Professor Kirsi-Maria Halonen will lead the University of Lapland team. Photo: Elli Alasaari
The Strategic Research Council (SRC) established within the Research Council of Finland has granted significant funding for WaterFall consortium. The University of Lapland’s share of the funding in the first phase is 389.560 euros.
WaterFall – Safe Water for All is a multidisciplinary research project
and consortium with partners from Finnish Institute for Health and
Welfare, Finnish Environment Institute, University of Oulu, University
of Lapland, National Defence University and Demos Helsinki. The project
aims to increase the resilience of authorities and water suppliers by
reinforcing their capacity to anticipate challenges and to make
long-term decisions in water supply security.
WaterFall belongs to SRC program Water for Welfare, Security and Peace.
Funding was granted to five consortia. A length of a consortium project
is 3 + 3 years. The University of Lapland’s share of the funding is
389.560 euros for first three years.
Professor
Kirsi-Maria Halonen will lead the University of Lapland team
as well as a working package that covers regulatory and governance
aspects including security of supply, crisis management and a citizens'
right to water.
– The research project could not be more topical – the recent break-ins
to water supply facilities, discussions about water pricing and
privatisation of water entitities, as well as declining state of water
infrastructures and regional economic and demographic differences makes
this project super interesting although demanding for the whole research
consortium, says professor Halonen.
Team comprises of
Tomi Tuominen,
Beata Mäihäniemi ja
Juho
Mäki-Lohiluoma. Additionally, a post doc will be hired for the project.
WaterFall focuses on water security from the perspective of safe
drinking water as a pre-requisite for human well-being. Providing safe
water for all is, however, challenged by changing climate, demographics
and security threats – physical and cyber. WaterFall project sets up an
interdisciplinary team to co-develop a new water supply management
approach and tools to foresee future challenges and enforce resilience
in a systematic way.
Project combines water research with social, economic, legal, military
and security sciences to analyse the water supply management in a
holistic manner from national level to single utilities, varying from
small to large. To comprehend the socio-technical system and develop
tailored solutions for water supply security in the future, WaterFall
complements societal safety approach with SETS
(social-economic-technological systems) framework and develop it by
including security perspective to the SETS framework.
Further information
Kirsi-Maria Halonen, kirsi-maria.halonen(at)ulapland.fi, +358 40 484 4262
Press release of the Strategic Research Council