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3.2.2 BE Westzaan polder Research centerOur ideas regarding this part of the chain have changed slightly when we discovered that theVerbrakking Polder Westzaan Project was kept on hold. This was due to the problems theprovince of Noord-Holland encountered: unsolved issues with the water circulation after itflows through the polders, and farmers questioning the water quality of the surroundings.Those were the two main causes of the project to stop. This has made us believe evenstronger in the necessity of the Research & Information Center! However, having no actuallocation and no people who had been involved in this subject, we had to start all over again.The Innovatie-Estafette in Katwijk was our first step to raise interest and find partners whowere willing to take over the idea and implement it. Indeed, most of the visitors stronglysupported our vision and expressed the need for such a Research Center, especially todiminish the fear of salinity and invite governments and general public to work on it. We metresearchers from Zeeland, who deal with the same problems in their province and they allrecommended to us to contact Wageningen University and Plant Research International,because of its knowledge, skills and expertise in the field. We knew there are studies onsaline agri- and aquacultures conducted by different organizations in different part of theNetherlands. However, it seemed that there were no actual results ready to beimplemented. It was clear to us that the demand for setting up a separate, single entity,focusing on only researching, experimenting, informing and collecting results, was very high,but there was no one who could gather all possible stakeholders to one room. For thatreason we decided to skip the part of Westzaan Polder and focus on carrying out the idea ofResearch Center.At the Innovatie-Estaffete we also met a representative from the Province of Noord-Holland,who presented to us the plans for the project “Toekomst Afsluitdijk – dijk en meer”. It soonturned out that the serious and very broad plans for Afsluitdijk provided opportunities torealize the idea of Research Center, especially when the Province recognized the demand forit.Our second major opportunity was the “Leven met water” conference in Rotterdam, wherewe could talk to representatives of ‘Leven met zout water’ and ‘Ecopolder’ programs, bothfrom Acacia Water. Their concepts were more or less concerned with the topics we weretrying to tackle: the salinization processes, its consequences and opportunities for its usage.We decided to bring together the three projects and present them to the Province of Noord-Holland on our final round table discussion. The main goal of that meeting was to gathereveryone who in may be in any way concerned with the subject and discuss what can bedone. To some extent the meeting was successful: we accomplished the planned ‘businesscards exchange’ between Acacia Water and the Province of Noord-Holland and as we knowfrom experience, this is already half of the success.However, we sensed quite a negative attitude among other participants, which havebasically spoken out our concerns: there are too many research centers! Some of them areprivate, some private-public, some governmental and they all focus on study the samesubjects. Why is this knowledge spread all over the country? Why there is so littlecooperation between those organizations? Why there are no concrete results published to13
the public? Maybe this is the future of our research center: one central place, focusing onexperiments in real conditions, where the knowledge, resources, skills and facilities cometogether and join strengths to work towards the common good. This is something to keep inmind if one wants to pursue this any further.3.3 Saving energy – resultsAfter the research phase was done, we decided that the best way to finalize the efforts intoimproving the DSS was to gather as many relevant parties as possible in one room, presentour results and encourage discussion between them and RWS. This took place on the 20th ofJanuary and the attendance list can be found in the appendix (Ref. 5.14) and the results arepresented in the next sections.3.3.1 Regional cooperationAfter our initial research into the current status of DSSs in each of the waterboards, we had alot of data in our hands. Most of it can be found in the appendix (Ref. 5.15), but we alsofound it useful to present it in a friendly way.Real-time input(pumping stationsof third parties)Real-time statuspumping stations(their own)Precipitationinformation realtimePrecipitationpredictionsOverall inputpredictionsOverall outputpredictionsInfluence on otherparties' watermanagementProgress/statusNSC / RWS AGV HHNK HDSR RijnlandIncompleteYes: Rijnland & HDSRNo: RWS14No? Yes, RWS Yes, AGV, HDSRYes Yes Yes Yes YesYes Yes, inaccurate Yes Yes YesYes No, planned in 1-2yearsIncomplete*No: Rijnland, HDSR,RWSYes, 24-48h Yes, 48h Yes, 24hNo: RWS RWS-Utrecht? YesN/A No No No Yes, RWSYes: in high watercalamitiesComplete andworking,available forimprovementsNo** No No** No**Version 1 of the‘second generationsystem’, basictesting***Implementationand testing inJanuaryFirst generation(working on asecond)***Secondgeneration****Predictions from RWS's own systems (from the Markermeer for instance), not from any of the waterboards.** There is cooperation or influence on a voluntary (and informal) basis between HDSR, Rijnland, and AGV.Practically, this means that if they have a problem, they get on the phone and ask their neighbours for help.Generally they will receive it, beyond the formal obligations they have to each other.*** HDSR, Rijnland, and AGV all have pretty much the same system, except that HDSR had it first and is nowworking with an older generation. They are working on an upgrade, though, and then those three systems willbe even more compatible.
Page 1 and 2: Creating opportunities to adapt to
Page 3 and 4: 1. IntroductionThis project started
Page 5 and 6: 2.2 The two main chains2.2.1 BE In
Page 7 and 8: We have got the commitment of Wagen
Page 9 and 10: which in turn leads to more efficie
Page 11 and 12: These issues close the cycle: even
Page 13: This leads us to the topic of discu
Page 17 and 18: The problem in this case stems from
Page 19 and 20: 4. The next stepsIn this report, we
Page 21 and 22: 4.1.3 Thoughts on cooperationClearl
Page 23 and 24: 4.2.2 Policy makersThe 'lower level
Page 25 and 26: & Gill BV have came up with e new b
Page 27 and 28: AGV is also working on a system (CA
Page 29 and 30: Hoogheemraadschap De Stichtse Rijnl
Page 31 and 32: Erik Stapper, RWS Noord-Holland, 'P
Page 33 and 34: Frans van de Ven - Prof TUdelftEmai
Page 35 and 36: Peter Hoogervorste-mail: hoogervors

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