The Water Systems and Services Innovation Centre (WSSIC) is a joint venture between Cork City Council, Cork County Council and the Nimbus Centre at Cork Institute of Technology.  The WSSIC is on track to create an expert resource in modernizing Ireland’s water infrastructure by taking advantage of Nimbus’ technological expertise and leveraging both Councils’ experience in Water Resource operation.

Continuing the momentum of the successful first phase, the WSSIC Centre Manager will link closely with high potential businesses in the region to actively innovate and solve problems within the water sector. The WSSIC team evaluate new solutions in water and waste water management at the earliest possible stage and develop end-to-end solutions that show good evidence of high potential return on investment. The economic potential of this will be enormous, translating into profit for local business, providing employment and opportunity, while in tandem driving a clean environment agenda.

The WSSIC is an excellent opportunity to showcase the innovation and leadership that Cork provides in terms of water management. These problems can be effectively addressed with the synergy of vast expertise and experience from the councils and industry in conjunction with the advanced technological capabilities of Nimbus.

Sean Sherlock TD, who was present at the launch, said “This innovation hub will help provide better water services for the people of Ireland. In doing so, the innovation hub will create new, innovative, industry opportunities and jobs, while promoting Ireland as the sector leader on the European stage.”

Tim Lucey, Cork City Manager, Dr. Brendan Murphy, President of CIT, Sean Sherlock TD, Minister of State for Reserach & Innovation, and Martin Riordan, Cork County Manager pictured at the launch of phase two of the Water Systems and Services Innovation Centre (WSSIC) at the Nimbus Centre at Cork Institute of Technology.
Picture: Pascal Ungerer

Dr Brendan Murphy, President of Cork Institute of Technology, was one of the main speakers at the launch. He said “This exciting initiative is an example of CIT’s innovation ecosystem working for Ireland. Our goal is to take this into the Nation’s communities and create a new kind of innovation that impacts on our daily lives and inspires creativity.”

The WSSIC will harness state-of-the-art technology, innovations and leadership in water quality monitoring, leakage reporting & repair, remote monitoring and much more.  New ideas and technology developed in WSSIC can have global impact, positively influencing the major political, environmental and humanitarian issues caused by water supply and quality. The resulting advances will be rolled out across County Cork, with a view to deploying to all city and county councils in Ireland.  Alongside more efficient water services and monitoring processes, the WSSIC will be used as a catalyst for the creation of new Irish-based enterprise and jobs.

The WSSIC will establish and actively use 4-6 high impact test-beds for assessment and trials, located at appropriate City and County sites and promote Cork as an internationally recognised cluster of water systems and services organisations. This will translate innovation excellence into sustainable regional and national economic development and job creation.

The Nimbus Centre is equipped with state-of-the-art facilities and equipment for embedded systems research, development and demonstration. The Centre’s sixty five researchers and engineers also focus on hardware, systems integration and networking in application fields such as smart cities, energy, security, transport and user interfaces. Nimbus has extensive involvement with Irish SMEs, which will also be exploited for technological advances.

This innovation initiative is led by Kevin Fitzgibbon, Water Co-ordinator, Nimbus Centre, CIT.

Kevin.Fitzgibbon@cit.ie 021 433 5095

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TEC@Nimbus is part of the Nimbus Centre, Ireland’s only research centre dedicated to networked embedded electronics and software solutions. The Centre won nearly €3 million in research funding in 2012. With 50 dedicated staff working on 30 – 40 projects at any one time, the Centre acts as a “One Stop Shop” industry technology gateway offering complete system solutions for industry.

Do you want to develop new ideas in technology innovation for your company? Then come along to our Open Day. The Open Day will inform the innovation services offered to Start-ups, SMEs and large enterprises across Ireland. It will also be possible to see some technology demonstrations in our state-of the-art laboratory and network with some of our industry clients.

This is a free event and is open to Startups, SMEs, large multi-nationals, investors, relevant government agencies and professional service companies who want to develop or apply new ICT technologies in Energy, Water, Location Based Services or are interested in opportunities in the sectors. Tea/coffee available from 9.30am. See Agenda below. Register online at www.tec-centre.ie

Opportunity to win €5,000 worth of Research to explore Your Concept

TEC@Nimbus is holding a competition for the most technically innovative idea with the best commercial opportunity.

To enter: Click here to download the application form. Send the completed form to sinead.rodgers@cit.ie by 12^th June 2013. The winner will be announced at the Industry Open Day on the 14^th June. This competition is open to any individual or company.

TEC@Nimbus is funded by the Enterprise Ireland Technology Gateway Programme.

Open Day Agenda:

• CIT’s Innovation EcoSystem – learn more about the industry innovation supports within CIT and TEC@Nimbus
• Enterprise Ireland Funding Mechanisms – how to avail of the funding schemes for innovative projects
• Presentations by Industry Clients – listen to companies who have successfully worked with TEC@Nimbus in the past
• Rubicon Innovation Centre – learn about start-up incubation support to help set up and grow your business
• Commercialisation Opportunities – Technology Transfer Office describes the commercialization services available
• Water Services & Systems Innovation Centre (WSSIC) – information on the latest water technologies
• Mallow Systems Innovation Centre – see how you can trial your projects in real-time in a living lab situation
• National Sustainable Energy Test Bed – see how you can trial your own technology and learn about the Zero2020 project
• Technology Demonstrations – experience our latest cutting edge technical developments in our laboratory
• Announcement of winner of €5,000 worth of research

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Time: Wednesday 30th January, refreshments at 6pm, lecture at 6.30pm.

Abstract:

Rapid advancements in smartphones, wireless sensors and mobile communications have led to the development of cyber-physical systems, smart environments, and pervasive computing with important applications in environmental, civilian, military, industry, and government sectors. Sensor networks and smartphones play significant roles in this context as they not only act as effective interface between physical and cyber worlds, but also bring in human social aspects. However, increasing scale and heterogeneity at all levels – users, devices, networking and computing technologies, information and services – implies a high degree of uncertainty in distributed control and operations of pervasive and cyber-physical systems, thereby posing significant challenges in providing desired information quality, assurance, and reliability for intelligent decision making. This is particularly important for applications like smart health care, smart energy management, and pervasive security.

This talk will examine uncertainty-driven unique challenges and opportunities in cyber-physical systems and smart environments, and their inter-winding relationships with pervasive computing and communications. The talk will be concluded with provocative thoughts, open issues and future directions of research.

Biography:

Dr. Sajal K. Das is a University Distinguished Scholar Professor of Computer Science and Engineering and the founding director of the Center for Research in Wireless Mobility and Networking (CReWMaN) at the University of Texas at Arlington. During 2008-2011 he was a Program Director at the National Science Foundation in the Division of Computer Networks and Systems. He is currently an SFI funded E.T.S. Walton Visiting Fellow at CIT, Ireland. His broad research interests include wireless and sensor networks, mobile and pervasive computing, smart environments and cyber-physical systems, security and privacy, cloud computing, social and biological networks. Dr. Das has contributed significantly to these areas, published over 500 papers and 47 book chapters; holds five US patents; and coauthored three books including “Smart Environments: Technology, Protocols, and Applications” (Wiley, 2005), the first ever book on this topic. He is a recipient of the IEEE Computer Society Technical Achievement Award for pioneering contributions to sensor networks and mobile computing, IEEE Region 5 Outstanding Engineering Educator Award, and eight Best Paper Awards at prestigious international conference. At UT Arlington, Dr. Das is also a recipient of the Graduate Dean’s Award for Excellence in Mentoring Doctoral Students, Lockheed Martin Teaching Excellence Award, College of Engineering Research Excellence Award, University Award for Distinguished Record of Research and Academy of Distinguished Scholars Award. He is the Founding Editor-in-Chief of Elsevier’s Pervasive and Mobile Computing journal, and an Associate Editor of multiple journals. He is a founder of several high quality workshops and conferences including IEEE PerCom. He has served as General and Technical Program Chair of numerous IEEE and ACM conferences.

 Please RSVP to sinead.rodgers@cit.ie as space is limited.

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The WSSIC plans to harness state-of-the-art technology in water quality monitoring, leakage reporting and repair, remote monitoring and much more. The resulting innovations will be rolled out across Cork city and county with a view to deploying to all city and county councils in Ireland. With this, the WSSIC will seek to become internationally recognised as a hub for innovation in water-based systems and technologies. Alongside more efficient water services and monitoring processes, the WSSIC will be used as a catalyst for the creation of Irish-based enterprise and jobs.

Cllr Tony Fitzgerald, Deputy Lord Mayor will represented City Council at the launch. “The creation of this Innovation Hub will help to provide better water services for the people of Cork and in doing so will create new industry opportunities and jobs” he says.

Martin Riordan, Cork County Manager adds “We need to look at new and more efficient ways of managing all the water and waste-water sites across the whole county. The key challenge will be to ensure that that all the sites can be managed efficiently through a centralised control system.”

Dr Brendan Murphy, President of Cork Institute of Technology, was one of the main speakers at the launch. He says: “This exciting new initiative is an example of CIT’s innovation ecosystem working for Ireland. Our goal is to take this into the communities nationally and create the kind of innovation that impacts on our daily lives.”

The Nimbus Centre is equipped with state-of-the-art facilities and equipment for embedded electronic systems research, development and demonstration. The Centre’s sixty-five researchers and engineers also focus on hardware, systems integration and networking in application fields such as energy, security and user interfaces.

This initiative is led by Dr Kieran Delaney, Lead Innovator with the Nimbus Centre. Contact details: Dr Kieran Delaney, Kieran.delaney@cit.ie, 021 433 5567

Contact Details for other project members:

Researcher: Dr Ross Gillanders, ross.gillanders@cit.ie, 021 433 5184

Cork City Council, Senior Engineer: Pat Casey, pat_casey@corkcity.ie

Cork County Council, Chair of Steering Group: James Fogarty, james.fogarty@corkcoco.ie

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