Insights from the EU Space Conference by Pierre Bahurel, Director General of Mercator Ocean

Mercator Ocean International joined Europe’s vibrant space community in Brussels last month for the European Space Conference. I was delighted to be there to sign a Partnership Agreement with Josef Aschbacher, Director General of the European Space Agency (ESA). We have shared the news and I am looking forward to get started on paving the way for key collaboration in the future. On the one hand, we at Mercator Ocean are keen to ensure our tools, and particularly the Digital Twin Ocean, are reliable, fast and ready to use whenever necessary. On the other, the full force of Europe’s space capabilities will be essential to achieving these goals.  

We can provide the data, the analysis and the power of our systems, but without accurate and real time space observations, we are blind. That is why building ways to best share and enhance knowledge and data between us is so essential. 

This initial Memorandum of Intent is a first step setting the course for a partnership running from 2025-2030, with the ultimate goal to set a collaboration framework that guarantees software that is reliable and reactive so that policymakers can take decisions on ocean conservation based on solid scientific evidence. 

What to expect

Building on our longstanding partnership within the European Copernicus programme, we will now embark on developing collaborative projects between ESA and Mercator Ocean Our communities of experts will work together on a sustained and ongoing basis to accelerate initiatives, technological advances and EU leadership over the next five years. 

In fact, we have already identified key priority areas to focus on: 

• Strengthening scientific and technological collaborations: to optimise our tools, we will promote collaboration on the design and impact assessment of new mission concepts with integrated ocean observing systems. We will bridge data information and access systems to make our tools as useful as possible.  

• Fostering an integrative approach of digital ocean twinning: we need to  identify scientific and technological synergies in digital ocean twinning, particularly Mercator Ocean’s Digital Twin Ocean and the ESA’s Digital Twin Earth Element. Artificial intelligence is a key component of our ocean applications, so we will collaborate on continuing to make the best use of it moving forward. 

• Enhancing European space and ocean leadership internationally: We will harness opportunities to coordinate relevant resources and expertise to enhance the use of Earth Observation data for understanding, monitoring, and protecting oceans.  

• Facilitating dialogues for responding to environmental challenges: together we will promote dialogue with international organisations engaged in initiatives aimed at addressing major environmental, climactic, and societal challenges. With Mercator Ocean’s evolution to an international organisation underway, we will also support dialogue between ESA’s member States and Mercator Ocean’s future member States.  

What’s next on the agenda? 

The agreement signing comes at just the right time. France celebrates its year of the Sea and will host the United Nations Ocean Conference in Nice in June this year, and we fully intend to share the good news of our ESA agreement among the ocean community too. We will be at UNOC to showcase some of our latest tools and innovations, many of which are fed by space data.  

There are two key components to our Digital Twin Ocean, a global virtual representation of marine and coastal environments. EDITO Infra, which is open for beta-testing now, allows users to build applications to inform decision making on ocean conservation.  

Through the EDITO Model Lab, we are developing the next generation of ocean numerical models. These are being integrated into the EU public infrastructure of the European Digital Twin. It will provide access to specific applications, focusing on topics such as Blue Economy sectors, including Marine Protected Areas, ship routing and pollution. Through ‘what-if’ simulations for sustainable ocean management, the model lab can also help find solutions to natural and man-induced hazards, such as marine plastic and carbon emissions from aquaculture.  

These exciting new possibilities of course rely on timely and accurate space data. Our agreement with the ESA is the next step in ensuring this is the case. 

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About the author: Pierre Bahurel is Director General of Mercator Ocean International. He has worked on space altimetry, modelling and data assimilation applied to operational oceanography and was among the founders of Mercator Ocean in 1995.