Earth Observation data access through the Copernicus data distributor systems has paved the way to monitor changes on Earth, using Sentinel data. One of the main objectives of EOPEN is to fuse Sentinel data with multiple, heterogeneous and big data sources, to improve the monitoring capabilities of the future EO downstream sector. Additionally, the involvement of mature ICT solutions in the Earth Observation sector shall address major challenges in effectively handling and disseminating Copernicus-related information to the wider user community, beyond the EU borders. To achieve the aforementioned goals, EOPEN will fuse Copernicus big data content with other observations from non-EO data, such as weather, environmental and social media information, aiming at interactive, real-time and user-friendly visualisations and decisions from early warning notifications. The fusion is also done at the semantic level, to provide reasoning mechanisms and interoperable solutions, through the semantic linking of information. Processing of large streams of data is based on open-source and scalable algorithms in change detection, event detection, data clustering, which are built on High Performance Computing infrastructures. Alongside this enhanced data fusion, a new innovative, overarching Joint Decision & Information Governance architecture will be combined with the technical solution to assist decision making and visual analytics in EOPEN. Apart from EO product-oriented data management activities, EOPEN also exploits user-oriented feedback, tagging, tracking of interactions with other EOPEN users. EOPEN will be demonstrated in real use case scenarios in flood risk monitoring, food security and climate change monitoring.

Coastal urban development incorporates a wide range of development activities that are taking place as a result of the water element existing in the fabric of the city. This element may have different forms (i.e. a bay, a river, or a brook) but in almost all cases the surrounding area constitutes what maybe considered as the heart of the city. Every city that incorporates the water-element in its fabric is confronted with the fundamental requirement of developing policies for driving development in the surrounding area, while balancing between: a) economic growth, b) protection of the environmental, and c) safeguarding social cohesion. This requirement is tightly connected with the concept of Urban Resilience, which is the capacity of individuals, communities, businesses and systems within a city to survive, adapt and grow no matter what chronic stresses and acute shocks they experience. In developing policies that add value to the resilience of a city, we shift the existing paradigm of policy making, which is largely based on intuition, towards an evidence-driven approach enabled by big data. Our attention is placed on policies related to the water element. Our basis is the sensing infrastructures installed in the cities offering demographic data, statistical information, sensor readings and user contributed content forming the big data layer. Methods for big data analytics are used to measure the economic activity, assess the environmental impact and evaluate the social consequences. The extracted pieces of evidence are used to inform, advice, monitor, evaluate and revise the decisions made by policy planners. Finally, effective policies are developed dealing with: a) the economic and urban development of Thermaikos Bay, Thessaloniki, b) the transformation of Düden Brook into a recreation and park area, Antalya, c) the development of a Storm Water Plan, Antwerp, and d) the review of the Country Development Plan in the River Lee territory, City of Cork.

ODYSSEUS aims to increase the knowledge on explosive precursors and homemade explosives (HMEs), including precursors not previously studied, and develop effective and efficient prognostic, detection, and forensic tools to improve the capabilities of LEAs towards the prevention, countering, and investigation of terrorist incidents involving HMEs. ODYSSEUS will build upon relevant previous projects mainly HOMER, through the involvement ofHOMER’s core partners in this consortium, and will thus continue the work already done in HOMER on some precursors and further extend it to not previously studied precursors. To discover potentially hitherto unknown information, online HMEs recipes will be collected and their content will be analysed so as to extract knowledge about (possibly unknown) precursors and HMEs. Selected precursors will be then characterisedand analysed for determining their explosive properties, feasibility, and potential for becoming a threat.This knowledge will be leveraged for developing tools for(i) chemical supply chain monitoring for irregularity detection to enable prediction and localisation of potential threats; (ii) advanced sensors for detecting in (near) real-time explosive precursors through air emissions and sewerage networks; (iii) robotised tools for improved mobile detection and in-situ forensic support; and (iv) automated threat detection, localisation, and assessment; these tools will be integrated into a configurable platform that will assist LEAs’ operations in diverse scenarios. ODYSSEUS will be validated in lab and field tests and demonstrations in three operational use cases. Extensive training of LEAs' personnel, hands-on experience, joint exercises, and training material will boost the uptake of ODYSSEUS tools and technologies. With a Consortium of 4 LEAs, 9 Research/Academic partners, and 5 industry partners, ODYSSEUS delivers a strong representation of the challenges, requirements and tools to meet its objectives.

WQeMS aims to provide an operational Water Quality Emergency Monitoring Service to the water utilities industry in relation with the quality of the ‘water we drink’. Therefore, it will focus its activities on monitoring of lakes valorized by the water utilities for the delivery of drinking water. Sentinel data (i.e. Sentinel -2 and Sentinel-1) will be exploited for quality monitoring at a fine spatial resolution level, following validated processes with in situ data. The proposed WQeMS will exploit the Copernicus Data and Information Access Services (DIAS ONDA), instead of setting up its own download and processing infrastructure. Linkages with the existing Thematic Exploitation Platforms (TEPs), such as the Hydrology TEP for monitoring flood events and the Food Security TEP for supporting the sustainable intensification of farming from space will be pursued. Following cases are to be treated in real time in cooperation with drinking water production companies (public and private): - Slow developing phenomena (business-as-usual scenario), such as geogenic or anthropogenic release of potentially polluting elements through the bedrock or pollutants’ leaching in the underground aquifer through human rural activities, may influence water quality. Changes in the monitored chemical dissolved substances may be then detected. - Fast developing phenomena (e.g. floods spilling debris and mud or pollutant spills of chemicals in the lakes or algal bloom and potential release of toxins by cyanobacteria) produce huge quantities of contaminants at a short time interval bringing sanitation utilities at the edge of their performance capacity. Monitoring of the extent of the effluents in the lake; thus, providing a warning about the risk of water contamination, assist in mitigating impact, both for the water drinking water production and the environment.

In every disaster and crisis, incident time is the enemy, and getting accurate information about the scope, extent, and impact of the disaster is critical to creating and orchestrating an effective disaster response and recovery effort. The main goal of beAWARE is to provide support in all the phases of an emergency incident. More specifically, we propose an integrated solution to support forecasting, early warnings, transmission and routing of the emergency data, aggregated analysis of multimodal data and management the coordination between the first responders and the authorities. Our intention is to rely on platforms, theories and methodologies that are already used for disaster forecasting and management and add the elements that are necessary to make them working efficiently and in harm under the same objective. The overall context for beAWARE lies in the domain of situational awareness and command and control (C2). The first phase concerns the forecast of the extreme condition and the relevant preparations. Once a disaster occurs, an initial assessment needs to be conducted as soon as possible to determine the scope, geographical distribution, and scale of the incident. Situational awareness means being able to accurately determine what has happened, what is happening now, and what will come next, all in order to plan and coordinate the most effective response possible with the resources available. This observation phase will lead to an orientation phase suggesting both an individual as well as collective “cognition” orientation to data that is sensed and communicated. Once orientation to the data (or the lack of it) occurs then a decision is made, ultimately resulting is the final step, which is “act”. The crisis management center is always striving or struggling to gain a sense of what is reality to be able to feel that he or she can make a decision that is the "best possible" given the circumstances.