Community Portal Self Creation
This use case focuses on enabling developers to create community-specific portals on the GEOSS platform. These portals help communities access and utilize Earth observations relevant to their specific needs. Users can log in, download templates, install tools, customize the portal's interface, and choose from predefined views or defaults.
Representatives from specific communities can request the creation of community-specific portals on the GEOSS platform, pending approval by the GEOSS Governance Body. The process involves submitting requests, providing community details, and finalizing approvals, ultimately making these portals accessible via the GEOSS platform.
Actors and stakeholders involved: Users of the GEOSS Platform affiliated to a specific community (e.g. AfriGEOSS) were very interested in a tailored customized version of the GEOSS Portal, responding to their specific needs. This was the driver for a general purpose tool, easily customizable for different communities.
Yellow Pages Management
This use case involves the registration of data providers not yet registered in the GEOSS Yellow Pages. Data providers can complete registration forms, agree to terms and conditions, and submit their profiles to be listed in the GEOSS Yellow Pages, helping users discover relevant data sources and services.
The Yellow Pages Widget is a critical component for registering data providers in GEOSS. This widget can be downloaded and installed by authorized Yellow Pages owners. Data providers can then access and submit their information, and the Yellow Pages owner facilitates communication between data providers and GEO Bodies for approval or denial.
Actors and stakeholders involved: Users who want to become a new service provider in the GEOSS platform will be involved directly in the registration process. They will be guided and supported by the GEO Sec and the YP component team to ensure a smooth process. Now that the GIDTT has re-started, we also aim to do a test with the GEO Sec focal point to ensure that the latest developments are also widely accepted with the technical community that supports the GEOSS platform. Once we will receive that green light we will deploy the YP2.0 in production.
Land Degradation
This use case focuses on addressing the Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 15.3.1, which aims to monitor and combat land degradation. The goal is to enable users, particularly from national SDG-related agencies and environmental organizations, to calculate the related SDG indicator at the national scale. Users can access Earth observation data sources such as land cover, land productivity, and carbon stocks. The GEOSS platform offers tools to discover relevant data, select suitable indicators, and execute calculations based on climate change scenarios, providing actionable knowledge in the form of risk maps. This use case highlights the platform's role in supporting sustainable land management and SDG tracking.
Actors and stakeholders involved: GEO LDN initiative is the main group approached so far with this use case. Based on their feedback, we understand that the use case can serve as an integrated & reproducible method to support Assessment and Monitoring/Evaluation phases of their integrated land use planning-integrated land management (ILUP-ILM) framework. Moreover, national stakeholders in Switzerland and local stakeholders in China (through direct collaborations) have been also exposed to the developed solution.
AfriGEOSS
The AfriGEOSS initiative seeks to identify challenges and put in place measures to enhance Africa’s participation in, and contribution to, GEOSS. This participation will support the continent’s efforts to bridge the digital divide and build a knowledge-based economy using GEO networks and GEOSS infrastructure. This scenario concerns the creation of a dedicated Community Portal for AfriGEOSS.
Actors and stakeholders involved: Representatives of AfriGEOSS were continuously and directly involved in the collection of the requirements for their Community Portal as well as in the validation of the intermediate and final developments.
Climate Change Impact on Norovirus Pandemic Risk
This use case addresses the potential impact of climate change on Norovirus outbreaks, focusing on mapping the risk based on environmental changes. Users, particularly from health organizations, can search for relevant information, discover modeling tools, set input parameters, and generate risk maps based on climate change scenarios.
A complementary use case aims to create a tool for correlating Norovirus outbreaks with environmental, clinical, and socio-economic parameters. While it's still in the early phase due to data access challenges, this tool could provide valuable insights into Norovirus-related risks.
Actors and stakeholders involved: The use-case is developed under the scientific patronage of the Università degli Studi di Firenze – Deparment of Chemestry (DICUS). DICUS is the coordinator of a recently funded project in the framework of the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions Doctoral Networks 2021, specifically focused on Norovirus infections. DICUS also has the co-leading position in a new COST Action European Network for diagnosis and treatment of antibiotic-resistant bacterial infections (EURESTOP). Other relevant stakeholders that have been contacted are the Meyer Foundation and the Istituto Superiore di Sanità - ISS).
SDG 11.7 - Monitoring the accessibility to urban green spaces
This use case tackles the accessibility of urban green spaces (SDG11.7) using GEOSS. Users, including national SDG-related agencies and city planners, can calculate urban green space accessibility using various input data like NDVI, population grids, land cover, and more. The GEOSS platform offers tools for generating actionable information through dashboards.
Actors and stakeholders involved: The plan here is to contact EuroStat that expressed an interest in developing a methodology to monitor this SGD indicator. Use case leader has already contact with them. More broadly we foresee also a potential collaboration with GEO WP initatives such as the Global Urban Observation and Information. We are also in contact with the State of Geneva that will probably test the application.
Nutrient Pollution in European Inland and Coastal Waters
In Europe, intensive agricultural practices together with high population density represent important sources of nutrients for fresh and coastal waters. Nutrient pollution is one of the major pressures on European aquatic ecosystems altering their condition. Ambitious water policies are in place in the European Union for protecting and restoring aquatic ecosystems. In October 2022, the Commission revised the Urban Wastewater Treatment Directive, adapting it to the newest standards, on the basis of an extensive impact assessment.
The GREEN model, developed by the EC Joint Research Centre, was utilized in the impact assessment to quantify the current pressures of point and diffuse nitrogen and phosphorus emissions to European fresh and coastal waters and analyze the effects of different policy scenarios of different ambition level on nutrient pollution reduction.
The GEOSS Platform Plus project, in collaboration with JRC, developed a proof of concept to enable the execution of GREEN model in a multi-cloud environment. GREEN runs through the Virtual Earth Laboratory (VLab), which utilises the European cloud computing platforms, including the Copernicus DIASes and the European Open Science Cloud, for the execution of scientific models. The GREEN Web application, developed by GEOSS Platform Plus project and the Joint Research Centre, allows the replication of GREEN model results of the impact assessment, contributing to a transparent and evidence-informed policy making process, according to the principles of the European Commission Better Regulation agenda.
The scenario was presented at the GEO week 2023 in Cape Town (South Africa).
Actors and stakeholders involved: The scenario was developed and co-designed in collaboration with several units of EC Joint Research Centre, including the developers of the GREEN model, the working group on the MIDAS (the Modelling Inventory and Knowledge Management System) and the Digital Economy Unit. This allowed to develop the scenario according to the needs of the relevant stakeholders, e.g., policy- makers, in water and marine domain.
Above Ground Biomass
The quantification of forest above-ground biomass (AGB) over large areas is used as a proxy for the quantification of carbon stocks, particularly referring to Reduced Emissions from Deforestation and forest Degradation (REDD+) projects, for the quantification of forest resources and ecosystem services, the creation of fuel maps to be used as input to wildfires spread models, and for biodiversity and climate change models. According to the definition of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC 2006), Above-Ground Biomass is defined as “All living biomass above the soil including stem, stump, branches, bark, seeds and foliage”. The main objectives of the use-case are the generation of maps of biomass (based on observation points (in-situ data) and vegetation indices (VIs) from remote sensing imagery) and allow the comparison of results obtained by different Machine Learning (ML) models.
Actors and stakeholders involved: The use-case is developed in collaboration with EC JRC and is still in its early phase of development, the plan is to involve stakeholders from REDD+ network, forestry-related agencies, policy makers, etc.
AGAME – Automated Gross Primary Production Application for Monitoring Ecosystem Health within GEOSS
This use case focuses on enhancing the capabilities to monitor and assess ecosystem health for targeted regions in Europe. Different user communities are involved to develop tailored and downscaled Gross Primary Production (GPP) data products, as GPP is a key indicator of ecosystem health. We provide the datasets as an additional data layer in the eLTER Information Cluster and share them through the GEOSS platform. In-situ data on net ecosystem exchange as well as Sentinel-2 data will be integrated by developing dedicated workflows. Users can access Earth observation data sources, like GPP data products , and combine it with local in-situ data. The GEOSS platform offers tools to discover and visualize relevant data. This use case highlights the role of the platform in supporting ecosystem assessment and enabling further scientific analysis.
Actors and stakeholders involved: AGAME adopts a user-centred approach by addressing end user communities, such as the eLTER Site and Platform coordinators, as well as European research infrastructures, such as the Integrated European Long-Term Ecosystem, critical zone and socio-ecological Research (eLTER RI). By doing so, AGAME supports the data needs and workflows in scientific analysis and daily management. In addition, GEO and the European Environment Agency are included as continental scale users enhancing the information exchange. All communities are included in an iterative development and implementation of the use case.
MAPS4GPP - Harmonized in situ data for crop mapping
In-situ data plays a pivotal role in enhancing the precision and reliability of global crop mapping. There are several institutes, projects and programs providing in-situ data in a standardized way (data providers) that can be used in support of GEOGLAM essential agricultural variables (EAV). One of these data providers is the ESA funded WorldCereal project, that collected and harmonized in-situ data for crop mapping. In addition, there are other data providers serving standardized data or offer data harmonzied for specific use. Currently, there is no central place where these different data sets can be found and used. Therefore, Maps4GPP aims to strengthen the in-situ data component of the Global Earth Observation System of Systems (GEOSS) platform as a central hub where users can explore and download data (human- readable) and integrate in-situ data in dedicated applications (machine-readable). The initiative aims to ease the finding, use and contribution of data and demonstrate the enhanced value of harmonized in-situ data in generating crucial spatial layers for regional crop productivity analyses and assessments of agricultural externalities.
Actors and stakeholders involved: We actively engaged with the crop mapping community by organizing a webinar, an on-line survey, and meetings to learn from experiences in finding and working with in- situ data and to capture specific needs and requirements for an online in-situ data repository. The community includes many different organizations such as FAO, WFP, European Environmental Agency, JRC, CGIAR-CIMMYT, Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, NASA crop harvest, INTA Argentina, RadiantEarth, UCLouvain etc. and projects such as WorldCereal. In general, the community showed a strong support for a better availability of harmonized in-situ data within the GEOSS platform.