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To find new ways to help conserve water in a future affected by climate change, TCD will host a 24-hour global hackathon.
The UN’s recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report sent shockwaves across the globe, suggesting that we only have slightly more than a decade to prevent us from causing catastrophic, irreparable damage to our planet.
Now, in an effort to find potential solutions to make our lives more sustainable, a global 24-hour hackathon will take place tomorrow (26 October), bringing together students, entrepreneurs, makers, technical experts and app developers.
Its focus will be to create new possibilities for Dublin to become a ‘smart water city’ with substantially better urban water management.
Organised by the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT), the Climathon is taking place across 115 cities around the world, and Dublin has put itself forward as one of the locations, with Trinity College Dublin (TCD) playing host.
Through EIT’s Knowledge and Innovation Communities (KIC) partnerships, last year’s event saw more than 100 cities across 44 countries take part, reporting a total reach of 33m people.
Throwing down a gauntlet
“The recent IPCC report has thrown down the gauntlet to governments and cities across the world. The challenges of meeting a 1.5 degree Celsius target are so immense that it is difficult to comprehend the scale and scope of collective transformation required,” said Kirsten Dunlop, the CEO of EIT’s Climate-KIC.
“We have 10 years to set radical changes in motion definitively across all sectors and, most crucially, in our own minds and everyday choices.”
Speaking of its importance for Dublin, TCD’s director for the Centre for the Environment, Dr Quentin Crowley, said: “Transitioning to a water smart city is a crucial and important step for Dublin.
“Climathon presents the perfect opportunity for us to look at innovative ways to make this transition as seamless as possible, so it’s exciting to think about what teams might come up with.”
The organisers said that anyone still looking to be a part of the hackathon can find more information about the event on EIT’s own website.
