GEOEssential – mainstreaming workflows from data sources to environment policy indicators with essential variables

ABSTRACT

When defining indicators on the environment, the use of existing initiatives should be a priority rather than redefining indicators each time. From an Information, Communication and Technology perspective, data interoperability and standardization are critical to improve data access and exchange as promoted by the Group on Earth Observations. GEOEssential is following an end-user driven approach by defining Essential Variables (EVs), as an intermediate value between environmental policy indicators and their appropriate data sources. From international to local scales, environmental policies and indicators are increasingly percolating down from the global to the local agendas. The scientific business processes for the generation of EVs and related indicators can be formalized in workflows specifying the necessary logical steps. To this aim, GEOEssential is developing a Virtual Laboratory the main objective of which is to instantiate conceptual workflows, which are stored in a dedicated knowledge base, generating executable workflows. To interpret and present the relevant outputs/results carried out by the different thematic workflows considered in GEOEssential (i.e. biodiversity, ecosystems, extractives, night light, and food-water-energy nexus), a Dashboard is built as a visual front-end. This is a valuable instrument to track progresses towards environmental policies.

KEYWORDS:

• SDGs
• environmental policies
• essential variables
• earth observation
• knowledge base
• workflows
• virtual research environment

Acknowledgements

The authors wish to acknowledge the main contribution of the H2020 ERA-PLANET project No. 689443, as well as the contribution of all partners of the project.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

ORCID

Anthony Lehmann http://orcid.org/0000-0002-8279-8567

Stefano Nativi http://orcid.org/0000-0003-3185-8539

Paolo Mazzetti http://orcid.org/0000-0002-8291-1128

Aidin Niamir http://orcid.org/0000-0003-4511-3407

Grégory Giuliani http://orcid.org/0000-0002-4696-5313

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by European Commission [grant number H2020 ERA-PLANET project No. 689443].