Number of InfraTech Innovation Awards entries continues to grow

And this year too, the number of entries for the InfraTech Innovation Awards once again exceeds the number of the last edition.

Whereas 67 clients, companies and partnerships sent in their project or innovation at that time, the counter stood at no less than 79 innovations at the close of the application period in this coronagraph. 

As in previous editions, the InfraTech Innovation Awards were divided into three categories: product innovations, process innovations and innovative forms of cooperation. In the first category 42 innovations were submitted, in the second category 22 and for the ever-growing category 'innovative collaborations' the jury received 15 entries this year. 

Annemieke den Otter, Exhibition Manager of Infratech since February of this year, is elated that so many companies and organizations - despite corona - still took the trouble to send in their ideas. "For the organization of InfraTech, this is of course an incredibly weird year. But the fact that the sector just keeps working very hard and, moreover, is working on such wonderful innovations and is also willing to share them with others, makes me realize how important a platform like InfraTech is and remains. I expect that the jury will have a tough time picking three winners."  

At the right address

That jury - consisting of Maxime Verhagen, chairman of Bouwend Nederland; Doekle Terpstra, chairman of Techniek Nederland, Michèle Blom, Director-General of Rijkswaterstaat; Gerben Wigmans, Concern Director of Stadsbeheer Rotterdam; Tomas te Velde, Founder Suit Case and Marcel Hertogh, Professor of Infrastructure Design and Management TU Delft - will choose a maximum of three nominees per category in the coming weeks. They will be allowed to give a pitch on December 11 in which they present their entry to the jury. On Jan. 13, the winners will be announced by Minister of Infrastructure and Public Works, Cora van Nieuwenhuizen. She invited all entrants two years ago to submit innovations to Rijkswaterstaat as well. "An awful lot needs to be done to all that infra that dates back to the reconstruction era. Traffic has increased eightfold and trucks have become three times heavier on average. So we desperately need these innovations. We have a reputation to uphold in the Netherlands. Good ideas have come to the right place and will find their way into practice."

Circular construction

Among this year's entries are many innovations in the field of circular construction. But also air-cleaning materials, new land surveying techniques, flexible groynes in rivers, solutions for water storage, mobile windmills and power plants, energy-generating sheet piling, cooling asphalt, automatic water pipe valves, sustainable asphalt top layers, traffic intensity meters and inspection robots. There are also entries for circular traffic signs, zero-emission equipment, circular concrete, sustainable lighting in tunnels, movable collision protection, paving robots, autonomous GPS-controlled pile drivers water buffering paving. 

Among the more than 20 process innovations stand out, among others, reusable bituminous joint crossings for streetcar rails, self-maintenance predicting viaducts and bridges, energy-neutral structures and a PFAS soil cleaner. 

In the area of innovative collaborations, submissions included dike reinforcement projects, the Bridge Campus, innovative education and traineeships, construction challanges, digital partnerships, The Circular Road, the Emission Free Network, the Greendeal infrastructure and smart maintenance sensors.

Two years ago, the Plastic Road developed by KWS, the digital subsurface database GeoKennis-op-Maat of the Ministry of the Interior and Kingdom Relations and the Innovation Workshop of the three northern provinces won the 2019 InfraTech Innovation Awards. Sweco's Smart Traffic system then won the Cobouw Audience Award.