We have now held two of the three Digital Demonstrator workshops that are planned to support the pre-announcement of the Digital Environment Demonstrator Network call. Our meeting in London followed on from last weeks meeting in Cardiff, and Edinburgh comes next week.
The workshops comprise a range of presentations from NERC, from Defra and Environment Agency, and from representatives of the NERC data centres – and of course from us as the ‘Digital Champions’.
What followed these presentations was a fascinating set of discussions around the three key themes that emerged from the ‘Well-Sorted’ tool responses we had received in the period leading up to the workshops. Well-Sorted (https://www.well-sorted.org) is a fantastic tool from Texture Lab that allows delegates to express views and opinions in advance of an event, and for the convenors to group and sort these responses to allow a richer participatory experience for all (we hope!).
Our discussions then centred around three themes, namely (1) New technologies, data tools, modelling and visualisation technologies; (2) Monitoring, integrating sensors, citizen science, public engagement, inclusion, privacy and ethics; and (3) Infrastructure, data accessibility and usability for stakeholders, and user needs assessment. On the day, we wanted to capture the views of all participants. In previous times such exercises involve hundreds of post-it notes(!) However, in the digital spirit, we used the tool Slido (https://www.sli.do) to offer a web-based alternative. This was tremendous and we have gathered a huge range of comments, views and opinions. Slido also allowed us to have some insightful participatory exercises. After the same exercise in the next and final workshop, we will synthesise all these contributions and present back to the community the considered views and what we learned.
It is quite clear from the huge and growing interest in the Digital Environment theme and programme as a whole, that this is truly an ‘idea whose time has come’. These tools, techniques and approaches will inform future environmental science and environmental policy design and delivery. Thee is much to learn, but the benefits will be significant.