Romania enhances its Copernicus data infrastructure for better environmental insights

Romania is taking a significant step forward in utilizing satellite data for environmental monitoring through the ROCS project. This initiative aims to improve how the country stores, processes, and utilizes the vast amounts of information collected by the European Copernicus program.

The project, officially named "Extinderea infrastructurii naționale participantă la segmentul de sol colaborativ European (COLGS-RO)", is backed by funding from the Ministry of Research and Innovation via UEFISCDI. The ROCS project will enable the country to harness data related to atmosphere, land, oceans, climate, vegetation, and natural disasters more effectively.

With the help of satellite data from the Sentinel satellites, ROCS will enhance Romania's Copernicus Ground Segment infrastructure. This will facilitate better monitoring of crops, assessment of vegetation health, and tracking of deforestation and land use changes.

The project emphasizes the design of a distributed and federated solution for data storage, employing formats such as Amazon S3, GeoTIFF, and Zarr. Additionally, it focuses on creating a technological framework for easier national-level analyses and the development of tools for indexing raster and vector data.

EOCube.RO, a platform for storing and processing Earth observation data, will play a central role in this initiative. It features a Catalog STAC that provides access to available data, promoting transparency and collaboration through open-source solutions.

Led by the University of West Timisoara, the ROCS project also benefits from the expertise of the National University of Science and Technology Politehnica Bucharest in distributed processing solutions. Contributions from the National Meteorological Administration and the Romanian Space Agency ensure compliance with international standards, while BEIA Consult International provides expertise in integrating IoT infrastructures.

Ultimately, ROCS seeks to transform satellite images into valuable information for public decision-making, aiming for improved management of drought, deforestation, and land degradation. By integrating space-derived data into a smart national infrastructure, Romania is positioning itself to make informed decisions for a sustainable future.