ENWAP
Newsletter

The ENWAP – EG shares experiences on Good Practices

Welcome to the 3rd ENWAP (ENvironment telematics for Water and Air Pollution management) Newsletter provided by the ENWAP Expert Group to bring you up to date with our latest news.

During the last two meetings of the ENWAP Expert Group on the 5^th of December 1997 in Brussels and on the 2-3 March 1998 in Szentendre (Hungary) three main subjects have been focussed on:

• the consolidation of a standard structure on Good Practices of environment telematics projects in air and water pollution management,
• the discussion of the role of telematics in the approximation process for the CEEC environments in transition,
• The exchange of know-how and experience between actors from EU and CEE countries on specific environment telematics issues at the enlarged two-days seminar in Szentendre (Hungary).

The Good Practices exercise

Good Practices are the descriptions of advanced methods and approaches of different initiatives and their likely impacts (projects) which have resulted /will result in tangible improvements of the management of the environment in the domains of air and water pollution by the use of telematics. Good Practices are included from projects from the EU and CEE countries.

The Good Practice (GP) exercise aims to serve as a tool to work towards the best services at minimum cost (sustainable competitiveness) and consists of two phases :

• the elaboration of a standard structure where the elements are described, such as the profile of the application site, the application objectives, commercial practice, technical profile, environment requirements, obstacles encountered, lessons learned, transferability of the product, as well as the identification of users.
• the analysis and synthesis of the above mentioned elements to elaborate a set of recommendations on common “Good Practices” in air and water pollution management by the use of telematics.

The GP exercise makes sense only if the actors concerned will question their efficiency and effectiveness. Several of the Environment Telematics Application TAP-EN and other related projects have participated to the GP exercise as study-cases : EFFECT, E-MAIL, EMMA, REMSSBOT and TEMSIS for the TAP-EN projects; DANIS, DANUBE-AEWS, SNIRH, European Urban Air Quality Management System and Health and Environment Information System Munich for other related EU and CEEC environmental projects.

This exercise can evolve to identify instruments and references leading to support economical structural changes. Its benefits can be translated in a long-term view such as : better services for the individual and for the enterprises, lower costs, more user friendly services provided by administrations, better economic performance, more work, an improved environment and better preservation of the ecosystems and natural resources. It may contribute also to further economic convergence with the EU and CEE countries, thus help in closing gaps in productivity and reducing economic inequality.

The process of identification and selecting GP will give the opportunity to identify the priorities in sustainable telematics applications for environmental management. Learning from each other’s Good Practice can promote successful partnerships between governmental authorities, city authorities, industry and research organisations and the full range of interest groups involved in sustainable environment management.

A draft document of the GP exercise is under elaboration. Once the exercise is complete, it is envisaged that the GP document will serve as a tool to introduce interested parties, leading to further discussion and possible collaboration.

The approximation strategy for CEEC environments in transition : the role of telematics

The implications of the enlargement of the European Union for ten accession countries of Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) will significantly determine most of the ten countries' policy making for the next five to fifteen years. The process of pre accession/accession will be very cost-intensive, where the environmental sector is rather expensive with a total of 120-150 billion ECU estimated investments. Such investments are expected to be allocated for 40% to the combustion plants, for 40% to water and sewage treatment plants and 20% to solid and hazardous waste.

The key-challenges of the accession countries indicate that main efforts should be directed in the construction of the necessary Institutions, to pursue a nuclear safety policy, in abating nitrogen content in water, to reduce point source pollution and to increase energy efficiency.

The ten CEE accession countries are racing against time undergoing serious institutional, economic and political restructuring of their own nations.

During the 4^th and the 5^th ENWAP-EG meetings several invited speakers from the EU Commission (Mr. B. Griepink, DG1a, PHARE programme and Mr. G. Strongylis, DGXI) and from the Ministries of Environment of Hungary (Mr. N. Zoltai and Mr. P. Bozo), Czech Republic (Ms. S. Safrankova) and Poland (Mr. B. Kobus) gave to the Expert Group a glimpse of the complex process of adapting the EU Environmental legislation (Acquis) into their own national legislation, of implementing environmental commitments and what the European Commission had provided to the CEEC for economic assistance in the Environmental sector.

The speakers also identified the needs of telematics tools for environmental management in the domain of air, water and waste such as Environmental Information Systems and Environmental Management Support Systems.

Data are the backbone of any environmental management process : poor quality data available at national level, inaccurate and often not comparable, will impede all but the simplest reviews of implementation of environmental commitments. Consequently the accession governments need up-dated, standardised and interchangeable environmental data to formulate environmental policy, in order to give background and support for the implementation and enforcement phase of the legislation. Additionally they need those data to inform the public on environmental protection issues and to prove objectively their fulfilment of the environmental commitments for the accession.

The ENWAP-EG goes East

The two days seminar held at the Regional Environment Centre in Szentendre, Hungary, on the last 2-3 March also gave the opportunity to gather new actors, mainly from the CEE countries, interested in the Environment Telematics applications as well as the members of the ENWAP-EG. The discussion about the approximation strategies for CEEC environments in transition and of the Good Practice case-studies had initiated the process of experience exchange and it helped to further target the work of the ENWAP-EG. The main conclusions that can be pointed out are:

• air and water pollution management issues are the main concern for the environment telematics applications in the CEE countries.
• data interchangeability and their quality standards are of major importance both in transboundary and national partnerships, compliance with ISO standards and other standards are a must;
• environmental data communication for the public deserves more attention, looking for appropriate media and messages;
• a real involvement of the different categories of stakeholders (government agencies, decision makers, industry and public) should occur to manage properly environmental problems
• the need for more local partnerships to raise public pressure onto authorities on environment/health issues;
• the local partnership should include different parties involved in the strategy of the air quality action plan, especially health authorities, transport providers, etc.
• need of training is a prerequisite
• importance of sustainable development of telematics applications
• transparent allocation of the national resources, provided by foreign government to national government, should occur and should be distributed more at local level

• the Institutional constraints, such as lack of cooperation among users at different levels of the organisation and between different organisations. The process of privatisation had cut down fundings causing the departure of operators into more remunerative sectors. To regain such technological and scientific gaps a real partnership looking at effective implementation of telematics applications should be established between EU and CEE countries where private partnership should be largely involved to create longer sustainable applications.
• The infrastructure, which is inadequate or even absent. Within the CEE countries the local differences are very large, showing lack of a reliable communication network, limited electronic equipment, etc.
• The inadequacy of funding occurs via the government which is shifting the responsibility of the environment to local authorities without providing enough financial resources. Also the difficulty of getting fundings through the RTD programs in the CEE countries and via foreign organisations (EU-RTD), exacerbated by the proposal procedures, represent a major bottleneck to get financial supports.
• The level of know-how. Even though a strong academic background is present at different levels of local authorities, the technical and operational know-how needs improvements. Relevant education and training for all the users and stake-holders has to be reinforced.
• A successful implementation of Environment telematics applications requires the involvement of all the parties.

The DETERMINE conference

A conference disseminating the results of the Environmental projects of the European Union's (EU) RTD Telematics Application Programme (TAP) and related research programmes will be held at the REC's Conference Centre in Szentendre, Hungary, June 4-5, 1998. The conference, co-organised by the International Society for Environmental Protection (ISEP), Austria and the Regional Environmental Centre (REC), Hungary is funded under the TAP Programme by DGXIII and supports the objectives and implementation of the EU-CEEC Information Society Forum.

The objectives of this user forum Conference are to introduce the Telematics Applications Programme (TAP) ; to present results of Telematics projects in the fields of Environment and Transport; to facilitate the possible uptake of TAP results in CEE; to discuss the needs in CEE for Telematics related technologies and the problems associated with their implementation; to outline existing Telematics initiatives/success stories in CEE; to facilitate participation of CEE countries in the future EU Information Society Technology (IST) programmes.

The Conference is targeted to representatives of the potential users of Environment and Transport Telematics Applications from CEE countries and the EU such as local and municipal authorities, decision makers research institutes, environmental authorities, industry, business, consultants and international organisations. About 100-120 participants are expected to attend at this open forum event. The Conference is free of charge.

A conference exhibition will be also organised. The Telematics Application Projects are invited to present practical demonstrations in the exhibition area. Visitors will be able to see examples of EU TAP projects, the benefits they can bring, and how these can be applied locally.

The ENWAP-EG is participating actively in the conference. A panel discussion will be held on the key issues resulting from the analysis of the good practice exercise carried by the ENWAP-expert group. Two ENWAP documents are under elaboration and will be presented at this main Conference. They relate to the description of user requirements, potential users and common user requirements identified for the TAP-EN and related projects and to the synthesis of the good practice exercise.

More information ?

If you wish to have more information on the ENWAP activity or to establish some discussion with the Expert Group on the ENWAP objectives , please feel free to use the e-mail address: enwap@list.arttic.com

More detailed information on the ENWAP activity i.e. the minutes of the ENWAP-EG meetings, the experts addresses, etc. are provided by the following WEB sites:

www.ceit.sk/wwwisis/enwap.htm

www.trentel

(will be operational at the end of April 1998)

The first WEB site is provided by CEIT in Slovakia and it is also used for the DANIS (Danube Information on Human Resources) home page, a database often utilised by many CEEC users;

or by the ENWAP rapporteurs :

www.rec.org/DETERMINE

www2.echo.lu/telematics

or by :