2022 SOST Opportunities and Actions Roundtable
Summary: The Smart Great Lakes Initiative is a grassroots organization of over 70 partners working together to advance technology applications that improve our understanding, use, conservation, and management of the Great Lakes. Over the past decade, smart technologies have transformed the world: sensors have been deployed across our lives and environments, artificial intelligence has become widely accessible, and our ability to analyze and act on that data has grown exponentially. These technologies present a unique opportunity for addressing today’s Great Lakes challenges like never before, from safeguarding drinking water and understanding changing shorelines to tracking the long-term effects of climate change. Experts from academia, government, private sector, and policy are working collaboratively and calling for more "smart" investment in innovation, science, and information technology. Concurrently, this group is also exploring an Indigenous-led Smart Great Lakes effort, to determine if/how the concept resonates with Indigenous communities and how traditional and western knowledge can be complementary in an attempt to develop a more holistic approach to helping us be "smarter" about how we manage and protect the Great Lakes.
Sector: NGO
Organization: Great Lakes Observing System (GLOS)
POC: Kelli Paige, kelli@glos.org