Space for Infrastructure: Water Management

The “Space for Infrastructure” thematic Call for Proposals from the European Space Agency includes water management infrastructure.

Water is key to sustaining life on Earth; its distribution is a fundamental part of modern society. Water management refers to the physical structures and networks that are used both for the distribution of water and for waste management (i.e. sewage). Waste management refers to the collection and treatment of sewage, which improves  living standards and also increases hygiene levels by almost eliminating the presence of waterborne diseases. With water security coming under threat in many countries, water infrastructure operators are increasing their investment to secure their future water supply. Use cases that may be addressed through this call include (but are not limited to):

• the estimation of future water usage, where, by predicting future demand, water authorities will be able to better plan the future infrastructure production needs, which will also improve the efficiency of water usage increasing the efficiencies in water treatments including for example waste water infrastructure monitoring
• facilitating preventative infrastructure maintenance to increase the grid capacity and allow for a more efficient system
• supporting better-informed water policy creation and information policy decisions
• monitoring water grid security and threats to infrastructure.

We look for teams who have identified an attractive market opportunity with real potential to engage customers. Motivation, business experience and domain expertise are all important features. We want to hear about your ideas that involve the utilisation of either space technology or space data.

In particular we are looking for those opportunities which are going to become market disruptors to the water and waste infrastructure market(s) and which offer a high level of innovation.

As part of this call for proposals, ESA will support Feasibility Studies and Demonstration Projects under this ‘Announcement of Opportunities’:

• Feasibility Studies allow successful teams to analyse, design and plan their intended service
• Demonstration Projects allow successful teams to put their intended service into practice.

Teams will test their service in the market by running a pilot with significant users and, by the end of the project, the service should be operational.

Application is open to businesses or business-led consortia from 22 countries, including the UK.