eUMaP – Development of a Utilities Management Platform for Quarantine and Lockdown Scenarios

LMA Sistemi Srl is actively engaged in research and innovation activities in response to the Covid-19 emergency. The project eUMaP – Development of Utilities Management Platform for the Case of Quarantine and Lockdown has been selected for funding under the H2020-RISE call. The consortium is coordinated by LMA Sistemi Srl and involves a team of nine partners from Italy, Cyprus, Greece, Lithuania and Germany.

In 2020, Europe faced a profound economic and social crisis caused by the outbreak of the Coronavirus. Over 200 million European citizens were subjected to restrictive measures, including in many cases full lockdowns, as governments and local authorities across the European Union took action to contain and limit the spread of the virus.

This unprecedented situation revealed a number of vulnerabilities in the management of urban infrastructure, particularly with regard to building utilities. As most of the European workforce shifted from office spaces to remote work within just a few days, many critical issues emerged, including power outages, water shortages, and insufficient internet connectivity. These problems exposed weaknesses in the planning and resilience of essential services at both local and national levels.

The eUMaP initiative aims to address these challenges through the creation of an open and flexible digital platform that will allow local authorities to efficiently plan and manage the demand and supply of utilities in the event of future lockdowns or other emergency situations. The platform is being developed under the Research and Innovation Staff Exchange (RISE) programme of Horizon 2020.

The system will be based on Earth Observation technologies, and will integrate the collection and digitisation of network infrastructure data using open BIM (Building Information Modeling) platforms. This includes the mapping and management of utility networks such as electricity, water distribution, heating and telecommunications.

The platform will be piloted in five European capital cities — Rome, Berlin, Athens, Vilnius and Nicosia — to test its performance in real urban environments. These pilot studies will support the optimization of the platform and will help ensure that, at the end of the programme, it can be delivered as a scalable open-source solution ready to support local governments across Europe in future public health emergencies or similar large-scale disruptions.