Danube River Environmental Assessment and Monitoring ( DREAM - ROBG00169 )
What is the purpose?
Specific Objective: 2.7 - Enhancing protection and preservation of nature, biodiversity and green infrastructure, including in urban areas, and reducing all forms of pollution
The Danube River Environmental Assessment and Monitoring (DREAM) Project aims to identify and address environmental issues along the Danube River in the Ruse/Giurgiu-Silistra/Calarasi region. The initiative intends to comprehensively assess air and water quality, noise pollution, and other
environmental aspects using cutting-edge technology like UAV, and a solar-powered boat. The main objective of the project is to provide thorough, precise, and up-to-date data on the environmental condition of the Danube River in the Ruse/Giurgiu-Silistra/Calarasi region. It aspires to achieve the following goals through this:
- Facilitate prompt actions to lessen negative environmental effects;
- Serve as a model for other Danube basins and comparable ecosystems internationally;
- Promote awareness and cooperation among local communities, governments, and industries.
What is the budget?
733.294,60 €, from which 586.635,68 € FEDR and 146.658,92 € National Contribution
Who implements the project?
Lead partner (LP): University or Ruse "Angel Kanchev", Bulgaria
Partner 2 (P2): National Research and Development Institute for Gas Turbines COMOTI, Romania
Partner 3 (P3): National Institute for R&D in Electrical Engineering ICPE-CA Bucharest, Romania
What is the implementation period?
Start date: 2024-12-21
End Date: 2026-06-20
Period: 18 months
Where it is implemented?
Ruse and Silistra region - Bulgaria
Giurgiu and Calarasi region - Romania
What will happen?
- Conceptualization and Design of EFMS;
- Procurement and Components Acquisition for EFMS;
- Assembly, Integration, and Preliminary Testing;
- EFMS Delivery and Project Result Promoting;
- Dissemination and Promotion of Project Results;
- Feedback Collection and Aftercare.
What will be the results (what is the contribution to the program)?
- RCO87 - Organizations cooperating across borders: 3
- RCO84 - Pilot actions developed jointly and implemented in projects: 1
- RCR84 - Organisations cooperating across borders after project completion: 3
- RCR104 - Solutions taken up or up scaled by organizations: 1
Status
The project is currently under implementation.
- The design of the environmental factors monitoring system (EFMS) is completed, and partners have started the activities for actual development of the EFMS system, installing, testing.
- Communication and stakeholder engagement: The official launch event was organized on 08.04.2025 in Ruse, Bulgaria, and a multilingual stakeholder survey was conducted to collect public feedback on the proposed system design.
- The procurement and delivery of core components for the Environmental Factors Monitoring System (EFMS) have been successfully completed. This includes the submersible water-quality monitoring station, key parts of the UAV subsystems (DRADAR and DREYE platforms), and the electric propulsion and renewable energy systems for the solar-powered vessel.
- Regarding the communication activities carried out in the second implementation period, these have been conducted according to plan. Durable information panels have been installed at all three partner headquarters.
In the 3rd period, partners continued to update the Facebook site with the progress of the project (DREAM Project | Silistra | Facebook)
5. A new survey regarding monitoring of environmental conditions on the Danube addressed to stakeholders has been published on the project website (https://dreamproject.eco/survey), this being a follow-up survey after the one initially conducted.