Energy is a key factor in civilization's sustainable development and people’s well-being. The global intensive economic growth and energy consumption requires adequate growth in production. It is necessary to provide sufficiently large, affordable and reliable energy sources and exploit potential renewable sources as well as fossil and nuclear fuels. The affordable and safe energy provision for humanity and environment protection requires the use of all sources of energy in an optimal mixture. The important role of engineers is to design future fit for humanity innovative energy generation systems providing sustainable, affordable, reliable, safe, resilient and environmentally friendly energy of all needed forms and volumes in the coming period of the transmission to the carbon-neutral circular economy.

Sub-themes

• Limits for the use of PVE and WE in modern industrial society
• SMR, a nuclear reactor of the 4th generation or waiting for nuclear fusion?
• Power to X - medium-term efficient energy storage
• Renewable resources for sector coupling
• Interconnector capacity for the green scenario of the power generation
• Smart grids and artificial intelligence
• Stability and flexibility of electricity networks
• Sustainable, affordable and reliable power generation and use
• Environmental and energy sustainability of society
• Building energy management and economy
• Photovoltaic power plants and recycling
• Wind power plants lifecycle and recycling
• Environmentally friendly and safe renewable energy sources exploitation
• Social, health, food, biodiversity and health aspects of the energy provision
• Heating, cooling, accumulation
• Energy communities, active customers

Keywords

Affordable and reliable energetics, Artificial intelligence, Carnot batteries, CCS+U, coal, Fossil fuels, Natural gas, Hydrogen using, Climate adaptation, Closure objectives, Energy efficiency and certification, Energy efficiency and carbon footprint, Environmental sustainability, Interconnector capacity, Photovoltaics and recycling, Power X – energy storage, Smart grids, Population energy consumption, Reprocessing of nuclear fuel, Tolerant fuel, Stability and flexibility of electricity net, Wind energy, Wind power plants lifecycle and recycling, Environmentally friendly and safe renewable energy sources exploitation, Social, health, food, biodiversity and health aspects of the energy provision, Distributed power generation, Building heat and ventilation

The concept of smart cities and urbanization tries to use modern technologies in suitable ways to invoke synergic effects between various subsystems (transportation, logistics, safety and security, building administration etc.) regarding the quality of life of its citizens. The essence of the current problem with cities and urbanization is that the complexity of their political, social and economic environment has increased exponentially whilst their administration and technological infrastructure has remained rigid and therefore unable to operate effectively under any new volatile, dynamic conditions. As a consequence, citizens are frustrated, there is an increase in health hazards from pollution, precious resources are wasted and the natural environment is damaged. The meaning of the term "smart", therefore, is to be seen in a balanced relationship between man and technical systems. Smart solutions must make cities more humane and not only technologically advanced. To solve the problem of smart cities, interdisciplinary teams, including experts in humanities (sociology, psychology, the environment, etc.), naturally arise. New technologies enable better project management and public participation in urban development. New forms of participatory methods of citizen engagement are being promoted. The presentation of variant solutions can be shown using various advanced visualization tools like virtual or augmented reality. For example, simulation models, where the advantages and disadvantages of individual variants can be traced so that they can make more qualified decisions at the city management level.

Sub-themes

• Sustainability and resiliency of settlements
• Intelligent mobility in smart cities
• Smart city services (healthcare, food supply, water supply, rubbish collection)
• Digital twin cities (sensors, Internet of things, 5G networks, simulation and modelling, etc.)
• Interoperability and technical standards (ISO, CEN, IEEE. etc.)
• New forms of participatory methods of citizen engagement
• Historical monuments maintenance and preservation

Keywords

Smart cities, Smart settlements, Sustainability, Resiliency, Digital twin, Internet of Things (IoT), Augmented reality (AR), Virtual reality (VR), 5G networks, Drones, Remove sensing, Historical monuments, Intelligent mobility, Intelligent transport systems (ITS), City infrastructure, Intelligent buildings, Interoperability, Technical standards, Food supply, Water supply, Rubbish collection, Healthcare, Social services

Population growth, industrial and food production resulting in the alarming rise of exploitation of all-natural resources impacts the severely existing natural environment and causes a human-made climatic change on the planet. To assure sustainable development of human life there is an important role of engineers in environment protection to mitigate the environmental impact of human activity, repair damage and safeguard environmental health, cleanliness and biodiversity. The engineering measures comprise the innovative design of new industrial production processes and products focusing on the recycling of construction materials, wastewaters, sewage and sanitation, technical measures assuring protection from flood and drought. Design and realize reclamation projects repairing devasted areas by intensive extraction, surface mining, petroleum extraction, trees cut, deforestation, and agriculture represent a great challenge for engineers and their contribution to the sustainable development of humanity.

Sub-themes

• Carbon offsetting processes
• Reclamation of devastated areas, Environmental cleanup
• Industrial production processes and products recycling
• Water quality treatment, flood and drought protection technologies
• Smart waste disposal, Management of air pollution
• Natural environment protected areas, Land use planning
• Environmentally sensitive agriculture, Precision agriculture (Precision farming)
• Chemicals, materials, microparticles and microplastics contamination

Keywords

Carbon footprint, Carbon offset, Air pollution, Noise pollution, Waste disposal, Recycling, Biodiversity, Reclamation, Environmental engineering, Pollutants, Climate change, Global warming, Circular economy

Engineering education is very important for the development of technical branches. Using of standard and new education methods is a matter of fact now. Industry 4.0 brings new requirements for education and new engineers. Engineering Education and Continual Professional Development will be focused on sustainability in engineering education as are technologies and skills needed, a new education paradigm and new engineers for the future. The second theme will be concerned with forms and methods for practical engineering education and the rise and use of virtual laboratories. Attention will be attended to lifelong learning principles and models. Very important is the last theme that is focused on a new approach to engineering education assessment, cooperation with industry. All these problems will be discussed in four subsections. Every subsection has a key speaker which is the subsection chair, too.

Sub-themes

• Sustainability in engineering education – Technologies and skills needed, New education paradigm, Engineer for future, STEM activities
• Forms and methods for practical engineering education and virtual laboratories, Citizen science (volunteer monitoring)
• Lifelong learning principles and models, University of the third age
• Citizen Science and public engagement in science and technology
• New approach to engineering education assessment, Cooperation with Industry

Keywords

Engineering education, STEM, Continual professional development, Virtual laboratories, Engineer for future

Passenger and freight transport face significant challenges leading to its transformation into sustainable, smart, and resilient transport. They are driven by major technical and political trends increasing pressure for the deployment of low-emission technologies, the emphasis on multimodal transport chains, improving transport safety or the use of smart digital technologies, but also influenced by uncertain prices or availability of resources. In the context of transport, a trade-off between many criteria must be reached to make transport affordable in the future. On the path to smart and sustainable transport, zero-emission vehicles and aircraft must be supported by smart digital technologies to achieve connected and automated multimodal mobility. Smart technologies will form the basis for passengers and freight to move seamlessly between modes of transport, including innovative technologies such as micro-mobility or urban air mobility.

Sub-themes

• Sustainability
• Safety
• Affordability
• Transport policy

Keywords

Air transport, road transport, rail transport, ground transport, emission in transport, advanced propulsion technology, electrification, hydrogen propulsion, batteries, synthetic fuels, biofuels, renewable fuels, recycling in transport, reduction of fatalities in transport, automated driving, transport safety, smart technologies in transport, integrated transport systems, logistics, regional transport, multimodal transport, drones, urban air mobility, micro-mobility

The increasing use of digital technologies and the internet in every aspect of human life result in a new era of living in a digital world. The phenomena highly affect the process of education, business, manufacturing and services as well as personal and social life. The wide adoption of digital communications introduces risks and vulnerabilities that may be targeted and exploited by severe threads. There is always a chance to get attacked in the digital world losing privacy, personal information, sensitive data or even control. The target application domains are education, social networks, the internet of things, embedded systems, smart cities, healthcare, manufacturing and supply chains, or autonomous systems and vehicles. How do the emerging and future technologies help to keep safety and security in a digital world, protect virtual identities, increase the trustworthiness of the system, or protect against misinformation?

Sub-themes

• Trusted computing, Trustworthy artificial intelligence, Safe and reliable machine learning
• Security and privacy in the Internet of Things, Vulnerable population safety
• Autonomous system cybersecurity, Policies and practices for safe digital world trusted computing
• Smart health security threats
• Cognitive Security – means of defence against social engineering attempts
• Manufacturing process security, Supply chain cyber security, Automotive IoT security
• Embedded system security, Intrusion detection

Keywords

The digital world, Internet of things, Smart city, Digital healthcare, Digital education, Digital world vulnerabilities, Safety and security, Cybersecurity, Artificial intelligence, Cognitive security

Ever growing interconnectivity enabled by the internet opens the door to new technologies enhancing the capabilities of industrial production. First of all, huge volumes of data are being generated, stored and collected thanks to various sensors, machine perception, the internet of things on the one hand and large data storage and high-performance computers have been installed on the other hand. etc. Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning methods are here to process the data efficiently and to discover hidden rules and facts. The most important role of Artificial Intelligence is to support dynamic planning, scheduling, organizing and anticipating events as well as integrating partial systems into global ones in the production environment. AI techniques, especially those of explainable AI, support the human-machine interaction and cooperation in the joint robot-human production teams. Nano-technologies, 3D printing and advances in software engineering, incl. embedded systems and edge-computing do represent additional latest technologies that are entering massively the industrial scene. Quantum computing knocks on the door. The Industry 4.0 future visions target more and more social and green aspects, making production comfortable for workers and protecting the environment of our planet. They influence also the areas of smart cities, energetics, agriculture, health care and create a backbone for future system architectures. In textile engineering fibre-based structures (prepared mainly by textile technologies) are and will be used in solving basic problems of society, such as health care and quality of life, reduction of energy needs, creation of advanced materials including nanostructures and efficient use of wastes. This section will cover broad topics of field "fibre material engineering", which combines textile production technologies with the functionalization of products to achieve the effects needed in various clothing and industrial applications ranging from protective materials and composites through wearable electronics to medical materials.

Sub-themes

• Future trends in Industry 4.0, Internet of things
• Future trends in robotics, Collective robotics, 3D printing and prototyping
• Collaborative work and Multi-Agent Systems
• Planning, scheduling and predicting, New technologies for better social life
• Nano-technologies, Fibre material engineering, Nano-fibre based scaffolds, Breakthrough technologies in textile engineering, Textile thermal bioengineering
• Innovation and disruption
• Artificial intelligence, Machine learning, Quantum computing, Software engineering, Modelling and simulation

Keywords

Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, Machine Perception, Industry 4.0, Robotics, Internet of Things, Innovations and Disruptive Technologies, Applications in Industry, Smart Cities, Health-Care 4.0, Energetics 4.0, fibre-material engineering, textile thermal bioengineering, nanofibre based scaffolds

Rapid technological development during the last two decades of the 20th century and both decades of the 21st century changed the character of health care and many types of medical examinations. There has been introduced the idea of the integrated care cycle (ICC) is based on the vision of such an environment where the patient-centred approach is applied, where care is personalized, where keeping people healthy is central to health care solutions, where hospitals provide the least-invasive interventions with the shortest length-of-stay for any condition, and where recovery occurs outside the hospital. The ICC is built on the following steps: prevention, screening and early detection and diagnosis, discovery to treatment, minimally invasive interventions, management and monitoring, and chronic disease management. All these steps can be effectively supported and enhanced by modern technology and advanced software tools, including utilization of AI and big data methods, mobile monitoring. Despite rapid developments in health technology, there have been some gaps, especially in the area of care technology for post-acute and long-term care settings including home care. Last but not least it is the involvement of patients and the public (PPI) in research generally, and developments of technologies especially.

Sub-themes

• Medical Imaging
• Health technology standards and interoperability
• Robotics in health and social care
• Citizen engagement with digital health technology, Patient and public involvement in research and development
• Mobile health assessment and contact tracing apps
• Digital health for nursing and rehabilitation, Digital health technology for emergency care
• Health technology in Living environments and the Internet of Things
• AI in the hospital of the future, AI in Health and Wellness Technology
• Ethical issues of human-robot interaction, Social care and health prevention
• Medical innovation, Intellectual property, and patent management, Privacy, ethics, and cyber-security in the AI age

Keywords

Artificial intelligence, Interoperability, Standards, Mobile health technology, Data privacy, Robotics, Patient public involvement, Social care, Health prevention

The concept of sustainable food production means ensuring fertile soil, sufficient quality water, energy and well-educated staff in food production companies. The issue of sustainable food production also includes packaging materials that can be composted or used as secondary sources of raw materials.
High importance in food production has topics like food safety, food security and ethics.
The inhabitants of the globe need to ensure sufficient sources of quality drinking water. Growing plant raw materials for food preparation requires quality soil rich in nutrients and able to retain rainwater. The issue of sustainable food production also includes packaging materials that can be composted or used as secondary sources of raw materials.
Mankind is increasingly looking for food from raw materials processed by gentle methods that, if possible, prolong the usefulness of the finished product, but the process preserves as many of the original components of the raw material important for health (vitamins, enzymes and fibre). Such technologies are represented by High-pressure processing, Pulsed electric field, ultrasound, cold plasma, UV light and other gentle methods. Such gentle processing is related to the food chain that has to ensure food quality by chilling on the way between food producers and the food chain.

Sub-themes

• Food material properties, Future foods for health, Effects of diet on the occurrence of major diseases
• New gentle technologies of food processing, Freezing and food storage processes, Innovative non-thermal and disinfection technologies
• Desert soil fertilization bioreactors, Remediation of soils contaminated by potentially risky elements
• Predictive modelling in foods
• Food safety, Food preservation, Application of natural antimicrobials for food preservation
• Circularity in food processing, Circular bio-economy systems, and sustainability issues
• Agriculture assures sustainable sources of food and raw materials
• Water source in dessert
• Desiccation unit for watering plants
• Recovery and reuse of value products from water streams

Keywords

Food materials, Food processing, Soil fertilization, Bioreactors, Food storage, Desiccation, Watering plants, Future foods, Food safety, Food diet effects on health

9.1 WFEO Standing Technical Committee on Water session

• SDG Goals: Water Challenges

The frequency and scale of natural disasters are growing, but as a result of the significant overpopulation of the planet, the consequences are also increasing, natural fires, major floods, earthquakes, hurricanes and tornadoes, tsunamis and more. Scientific and technical progress, in addition to the positive aspects of the growth of production of various needs, especially energy, raw materials and consumption values of various forms, also brings an increase in great risks. In the 20th and 21st centuries, there was a rapid development and growth of industrial production, the permanent introduction of new technologies, the use of new materials, the emergence of new industries, the extensive centralization of emerging production facilities and their deployment near urban agglomerations. All this entails some dangers and serious natural and industrial risks, and society must be sufficiently prepared to protect not only the affected and endangered populations, but also the society's critical infrastructure. Consistent prevention and sufficient preparedness, as well as crisis management and emergency planning, play a crucial role in protecting the population and society.

Sub-themes

• Risk assessment, prevention and management of natural and industrial disasters/accidents
• Mitigation of the consequences of the main natural disasters and industrial accidents
• Preparedness and awareness of integrated rescue/emergency system for natural disasters and industrial accidents
• Improve the population's education for natural disasters and major industrial accidents

Keywords

Natural disasters, Major industrial accidents, Emergency rescue systems, Prevention of disaster, Prevention of major accidents, Preparedness of population for all kinds of disasters, Population Protection, Risk Management, Mitigation measures, Consequence management, Crisis management, Case studies

The average global temperature will increase by at least 1.5 °C over the next twenty years. But climate change will remain with us for decades to come, as the heat contained in the world's top 700m ocean will radiate only slowly. Also, carbon dioxide, which is partially contained in the atmosphere, but also dissolved in sea currents, whose circulation lasts up to 200 years, will be released gradually. The almost full thermal impact of the released carbon dioxide is therefore manifested in 60 years at the earliest. Only today are we bearing the consequences of emissions released decades ago, and this also applies to our descendants. There is not only one solution to the crisis but many small, deliberate steps that, in their cumulative effect, will transform life on earth. Philosophical or value solutions alone will not suffice, but also new technologies. Engineering without a soul will be as misleading as a soul without practical solutions. It's a much more optimistic attitude, but we all know that the beginnings are rarely easy. How can engineers help solve the problems of today's world?

Sub-themes

• Support the mental and physical transformation of the world with new, compassionate and low-emission technologies
• Working together in a resilient world with increased water, food and energy security
• Recreation of rational and responsible engineering culture that will be the bearer of the transformation of the world and not just an instrument of market mechanisms
• Low emission technologies
• Resilience technologies for a new, brave world

Keywords

Mental, value and physical transformation, low emission technologies, water, energy and food safety, resilience, technologies for a new, brave world.

Observing the Universe and the Earth is a rapidly developing technical branch. The observation of the universe historically begins with the development of telescopes, starting with the work of Galileo Galilei. In the 20th century, scientists began to observe the Universe and the Earth from space, space stations were built, last the ISS, mankind arrived on the Moon. In the near future, new interplanetary missions, the return to the Moon, missions to Mars and the construction of new space stations are expected, also to support interplanetary missions. Observing the Universe opens new possibilities for knowledge. Earth observation allows to monitor and react correctly to events and progress on Earth. To make the new missions possible, new launchers, new propulsion systems, new space technologies, new satellite production technologies, new communications systems are needed. The massive use of space robots and artificial intelligence, the development of services in orbit, research in microgravity conditions, production and assembly in space, and autonomous navigation will be increasingly important. Satellites will become increasingly important to support scientific and technological development and to allow a sustainable development on Earth.

Sub-themes

• Earth observation, Remote sensing, Downstream solutions, Robotics and AI
• Importance and support for European Green Deal activity
• Space system technology, Component development, System development, Electronics and electrical systems development, Propulsion system development, Satellite manufacturing capabilities
• Launch technology and management, Testing services and technologies
• In-space manufacturing and assembly, On-orbit service, Space transportation and exploration, Research under space conditions, Cosmic waste, Safety of space activities
• Navigation, Communication and Quantum Technology
• Industry support, Commercialization and new space development, Space law and security, Regulations and international law, Market trends

Keywords

Universe, Earth, Space, Universe observation, Earth observation, Space rockets, Rocket fuel, Satellite, Propulsion system, Space technologies, Satellite manufacturing, Communication, Space robots, Artificial intelligence, On-orbit services, Research under the space conditions, In-space manufacturing, Assembly.

The most important topics of the moment, the questions related to Energy, Environment and Climate Action can we define as well as the top priority for young engineers from whole the world. The impact of the COVID pandemic calls to identify the needs of young engineers and shape their future working environment. Attending the WEC 2023 Young Engineers Forum allows become part of the community of participants in Congress and foster collaboration between engineers from 100 countries. They can use the opportunity to discuss with attendings experts and build bridges with policymakers. The WEC 2023 Young Engineers Forum will include a mix of technical talks, panel discussions seminars, soft skill workshops, technical visits and social events.

Various formats of meetings, round tables, panel discussions and other formats will introduce inspirational women and their professional achievements in their careers as engineers and scientists. The discussions will endeavour to emphasize gender equity in STEM as a driver for sustainable development.