---

---

---

---

Science Current Events and Science News RSS Feeds

---

---

Email a Friend Printer Friendly

Safeguarding the Environment in 2010 - UKISHELP Believes Glimpse Into the Future Can Inspire More UK Environment Sector IT Funding Success

April 03, 2002

The DTI’s EU funding support initiative UKISHELP (www.ukishelp.co.uk) believes that an exciting report offering a glimpse into the future of the environment sector could inspire even more UK companies to achieve European IT funding success. The report commissioned by ISTAG (the Information Society Technologies Advisory Group) examines a new concept called ‘Ambient Intelligence’. It looks at the way new technologies, including those in the environment sector, will integrate microcomputers into everyday objects making interaction with people as natural as possible.

The report draws on current EU-funded research and uses real life scenarios to describe what living with ‘Ambient Intelligence’ will be like for European citizens in the year 2010. One of the scenarios looks at how new technology might alleviate the problem of vehicle emissions. It’s a normal weekday morning. Carmen wakes and plans her travel for the day. For the purposes of the scenario people integrate with the new technologies by communicating with ‘the ambient’:

… She wants to leave for work in half an hour and asks the ambient clarify, by means of a voice command, to find a vehicle to share with somebody on her route to work. The ambient starts searching the trip database and, after checking the willingness of the driver, finds someone that will pass by in 40 minutes. The in-vehicle biosensor has recognised that this driver is a non-smoker – one of Carmen requirements for trip sharing. From that moment on, Carmen and her driver are in permanent contact if wanted (e.g. to allow the driver to alert Carmen if he/she will be late). Both wear their personal area networks (PAN) allowing seamless and intuitive contacts.

The scenario also suggests how city pollution levels might be controlled:

A persistent high-pressure belt above the city for the last ten days has given fine weather but rising atmospheric pollutants. It is rush hour and the traffic density has caused pollution levels to rise above a control threshold. The city-wide engine control systems automatically lower the maximum speeds (for all motorised vehicles) and when the car enters a specific urban area toll will be deducted via the Automatic Debiting System (ADS).

For UKISHELP, Peter Walters concludes,

“Many UK companies working in the environment sector are already involved in the European Information Society Technologies Programme; taking advantage of European Funding; and, helping to make the ISTAG report’s predictions become a reality. With a new €3.6 billion European IT funding opportunity called the Sixth Framework expected in later this year, the DTI is advising UK environment sector decision makers to find out more now about the business benefits of positioning their companies at the forefront of European technological innovation.”

To find out more about European Information Society Funding Programmes contact UKISHELP visit the website (www.ukishelp.co.uk) or call the telephone support line on 0870 606 1515. Visit the ISTAG web site at www.cordis.lu/ist/istag. The scenarios were developed for ISTAG by the Institute for Prospective Technological Studies of the EC’s Joint Research Centre (visit www.jrc.es and http://futures.jrc.es for information).

Glasgows