The last day of the 1st summer school has stimulated discussion among all participants and 4 workgroups have been created. Each group has worked on a project idea, presenting results to the class and discussing them together.
Speakers of the last day of the 2nd Summer School presented concepts, methodologies and tools for developing and improving their ideas. Particular attention has been put on intellectual property rights (IPR), technology transfer and green business instruments for companies.
WP6: E-learning course
The STREAM e-learning course aimed at explaining and disseminating the main themes related to water management through providing updated contents and knowledge in the fields of: EU legislations, research results and innovative technologies developed and applied for sustainable use of water resources.
The e-learning course has been applied as complementary communication tool in the framework of STREAM project addressed at raising awareness on the state of the art of water technologies research and at bringing it to the interest of policy makers and potential up-takers.
To this end, the course involved different typologies of stakeholders (including higher education students, young researchers, representatives of industries and other types of stakeholders) and allowed them working together to share their different perspectives and exchange experiences and knowledge. The expected impact was to bridge the communication gap between the policy makers, researchers and industry sectors. According to this, participants of the e-learning course were not necessarily required to be specialists of water research, but might needed to get a sound overview of water research developments and water management related issues across Europe or at least worked in water management and innovation sectors.
The course has been delivered following this calendar:
- 1st Module EU legislations, delivered from November 2011 to February 2012 addressed to introduce EU water legislations providing EU official documents and STREAM Policy Factsheets.
- 2nd Module Research results, delivered from March 2012 to April 2012 addressed to illustrate updated research results in the field of reducing water consumption and using water resources in a sustainable way by the use of STREAM research projects factsheets and with the contribution of research project coordinators, who were available to answer questions from course participants.
- 3rd module innovation and new technologies, delivered from May 2012 to June 2012 addressed to illustrate innovative and new technologies in water with particular attention on how to overcome barriers to bring them into the market (in collaboration with the INNOWATER project).
- 4th module problem based activity for self-assessment, implemented from September 2012 to November 2012 specifically addressed to allow participants working together based on the simulation of research projects design trying to apply what they have learned.
The course was uploaded on a MOODLE platform through which the course has been designed, organised and delivered. The MOODLE tool was used to make participants working together and specific solutions were adopted:
(a) tests (in particular in the Policy module);
(b) FORUM sessions (applied in the policy, research, innovation and in the final practical project based activity) where participants have been able to discuss and to share ideas, opinions and experiences;
(c) wIKIs collaborative working space (applied in the policy, research, innovation and in the final practical project based activity) where participants have been able to write together brief documents as final outcome for each module;
(d) CHAT tool for online synchronous discussion applied in the 4th final module to allow participants having direct and quick communication among them.
The learning contents provided were mainly:
(a) 2 power point presentations, (one provided in the policy module and the other one in the Innovation module);
(b) 10 video presentations (recorded during the first policy seminar and provided in the research module);
(c) 11 video lectures (delivered by INNOWATER experts and provided in the innovation module);
(d) 19 official documents from the European Commission (EC) (in particular provided in the policy module);
(e) 18 STREAM policy factsheets (provided in the policy module through direct link to STREAM website);
(f) 55 STREAM research project factsheets (provided in the Research module);
(g) Several direct links to EC websites related to water sector.
The e-learning course was applied as communication tool and thus it has been carried out in a tight cooperation with the other STREAM activities (such as summer schools in which some participants of the e-learning course attended at), as well as in collaboration with other research projects (firstly with STEP-WISE but also with other project coordinators of running projects in the field of water).
Special mention shall be given to the collaboration with STEP-WISE project that has been smooth and fruitful for the implementation of both e-learning course (STREAM course and WISE-RTD portal course). In particular, the collaboration was based on a 'win-win relation': The WISE-RTD Portal has been introduced to STREAM e-learning participants as useful digital library where participants could find additional or further contents and the e-learning course uploaded on it was useful for STREAM participants on order to learn how to use the WISE-RTD portal.
As additional value of this collaboration, STREAM e-learning participants provided qualitative comments and feedback on the usability of the WISE-RTD portal and its tutorial exercise to STEP-WISE partners.
The total amount of participants registered for the STREAM e-learning course was of 87 people of whom 20 participants attended the entire course and did the final module based on group work and self-assessment.
The outcomes of participants according to each module have been the following:
- 1st module EU legislations: participants were divided in two groups and each group developed one complete brief document.
- 2nd module research results: participants were divided in 6 groups according to water sectors of their interest, they were asked to choose one project and try to design a follow up project. 4 of the 6 groups developed 9 brief documents.
- 3rd module Innovation and new technologies module: participants were divided in 4 groups. Only 1 group managed to design a complete brief document.
- 4th module Project based work: participants were divided in 3 groups, they were asked to work together in a simulation activity focused on the design of a research project based on European needs in water sector. Only 1 group managed to fulfil this task; however the other groups asked to leave the platform open and available because they wanted to work on it even beyond the end of the module.
WP7: Interactive audiovisual production
The audiovisual materials in traditional and interactive format are one of the significant tools to support dissemination activities. Under this WP 'Interactive materials' were developed in the form of 'webinars', whereas 'traditional audiovisual materials' are produced in the form of project videos and interviews with water experts.
Within this framework, STREAM produced:
(a) 5 videos of 5 minutes to inform about 5 flagship projects on water technologies;
(b) 11 interviews with water technologies and policies experts;
(c) 3 interactive webinars organised in the occasion of a high level seminar or conference on water technologies planned by other EU funded projects.
All audiovisual production is available at: www.stream-project.eu/audiovisual/audiovisual-production
STREAM has produced videos for the following 5 selected projects: (1) INNOWATER is a competitiveness and innovation FP (CIP)-funded project aiming to establish and implement a water innovation partnership that develops and tests new and better innovation support tools and delivery mechanisms for innovative SMEs and first-user industries. Shootings of interviews were made on 17 June 2011 at the offices of European Water Partnership in Brussels during a project meeting.
(2) AQUAFIT4USE is an FP7 project aiming at making industries more independent of the supply of fresh drinking water for their production processes and obtaining water qualities that are tailored to suit product and process demands and quality standards, in other words 'water fit-for-use'. Shootings of interviews were made on 13 - 14 September 2011 in Munich during the project WPs meeting and onsite visit to Trostberg papermill.
(3) AQUAREHAB is an FP7-funded project aiming at developing rehabilitation technologies and approaches for multipressured degraded waters and the integration of their impact on river basin management. Shootings of interviews were made on 15 November at VITO premises in Mol, on 16 November during the pilot injection in Aarschot and 23 November in Munich during a project meeting.
(4) SIRIUS is an FP7 project which aims at developing satellite-assisted services for efficient water resources management in support of food production in water-scarce environments. Shootings of interviews were made on 4 - 6 June 2012 in Manisa and Izmir cities of Turkey. The occasion was the SIRIUS local stakeholder workshop. Therefore, it was possible to interview both the SIRIUS partners and stakeholders (public officials, farmers, irrigation associations).
(5) TRUST is an FP7 project aiming to research innovations and tools for urban water services to create a more sustainable, low-carbon water future. Shootings of interviews were made on 4 - 5 October 2012 in Basel, Switzerland during the TRUST workshop sustainability roadmap where all TRUST member cities were present.
The selection was made to provide this dissemination support to projects addressing diverse topics of water research, having large impact for industry and consumers and being at an advanced stage so that they have concrete results to disseminate but still having some years to go, in order to be able to benefit longer from the audiovisual material.
Besides project videos, 42 interviews with water experts were realised during the two years of the project and among them 11 were selected to be produced and made available on the STREAM website.
Videos presenting project results are an efficient tool to transform scientific content into an easily understandable format, while interviews with water experts provide an exchange of opinions. In the videos, the shootings realised in laboratories, pilot areas and implementations are accompanied with a story based on interviews with a simple language. On the other hand, the interactive webinars give the event access to a larger public, facilitate live interaction, further access and larger dissemination of results.
The main dissemination tool for the audio-visual production of STREAM was its website and YouTube channel.
The videos produced were submitted to several water film festivals and web portals such as:
- the water channel (around 800 views per video until the end of 2012): http://thewaterchannel.tv/
- reel Water Film Festival 2012: http://reelwaterfilmfest.org/
- choices from the Waters Film Festival 2012: http://www.voicesfromthewaters.com .
(The films were not selected for screening during these two festivals)
In addition, the videos produced by STREAM were shown during the following water related events:
- At the EC booth during the 6th World Water Forum, Marseille, March 2012
- At the STREAM Satellite event 'FILM SESSION: Water technologies transfer from research to policy and industry', during the Green Week, Brussels, May 2012
- At the STREAM room of the SPI-Water Cluster training sessions during the 2nd CIS-SPI 'Water Science Meets Policy' event, Brussels, November 2012
- At the video corner during the STEP-WISE and STREAM Final Conference, Brussels, December 2012.
STREAM found it important to benefit from the dissemination opportunities provided by major water related events. For example in 2012, the annual Green Week took place from the 22nd to the 25th of May in Brussels with the theme 'The Water Challenge - Every Drop Counts' and on 23 May the STREAM project organised a satellite event entitled 'Film session: Water technologies transfer from research to policy and industry' to show films of EU water research projects supported by STREAM. This event, which has been selected together with 10 other satellite events in Brussels and 50 all over Europe, aimed at showing 5 project videos from different water research projects: INNOWATER, AQUAREHAB, BIOFRESH, IMPRINTS, and AQUAFIT4USE. After each video, the audience had the chance to directly ask the project representatives for questions, especially on how the water research technologies can be further used by policy makers and industries. Therefore a very interesting and lively discussion on video production and its dissemination potential to involve and reach the general public was undertaken. This event was realised to disseminate not only project videos produced by STREAM, but also other videos on water research projects such as BIOFRESH and IMPRINTS. These videos were submitted to the contest organised by STREAM among water research projects to benefit from the video dissemination opportunity during this session in the Green Week.
This session organised in an informal atmosphere within the framework of a highly attended event and gathered several projects together proved that creating synergies among different projects and using a common dissemination opportunity for several project results can be interesting and effective.
Besides videos and interviews, STREAM provided webinar support to 3 major events of selected EU water research projects:
- PREPARED project: Alliance Forum meetings on 14 May 2012, in the framework of the International World Congress on Water, Climate and Energy, Dublin, Ireland. (followed by 62 online viewers).
- IMPRINTS project: 'Implementing the EU Flood Directive in Flash Prone Areas' on 27 September 2012, Brussels, Belgium (followed by 60 online viewers).
- NOVIWAM project: 'Water Resources Management - Adaptation to Climate Changes' on 15 October 2012, Limassol, Cyprus (followed by 52 online viewers).
All the webinars were widely promoted by the STREAM project starting from a few weeks before the webinar to attract the interested participants. The selected projects also announced the webinar throughout their own networks.
The webinars were first made available live during the events and then recordings of the sessions were uploaded on the STREAM website for further viewing after the events.
The main opportunity provided by the webinars to online participants was the possibility to watch the speakers along with the presentations, the possibility to download meeting documents and to be able to ask questions and join the interactive debate. STREAM has received positive feedbacks from the projects about the effectiveness of the webinar tool. The interaction with the online audience is still an aspect that should be further encouraged and improved as generally online participants do not ask questions or make comments through the webinar although this opportunity was provided in all STREAM webinars.
Potential impact:
Collection of data about the EU water research results
The work of the STREAM project in WP3 resulted in a large database of up-to-date information on recent European research projects on water. As outlined in the STREAM continuity study (roadmap) it is of the highest importance that one repository of concise and up to date information on European research projects is set up and maintained. The STREAM project developed a 2 page research projects factsheet template including the main information and gathered this information in one central place for around 30 % of the projects of the last 6 years.
These factsheets have also proven their worth in the other dissemination and training activities of STREAM, like the E-learning, the summer schools and the policy seminars. Participants in these activities value the easy and accessible overview of ongoing and recent projects.
This work provides a good basis to further develop the required central database. The WISE-RTD website could provide the central point, where the STREAM factsheets have already been uploaded. However, for this information to remain updated, it is crucial that the providing of information and regular updating is made mandatory for the Project Coordinators and can be covered by the project budgets. If the provision of updated information is not made mandatory by the EC, a large number of project coordinators will not provide the information for lack of time or budgets.
The approach to ask project coordinators to target the messages from their projects to the respective audiences in activities like the summer schools, the e-learning modules and the policy seminars proved to be a strong approach to promote focused discussions between projects and stakeholders on a specific topic. Especially in the policy seminars it however proved difficult to reach a large number of stakeholders due to the large competition of the enormous amount of water-related events.
During the work in WP3 the main contacts were between STREAM and the Project Coordinators of the EU projects. In total 420 projects were contacted on a minimum of three occasions. 30% of these replied with a filled in questionnaire. A reply rate of 30 % can be considered quite high, seeing the fact that a large number of projects had already ended and therefore the Project Coordinator was either working on other topics or not employed by the same organisation anymore and seeing the fact that we could not provide reimbursement for extra efforts within the normally already tight project budgets.
Dissemination of research results with training activities and policy seminars
1st summer school has gathered a total of 21 participants from the EU, as well as its associate and neighbouring countries. Researchers, SMEs, water practitioners and stakeholders have discussed and shared best practices on water and environmental technologies with 28 experts coming from the following important EU research centres, companies and organisations, as well as the EC: Gate2Growth, Gencat, Politecnico di Torino, IRTA, ACC1Ó, Amphos21, CTM, ICRA, REDINN, SOST, AGBAR, CENTA, CSIC, WssTP and CWP.
2nd summer school has gathered a total of 30 participants that have discussed and shared best practices on water and environmental technologies with 27 experts coming from the following important EU research centres, companies and organisations, as well as the EC: ENEA, BIC Lazio, IRSA - CNR, CERTE, CTM, SOST, Leeds Metropolitan University, Hydroscan, Watercycle Waterschap Vallei & Veluwe, OSV srl, Laboratorio di Scienze della cittadinanza Rome, Simploil srl, Enrico Mattei and Euro - Mediterranean Centre for Climate Change. The 2nd summer school also represented an opportunity to share consensus about water with project coordinators of other water research projects: during the first day of the course STEP-WISE, CB-WR-MED, WATERBEE, XEROCHORE, EPI-WATER AND WATER2ADAPT were presented by each respective project coordinator to share their experiences with summer school participants and exchange ideas with them in an interactive manner. A mailing list of participants and a Facebook group has been created and will be used to keep participants of both schools informed about future initiatives.
E-learning course attracted a total of 138 registrations even if only 87 people were really interested and motivated to attend the entire course. All participants were advanced learners, who had background of high level studies in water (PhDs, universities researchers, professors) and/or active in water policies and innovation technology (national or local policy decision makers, industry representatives). The profiles of participants were:
(a) around 51 % researchers or PhD students;
(b) around 14 % policy advisors;
(c) around 12 % project managers;
(d) remaining 23 % with diversified profiles, all of them being active in water management and use.
The lessons learned from the application of the e-learning course as communication tool, thanks to the implementation of STREAM e-learning course, are the following:
- Due to the fact that the courses was free for all, the modules have to be designed in a way to keep the level of the engagement of the participants always high, meaning providing learning and dissemination contents while fostering the share of ideas and experience among participants through collaborative tools (FORUM and WIKI).
- Tutors have to give assignments and deadlines in order to guide and motivate participants in working together and providing inputs, but in the same time tutors should be flexible to give extension of deadlines since participants have their professional life with busy schedules and sometime they have other priorities and have no time to enter in the platform and contribute with feedback.
- E-learning courses provide 'space' and 'moment' in which different stakeholders can meet, discuss, create a dialogue and exchange experiences, knowledge and expertise.
- Contents, activities, assignments have to be always relevant to participants' job activity and to be adapted according to their commitments. This means that the programme has to be defined before the start of the course but after closing the registration the programme has to fit with the profile of participants.
- Plan, promote, foster and encourage participants to work together in small groups (maximum of 5 members), to facilitate the tutors' activity of monitoring, motivating and supporting the participants.
In addition to these recommendations, the e-learning course, as a communication tool, can be seen as a way to further stimulate the exploitation of research results of successful projects and can be proposed as a useful way to keep updated and informed in depth potential uptakers of research results. The STREAM e-learning platform will stay open for other two years with all content accessible, in order to allow existing participants and future users to keep on working together. This direct link is available on the STREAM website and MENON website.
3 policy seminars and a final conference were set up to bring research (projects) and policy together on a specific theme, to discuss how to improve the cooperation between research and policy to address the challenges on this specific theme. This concept provides added value to the discussions as there are different EU research projects on related themes discussing with and learning from each other and providing the EC with specific input into policy debates in a focused discussion. The concept showed its value in the content of the discussions at the events. It proved however difficult to attract sizeable audiences to the events. One of the main causes is the overload in number of events on water, with each EU water related project organising its own workshops and conferences. Therefore, the STREAM continuity study (D.2.5.) proposes to the EC to organise thematic events in which the EU research projects on that theme come together to discuss their (intermediate) results with the Commission and thereby provide concrete input from different angles into one specific water-related policy issue.
The three policy seminars together attracted around 90 participants from the policy makers, researchers, NGOs and businesses (Further information on these events available in D4.2 D4.3 D4.4). The webinars for the 1st and 2nd policy seminars attracted a total of 572 online viewers. The 2nd policy seminar could not be web streamed, as the WWF6 venue did not have high speed internet facility, but the recordings were made available on the STREAM website.
The SPI water cluster projects STEP-WISE and STREAM organised a joint final conference, including input from the ongoing WaterDiss2.0 project. This took place in Brussels on 3rd and 4th December 2012. This conference was attended by 67 participants from 12 countries, representing 16 from Policy, 21 from Research and 17 from Industry and consultancy and 13 from other areas (NGOs, media, communication, education). The second day of the conference was web streamed: 123 online participants viewed the session during the day of the event; the webinar was made available also after the event, by the end of December the total number of viewers reached up to 251. (Further information available on D.4.5)
Therefore, a total of 157 onsite participants and 823 online viewers followed the STREAM policy seminars and final conference. As the presentations, recordings and speakers biographies of Policy Seminars and Final Conference are available online on the STREAM website, further audience is reached.
Dissemination by the use of online tools
The website is the backbone of the communication of the STREAM project and the major instrument to promote in particular STREAM main outputs: http://www.stream-project.eu
According to Google Analytics, during the two years of the project 10 576 unique visitors from 147 countries have visited STREAM website, for a total of 18 765 visits and 66 704 page views. The top 5 visits were from Belgium (4 293), Italy (2 397), Spain (1 300), Germany (993) and the United Kingdom (UK) (973).
In order to reach to diverse group of stakeholders that are actively using internet, STREAM created profiles / pages on Facebook (June 2011), Twitter (June 2011) and LinkedIn (October 2011). Each page has been updated on a daily basis in order to inform followers about news and upcoming events about STREAM, as well as other water research related events in EU and all over the world.
The social media tools allowed STREAM project partners and its followers to be linked to other water groups and networks active at European and International levels. Examples of these organisations and networks with whom STREAM has been in contact are: http://Water.org Association of Women in Water, Energy and Environment, Euro-Mediterranean Water Information System, Water Engineering Professionals, Global Water Partnership, International Water Resources Association (IWRA). STREAM also followed the social media pages of milestone water events taking place in 2012 such as 6th World Water Forum and UN World Water Day.
STREAM posted news about its upcoming activities and actual news about water research and technology in the EU not only to its own social media pages, but also to those of other groups and networks.
The project also opened a channel on YouTube where all videos and interviews produced by the STREAM project are made available.
STREAM has developed and effectively utilised an e-mailing list consisting of stakeholders and media contacts to send digital newsletters and press releases. As of December 2012, STREAM newsletters and press releases reached to a total of 4 401 contacts. The contact list of STREAM consists of following categories: project stakeholders (researchers and universities, policy makers, industry and SMEs, water related EU research projects, EC contacts) and media contacts (journalists and communication contacts related to water, science and environment). The contact list covers all the stakeholders targeted by the project from EU-27.
During the two years:
- A total of 22 press releases were prepared and sent for the promotion and dissemination of results of the stream policy seminars, summer schools and e-learning course. For the 2nd summer school in Rome, an Italian press release was also prepared and sent to local media, as well as to the media offices of the three institutions / research centres involved in the programme for further dissemination in their networks: ENEA, BIC and CNR.
- A total of 7 quarterly newsletters were produced and disseminated.
Dissemination by audiovisual tools
The 5 project videos and 11 interviews with water experts were used as effective tools to reach a broader audience in a visually attractive manner with a simple language. STREAM took the following dissemination steps to increase the impact of audiovisual tools:
- The final version of videos were sent to project coordinators, as well as STREAM partners, so that they can disseminate them in their own networks.
- The videos were uploaded to the STREAM e-learning platform and were especially used in the 2nd module on research that took place February - March 2012.
- The videos and interviews are made available online at the STREAM website as well as at the STREAM project channel on YouTube. The videos and interviews uploaded by STREAM were viewed in total for 1 100 times as of January 2013.
- The videos produced by STREAM were shown during the following water related events:
(i) t the EC booth during the 6th World Water Forum, Marseille, March 2012;
(ii) At the STREAM Satellite event 'FILM SESSION: Water technologies transfer from research to policy and industry', during the Green Week, Brussels, May 2012;
(iii) At the STREAM room of the SPI water cluster training sessions during the 2nd CIS-SPI 'Water Science Meets Policy' event, Brussels, November 2012;
(iv) At the video corner during the STEP-WISE and STREAM final conference, Brussels, December 2012.
Videos produced by STREAM were also submitted to several web-based video portals and film festivals including: The Water Channel (see http://www.thewaterchannel.tv online for further details), Voices from the Water International Film Festival (see http://www.voicesfromthewaters.com online for further details) and Reel Water Film Festival (see http://reelwaterfilmfest.org online for further details).
The webinars were very important to reach a broader audience as they allowed interested people to follow a major water related conference from their computers without travelling. The recordings of the webinars were as well made available on the STREAM website after the events are web streamed, therefore reaching more people. A total of 174 viewers followed the PREPARED, IMPRINTS and NOVIWAM events web streamed with the support of the STREAM project.
Conclusion
The STREAM project managed to create a series of communication tools through an integrated approach to reach the three types of stakeholders.
The various types of communication actions and tools complementing each other created a full communication package that was offered to water research projects. A group of qualified organisations were involved in such an ambitious project to perform all variety of activities foreseen: STREAM consortium gathered partners with specific capabilities and backgrounds and established relations in the field, like specialists in water issues, experts in communicating science and carrying out innovative dissemination activities to transfer the knowledge gathered to the target audiences.
The tools and actions were tailored and diversified according to the various types of stakeholders and partners received positive feedback on the tools provided to the supported projects.
As a result, it is foremost important to say that transforming the scientific content into an accessible language is a must and creating interactions between different groups of stakeholders is of prominent importance. In order to do that, types of projects like STREAM with its tools and those proposed by the other SPI water cluster projects are fundamental for supporting and sustaining the achievement of these results.
As final outcomes of the STREAM activities, the following could be listed:
- Researchers were informed about the policy and industry priorities and therefore have been trained to be able to make policy and industry driven research that will have practical outcomes.
- Policy makers were made aware of the latest research and scientific data: they have the tools to make their policy more industry and research oriented.
SMEs / industry representatives were informed about what research projects may offer to industry and got to know about some research results that can be implemented in their field.
The STREAM project directly reached to around 300 stakeholders during its training activities (Summer Schools and E-learning Course) and Policy Seminars. Among the participants, around 35 % were researchers, 25 % were from industry/SMEs, 18 % were policy makers and the rest were from other fields (non-governmental organisations (NGOs), media, communication, education, consultancy, project management).
During its webinars, STREAM reach to almost 900 online viewers from Europe and all over the world through the webinars it organised and attracted 10 576 unique visitors to its website from 147 countries during two years. The STREAM press releases and newsletters were regularly sent to around 2 500 stakeholders in the first year and 4 500 stakeholders in the second year.
STREAM also provided a future vision for the dissemination of EU water research results in Europe based on its experience. To learn more about the recommendations for the future, please check roadmap for uptake of EU water research in policy and industry prepared in collaboration with the other SPI water cluster projects STEP-WISE and WaterDiss2.0. The Roadmap is also attached to this report.
List of websites: http://www.stream-project.eu
Project coordinator: Hinano Spreafico: hinano@minerva-communication.eu
Project manager: Tugce Tagmat: tugce@minerva-communication.eu
