News2 – Page 20 – Water Research laboratory

Cities and Water Conference in the Netherland

On February 11th Talis Juhna were in Cities and Water Conference in the Netherland (http://watercampus.nl/conference-programme/). In the conference he participated with «Rīgas ūdens» guidance. During his visit in Netherland he visited laboratories cooperation partners Wetsus centre – European centre of excellence for sustainable water technology (https://www.wetsus.nl/ ) .

The Water Research Laboratory arrived guests from the broadcast Bez Tabu

In late January to the Water Research Laboratory arrived guests from the broadcast Bez Tabu. They wanted to find out whetherthe measurements taken by the various water filter installers are true, or does not. Laboratory views represented KamilaGruskevica and Sandis Dejus.
The experimental results shown in Bez Tabu scene (from 22:20) in 29th of January.

Waterchain project meeting in Tallinn, Estonia

From 12th to 13th of January 2016, Kamila Gruskevica and Kristina Tihomirova participated in Waterchain project meeting in Tallinn, Estonia. The meeting was aimed to discuss current progress in project (more info here) about Baltic Sea environmental issues, as well as in technological solutions aimed to save Baltic Sea environment. The meeting was very interesting and useful and included a practical excursion to the laboratory in Estonian Environmental Research Centre.

Ilustrētā Zinātne

In the newest magazine «Ilustrētā Zinātne» is article that Riga Technical University scientists developed a new method for the detection of contaminants in the biobutanol fermentation reactors.

Read article in magazine «Ilustrētā Zinātne» /January of 2016.

Anaerobic microbial granulation under saline conditions in UASB bioreactors

On 23th December 2015, PhD student Dainis Sudmalis from Wageningen University and Research Centre had presentation in WRL about his PhD topic «Anaerobic microbial granulation under saline conditions in UASB bioreactors». Dainis had started PhD at the Sub-department of Environmental Technology (ETE) in October 2015. The main idea whom Dainis would like to defend during his PhD is the possibility of anaerobic granular sludge formation in UASB reactors under highly saline conditions by application of stimulating factors to avoid adverse effects such as multi-valent cation leakage from the EPS and cell lysis due to osmotic up – shocks in the system. An integral part of the research will be the performance of bioreactors as well as the mechanisms of granule’s formation.

Council of Research Center of Civil Engineering

In late November in the Riga Technical University was approved a separate structure Research Center of Civil Engineering. It consists of three laboratories:

· Water research laboratory;
· Scientific Laboratory of Powder Materials;
· Spatial and Regional Development Research Laboratory of RTU.

Council of Research Center of Civil Engineering is Sandris Rucevskis, Talis Juhna, Viktors Mironovs and Janis Zvirgzds .

On December 2nd WRL

On December 2nd WRL prof.Juhna and assoc.prof. Rubulis with colleagues from Netherlands (Martijn Bijmans – Wetsus Manager Europe, Pieter de Jong – EU Liaison Officer at Wetsus and Eric Vos – Economic department in programme water technology at Province of Fryslân) meet representatives from Ministry of Education and Science of Latvia. The host persons were Līga Lejiņa (State Secretary at Ministry of Education and Science of Latvia), Agrita Kiopa (Deputy State Secretary on of the Higher Education, Science and Innovation Department) and Santa Šmidlere (Expert in Department of the Structural Funds Issues).

Representatives from Netherlands provided insight in to Wetsus and cooperation in research with Province of Fryslân, companies from Europe and worldwide. Later on representatives of Wetsus and RTU explained possible cooperation routes between both parties in the light of upcoming ESIF programme.

Excursion in Green World Group

November 26th staff of Water Research laboratory were in excursion in Green World Group. Green World Group is is a global leader serving municipal authorities and private companies with cost-effective and comprehensive solutions for waste management. GWG combines UK and Finnish technology with Latvian manufacturing and logistics, them products are offered in a wide range of high quality configurations tailored to each customer’s unique requirements. Their main goals is metal manufacturing, waste care products, waste to energy and plastic manufacturing.

In time of meeting GWG propose Water Research laborotory to get involve in new projects.

Cooperation for Development

On Wednesday November 25th members of WRL Tālis Juhna, Kristīna Tihomirova and Jānis Rubulis joined the forum «Cooperation for Development» organized by the Department of Business and Innovation at RTU. The forum was organized as a panel discussion of researchers and administrative personnel from RTU and representatives from Latvian municipalities. The objective of the forum was to discuss development guidelines for cooperation between both parties. In the forum were represented cities of Daugavpils, Liepāja, Valmiera, and municipalities of Ādaži, Bauska, Cēsis, Dobele, Madona, Ogre and Ventspils.

Director of International Relations Department at RTU

Following the visit of Tālis JUHNA and Inese Džarcāne (Director of International Relations Department at RTU) to Colombia in beginning of November, there was arranged return visit of Mrs. Dora María Carmona Garcés from Pontifical Bolivarian University (PUB) to WRL. The researcher Dora Carmona is representative of Environmental Research Group (GIA) and she’s research area is related with soil remediation from heavy metals.

During the visit of Dora Carmona in WRL on 23th November 2015, assoc.prof. Jānis Rubulis did presentation of main WRL projects and showed available prototypes and scientific equipment.

Finally Mr.Juhna, Mr.Rubulis and guest researcher discussed about possible future cooperation’s in field of water and wastewater sector (cotutelle model PhDs, research projects with Colombian industry partners).

Pontifical Bolivarian University (La Universidad Pontificia Bolivariana) is a private university in Colombia with its main campus in Medellín. Environmental Research Group (Grupo de Investigaciones Ambientales) involves several research directions: Atmospheric Research, Water Quality, Environmental Management, and Waste Management and Recovery.