A summit aimed at linking the protection of the Ottawa River with the tools and strategies of high-tech activism is scheduled to take place in Gatineau this May, fuelling hopes for a new era of co-operation between Quebec and Ontario over the boundary waterway.
Sandro Di Cori, director of the first AquaHacking Summit, says the two-day meeting, which takes place May 29-30, is being hosted and funded by the Montreal-based de Gaspé Beaubien Foundation.
The foundation was created in 1990 by Nan-B and Philippe de Gaspé Beaubien II with the goal of practicing “entrepreneurial philanthropy” to support people, agencies, and organizations in acting as agents of positive change.
Di Cori says the founders’ grandchildren wanted to get involved with the foundation by working on an issue important to them – water preservation – which is how the foundation got involved with water issues. Di Cori says it was the grandchildren’s idea to use a hackathon model to get youth involved.
“It’s a hackathon around water issues,” Di Cori says. “A hackathon is a coding competition. We wanted to take that concept and bring it to the support of water, which is where the term AquaHacking was created.”
Di Cori says the hackathon will consist of several teams working together to create software that will raise awareness about the health of the river.
On the first day of the summit, local politicians from Ottawa and Gatineau, as well as other decision makers, the public, NGOs, and water experts will get together to discuss water governance issues.
On the second day, the hackathon participants, or hackers, will present their projects to a panel of judges. The team with the best hackathon project will win $10,000. Second and third-prize hacking teams will be awarded $3,000 and $2,000, respectively, Di Cori says.
Some of the hacking projects in progress may include a mobile app that identifies which beaches are open or closed on the Ottawa River and why, Di Cori says. All of the projects are still in the works, so Di Cori says they don’t have many details about them.
The most important thing is that technology is put to the service of the river, according to Meredith Brown, the executive director of Ottawa Riverkeeper, a partner in the AquaHacking project.
Ottawa Riverkeeper is an Ottawa-based grassroots charity that aims to solve the problems threatening the health of the Ottawa River.
“We really want to involve youth, so we came up with this idea of AquaHacking as a way to use technology to service the river,” says Brown. “It’s the first time as far as we know that there has been a hackathon that centers around water preservation.”
Brown also says the summit will be an important way to get more people involved and aware of the issues facing the Ottawa River.
The AquaHacking website outlines 148 issues impacting the Ottawa River, including sewage disposal into the river, non-compliant facilities dumping toxic waste into the river, and industrial waste such as mercury being left in the river.
“The public, people like you and I, people who like the river, or even decision makers like mayors or councillors have to make decisions and they really don’t even know that much about the health of the river,” Brown says.
The hackathon is expected to result in some new technologies to help solve problems the river is facing by raising awareness for them, Brown says.
“Once you start to visualize data and information, it’s really helpful for figuring out how to solve the problems,” Brown says.
Korice Moir, a water policy researcher who will be attending the summit as an engaged citizen, also says she is looking forward to seeing technology used in positive ways.
“I think water can benefit from technology, instead of technological advances always impacting water in a negative way,” Moir says.
Moir says she hopes the AquaHacking summit will result in policy and behavior changes by engaging citizens and decision makers.
“Water is life. Water is the lifeblood of our economy,” Moir says. “I hope the AquaHacking event allows technology to be used to work for water.”
If the AquaHacking event is a success, Di Cori says they hope to make AquaHacking an annual event, and implement it in cities across Canada with water problems.