VISUALIZING.ORG HOSTS URBAN WATER DATA VISUALIZATION CHALLENGE IN COLLABORATION WITH CIRCLE OF BLUE
NEW YORK (February 21, 2011) – Visualizing.org, the global open data visualization platform created by Seed Media Group and GE, opened its World Water Day data visualization challenge today in collaboration with Circle of Blue, the leading news organization reporting on global water challenges. The challenge calls on designers, data experts, and visualizers to tap into the world’s stream of water data to create visualizations specifically on the topic of urban water. The international contest offers a $5,000 cash prize to the winner and offers a chance for contestants to help solve urban water issues through data and design.
The challenge topic was inspired by the World Water Day 2011 theme Water for Cities.
“Many of the world’s metropolitan centers lack the planning, infrastructure, and water resources needed to support the mass migration of residents from rural to urban areas,” says J. Carl Ganter, Director of Circle of Blue, “This is why cities are simultaneously places where the most dire resource challenges converge and where new ideas and water-related investments can be tested.” Circle of Blue therefore teamed up with Visualizing.org to host a challenge that would make use of the abundance of water data available.
“We’re delighted to partner with Circle of Blue to host a challenge that galvanizes our community of cross-disciplinary thinkers and designers to use the open water data to reveal new patterns and trends and introduce new ways of understanding urban water issues,” says Adam Bly, Founder of Visualizing.org.
The competition runs from February 21 through March 15 and will be judged by a panel of water and data experts as well as information designers. The results will be released on World Water Day, March 22, at Visualizing.org. To enter the competition or to find more information, visit Visualizing.org.
Share your data
Competition organizers encourage researchers, organizations and government agencies to share their data or point to links of existing data they would like participants to consider. Email suggestions and links to visualizing (at) circleofblue (dot) org Additional data, resources and links are located at www.circleofblue.org/visualizing.
About Visualizing.org
Visualizing.org is an open online data visualization platform created by Seed Media Group and GE. It is a free resource for designers and students looking for open data about world issues – such as climate change and global health; a platform for the creative community to share visualizations with each other and the public under a Creative Commons share-alike non-commercial license; a service that provides researchers, decision makers, media organizations, educators and the public with important information design; and a tool for schools to showcase the work of their students and help bring data visualization into the classroom.
About Circle of Blue
Circle of Blue is the national and global network of leading multimedia journalists, researchers and data experts that produces daily coverage and trend-setting reports about water issues from every continent. Circle of Blue approaches the freshwater crisis with three coordinated, interrelated components: front-line journalism, existing and new science and data, and communications design. Circle of Blue’s widely referenced reporting makes water issues personal and relevant while providing a hub for data visualization, aggregation and integration. Circle of Blue applies the best tools of the 21st century to help provide the knowledge that people need to make informed decisions. Circle of Blue is a nonprofit affiliate of the Pacific Institute.
Media Contacts:
Saira Jesani
Visualizing.org
jesani (at) seedmediagroup (dot) com
J. Carl Ganter
Circle of Blue
media (at) circleofblue (dot) org
+1.202.351.6870 x110
DETAILS
A Challenge: Making Sense of Water Issues Through Data and Design
A mass migration from rural to urban areas is underway globally. More than half of humanity lives in cities. Of all the challenges that influence this transition, none is more fundamental than water. Yet many of the world’s metropolitan centers lack planning, infrastructure and the water resources needed to support the new tide of urban residents. That’s why cities are simultaneously places where the most dire resource challenges converge, and testing grounds for new ideas, practices, and water-related investments for managing urban transformation.
The Challenge
Visualizing.org, the global open platform for data visualization, and Circle of Blue, the leading news organization reporting global water challenges, issue an ambitious and rapid-fire call to designers, data experts and visualizers to tap into the world's stream of water data. The international contest, which offers a $5,000 cash prize, challenges cross-disciplinary thinkers and cutting-edge creative teams to use and display data to reveal new ways of understanding trends and patterns, complex systems and relationships.
Topic: Urban Water and Sanitation
- connections between water and infrastructure capacities in cities
- the effects of climate change on urban water supplies
- urban water systems and sources
- water quality and water pricing
- water management and city planning
- innovation
- urban water data
Sample projects
Participants might explore:
• Access to safe water and sanitation, and the relationship to education, GDP and other indicators;
• New ways to map and track water climatological changes in the U.S. Great Lakes region, which supplies water to more than 40 million people, and comparing the Great Lakes to other parts of the world;
• How urban areas use and manage water. Participants might tap into massive streams of live information from major river flows and aquifers that feed major metropolitan areas such as Mexico City or Los Angeles;
• Asia's water challenges — more than a billion people live downstream from the Himalayan glacial melt. How will climate change affect these flows and how will urban areas monitor and prepare for a potentially drier future?
• Relationships between disease, water and climate;
• Urban water management and the quality of available water data.
• Financing water infrastructure.
How to participate
Sign up online at visualizing.org
Visit the water challenge on visualizing.org for more information and data
Visit Circle of Blue's resource site at http://www.circleofblue.org/visualizing for more data and ideas.
Submit your visualization at visualizing.org
Timeline
This is a rapid-fire competition. It opens on Monday, February 21st; the competition closes March 18 and winners will be announced on World Water Day, March 22.
Judging
Entries will be judged by a diverse panel of water and data experts, and information designers.
The winning entry will receive a $5,000 cash prize provided by GE.
Past challenges
Past challenges have compared life expectancies, explored the relationship between green space and health, charted relationships between agriculture and resources, and showed relationships between the World Economic Forum's Global Agenda Councils.
Showing posts with label circle of blue. Show all posts
Showing posts with label circle of blue. Show all posts
Wednesday, February 23, 2011
Wednesday, March 17, 2010
Water for the World Act - next steps on March 23, 2010
See article below from Circle of Blue. And a quick update: the Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing will indeed take place on March 23. Link here.
Senate Committee to Vote on Clean Drinking Water Bill
March 17, 2010
The bill emphasizes the importance of water and sanitation in U.S. foreign aid.
The Senate Foreign Relations Committee will vote at its next business meeting on a bill to provide safe drinking water to 100 million people, according to a committee staff member.
The meeting is tentatively scheduled for March 23, the staff member told Circle of Blue.
The Paul Simon Water for the World Act was introduced nearly one year ago, but has not been acted on by the Foreign Relations Committee.
“Our bill will reestablish U.S. leadership on water around the world,” said the bill’s sponsor, Senator Richard Durbin, Democrat of Illinois, at a press conference in 2009.
“By bringing safe water and basic sanitation to 100 million of the world’s poorest people, the Paul Simon Water for the World Act will make America safer by reaffirming our standing as a leader in the fight to end global poverty,” Durbin said. “It will help prevent humanitarian catastrophes and dangerous conflicts around the world.”
To help provide clean drinking water, the bill would create an Office of Water within the U.S. Agency for International Development and a diplomatic position in the State Department to increase the importance of water and sanitation for U.S. foreign policy.
Currently, water policy at USAID is managed across several offices and bureaus.
Members of both political parties are among the 30 co-sponsors. Similar legislation — the Water for the Poor Act — was passed in 2005, establishing the United Nations Millennium Development Goal targets for water and sanitation as key elements of U.S. foreign assistance programs. The current bill gives more detailed guidance on how to achieve those goals.
Meanwhile, the House version of the bill is being held up in the Foreign Affairs Committee because it is part of a larger overhaul of foreign aid legislation, according to committee communications director Lynne Weil.
In order to restructure the U.S. water policy bureaucracy, both Senate and House versions of the bill would amend the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961. The chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Representative Howard Berman, Democrat of California, is working on re-writing that act, which guides how the U.S. conducts its foreign aid programs.
“Any legislation that amends the Foreign Assistance Act is being considered for inclusion in the foreign assistance reform bill,” Weil told Circle of Blue. “That’s why individual pieces haven’t been considered separately.”
Berman’s bill, the Foreign Assistance Reform Act, would require the President to submit a national strategy for reducing global poverty and assisting economic growth in developing countries. The legislation would create an advisory council to complete annual assessments of the effectiveness of foreign aid programs.
Weil said that Berman intends to introduce the bill later this year.
Senate Committee to Vote on Clean Drinking Water Bill
March 17, 2010
The bill emphasizes the importance of water and sanitation in U.S. foreign aid.
The Senate Foreign Relations Committee will vote at its next business meeting on a bill to provide safe drinking water to 100 million people, according to a committee staff member.
The meeting is tentatively scheduled for March 23, the staff member told Circle of Blue.
The Paul Simon Water for the World Act was introduced nearly one year ago, but has not been acted on by the Foreign Relations Committee.
“Our bill will reestablish U.S. leadership on water around the world,” said the bill’s sponsor, Senator Richard Durbin, Democrat of Illinois, at a press conference in 2009.
“By bringing safe water and basic sanitation to 100 million of the world’s poorest people, the Paul Simon Water for the World Act will make America safer by reaffirming our standing as a leader in the fight to end global poverty,” Durbin said. “It will help prevent humanitarian catastrophes and dangerous conflicts around the world.”
To help provide clean drinking water, the bill would create an Office of Water within the U.S. Agency for International Development and a diplomatic position in the State Department to increase the importance of water and sanitation for U.S. foreign policy.
Currently, water policy at USAID is managed across several offices and bureaus.
Members of both political parties are among the 30 co-sponsors. Similar legislation — the Water for the Poor Act — was passed in 2005, establishing the United Nations Millennium Development Goal targets for water and sanitation as key elements of U.S. foreign assistance programs. The current bill gives more detailed guidance on how to achieve those goals.
Meanwhile, the House version of the bill is being held up in the Foreign Affairs Committee because it is part of a larger overhaul of foreign aid legislation, according to committee communications director Lynne Weil.
In order to restructure the U.S. water policy bureaucracy, both Senate and House versions of the bill would amend the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961. The chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Representative Howard Berman, Democrat of California, is working on re-writing that act, which guides how the U.S. conducts its foreign aid programs.
“Any legislation that amends the Foreign Assistance Act is being considered for inclusion in the foreign assistance reform bill,” Weil told Circle of Blue. “That’s why individual pieces haven’t been considered separately.”
Berman’s bill, the Foreign Assistance Reform Act, would require the President to submit a national strategy for reducing global poverty and assisting economic growth in developing countries. The legislation would create an advisory council to complete annual assessments of the effectiveness of foreign aid programs.
Weil said that Berman intends to introduce the bill later this year.
Thursday, August 20, 2009
Global Water Survey: Results
Some encouraging news from Carl Ganter and the always-impressive Circle of Blue at World Water Week:
NEW GLOBAL PUBLIC OPINION SURVEY FINDS WATER ISSUES ARE THE TOP ENVIRONMENTAL CONCERN WORLDWIDE
A quick summary from WaterTechOnline.com:
A close look at the results shows that people around the world view water pollution as the most important facet of the freshwater crisis, and that shortages of fresh water are very close behind. Across the 15 countries surveyed:
• 93 percent say water pollution is a very serious (72 percent) or somewhat serious (21 percent) problem.
• 91 percent believe that a shortage of fresh water is a very serious (71 percent) or somewhat serious (20 percent) problem.
Across the seven focus countries:
• Government is considered among the most responsible for ensuring clean water.
• 78 percent say “solving drinking water problems will require significant help from companies,” indicating that partnerships are an important component to resolving the world’s freshwater sustainability challenges.
• 76 percent say “I need more information to be able to do more to protect water.”
While people around the world agree on the importance of the issue, some key differences between the countries surveyed support the idea that solutions will have to be carefully tailored to local conditions.
These findings are helpful for water writ large, and highlight a couple of really important topics:
- At the end of the day, meeting peoples' needs for safe drinking water and sanitation is the responsibility of the governments around the world. If those governments chose to outsource some of the infrastructure provision, I have no issue with that per se. Those governments need to maintain the intellectual capacity to manage that relationship so that the outsourced provider is not simply focused on profit, but on the social contract.
- Solutions will indeed need to be tailored for each local condition. There are so many social externalities associated with water and sanitation/hygiene that the cultural piece of this puzzle may prove to be the most challenging.
- I need to dig into the report further, but I hope that its definition of 'pollution' includes not just industrial/chemical contaminants running into water supplies, but nasty biological contaminants like rotavirus and vibrio cholerae, which kill millions of people unnecessarily each year. However, considering that quality typically lags quantity, it's good to see quality taking the spotlight in this survey period.
And of course MUST give shout out to Molson Coors Brewing Co. for their support for this survey. Molson can spend its money (part of it from me...) on many things, and I am glad they chose this.
NEW GLOBAL PUBLIC OPINION SURVEY FINDS WATER ISSUES ARE THE TOP ENVIRONMENTAL CONCERN WORLDWIDE
A quick summary from WaterTechOnline.com:
A close look at the results shows that people around the world view water pollution as the most important facet of the freshwater crisis, and that shortages of fresh water are very close behind. Across the 15 countries surveyed:
• 93 percent say water pollution is a very serious (72 percent) or somewhat serious (21 percent) problem.
• 91 percent believe that a shortage of fresh water is a very serious (71 percent) or somewhat serious (20 percent) problem.
Across the seven focus countries:
• Government is considered among the most responsible for ensuring clean water.
• 78 percent say “solving drinking water problems will require significant help from companies,” indicating that partnerships are an important component to resolving the world’s freshwater sustainability challenges.
• 76 percent say “I need more information to be able to do more to protect water.”
While people around the world agree on the importance of the issue, some key differences between the countries surveyed support the idea that solutions will have to be carefully tailored to local conditions.
These findings are helpful for water writ large, and highlight a couple of really important topics:
- At the end of the day, meeting peoples' needs for safe drinking water and sanitation is the responsibility of the governments around the world. If those governments chose to outsource some of the infrastructure provision, I have no issue with that per se. Those governments need to maintain the intellectual capacity to manage that relationship so that the outsourced provider is not simply focused on profit, but on the social contract.
- Solutions will indeed need to be tailored for each local condition. There are so many social externalities associated with water and sanitation/hygiene that the cultural piece of this puzzle may prove to be the most challenging.
- I need to dig into the report further, but I hope that its definition of 'pollution' includes not just industrial/chemical contaminants running into water supplies, but nasty biological contaminants like rotavirus and vibrio cholerae, which kill millions of people unnecessarily each year. However, considering that quality typically lags quantity, it's good to see quality taking the spotlight in this survey period.
And of course MUST give shout out to Molson Coors Brewing Co. for their support for this survey. Molson can spend its money (part of it from me...) on many things, and I am glad they chose this.
Monday, January 21, 2008
World Economic Forum and Water
The World Economic Forum's Chairman Klaus Schwab and the Nestlé Group's CEO got the Forum's annual meeting in Davos, Switzerland off to a good start by co-authoring A World United on Water.
The authors ask the right, inter-related questions about water (if completely ignoring the sanitation challenge and its impact on human health and the environment), and give readers their hopeful and I think realistic answer:
The authors ask the right, inter-related questions about water (if completely ignoring the sanitation challenge and its impact on human health and the environment), and give readers their hopeful and I think realistic answer:
"But it is not a catastrophe yet. It lies within our collective grasp to find the solutions. Business can improve its water efficiency, and in many cases it has raised the bar. There are many success stories. But it will take everyone in the water basin working together to change the overall game. This is what makes the challenge complicated. We are ahead of the curve for now. Addressed smartly, innovatively and with new forms of collaboration between government, business and industry, we believe the coming crisis can be averted."
I think I'll write a book on the world's water issue called "It Takes a Basin." Peter Brabeck is as pro-business as it gets as you might imagine - check out the last bit of his wikipedia entry (no citation given, so take with a grain of salt), and he is right to include the self-interests and responsibilities of business into the mix. He is also right to assert that all water is local. If all water stakeholders in an individual water basin can't work together to come to a reasonable settlement to the issue, the settlement will not be sustainable.
I am constantly harping on the solvability of the world's water challenge, if we actually make the commitments necessary to come to that solution. Carl Ganter quotes Peter Gleick in his post at The Huffington Post: "We know how," he says. "It's just not clear that we're going to make the commitment." Carl is looking for commitments at Davos this year, and so am I.
So call your CEO, ask him/her to attend the water events at Davos this year, and report back.Tuesday, October 9, 2007
October 11 - Art Opening and Reception, Washington DC
Less blogging today, more partying. Carl Ganter is a rock star of the safe water sector. No one tells a story like this guy - check out www.circleofblue.org.
Please join the Woodrow Wilson Center’s Environmental Change and Security Program and Mexico Institute for the opening of:
Water Stories: A Focus on Mexico
Thursday, October 11, 2007
Art Opening and Reception
5:00 p.m. - 7:00 p.m.
Comments by Circle of Blue director J. Carl Ganter at 5:30 p.m.
Fourth Floor Atrium
Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars
1300 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, DC
Please RSVP to ecsp@wilsoncenter.org.
More than 1 billion people lack access to potable water and more than 2.6 billion do not have adequate sanitation. The Woodrow Wilson Center’s new photography exhibit, “Water Stories: A Focus on Mexico,” in collaboration with Circle of Blue, offers a vivid glimpse of the lives that lie behind these statistics. Circle of Blue director J. Carl Ganter chronicles water and sanitation challenges facing families in the Iztapalapa region of Mexico City. World Press-winning photographer Brent Stirton documents how water shapes everyday life in the Tehuacán Valley southeast of Mexico City, as residents struggle to obtain enough clean water to meet their basic needs. In Mexico, as with many other places around the world, the quest for water consumes time, energy, and valuable resources. Understanding this human struggle is one step toward ameliorating the global water crisis. In conjunction with the photography exhibit, the Woodrow Wilson Center is launching a new publication, entitled Water Stories: Expanding Opportunities in Small-Scale Water and Sanitation Projects, that features photographs taken by J. Carl Ganter. For more information please visit www.wilsoncenter.org/water.
This exhibition and the Navigating Peace Initiative are made possible by the generous support from the Carnegie Corporation of New York. Circle of Blue’s Mexico coverage, Tehuacán: Diving Destiny, was made possible with generous support from the Ford Foundation. Additional support from FEMSA and the Woodrow Wilson Center’s Mexico Institute.Location: Woodrow Wilson Center at the Ronald Reagan Building, 1300 Pennsylvania Ave., NW (“Federal Triangle” stop on Blue/Orange Line), Fourth Floor Atrium. A map to the Center is available at www.wilsoncenter.org/directions. Note: Due to heightened security, entrance to the building will be restricted and photo identification is required. Please allow additional time to pass through security.
Please join the Woodrow Wilson Center’s Environmental Change and Security Program and Mexico Institute for the opening of:
Water Stories: A Focus on Mexico
Thursday, October 11, 2007
Art Opening and Reception
5:00 p.m. - 7:00 p.m.
Comments by Circle of Blue director J. Carl Ganter at 5:30 p.m.
Fourth Floor Atrium
Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars
1300 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, DC
Please RSVP to ecsp@wilsoncenter.org.
More than 1 billion people lack access to potable water and more than 2.6 billion do not have adequate sanitation. The Woodrow Wilson Center’s new photography exhibit, “Water Stories: A Focus on Mexico,” in collaboration with Circle of Blue, offers a vivid glimpse of the lives that lie behind these statistics. Circle of Blue director J. Carl Ganter chronicles water and sanitation challenges facing families in the Iztapalapa region of Mexico City. World Press-winning photographer Brent Stirton documents how water shapes everyday life in the Tehuacán Valley southeast of Mexico City, as residents struggle to obtain enough clean water to meet their basic needs. In Mexico, as with many other places around the world, the quest for water consumes time, energy, and valuable resources. Understanding this human struggle is one step toward ameliorating the global water crisis. In conjunction with the photography exhibit, the Woodrow Wilson Center is launching a new publication, entitled Water Stories: Expanding Opportunities in Small-Scale Water and Sanitation Projects, that features photographs taken by J. Carl Ganter. For more information please visit www.wilsoncenter.org/water.
This exhibition and the Navigating Peace Initiative are made possible by the generous support from the Carnegie Corporation of New York. Circle of Blue’s Mexico coverage, Tehuacán: Diving Destiny, was made possible with generous support from the Ford Foundation. Additional support from FEMSA and the Woodrow Wilson Center’s Mexico Institute.Location: Woodrow Wilson Center at the Ronald Reagan Building, 1300 Pennsylvania Ave., NW (“Federal Triangle” stop on Blue/Orange Line), Fourth Floor Atrium. A map to the Center is available at www.wilsoncenter.org/directions. Note: Due to heightened security, entrance to the building will be restricted and photo identification is required. Please allow additional time to pass through security.
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