PROGRAMME

Metaverse and more specifically the technologies that comprise it like virtual and gamified environments, eXtended Reality (XR), the Internet of Things and Artificial Intelligence can bring a new era to the means of real time monitoring and decision making and ultimately, disrupt the field of waste management. In order for waste management strategies to fall in line with EU legislation, directives and strategies (i.e. European Green Deal, Circular Economy, Sustainable Development Goals of the United Nations etc.), , key stakeholders and policy makers need to have access to data and information. This information needs to be direct and accurate in order for them to proceed further and employ the necessary directives. At the same time, access to large amounts of incomprehensible data could result in wrong interpretations and thus, in ineffective or inefficient measures. The present work will showcase a framework of how we can implement gamified and virtual worlds that provide data visualization in a user-friendly and role playing manner (e.g. virtual embodiment of a key stakeholder). We also vision these worlds to be fed with real-time or low latency inputs of waste management data, sourcing from external sensors and thus, providing a sense of hybrid worlds, mixing the synthetic environments with the real world information. Lastly, AI models could be trained using this data and information and act as assistants in decision and policy making. So, this holistic Metaverse framework from sensor data and virtual worlds to decision making including AI-assistance could drastically change the field of waste management, leading into a new era where advanced tools will be in service to improve people’s daily lives.