Projects
COVID-19 Impact on Food Habits
Support COVID-19 Impact on Food habits Project, we are inviting everybody to participate in this project!
What is COVID-19 on Food Habits Project:
Food is for some people is purely subsistence, for others it can be about good health, connection with nature and with family, in expressing one’s cultural identity and way of life. At the COVID-19 on Food Habitas project we are looking if these attitudes are being reinforced or lessened as a result of the lockdown. There is no doubt that, in some individuals cases, there has been a behavioural shift towards what is eaten and how it is eaten. Anecdotal evidence suggest that there has been a rise in the amount of people that are now growing vegetables, herbs and fruits at home; in trying to decrease food waste; in cooking and baking new types of recipes, with banana bread for instance becoming a recent social media sensation; in families sharing meals together; in concern about the impact of ‘food miles’ on the environment and society and in where one buys food. yet there also seems to be an increase in families purchasing takeaways as a substitute to eating out.
What is COVID-19 on Food Habits do different:
The Insight SFI Research Centre for Data Analytics at NUI Galway is inviting the public to take part in a questionnaire that is designed to find out how people’s attitudes to food has been impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic. The survey is part of a European-wide research project.. We want to find out, amongst other things, how extensive these changes actually have been and if people intend to continue with these changes post COVID-19. All data will be treated anonymously and confidentially at every stage of the research that fully complies with the EU’s GDPR regulations.
What is the objective of COVID-19 on Food Habits:
Measuring to what extent this crisis has changed people’s relationship to food in terms of planning, purchasing and growing food as well as in the preparation, the ingredients used and in dietary aspects.

To support the COVID-19 Impact on Food Habits project complete the questionnaire…
Care-Peat Project
Due to COVID-19 we are working normally from home, however our outside activities are stopped until further notice!
What is Care-Peat Project:
Care-Peat is a North-Western (NWE) International regions (InterReg) project where nature organisations work with landowner groups to demonstrate carbon savings potential by using innovative technologies over large extension(s) of land ranging from 10 to 250 ha. considered as pilots. In Care-Peat five knowledge institutes from 3 countries work together with industry partners and citizen’s organisations to develop and test new techniques for improved peatland carbon assessment and accounting to highlight the region’s natural potential for significant carbon reduction.
What Care-Peat do different:
The innovative actions that Care-Peat project promote are that companies in the field of restoration together with citizens from nature organisations develops partnerships with local and regional stakeholders to reduce the CO2 emissions and maximize socio-economic benefits by restoring the peatlands in NWE areas. Methods tested and validated will be transferred and replicated to users across NWE to determine the most appropriate management measures. Partners, who manage additional peatlands, will facilitate further restorations after project end to benefit both biodiversity and carbon reduction policies. The project will continuously liaise with our Connects partners to maximise exchange, cooperation and dissemination. The effect of pilots at project end is a C reduction of 7,800 tonnes/year, after 5 years 0.14 MT/y and after 10 years 1.4 MT/y across other NWE nature reserves.
What is the objective of Care-Peat:
Beyond the fact that the Northern hemisphere peatland soils contain 33% of global soil carbon, while accounting for only 3% of total land area. Many of these peatlands are degraded and emit rather than store carbon. The main objective of Care-Peat project is to demonstrate that innovative technologies can reduce the net emissions of CO2 saving pit-land ecosystems and at the same time increase the capacity and accounting techniques for restoration.

For more details about this project…
crowd4access Project
Due to COVID-19 we are working from home, however any outside activity is affected!
What is crowd4access Project:
Crowd4Access is a Citizen Science project that provides an opportunity and an environment for the general public to map the accessibility of cities through crowdsourcing and data analytics.
What crowd4access do different:
Everyone has challenges when navigating the footpaths of a city. Th wheelchair user and the parent pushing a buggy may need access ramps, the runner may need an even surface, the person with low eyesight may need a good contrast between footpath and the street, whereas the blind may need tactile pavement. We want to learn about the problems that you can encounter when navigating the city.
What is the objective of crowd4access:
Mapping the accessibility of neighbourhoods, share experiences of moving around the city and contribute to the development of an Irish dataset of images of good and bad accessibility in urban areas.

For more details about this project…
Environmental Monitoring Project
Due to COVID-19 we are working from home, however our planned outside activities have been stopped until further notice

At its core, environmental monitoring is designed to help understand the natural environment and protect it from any negative outcomes of human activity.
The process is an integral part of environmental impact assessments and results can directly determine whether or not projects are given the all clear.
For more details about this project…
Air Quality
Ireland benefits from prevailing weather patterns which typically bring relatively clean south-westerly Atlantic air over the country. Under certain conditions, typical weather patterns can be disrupted, and pollutant emissions build up in the air. These conditions can occur at any time of the year, but the impact on air quality can be particularly severe during winter, when the combination of cold still weather, increased emissions associated with a higher heating demand, particularly from solid fuels, can lead to high concentrations of pollutants with a consequent increased risk to human health.

Mobile Unit in action
Here you can see our mobile unit in action, collecting and analysing live streams of data.
The data in Question is Carbon Dioxide levels being recorded by our mobile unit.
This data is transformed into information that can be used in real time about our environment.
On the right we see the latest reading that has been collected.
Below is a line graph that records readings throughout the day.