For the good of our loyal followers, we provide an overview on the reasons that took us into a talcum mine, a site which is not so obvious for those who work in the field of management.
“PROGEOPiemonte” is the reason why. It is a triennial multidisciplinary research project of the University of Torino, funded by Compagnia di San Paolo, which aims to achieve a new conceptual and operational discipline in the management of the geological heritage of the Piemonte Region. It is focused on the development of techniques for recognizing and managing its rich geodiversity, at the local and regional scale. The project aims at enhancing the quality of the tourist package in order to improve tourism in the area based on geo resources as well as industrial heritage.
Several research groups are cooperating, working on tiles able to build a large mosaic, designed and coordinated by Prof. Marco Giardino.
Among them, there is a research unit, coordinated by Prof. Riccardo Beltramo, whose members are Ing. Paolo Cantore, Dott. Stefano Duglio and Dott. Enrica Vesce.
Aims of this group are the design and the implementation of an integrated management system in the geosite Gianna Mine, a mine reconverted into tourist destination, situated in the North-West of the Italian Alps, in the Piedmont Region, nearby Torino.
The innovative system integrates two tools developed by Commodity Science Area: a wireless network system, called Scatol8®, which provides information to a management system, called TIQMS (Territorial Integrated Quality Management System).
Scatol8® is a remote sensing network of environmental, landscape and management variables based on open-source technology (hardware and software) that consists of a central and peripheral units, connected in a network. Numerous sensors are inserted in the peripheral units, which transmit the data to the central one and, thanks to a server, to the Internet. Sensors and peripheral units can change in type and numbers, depending on customers’ requirements; thus, it is possible to create a real-time monitoring of each measured variable as well as evaluate their performance over time.
To set up a Scatol8® wireless network in Gianna Mine geosite, some critical points have been faced and overcome, due to microclimate and morphology of the gallery, in terms of low temperature, high humidity rate, wireless communication. Nowadays, the complete network has been designed and partially implemented; the complete implementation is expected on June 2015.
From October 16th to November 21st, two Scatol8® peripheral units collected some 28,000 data, which are now under processing. They refer to external and internal temperature, and to external and internal humidity rate. By the program, the adoption of other sensors has been planned: this option is always open, thanks to the modularity of Scatol8® system.
Data can be input for the territorial system. TIQMS is a methodology that allows the user to analyze a region by many points of view, regarding quality, landscape, environmental, occupational health and safety, and social accountability aspects.
All these features are managed because of the European Landscape Convention, ratified by Italy, and the following international standards: ISO 9001:2008, ISO 14001:2004, OHSAS 18001:2007 and SA8000:2008. All of them request the assessment of some specific indicators that can be evaluated thanks to the information supplied by Scatol8®.
Thanks to multimedia technology, the same data, duly processed, could feed interactive devices, whose sounds or colorful shows add something unique, to make the mine visit really wired.
Actually, we can say that a talcum mine has become a mine of information!
