Effective environmental observing systems and associated governance

Expected Outcome:

Successful proposals will contribute to the expected impact of this Destination on more accessible and interoperable environmental observations.

Project results are expected to contribute to all of the following expected outcomes:

• more cost-effective and user-friendly environmental observing systems serving the needs of science, as well as policy and decision makers at various levels, based on enhanced usability, accessibility, effectivity, interoperability and exploitation of environmental observations;
• improved international cooperation in support of EU and global climate and environmental monitoring policies and reporting obligations;
• more sustainable and resilient environmental observing systems based on advanced governance models and well-informed decision-making by national, European and international actors.

Scope:

Efficiency and cost-effectiveness of observing systems will play a crucial role in global initiatives such as the WMO Global Greenhouse Gas Watch, or GEO initiatives and flagships, which are needed to support EU and international policies, like for example the Paris Agreement, the Montreal Protocol and its Kigali Agreement, the European Climate Law, the EU climate adaptation strategy, the EU's F-gas Regulation^[1], or the Regulation on ozone-depleting substances.

Proposals are expected to exploit the latest digital technologies (e.g. Artificial Intelligence, digital twins, IoT) and science (e.g. data assimilation and analysis, or models) to develop innovative, generic, quantitative, cost-effective and user-friendly tools to optimize current and future/emerging orbital (baseline and small satellite constellations) and non-orbital observing systems (e.g. autonomous systems, manned and unmanned aerial vehicles (drones), citizen science networks) and their combinations from a performance and investment point of view, using approaches like Observing System Experiments (OSEs) and Observing System Simulation Experiments (OSSEs).

Proposed activities should identify technical, as well as socio-economic, cultural, geo-political, or other barriers on usability, accessibility (including at international level), effectivity, interoperability and exploitation of environmental observing systems, and propose and support the implementation of innovative, efficient and pragmatic solutions to overcome them. Towards this end, the inclusion of social sciences and humanities (SSH) disciplines is encouraged.

Innovative decision-making approaches should be investigated to support and facilitate international governance and negotiations at European and global level, as well as national actors on sustainable and resilient environmental observations matters, regarding investments, operations, accessibility, gaps and innovation. Inter-operability with European data spaces and other existing data infrastructures should be considered.

The approaches should be demonstrated in the context of one of the following specific use case areas (and proposals should identify which use case area they are addressing):

• Area A: monitoring global anthropogenic and natural greenhouse gas emissions and sinks, in support of the Paris Agreement;
• Area B: ozone depleting substances and F-Gases, in support of the Montreal Protocol.

Proposals are expected to demonstrate a good understanding of data requirements for policy implementation. The optimisation of the observing systems should identify and address in an iterative process the needs of well identified user groups, like for example modelling communities, Copernicus, Destination Earth, international organisations, and regional or national authorities.

Tools and approach should be flexible enough to be applied to other observing systems and examples. The project is expected to benefit from and leverage underlying work of ESA, EUMETSAT, Copernicus, or European Research Infrastructures (ICOS, ACTRIS, etc.).

International cooperation is encouraged.

[1] Regulation (EU) 2024/573, http://data.europa.eu/eli/reg/2024/573/oj.