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MyOcean is a series of projects granted by the European Commission within the GMES Program (Seventh Framework Program), whose objective is to define and to set up a concerted and integrated pan-European capacity for ocean monitoring and forecasting. The activities benefit several specified areas of use: Maritime security, oil spill prevention, marine resources management, climate change, seasonal forecasting, coastal activities, ice sheet surveys, water quality and pollution. The series of MyOcean projects ended in 2015, and their services are now continued by the Copernicus Programme. [1]
The name MyOcean has also been used to brand the Copernicus Marine Service MyOcean Viewer, in operation since 2020.
MyOcean's objective is to set up (definition, design, development and validation) an integrated pan-European capability for ocean monitoring and forecasting, using nationally available skills and resources.
Although the budgetary frame of the project is labelled "Research", the priority is not to conduct further scientific research in the field of operational oceanography, even if this aspect is also taken into account. It is more a question of developing a System of Systems (in the industrial sense), according to the European quality standards, and to achieve operational qualification and eventually qualification of Service.
The first MyOcean project started on 1 January 2009, scheduled to last for 39 months. [2] It is a follow-up to the MERSEA project (FP6: system implementation phase: 2004-2008), and also integrates some service lines developed as part of ESA's GSE (GMES Service Elements) projects, particularly Marcoast and PolarView.
The follow-up project MyOcean2 runs from April 2012 to September 2014 to ensure a controlled continuation and extension of the services and systems already implemented. [3]
MyOcean is a consortium of 60 partners in 28 countries (the 22 states of the EU-27 that have a sea coastline, plus Norway, Russia, Ukraine, Morocco, Israel and Canada). Two European bodies (JRC and ECMWF) are also partners of 'MyOcean'. The (European Environment Agency) and the (European Maritime Safety Agency) are represented on the Board.
The total budget was €55M, of which €33.8M comes from a European Commission subsidy (representing 61% of the total budget), over 36 months. This budget essentially corresponded to staff costs (83.5%), with the second largest item being mission expenses (7.3% of the total budget). Management costs (and external communication costs) represented 4.1% of the total budget. Equipment fees represented 3%.
The total workload corresponded to the equivalent of 190 full-time employees, but in practical terms, there were more than 350 people involved in the project.
The total budget og MyOcean2 was €41M.
The project is coordinated between the executive level (the Executive Committee) and the strategic level (the Board). The role of the 'Governing Body' is to take high-level decisions that affect the project at a strategic level, the major themes, the budget or the make-up of the consortium.
On the 'Board' the following are represented: - Senior experts representing the main parties (INGV, Met Office, NERSC, DMI, Ifremer, CLS and Mercator Ocean) - The Chairmen of the Advisory Bodies (Core User Group and Scientific Advisory Committee) - Representatives of the European Stakeholders (EEA, EMSA, etc.)
The Board and the Governing Body are chaired by Pierre Bahurel.
Their role is to collect the measurements or observations, whether satellite or in situ, and to calibrate, validate, edit, archive and distribute them. There are 5 TACs (WP Leader shown in brackets):
TAC involved into MyOcean project are organized into 7 regions, each region is linked to the corresponding area defined into SeaDataNet project in order to improve efforts on data management and exchange of datasets.
They correspond to the 6 European 'basins', plus the Global Ocean. By assimilating observation data in 3D Models, they are to predict the state of the ocean (or to say what the state of the ocean was between two observations). There are 7 of them:
After the MyOcean project (2009–2012), the second Milestone "MyOcean2" (2012–2014) came to an end on September 30 and let the floor to MyOcean follow-On, from October 1, 2014, until March 31, 2015. [4] On 11 November 2014, the European Commission signed an agreement with the French privately owned non-profit company Mercator Ocean, that entrusts the latter with the setting-up of the future Copernicus Marine Service as of April 2015. [1] The services provided of the former MyOcean site "myocean.eu" are now hosted by marine.copernicus.eu.
The European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) is an independent intergovernmental organisation supported by most of the nations of Europe. It is based at three sites: Shinfield Park, Reading, United Kingdom; Bologna, Italy; and Bonn, Germany. It operates one of the largest supercomputer complexes in Europe and the world's largest archive of numerical weather prediction data.
The European Organisation for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites (EUMETSAT) is an intergovernmental organisation created through an international convention agreed by a current total of 30 European Member States.
The Institut Français de Recherche pour l'Exploitation de la Mer or Ifremer is an oceanographic institution in Brest, France. A state-run and funded scientific organization, it is France’s national integrated marine science research institute.
The Danish Meteorological Institute is the official Danish meteorological institute, administrated by the Ministry of Climate, Energy and Utilities. It makes weather forecasts and observations for Denmark, Greenland, and the Faroe Islands.
Copernicus is the Earth observation component of the European Union Space Programme, managed by the European Commission and implemented in partnership with the EU member states, the European Space Agency (ESA), the European Organisation for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites (EUMETSAT), the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF), the Joint Research Centre (JRC), the European Environment Agency (EEA), the European Maritime Safety Agency (EMSA), Frontex, SatCen and Mercator Océan.
The Norwegian Meteorological Institute, also known internationally as MET Norway, is Norway's national meteorological institute. It provides weather forecasts for civilian and military uses and conducts research in meteorology, oceanography and climatology. It is headquartered in Oslo and has offices and stations in other cities and places. It has around 500 full-time staff and was founded in 1866.
The European Union Space Programme is an EU funding programme established in 2021 along with its managing agency, the European Union Agency for the Space Programme, in order to implement the pre-existing European Space Policy established on 22 May 2007 when a joint and concomitant meeting at the ministerial level of the Council of the European Union and the Council of the European Space Agency, known collectively as the European Space Council, adopted a Resolution on the European Space Policy. The policy had been jointly drafted by the European Commission and the Director General of the European Space Agency. This was the first common political framework for space activities established by the European Union (EU).
The North West Shelf Operational Oceanographic System (NOOS) monitors physical, sedimentological and ecological variables for the North Sea area. NOOS is operated by partners from the nine countries bordering the extended North Sea and European North West Shelf; Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Ireland, Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, and United Kingdom. Working collaboratively to develop and implement ocean observing systems in the area. Near real time and recent history sea levels are available to on their web site in map, graph or table format.
Sentinel-1 is the first of the Copernicus Programme satellite constellations conducted by the European Space Agency. The mission was originally composed of a constellation of two satellites, Sentinel-1A and Sentinel-1B, which shared the same orbital plane. Two more satellites, Sentinel-1C and Sentinel-1D are in development. Sentinel-1B was retired following a power supply issue on December 23, 2021, leaving Sentinel-1A the only satellite of the constellation currently operating. Sentinel-1C is currently planned to launch in the final quarter of 2024.
Sentinel-3 is an Earth observation heavy satellite series developed by the European Space Agency as part of the Copernicus Programme. As of 2024, it consists of 2 satellites: Sentinel-3A and Sentinel-3B. After initial commissioning, each satellite was handed over to EUMETSAT for the routine operations phase of the mission. Two recurrent satellites, Sentinel-3C and Sentinel-3D, will follow in approximately 2025 and 2028 respectively to ensure continuity of the Sentinel-3 mission.
The Earth and Mission Science Division is a group of European Space Agency (ESA) staff mission scientists, contractors, research fellows, young graduates, trainees, and administrative staff working within the Climate Action, Sustainability and Science Department of the Directorate of Earth Observation Programmes. The Division is located at ESA's European Space Research and Technology Centre in Noordwijk, South Holland, The Netherlands.
The Euro-Mediterranean Center on Climate Change (CMCC) is an Italian research centre dedicated to climate and climate related research, including climate variability, its causes and consequences, carried out through numerical models ranging from Global Earth System to regional models within the Euro-Mediterranean area.
SARAL is a cooperative altimetry technology mission of Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) and Centre National d'Études Spatiales (CNES). SARAL performs altimetric measurements designed to study ocean circulation and sea surface elevation.
The Flanders Marine Institute provides a focal point for marine scientific research in Flanders, northern Belgium.
CORA is a global oceanographic temperature and salinity dataset produced and maintained by the French institute IFREMER. Most of those data are real-time data coming from different types of platforms such as research vessels, profilers, underwater gliders, drifting buoys, moored buoys, sea mammals and ships of opportunity.
Coriolis involves 7 institutes in operational oceanography in France decided in 2001 to joint their efforts within Coriolis in order to:
European Multidisciplinary Seafloor and water-column Observatory (EMSO) is a large-scale European distributed Research Infrastructure for ocean observation, enabling real-time interactive long term monitoring of ocean processes. EMSO allows study of the interaction between the geosphere, the biosphere, the hydrosphere, and the lithosphere; including natural hazards, climate change, and marine ecosystems. EMSO nodes have been deployed at key sites in European seas, starting from the Arctic, through the Atlantic and Mediterranean, to the Black Sea.
Sentinel-1A is a European radar imaging satellite launched in 2014. It is the first Sentinel-1 satellite launched as part of the European Union's Copernicus programme. The satellite carries a C-band Synthetic Aperture Radar which will provide images in all light and weather conditions. It analyzes many phenomena occurring on Earth, from detecting and tracking oil spills and mapping sea ice to monitoring movement in land surfaces and mapping changes in the way land is used.
The Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (CAMS) is a service implemented by the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF), launched in November 11, 2014, that provides continuous data and information on atmospheric composition. CAMS, which is part of the Copernicus Programme, describes the current situation, forecasts the situation a few days ahead, and analyses consistently retrospective data records for recent years. This service has around 10 years of developments, and its current precursor project, MACC-III, is delivering the pre-operational Copernicus Atmosphere Service. CAMS tracks air pollution, solar energy, greenhouse gases and climate forcing globally.
The Sentinel-6 Michael Freilich (S6MF) or Sentinel-6A is a radar altimeter satellite developed in partnership between several European and American organizations. It is part of the Jason satellite series and is named after Michael Freilich. S6MF includes synthetic-aperture radar altimetry techniques to improve ocean topography measurements, in addition to rivers and lakes. The spacecraft entered service in mid 2021 and is expected to operate for 5.5 years.