emplement!

emplement! is a joint R&D project within the Sustainable Development of Urban Regions program, sponsored by the German Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) and facilitated by DLR Project Management Agency.

Within the framework of the overarching objective of "sustainable urban regions", projects are to be promoted which serve to increase the "resilience of cities, their environs and urban regions".

After a 6-month preparatory phase, the project is currently in the 18-month definition phase, which may be followed by a 4-year R&D phase.

Rapid urbanization presents cities and their surrounding regions with major challenges. Not only due to the increasing consumption of resources and the consequences thereof, but also due to climate change and the threats of associated disasters. Strategies and plans addressing these challenges do not only need to be developed, they need to be practically implemented.

Objective of emplement! is to develop transferable tools and the needed capacities that enable the involved players in Da Nang City and the adjacent Quang Nam Province to implement sustainability and resilience strategies and plans into practical and synergetic measures. At this the city and province are not considered separately, but with special emphasis on their systemic interdependencies. The development of the tools takes place at three different levels:

• System Level (strategies, plans, general framework; data generation methods);
• Technology Level (appropriate technologies, support of decision-making);
• Implementation Level (identification of obstacles, showcases, research on implementation).

Given the economic importance for Da Nang and Quang Nam, emplement! focuses on 4 fields of action:

Implementation should be sustainable, insofar as the technologies must be resource-efficient, scalable, emission-reducing, and thereof contribute to the reduction of GHGs.

But they also must be financially sustainable and operational in the long term. In the structured implementation dialog, the balance between technically possible and appropriate is to be found. Technologies and concepts for the four fields of action are elaborated in such a way that they contribute, inter alia, to resilience against drought and flooding.

Important aspect of emplement! is the implementation process for infrastructure e.g. Green Technologies or procedures/ methods in the areas of water and energy supply, wastewater and waste disposal, and food in the urban-region nexus. For the 4 fields of action (Tourism, Agriculture/ Forestry, Industry, Built Environment), technology setups will be developed and selected with regard to their local context, scalability, and potential synergies between the technology applications.

In the 4 fields of action implementation activities are defined and first practical showcase projects will be implemented during the definition phase, taking into account the conceptual and technical synergies both between the fields of action and in the urban-regional context. The project provides contributions to practical implementation processes, strengthening local competences, and general implementation research.

Target area of the emplement! project is the city of Da Nang and the adjacent Quang Nam Province (Central Vietnam). The 4 fields of action are of great importance for Da Nang and the Quang Nam Province and are in direct competition for resources such as water, energy or land. But there is also a great synergy potential, the development of which is part of this project.

In this current definition phase, the emplement! team and participating actors will define showcases which can be implemented as prototype projects within the 4 fields of action for the subsequent detailed scientific analyses. For proper design, emplement! is applying tools like questionnaires, obstacle analysis, summer schools and practical trainings. 

AT-Verband/ Association for the promotion of adapted, socially and environmentally friendly technologies

emplement! project coordination, method approach for implementing research & regional cooperation and working on the waste topic

AT-Verband

IZES gGmbH/ Infrastructure und Commune Development

Analysing stakeholder and administrative structure and material and energy flows

Frankfurt University of Applied Sciences / Institute for Architecture Civil Engineering and Geomatics

Responsible for urban planning aspects, analysis of existing plans and strategies for Da Nang & Quang Nam Province

University of Tübingen/ Geography

Working on remote sensing and ecological questions and the network of relationship (city-province) in the fields of action

University of Hohenheim/ Department of Agricultural Engineering in the Tropics and Subtropics

Responsible for the topic agricultural and related showcase and for providing project information

Ostfalia University of Applied Sciences/ Faculty of Civil and Environmental Engineering

Working on infrastructure (particularly water and wastewater) related issues and introduction & analysis of showcases

United Nation Human Settlement Program/ Vietnam Office

Responsible for the Vietnamese stakeholder liaison & management

Da Nang Institute for Socio-Economic Development (DISED)

Promoting and coordinating the collaboration of the various city departments within the project

Da Nang Architecture University (DAU)

Contributing to the aspects of technical engineering, and the topics tourism and culture

Quang Nam People' Committee

Promoting and coordinating the collaboration of the various departments of Quang Nam province within the project