Socio-Economic Benefits from the Use of Earth Observations

This report summarizes the outcomes of the discussion of the workshop on Socioeconomic Benefit from the use of Earth Observation workshop held at JRC from 11 to 13 July 2011.JRC.H.6-Spatial data infrastructure

Mobile Phone Data from GSM Networks for Traffic Parameter and Urban Spatial Pattern Assessment - A Review of Applications and Opportunities

The use of wireless location technology and mobile phone data appears to offer a broad range of new opportunities for sophisticated applications in traffic management and monitoring, particularly in the field of incident management. Indeed, due to the high market penetration of mobile phones, it allows the use of very detailed spatial data at lower costs than traditional data collection techniques. Albeit recent, the literature in the field is wide-ranging, although not adequately structured. The aim of this paper is to provide a systematic overview of the main studies and projects addressing the use of data derived from mobile phone networks to obtain location and traffic estimations of individuals, as a starting point for further research on incident and traffic management. The advantages and limitations of the process of retrieving location information and transportation parameters from cellular phones are also highlighted. The issues are presented by providing a description of the current background and data types retrievable from the GSM network. In addition to a literature review, the main findings on the so-called Current City project are presented. This is a test system in Amsterdam (The Netherlands) for the extraction of mobile phone data and for the analysis of the spatial network activity patterns. The main purpose of this project is to provide a full picture of the mobility and area consequences of an incident in near real time to create situation awareness. The first results from this project on how telecom data can be utilized for understanding individual presence and mobility in regular situations and during non-recurrent events where regular flows of people are disrupted by an incident are presented. Furthermore, various interesting studies and projects carried out so far in the field are analyzed, leading to the identification of important research issues related to the use of mobile phone data in transportation applications. Relevant issues concern, on the one hand, factors that influence accuracy, reliability, data quality and techniques used for validation, and on the other hand, the specific role of private mobile companies and transportation agencies.JRC.H.6-Digital Earth and Reference Dat

New Directions in Digital Government Using INSPIRE - Report from the Workshop at the INSPIRE Conference 2017

Digital government in Europe is evolving rapidly, thanks to both advances in technology and the tendency for governments to establish more participative relationships with businesses and citizens. There is a drive to promote economic growth in digital businesses through the better use of data, and location data play a very important role in this. INSPIRE has created a basis for the harmonisation of location information across Europe, and is able to support some of the more important developments in digital government. Some Member States have developed integrated strategies and have provided lessons from which others may learn. Technological advances have created an immense range of opportunities through developments such as the internet of things, cloud computing and big data; however, they have also introduced challenges in terms of privacy, trust and the need for new digital skills. A workshop entitled “New Directions in Digital Government using INSPIRE” at the INSPIRE Conference 2017 aimed to explore these new directions by sharing experiences and ideas. This formed part of the ISA2 work programme, undertaken by the European Location Interoperability Solutions for e-Government (ELISE) project, which involves the development of frameworks and solutions to exploit the potential of location information in digital public services across Europe

Improving use of location information in e-government processes: methodology and use case

Many e-government public services and underlying processes use location information but the use of this information is not always optimal, inhibiting both efficiency and effectiveness. This report describes a two step methodology for analysing and improving how location information is used in e-government processes, together with an approach for estimating the impact of location enablement on the performance of e-Government processes. The use of the methodology is illustrated by examining an existing use case: the Traffic Safety Monitoring process in Flanders. The process and the current and potential integration of location information are described in detail, as well as the potential improvements, the potential impact of further spatially enabling the process and a series of recommendations. This document is one of a series of guidance documents associated with the European Union Location Framework (EULF) Blueprint. It should be read in conjunction with the companion guidance document “EULF Design of Location-Enabled e-Government Services”JRC.B.6-Digital Econom

Assessment of the Conditions for a European Union Location Framework Report EUR

The European Union Location Framework (EULF) is a set of good practices and actions to promote more effective and efficient use of location information in e-government services. The EULF is part of the Interoperability Solutions for Public Administrations (ISA) Programme, which supports interoperability solutions, sharing and re-use among European Public Administrations. This report assesses the conditions for an EULF, based on a survey of Member States and an examination of EU policies and work programmes. Five focus areas are being considered initially: policy and strategy alignment, e government integration, standardisation and interoperbility, costs and benefits and committed partnerships. The assessment confirmed their importance in realising and maximising the benefits of location-related information and services. There are various good practices demonstrating that these issues can be addressed and that benefits for governments, citizens and businesses can be delivered. However these good pratices are not universally deployed and there are some significant gaps. The assessment also identified other important issues, including the need for effective leadership and governance, a user-driven approach, an open and balanced data policy, training and awareness raising and appropriately targeted funding. There is, therefore, a need for an EULF, to build on the good practices and interest from Member States and to develop a framework of guidance and actions that will foster interoperable cross-sector and cross-border sharing and use of location information.JRC.H.6-Digital Earth and Reference Dat

Location data for buildings related energy efficiency policies

Based on the priority currently given by the European Union to the energy efficiency topic through its Energy Union Package, this feasibility study has focused on the role of location data in support of energy efficiency policies, taking into account the requirements of INSPIRE, EPBD and EED Directives, as well as the CoM initiative. The EU Member States are already due to implement such Directives according to different roadmaps, but there are benefits to be gained from a coherent and consistent approach. Moreover, data is not always available in consistent form and with good quality. The monitoring and reporting requirements set by the CoM need real data and models, that can be used and that should work consistently across different administrative levels. The analysis reported in this document support these statement, showing that there is lack of data quality and reliability. These aspects might hinder the effective application of the energy efficiency policies at the municipal, district and national level. Geospatial technologies in general and accurate location data in particular can support this field, because they can significantly support efficient processes related to data collection, elaboration and communication to be executed in all the phases of energy efficiency policies life cycle; and effective decision-making. INSPIRE has a role to play as it can provide common data models and common data access rules adopted by all EU MS and a roadmap to provide interoperable datasets of high relevance with energy efficiency. The study has identified areas of development and analysis that can be useful to fill the recognised “data gap”, and proposed an initial pilot activity as a start-up project to investigate concretely these ideas with a limited number of pilot citiesJRC.H.6-Digital Earth and Reference Dat

EULF Energy Pilot - Final Report Phase 1

The European Union is giving more and more emphasis to its energy policies, reinforcing a political commitment to very high energy savings, with the aim to achieve a more competitive, secure and sustainable European energy system. Increased energy efficiency is vital to achieve the challenging goals set for the future and energy efficiency constitutes one of the five dimensions of the European Commission's Energy Union Package, designed to enhance energy security, sustainability and competitiveness. Within this policy context, this report focused on the 2010/31/EU Directive on the Energy Performance of Buildings and the 2012/27/EU Directive on Energy Efficiency, describing an initial set of pilot activities undertaken to enable and test the use of geospatial technologies in Digital Government processes and services related to energy efficiency EU policies, aiming to show, through a set of use cases, that accurate and interoperable location-based information can lower the barriers faced by government, companies and citizens involved in the energy efficiency policies’ lifecycle. The approach adopted is based on the INSPIRE Directive 2007/2/EC, establishing an infrastructure for spatial information in Europe to support Community environmental policies, and policies or activities which may have an impact on the environment, such as energy policies. The enabling role played by INSPIRE consists in the provision of common data models and common data access rules adopted by all EU MS and a roadmap to provide interoperable datasets of high relevance with energy efficiency. The report has identified a series of next steps to be undertaken to achieve the expected benefits deriving from the use of interoperable location-based information within the analysed energy policy instruments and to solve the issues encountered.JRC.B.6-Digital Econom

Methodologies for energy performance assessment based on location data: Proceedings of the workshop, Ispra, 12-14 September 2016

This expert workshop is one of a series covering the following topics: energy, buildings, location, assessment methods and data in relation to European Directives on Energy Efficiency (EED), Energy Performance of Buildings (EPBD), INSPIRE, establishing an Infrastructure for Spatial Information in Europe and the Covenant of Mayors (CoM) initiative. These workshops are jointly organised by the EC DG JRC project on Energy and Location and the European Union Location Framework (EULF) action of the EC ISA Programme (Interoperability Solutions for Public Administration) . So far the JRC team has produced a feasibility study and started a dedicated pilot project on location data for buildings related energy efficiency policies . The first event organised was the workshop on “Spatial data for modelling building stock energy needs” held at JRC in Ispra 23-25 November 2015 . The aim of this second workshop was to discuss different approaches and methodologies to assess energy efficiency measures as well as energy usage and monitoring of energy flows at building, urban and regional level, representing an opportunity to share information, integrate stakeholders’ views and set the ground for mutual collaboration. Eleven invited leading organisations and EU projects were invited to take part in this workshop sending experts to present their projects and discuss how to assess synergies and how to arrive to a coherent approach for assessment of energy use in the built environment. Another twelve people from JRC, experts on energy efficiency, energy performance, geospatial data modelling and processing participated to the workshop. From the discussions, it has emerged that a holistic approach would give more evidence of the needs for measures to reduce energy consumption. This is a bit in contrast to what the EU policy requests by the present energy related Directives. More and more it becomes evident that the target should be reducing emissions and not necessarily reducing energy consumption. Integration of energy technologies are playing an important role at a higher level than the building only (i.e. at the EPBD–level). The energy market (gas and electricity) is able to provide an enormous buffer in storing energy virtually and the buildings itself should be much better balanced in energy terms to the thermal needs, e.g. heating and cooling. At the same time the energy network requires buildings for balancing. INSPIRE could be very relevant for energy assessment in the built environment and for this reason the Energy Pilot initiated under the “Energy and Location” and “European Union Location Framework” projects will be continued over the next years. Main objectives of the pilot project will be to continue to work on Use Cases already outlined, to be further elaborated based on the information gathered at the workshop. The JRC will seek to develop partnerships to implement the defined use cases with the selected partners.JRC.B.6-Digital Econom

Architectures and Standards for Spatial Data Infrastructures and Digital Government: European Union Location Framework Guidelines

This document provides an overview of the architecture(s) and standards for Spatial Data Infrastructures (SDI) and Digital Government. The document describes the different viewpoints according to the Reference Model for Open and Distributed Processing (RM-ODP) which is often used in both the SDI and e-Government worlds: the enterprise viewpoint, the engineering viewpoint, the information viewpoint, the computational viewpoint and the technological viewpoint. The document not only describes these viewpoints with regard to SDI and e-Government implementations, but also how the architecture(s) and standards of SDI and e-Government relate. It indicates which standards and tools can be used and provides examples of implementations in different areas, such as process modelling, metadata, data and services. In addition, the annex provides an overview of the most commonly used standards and technologies for SDI and e-Government.JRC.B.6-Digital Econom

Building a monitoring system for the EU bioeconomy

The new EU Bioeconomy Strategy, adopted in 2018 is more relevant within the actual political, environmental and social context than ever before. In these times of acute awareness of global climate change impacts and related challenges for sustainable development, the EU Bioeconomy is perceived a crucial stepping stone to changing our whole development paradigm and to trigger systemic change. Bioeconomy is intended to contribute to the decarbonisation of our economy, to catalyse changes in consumer habits and will modernise our industries throughout the value chain. But is it all good? At what cost to primary productions systems? Can the bioeconomy really deliver on its promises while ensuring biodiversity enhancement and the improvement of our planet’s overall health? To what extent will societies benefit from a transition from a fossil-based to a bio-based economy? This document describes the first year of the development of the EU Bioeconomy Monitoring System by the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre (JRC) in collaboration with experts throughout European and International organisations, EU Member States, Commission Services and other stakeholders to assess questions such as those posed above. The framework is designed to house several basic indicators that are, analogous to the instruments of a symphony, in themselves useful and meaningful but whose value is enhanced once they are placed within an orchestra. Only when the indicators interplay jointly the ensemble is capable of estimating the progress of EU bioeconomy and its contribution towards the Sustainable Development Goals, highlighting related trade-offs and synergies. In this first year, the development of the monitoring system has focused on structuring the framework, thus creating a better understanding of the bioeconomy as it is presented in various sources at national, EU and international levels. Criteria have been established to assess indicator quality, which is relevant to the final decision on indicator inclusion. This document represents a status report on the development of the EU-wide monitoring system for the Bioeconomy and by no means does it constitute the finished work. Comments are always welcome, please write to: [email protected]