The 8th EuroGOOS Conference Proceedings, Operational Oceanography Serving Sustainable Marine Development, have been released today. The EuroGOOS international conferences are tri-annual milestone events for operational oceanographic sciences. The conferences reflect the state of play and set future priorities for European oceanography across the full value chain, from observations to data processing and modelling, and to delivering fit-for-purpose services and products for users.

EuroGoos Proceedings

The 8th EuroGOOS international conference, titled Operational Oceanography in Service of Sustainable Marine Development, took place in Bergen, Norway, on 3-5 October 2017. The event was co-hosted by the Institute of Marine Research, IMR, and the Nansen Environmental Remote Sensing Centre (NERSC), and co-organized with the EuroGOOS office. 120 delegates from 24 countries and many international, European and regional networks attended. The programme included two plenary sessions running on the first and last days of the conference, a poster session, and a day-long splinters session featuring 54 talks across the marine observation and data value chain.

Major developments have taken place in operational oceanography in recent years particularly in the enhanced networking and cooperation among ocean observing and data aggregation initiatives and in the development of the Copernicus Marine Environment Monitoring Service (CMEMS) and associated products and services for users. Marine research infrastructures have in some cases transitioned to full legal entities providing robust, timely and quality assured data to the operational oceanography and wider scientific community. The polar oceans will also receive more attention in the coming years through the Year of Polar Prediction and projects including the European Commission’s INTAROS project focused on the Arctic observing system. In coastal seas, there is significant activity to raise the technology readiness of key observing technologies, to enhance predictions in coastal areas, to incorporate more routine collection of biogeochemical measurements, and to provide better services to users in all European sea basins including enhanced satellite products. Acoustic technologies have developed rapidly in recent years and are increasingly used in operational oceanography.

Johnny A. Johannessen at NERSC says that EuroGOOS has played an important role facilitating dialogue and synergy across actors and promoting the value of ocean observing services to science, policy and blue economy. - The conference demonstrated the importance of an end-to-end and fitfor-purpose oceanographic system. In this respect, the EuroGOOS work facilitating an integrated European Ocean Observing System, undertaken with the European Marine Board, is very important to achieve reliable and sustained oceanographic services, says Johnny A. Johannessen.

Over the next 3 years EuroGOOS and its member organisations will continue to advocate for sustained ocean observations in Europe and for the enhancement of the overall number of observing platforms collecting biogeochemical data. This strategy will be aligned with global efforts to systematically measure Essential Ocean Variables (EOVs) in physics, biogeochemistry and biology and ecosystems.

Contributions from NERSC

Nansen Environmental Remote Sensing Centre (NERSC) har contributed with several publications to the proceedings of the Eight EoroGOOS International Conference:

Download the 8th EuroGOOS Conference Proceedings