Date: Author: Doc Title. 20/08/14 Jimmy Slaughter Copernicus Services. Copernicus Services

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1 Date: Author: Doc Title 20/08/14 Jimmy Slaughter Copernicus Services Copernicus Services

2 Table of Contents Introduction... 3 What Will Copernicus Do? Land Monitoring Marine Monitoring Atmosphere Monitoring Emergency Management Security Climate Change... 8 Summary... 8 Annex A... 9 Page 2 of 9

3 Introduction Copernicus has existed legally since 25 April 2014 and currently has secured funding up until The Copernicus programme is coordinated and managed by the European Commission. The development of the observation infrastructure is performed under the aegis of the European Space Agency for the space component and of the European Environment Agency and the Member States for the in situ component. Much of the data provided by the Copernicus services will come from the Sentinel Missions; pairs of satellites designed with particular environmental monitoring needs in mind. The first of these satellites has already been launched with regular launches for the remainder planned over the next 5 years. More information on the Sentinel missions is available at A great deal of information about the services and contributing missions of Copernicus are available online at This document aims to provide a distilled version of the information available online as a quick reference guide to those new to Copernicus and the services it provides. What Will Copernicus Do? Copernicus will collect data from multiple sources, process these data and provide services related to environmental and security issues. These data sources include satellites, sea-borne and airborne sensors as well as ground stations. There are six Copernicus services, each related to a particular theme: land, marine, atmosphere, climate change, emergency management and security. The services are aimed at policy makers and public authorities and, as with the data, are free at point of use. The data and services can also be tailored to provide value added services. A summary of each service is outlined below: 2.1 Land Monitoring This service consists of three main components: Global Pan-European Local The Global Component contains three product families each with a number of variables. All variables are currently available as an archive product and, once the development stages are completed, will be available in near real time. The products, variables and status of the Global Component are in the table below: Page 3 of 9

4 Product Family Vegetation Variable Near Real Time Status Fraction of photosynthetically active radiation 1 absorbed by the vegetation Fraction of green vegetation cover Leaf Area Index Normalised difference vegetation index Demonstration 2 Vegetation condition index Vegetation productivity index Dry matter productivity Burnt area Land surface temperature Operational 3 Energy budget Top of canopy reflectivity Surface albedo Water Soil water index Operational Water Bodies Table 1: Copernicus Global Land Monitoring products More information on the Global Component is available at The Pan-European Component is coordinated by the European Environment Agency and produces 4 products: High resolution image mosaic Bio-geophysical variables o Currently only contains information for France and Iceland CORINE land cover o 2012 update currently underway. o 2006 version has 44 land cover classes with smallest unit mapped of 25 hectares High Resolution Layers (HRLs), broken down into; o Artificial surfaces (e.g. roads and paved areas) o Forest areas o Agricultural areas (grasslands) o Wetlands o Small water bodies 1 : products that are in development and not yet available to users. No time line has been stipulated for when the development phase is due to end. 2 Demonstration: products that are provided to users with a very limited commitment on the quality or availability of the service but have been considered useful to be disseminated in order to enable users to test the products and provide feedback. 3 Operational: products with documented non-relevant limitations that largely satisfy the requirements applicable and/or have been considered mature enough for distribution to users. Page 4 of 9

5 The best spatial resolution for the HRLs is 20m. The HRLs for grasslands, wetlands and small water bodies are currently not available for the UK. More information on the Pan-European Component is available at The Local Component is also coordinated by the European Environment Agency and contains the Urban Atlas. The latest version of the Urban Atlas is from 2012 and includes information on 28 distinct land uses in high resolution maps for some 305 larger urban zones across Europe. More information on the Local Component is available at Marine Monitoring The Copernicus Marine Service is currently being provided by the MyOcean2 consortium and is well established. As at June 2014 MyOcean provide 133 products, under 10 parameters, covering 7 different geographic areas. The products range from reanalyses of historical data, daily updates as well as weekly forecasts. Geographical Areas Covered Global Ocean Arctic Ocean Baltic Sea Atlantic European North West Shelf- Ocean Atlantic-Iberian Biscay Irish Ocean Mediterranean Sea Black Sea Parameters Measured Ocean Temperature Ocean Salinity Ocean Currents Sea Ice Sea Level Winds Ocean Optics Ocean Chemistry Ocean Biology Ocean Chlorophyll An online catalogue is provided at which allows the user to filter out parameters and regions for ease of data access. The online catalogue is available at The catalogue is easy to use and offers a good level of user experience. 2.3 Atmosphere Monitoring The Copernicus Atmosphere monitoring service provides continuous data and information on atmospheric composition. The service describes the current situation, forecasts the situation a few days ahead, and analyses consistently retrospective data records for recent years. Page 5 of 9

6 The Copernicus atmosphere monitoring service supports many applications in a variety of domains including health, environmental monitoring, renewables energies, meteorology, and climatology. There are 5 service types provided under atmosphere monitoring: Air Quality and Atmospheric Composition (Global and European) Climate Forcing UV and Stratospheric Ozone Solar Radiation Emissions and Surface Fluxes Each of these services contains a number of product families (aerosol, fire, greenhouse gas, radiation and reactive gas) using measured parameters to provide the data. A total of 42 parameters are measured as part of these services and a consolidated list of these, with the total number of services they feed into, is in the table at Annex A. It should be noted that some services are fed by more than one parameter. 2.4 Emergency Management The Copernicus emergency management has been operational since 1 April The service provides all actors involved in the management of natural disasters, man-made emergency situations, and humanitarian crises with timely and accurate geo-spatial information derived from satellite remote sensing and completed using available in situ or open data sources. The mapping component of the service (GIO EMS - Mapping) has worldwide coverage and provides maps based on satellite imagery. The products generated by the service can be used as supplied (e.g. as digital or printed map outputs) or combined with other data sources (e.g. as digital feature sets in a geographic information system) to support geospatial analysis and decision making processes of emergency managers. The service is provided free of charge in both rush and non-rush modes. It can only be activated by authorised users. Both modes are activated using the relevant Service Request Forms, available at The European Flood Awareness System (EFAS) is also provided as an operational service under the umbrella of the emergency management service. It is designed to produce European wide overviews of ongoing and forecasted floods, up to 10 days in advance. More information on EFAS can be found at Page 6 of 9

7 2.5 Security This service is still under development. It is currently planned for it to provide applications related to European Union policies in border surveillance, maritime surveillance and support to EU external action. These three main areas are currently being performed under EU funded projects. The Border Surveillance element was initially provided as part of GMES (Global Monitoring for Environment and Security) by G-MOSAIC between 2009 and The LOBOS (LOw time critical BOrder Surveillance) and SAGRES (Service Activations for GRowing Eurosur Success) projects are providing this service as part of FP7 projects. SAGRES also feeds in to the maritime surveillance aspect of the Security Service. The Maritime Surveillance element is designed to ensure safe use of the sea and to secure Europe s maritime borders. There are currently three FP7 projects undertaking research into how best to provide the Maritime Surveillance service: DOLPHIN, NEREIDS, and SIMTISYS These projects aim to improve space-based Maritime Surveillance techniques in order to support activities in the areas of EU Border Surveillance, Traffic Safety and Fisheries Control, and to develop an integrated vision of Maritime Policy and Maritime Surveillance. 4 There are two projects working to move Support to EU External Action from the research phase into operational services. The first is G-NEXT, which will: supply information and intelligence data to support the operations of the European External Action Service, including mapping and geoinformation products ready for use in emergency and crisis situations. Users should be able to integrate the services provided by G-NEXT into their working environments in an effective and reliable manner. The second is G-SEXTANT, which aims to develop a portfolio of Earth Observation products addressing: Humanitarian Crisis; Natural Resources; Land Conflict Situation Awareness; Nuclear Sites and Activities; Illicit crops; and Border Surveillance. More information will become available as these projects develop. 4 Taken from Accessed 21 August Page 7 of 9

8 2.6 Climate Change This service is still under development. A European Commission request for expressions of interest for the provision of Copernicus Services states: The objective of the Climate Change Service is to build an EU knowledge base in support of mitigation and adaptation policies. The Copernicus Climate Change service shall capitalize on three main components: sustained networks of in-situ and satellite based observations, re-analysis of the Earth climate with a variety of models driven by observations and climate projections based on a series of modelling scenarios. 5 The service is therefore aiming to provide access to several climate indicators (temperature increase, sea level rise etc) and climate indices (based on records of temperature, precipitation etc) for monitoring and predicting climate change. The architecture of the service will be provided by four building blocks: A consistent Climate Data Store that contains series of geophysical climate variables and indicators, A Sectoral Information System that contains information tailored to fit the needs of end users and customers of the service for various EU sectorial policies or other Societal Benefit Areas, An Evaluation Quality Control platform in charge of the quality control and evaluation of the Climate Change service, and The Outreach and Dissemination platform, will secure the dissemination of the climate related information, both from the Copernicus Climate Change Data Store and Sectoral Information System, to the end users, including e.g., public authorities, businesses, researchers and the general public as appropriate. 6 The climate change service will therefore be more than just data processing. The service aims to provide a wide range of climate indicators and indices to aid in policy decision making for both mitigation and adaptation scenarios. Summary The 6 services defined by Copernicus cover a wide range of environmental monitoring topics. Some of these services are already available, like Marine and Land but the full breadth of what Copernicus can and will offer is still being determined. The regularity and consistency of data into these services means they can be used operationally as standalone products or as part of a suite tailor made by the end user. 5 European Commission, Enterprise and Industry Directorate-General: Request for Expression of Interest. Candidate entities to be entrusted with parts of the implementation of the Copernicus Services (Atmosphere, marine, and climate change). n.d 6 Ibid. Page 25. Page 8 of 9

9 Annex A Consolidated list of measured parameters in the Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service Measured Parameter Total Aerosol Optical Depth 10 Sulfate Aerosol Optical Depth 2 Organic Carbon Aerosol Optical Depth 2 Black Carbon Aerosol Optical Depth 2 Sea Salt Aerosol Optical Depth 2 Dust Aerosol Optical Depth 8 Aerosol Extinction Coefficient 2 Sulfates Concentration 2 Organic Carbon Concentration 2 Black Carbon Concentration 2 Sea Salt Concentration 2 Dust Concentration 3 Particulate Matter Particulate Matter O3 28 CO 19 NOx 5 HNO3 5 HCHO 3 SO2 19 BrO 3 NO2 14 Aerosol Direct Radiative Forcing 1 Aerosol Indirect Radiative Forcing 1 SO2 Sources 1 Organic Carbon Sources 1 Black Carbon Sources 1 Biomass Burning Aerosol Sources 1 Sea Salt Source 1 Dust Sources 1 Aerosol Backscatter 1 Dust Layer Altitude 1 Aerosol 1 H20 2 N2O 2 HCI 2 HOCI 2 UV Index 2 CO2 5 CH4 7 Fire Radiative Power 1 Biomass Burning Emissions 1 Total number of products containing this parameter Page 9 of 9