WorldWater – Surface Water Dynamics

WorldWater

Delivering earth observation (EO) solutions to empower national and regional stakeholders with the data and tools required to monitor and report on inland water resources in an independent manner using EO technology.

Why is it important?

Water is essential for life on Earth and a critical natural resource that underpins all social and economic activity. During the last century, water consumption has increased twice as fast as the world’s population, and today water scarcity affects more than 40 percent of people globally – a disturbing figure which is expected to rise if we do not change our habits and respond to climate change and future global warming. The need for proper and timely information on water (non-) availability is a critical requirement for water management activities.

The WorldWater - Surface Water Dynamics project aim to address the needs of authorities, at all levels, by developing EO tools and products to improve the ability of national and regional stakeholders to monitor the world’s inland water resources in both extent and volume.

Project highlights:

Developing robust and operational EO methods and tools for surface water dynamics monitoring, applicable at a global scale.

Integrating EO products and tools in a data analytics platform to foster the wider usage of EO data and surface water dynamics products for country and basin scale water resource monitoring and reporting

Building national capacities to better monitor and report on water resources using EO through user workshops, training courses and awareness events.

In more detail..

The dedicated goal on water in the 2030 agenda for sustainable development has brought a spotlight to water policy at global level and in national planning and representing a clear indication that countries worldwide recognises the ‘water crisis’, which has consistently been ranked by the World Economic Forum as one of the threats with the highest potential impact and likelihood. In fact, reality may have turned out faster than anticipated. Population growth, socioeconomic development and urbanization are all contributing to increased water demand, while climate change induced impacts on precipitation patterns and temperature extremes further exacerbate water resource availability and predictability. The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), especially the goal on ‘clean water for all’ (SDG 6) and the ‘climate action goal’ (SDG 13) therefore need all the attention they can get to avoid an accelerating ‘water crisis’ towards 2030.

The use of EO data for monitoring water resources is increasingly being recognized and accepted as a viable source of information for practitioners and decision-makers. Through the lens of Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 6 and specific use case studies, the WorldWater - Surface Water Dynamics project will demonstrate how global coverage EO data can be used to systematically and accurately measure inland surface water resources. It will complement existing EO initiatives and projects (e.g. Global Surface Water Explore and the Copernicus global land services) by further developing EO tools and products to effectively use the most up to date, open and free satellite data, primarily from the Sentinel missions, for improved monitoring of the world’s inland water resources.

The project aim to enable national authorities and river basin organizations to apply EO data to independently monitor surface water dynamics at all scales in a robust way - thereby providing them with essential information for more evidence-based planning and management of water resources and an ability to efficiently report and act in response to the global water agenda.

DHI GRAS leads WorldWater in a consortium that also includes GeoVille GmbH (Austria), GISAT (Czech Republic), GRID-Arendal (Norway) and the technical university of Denmark (DTU).

European Space Agency:

The European Space Agency (ESA) is the European space programme and its mission is to explore Earth, its immediate space environment, our Solar System and the Universe.

ESA also works closely with space organisations outside Europe to develop satellite-based technologies and services, and to promote European industries.

EOatDHI part of the DHI GROUP

gras@dhigroup.com
+45 4516 9100

Agern Alle 5,
2970 Hørsholm,
Denmark

CVR: 36466871

July 20, 2020October 6, 2020

Releasing Flood Metrics – High-quality and cost-efficient information for your flood monitoring needs

Flood Metrics - Introducing our new all-in-one interface for our satellite-based flood monitoring products:

20 July 2020

Flooding’s are one of the most common and devastating types of natural disasters – causing significant social, economic and environmental consequences. The impacts of these events are often exacerbated by lacking data and information to support informed emergency response and flood protection measures.

New satellite data, novel image processing methods and state-of-art machine learning algorithms have propelled satellite-based flood mapping into a new era, providing a time-critical resource to address this data gap, as a fast, efficient and accurate tool for mapping water on terrain and flooded areas.

Our novel image processing methods, advanced machine learning algorithms and automated processing workflows of best in class satellite imagery has fueled a new generation of low-cost operational flood monitoring products to provide timely, accurate and reliable data on flooding events.

Our new Flood Metrics portal provides an all-in-one interface to this state-of-the-art product line, allowing users to search, explore and receive instant price ranges for 3 different products (Flood extent, Digital Elevation Models and Flood frequency).

Visit floodmetrics.dhigroup.com/home for more information or click the button below to access Flood Metrics directly.

EOatDHI part of the DHI GROUP

gras@dhigroup.com
+45 4516 9100

Agern Alle 5,
2970 Hørsholm,
Denmark

CVR: 36466871

July 20, 2020January 18, 2021

WindSight – input for wind resource assessments

WindSight is all about providing the right input data to lower the error of the wind resource estimations. . . . . .

WindSight

First class input data for wind models to ensure optimal wind resource estimations

Why is it important?

Accurate estimations of wind energy resources are highly complex and time consuming - ultimately relying on consistent, accurate and timely input data. Yet, in many cases such data is inaccessible or simply not available and this may impact the ability of wind modelers to accurately assess wind resources.

How can it help?

The WindSight data package provides a new generation of satellite-based information products to improve wind resource assessments.

WindSight includes 5 different high-quality and high-resolution data products on land cover, key forest characteristics, historical and future changes, topography and surface roughness. The core of the product suite includes the novel forest products which provide detailed inside on current and historical forest height and forest density, in grid sizes of 20 meters. Together with an improved 10 meter land cover product, these provide the backbone of the surface roughness product that provides accurate insight on roughness length - directly compatible as input for a wide range of software and modelling methods including WindPRO, WaSP and CFD tools.

What you get!

5 different high-quality and high-resolution data products – tailored for wind sites anywhere in the World.

Analysis ready data compatible with WindPRO, WAsP, CFD tools and standard GIS software.

Accurate, timely and low cost information on forest height and forest density, replacing the needs for most LIDAR campaigns.

Typical customers?

Wind energy developers use the data products for preliminary screening of wind site suitability for planning and prospecting.

Wind modellers use the advanced surface roughness data products in flow models, for improved accuracy of wind resource assessments. Testing at 10+ global wind energy sites has shown an improved accuracy of the modelled Annual Energy Production (AEP).