QleanUP project

QleanUP is a 4-year Horizon Europe project that comprehensively addresses urban water management and quality in the face of challenges from climate change, rapid urbanisation and emerging pollutants (such as PFAS and microplastics). Its main objective is to transform traditional reactive management into proactive, risk-based resilience.

 

To achieve this, the activities to be carried out focus on developing a next-generation water management platform. This will combine innovative hardware sensors with Artificial Intelligence (AI)-driven digital twins and predictive models, whilst also promoting the inclusive participation of the various stakeholders involved. The project is being executed by a multidisciplinary consortium of 14 partners and will be validated across 5 real-world demonstration cases (“demo cases”).

 

For the demo case 2 – Valencia (Spain) - the primary objective is to monitor the quality of the raw water entering one of the city's main Drinking Water Treatment Plants (DWTPs), specifically the Turia River, where anthropogenic impacts may be more significant. This will be done by looking at physicochemical and microbiological parameters, as well as using bioindicators to infer the quality of the water body. This objective will be achieved through offline and online monitoring (sensors/probes) of emerging pollutants and pathogens. Key local entities associated with the Global Omnium group are participating in this case, including GOServicios, Aguas de Valencia and EMIVASA, focusing on applying these cutting-edge technologies to safeguard public health and optimise the city's water management.

 

In terms of the benefits provided, the project's results are expected to contribute:

1. Improving urban water quality to provide better guidance for policymaking and priority setting through the development of integrated urban water quality monitoring management plans.
2. Robust, safer and risk-based urban water quality management plans, backed by enhanced holistic monitoring, advanced novel methods, digital solutions, modelling and evidence-based scenarios.
3. Increasing the adoption of digital tools in the water sector to support water management decisions for all stakeholders.

 

This project has been submitted to the HORIZON EUROPE call under reference HORIZON-CL6-2024-ZEROPOLLUTION-02. It is funded by the European Union through the European Research Executive Agency, and has a total contribution of 5.468.287,50 € https://qleanup-project.eu/