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4S stands for “Satellite Seafloor Software Suite”, an innovation project co-funded by EU Horizon Europe. Under the lead of EOMAP, eight renowned partners cooperated from 2019 to 2023. The 4S project sought to bring a higher level of automation and standardisation to shallow water mapping.

Understanding shallow waters

A deep understanding of the bathymetry and morphology of shallow waters is crucial for marine and coastal management. This knowledge is essential for activities such as coastal engineering and planning. Digital data on seabed characteristics not only greatly aids operations such as dredging, sand reclamation and navigation. Moreover, it supports targeted protection of critical habitats in shallow waters and thus helps strengthen biodiversity, carbon storage and coastal protection.

Digital data needed

Collecting data on shallow water morphology and habitats is currently linked to cost-intensive boat or airborne surveys, diving campaigns or cameras. These methods are not only risky, they are also limited by budget constraints and cannot provide continuous monitoring. To overcome this dilemma, the 4S project team strived to develop a cloud-based software solution building on satellite data. This online solution aimed at empowering its users to map and monitor seafloor habitats, morphology and water depth from the comfort of their desks.

Harnessing Copernicus data

The 4S team harnessed Copernicus satellite data and other Earth Observation information and combined them with user data. These were analysed in a state-of-the art workflow for aquatic remote sensing and service components, before being processed and stored in a cloud environment. Apart from a global map for SDB application, the major outcome is the online solution SDB-Online.

Validating across the world

Throughout the 4S project, the partners have optimised usability and validity of the software suite in +15 use cases. These range from the high latitudes of Canada to the turbid waters in Dublin Bay to the crystal-clear Caribbean. (See validation plots at the bottom.)

SDB of Hooper Island, Canada

More on 4S

Learn more about the project in the CORDIS article “Powerful tool surveys water depth in shallow waters from space”.

Read about detailed validation analysis in the peer-reviewed ‘International Hydrographic Review’.

Watch the video with interviews of all 4S project partners below.

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Contact

Reach out to our coastal team for more details on the 4S project.

Try the web app SDB-Online here.

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EOMAP provides current high-resolution Satellite-Derived Bathymetry (SDB) for EMODnet Bathymetry, a consortium of 41 European hydrographic offices and oceanographic institutions, research centres and commercial data providers.

Up-to-date, high-resolution bathymetric data is increasingly important for a large number of applications, such as hydrodynamic modelling, sediment transport, cable routing, coastal planning, resource exploration and defence purposes. The EMODnet Bathymetry portal offers access to a high-resolution sampled grid of bathymetric survey data and metadata  provided by the network partners. These data are being harmonised to create a seamless European bathymetric grid.

EOMAP contributes bathymetry for shallow waters that are poorly, if at all, covered by conventional survey data. Previously these areas were interpolated, with potentially high uncertainties. Now, by using satellite-derived bathymetry information, the digital terrain model is constrained by physically derived data in these areas, providing much higher detail.

EMODnet Bathymetry applies SeaDataNet standards and services for discovery and access to its bathymetric data resources. SeaDataNet is the leading infrastructure in Europe for marine and ocean data management.

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eoLytics Water Quality (now eoapp AQUA)  is a web application which allows users to control state-of-the-art satellite data processing within the EOMAP cloud. Users with an activated account are able to run their own water quality analyses using EOMAP’s proven and established Modular Inversion and Processing System (MIP). There is no need for users to provide powerful hardware, install software or download huge amounts of raw data. The results are available from predefined locations such as FTP servers or geo-databases which can automatically be accessed by EOMAP’s eoapp® or eoAPI.

A team of EOMAP experts travelled to Brazil for a one-week training and capacity building event for the staff involved at Lactec. The employees are now able to calculate the full range of EOMAP’s satellite-derived water quality parameters for the whole of Brazil using data from the Landsat 8, Sentinel-2 and Sentinel-3 satellites.

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Satellite-Derived Bathymetry (SDB) has experienced accelerating uptake in recent years, with users from industry, government and academia using this cost-effective and reliable method for multi-disciplinary hydrographic seabed mapping projects, hydrodynamic modelling, reconnaissance surveys and environmental campaigns across the globe.

As SDB is now considered to be an established survey technology, it is increasingly important that both users and providers worldwide have a venue for meeting as well as exchanging information on current and future capabilities or requirements.

SDB Day, the international Satellite-Derived Bathymetry Technology and User Forum, is organised and co-sponsored by EOMAP as the leading provider of SDB and coastal mapping services. The inaugural SDB Day 2018 took place in the Lake District of Bavaria, Germany, and offered a unique opportunity for users and providers to discuss requirements, capabilities, data integration and quality standards. SDB Day 2019 was hosted by EOMAP Australia at the beautiful Sunshine Coast of Queensland in Australia. Due to the COVID pandemic, SDB Day 2021 were held twice in a virtual format – one for Americas, Caribbean and Europe, another one for Asia and Oceania. Keynote speakers included Commander Chris Waterson of the Royal Australian Navy and Captain Yanuar of Pushidrosal, Indonesia.

In 2022, the SDB Day was embedded in the first Water Days Conference. This format built a bridge from coastal to inland water applications. Just like the first SDB Day, experts on Satellite-Derived Bathymetry gathered in the Lake District near Munich as well as on screens across the world. Insightful talks were given by representatives of research, industry and authorities, such as Seabed2030, fugro, Chartworld SevenCs or NIWA New Zealand.

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UNESCO, through its International Initiative on Water Quality (IIWQ) has published the first comprehensive global water quality atlas for freshwater systems such as lakes and rivers as well as coastal regions. The information is derived from satellite-based Earth observation data and made freely accessible through the IIWQ World Water Portal, run by EOMAP’s Water Quality Monitoring Services on behalf of the International Hydrological Programme (IHP).

The portal is a web application accessible from desktop computers as well as mobile devices. It is part of EOMAP’s next-generation product range, delivering innovation through Earth observation data solutions for businesses and governmental agencies around the world.

Users can view water quality measures such as turbidity, suspended matter, chlorophyll-a or harmful algae blooms, and export reports for user-defined water bodies and parameters. Environmental managers, politicians and scientists can import the service directly into their geospatial information systems for analysis and assessments. Training materials are provided within the IIWQ portal.

In this first version of the portal, a merged set of these parameters is provided at 90 m resolution covering most of the world. Time series products for the year 2016 are provided at 30 m resolution for selected regions of each continent. This can be continued for every country and, for historical views, even up to 30 years back in time. With this technology, various temporal and spatial resolutions with accuracies down to a few metres are supported by using a number of different satellite sensors with physics-based analysis technologies.

Nota bene: In 2024, EOMAP launched eoapp AQUA, an online solution with similar features as the IIWQ portal.

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Under the EU Water Framework Directive (EU WFD) environmental agencies are obliged to report regularly on ecological conditions and trophic state indices of water bodies. The measurement campaigns required to fulfil these tasks are costly and time-consuming.

The State Office for the Environment of Baden-Wuerttemberg (LUBW) contracted EOMAP for multi-source water quality monitoring of more than 20 lakes within the federal state boundaries over a period of 17 years to 2017. The initiative served as a pilot project for government use of satellite-derived water quality information.

EOMAP used high-resolution sensors on Landsat 7 and 8 and Sentinel-2 in order to derive the water parameters of turbidity, Secchi disc depth, total absorption, organic absorption, chlorophyll-a and harmful algae blooms for small lakes and reservoirs. Quality indication layers as well as spatially aggregated layers were also supplied. Lake Constance, Germany’s biggest lake, was also covered by medium resolution sensors on the Sentinel-3 satellites and the MODIS instrument on the Aqua and Terra satellites to reach the highest possible temporal coverage from 2011 to 2017, dependent on environmental conditions. The datasets were pushed to a customised copy of EOMAP’s eoApp© web visualisation tool.

Baden-Wuerttemberg has no fewer than 1300 lakes bigger than 1 hectare, illustrating the potential of high-resolution satellite-based water quality monitoring for government applications. Following the LUBW pilot project, other federal or state agencies expressed their interest and began similar projects. Within the federal state of Baden-Wuerttemberg, a follow-up project to incorporate satellite data into operational measurement and reporting routines is envisaged.

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