Fugro has joined OCEANITY, a Horizon Europe-funded project developing applications for Europe’s Digital Twin Ocean, EDITO and their involvement highlights how Earth observation businesses can contribute to services that help users assess the consequences of decisions before taking action.
The project combines satellite observations of coastal and marine conditions with computer models, artificial intelligence and socio-economic data to explore how different decisions could affect communities, ecosystems and maritime industries. Its three application areas bring this approach to coastal and urban resilience, marine spatial planning and sustainable maritime operations. The aim is to let users explore “what-if” scenarios before acting, helping them understand the relationships and trade-offs between environmental protection, economic activity and the pressures of climate change.
Fugro will help co-design the applications and manage stakeholder engagement. Its subsidiary EOMAP will contribute EO insights, platform components and a virtual reality environment supporting the coastal resilience application. Running from September 2026 to August 2029, the project plans demonstrations across Europe’s four sea basins.
For the commercial remote sensing sector, the interesting question is how these capabilities become useful in everyday planning. A coastal authority or maritime operator needs information that connects environmental change to the choices it faces, with enough clarity about uncertainty to support a decision. For BARSC readers, it points to potential roles in application development, data integration and specialist advice, as well as supplying observations.
The project’s results are still to come. Its value will depend on whether the applications prove useful beyond demonstrations and become part of sustained operational workflows.