1. The i2010 Initiative

We are following a strategy for the Information Society in Europe called i2010 which is a key component of the EU’s renewed Lisbon competitiveness strategy. The i2010 initiative has three priorities:

1. A Single European Information Space, which promotes an open and competitive internal market for information society and media.
2. Innovation and Investment in Research aims to strengthen innovation and increase investment in ICT research to promote growth in Europe as well as more and better jobs.
3. Inclusion, better public services and quality of life is about achieving an Inclusive European Information Society that promotes growth and jobs in a manner that is consistent with sustainable development and that prioritises better public services and quality of life

2. The Renewed Lisbon Strategy

There is a strong complementarity between the EU's Sustainable Development Strategy (SDS) and the Lisbon Agenda. The EU Council stated in June 2006: „The EU SDS and the Lisbon Strategy for growth and jobs complement each other. The SDS is primarily concerned with quality of life[…while the] Lisbon Strategy makes an essential contribution to the overarching objective of sustainable development […] increasing competitiveness and economic growth and enhancing job creation.“ The ICT sector is key to enable growth and productivity in all economic areas, to reduce the environmental footprint of human activities and to improve quality of life.

3. ICT for Environmental Sustainability and Growth

Climate change is an unprecedented situation in the history of Earth. We are driving towards a wall and all must contribute to restore a healthy planet - including ICT. Our aim is to eventually launch an initiative on "ICT for Environmental Sustainability and Growth". The driving objective is to enhance the ICT contribution to sustainable growth and environmental sustainability, namely by

• decoupling economic growth and environmental degradation,
• moving towards a cleaner, safer and healthier environment
• reducing environmental risk on society
• improving efficiency in the use of raw materials / natural resources
• and improving energy efficiency

In the 7th Framework programme we will focus very much on "ICT for environmental management and for energy efficency" – identified as major challenges for the future. The focus will be on environment monitoring and management, the application of ICT to energy-intensive products, processes and services, and on coordination and support actions.

The initiative "ICT for environmental sustainability and growth", falls within the framework of the third pillar of i2010 and aims to highlight the positive contribution that ICT can make to sustainable growth and to creating awareness and accelerating the adoption and deployment of ICT-based solutions. It will focus on more efficient production and use of energy and natural resources; on support to the monitoring and management of our fragile environment; and on a better prediction and mitigation of and response to man-made and natural disasters. The initiative aims to a commit industry (large and small) and national/regional authorities to environmental sustainability as a means for future competitiveness and job creation.

5. Energy Efficiency We have been discussing with major stakeholders what we need in detail related to the energy efficiency area. The main areas should cover:

• homes and buildings, e.g. demonstrate intelligent management and control systems for energy savings aiming at energy neutral buildings
• the ICT industry itself, e.g. encouraging adoption of innovative energy saving electronic devices (e.g. standby, lighting), ICT systems and appliances, including energy scavenging technologies. A lot of energy is wasted through leaving things on all the time, in standby mode, for example. We should also encourage people to use new forms of lighting which are now being developed and coming into the market. For example LED-based lighting reduces the energy consumption by 90 %. Energy scavenging technology helps extract energy, for example from the heat of our body, or our movements when we walk.
• CAD methods and tools assessing and optimising the energy profile of energy-intensive products and processes covering their full life cycle.
• innovative ICT-based systems for the monitoring and control of the production, distribution, trading and use of energy (e.g. keywords: "multisource" and "cogeneration"). Pilots for local networks of power grids and intelligent electronic metering are envisioned.

• those with a large share of energy consumption (e.g. buildings/homes) and significant energy saving potential;
• those where ICT would have a significant leveraging effect;
• those where industry and/or public institutions have already demonstrated serious commitment;
• those which would have an effective impact on energy user behaviour; and
• Overall support to reducing by 20% energy consumption by 2020 (following the Energy Efficiency Action Plan proposed by the Commission).

Environment monitoring is limited by the fragmented capacity to access or even manage a wide range of information and services, the heterogeneity in system architectures, technical implementation, data structures and semantics and the incompatibility amongst accessibility rules to data and services applied by organisations. The challenge is to foster the emergence of an Integrated European Information Space for effective environmental monitoring, namely to promote and demonstrate seamless collaboration among environmental institutions and service providers, to promote the IEIS approach to relevant European and international initiatives such as INSPIRE, GMES, GEOSS and to support rapid and broad deployment of environmental services based on a system of systems approach.

7. Prediction of and Response to Disasters and Crisis Situations

Anticipation of crisis situations is limited by the lack of an IEIS and varying regulatory constraints and the heterogeneity of potential disaster types (e.g. nature, criticality, magnitude, geography). Response to crisis situations is limited by, the weakness of the preparedness, the emergency response interoperability amongst involved organisations and time-criticality and accuracy of early warning information. The challenge will be to foster a pan-European infrastructure aiming at reducing the societal impact of natural and man-made disasters. It will reinforce synergies with the IEIS actions and the eCall (eSafety initiative), launch a Public Safety Communication Forum, promote disaster resilience measures (e.g. for critical infrastructures) and contribute to an EU-wide emergency telecoms spectrum policy.

8. Objectives of the Initiative and its Implementation

The overall objective of the "ICT for Environmental Sustainability and Growth" initiative is to provide an overall strategic framework for community action. This includes

• to devise and implement adequate European policies
  Examples: self-regulation in agreement with industry and relevant stakeholders; standards/recommendations for harmonised approaches; MoU; operational guidelines etc.…
• To support RTD on next generation of ICTs contributing to environmental sustainability
  Examples: more energy efficient and environmentally friendly ICT devices and buildings; low-cost solutions for environmental monitoring; ICT-enabled energy efficiency solutions in relevant industrial sectors, including distribution, trading and use of energy.
• To raise awareness about ICT-based solutions for environmental sustainability
  Examples: set up ICT-based pilots demonstrating and assessing effective environmental monitoring, energy savings (e.g. buildings) and preparedness / early warning procedures; exchange and transfer of best practices; encouraging pre-commercial procurement of innovation.

9. Next Steps Further information

Initiative i2010

7th Framework Programme:
http://cordis.europa.eu/ist
http://cordis.europa.eu/

ICT for Environment:
http://cordis.europa.eu/ist/environment

Symposium "Information Technology, Competitiveness and the Environment" in Helsinki, November 20, 2006
Website Management and Contact:
European Support Centre of the Club of Rome
http://esc.clubofrome.org