The ENVRI-FAIR project

About the ENVRI-FAIR project

Understanding the Earth is not possible without interdisciplinary science. We need a holistic approach where environmental data and services produced by the different research infrastructures are harmonized and easy to use for scientists from any field of environmental research.

The overarching goal of ENVRI-FAIR is to advance the findability, accessibility, interoperability, and reusability (FAIRness) of the data and services offered by the ENVRI Cluster research infrastructures and to connect them to the emerging European Open Science Cloud.

Through our joint efforts, we will better understand the Earth system and eventually be able to better respond to all the challenges our planet faces.

 

ENVRI-FAIR is the connection of the Cluster of Environmental Research Infrastructures (ENVRI) to the European Open Science Cloud (EOSC).

The overarching goal is that at the end of the project, all participating Research Infrastructures have built a set of FAIR data services which enhances the efficiency and productivity of researchers, supports innovation, enables data- and knowledge-based decisions and connects the ENVRI Cluster to the EOSC.

This goal is reached by:

  • Well defined community policies and standards on all steps of the data life cycle, aligned with the wider European policies, as well as with international developments;
  • Each participating Research Infrastructure will have sustainable, transparent and auditable data services, for each step of data life cycle, compliant to the FAIR principles;
  • The focus of the work is on the implementation of prototypes for testing pre-production services at each Research Infrastructure; the catalogue of prepared services is defined for each Research Infrastructures independently, depending on the maturity of the involved Research Infrastructures;
  • The complete set of thematic data services and tools provided by the ENVRI cluster is exposed under the EOSC catalogue of services via the EOSC services.

General information

Project Number: 824068
Project title:ENVironmental Research Infrastructures building Fair services Accessible for society, innovation and research
Starting date: 4 01/01/2019
Duration in months:48
Call (part) identifier:H2020-INFRAEOSC-2018-2
Topic: INFRAEOSC-04-2018; Connecting ESFRI infrastructures through Cluster projects
Keywords: Data services, environmental science, research infrastructures, FAIR

 

Scope

Natural and anthropogenic factors lead to environmental changes on a scale ranging from local to global. Understanding and quantifying these changes is a requirement for developing mitigation and adaptation options and fact-based decision-making.

Reliable predictions of environmental change must be based on trustworthy, well-documented observations which capture the entire complexity of the Earth system and the manifold interactions between the atmosphere, the land and the ocean; encompassing impacts both from and onto life in all its forms.

 

Natural and anthropogenic factors lead to environmental changes on a scale ranging from local to global. Understanding and quantifying these changes is a necessary requirement for the development of mitigation and adaptation options, and importantly for fact-based decision making.

 

Reliable predictions of environmental change must be based on trustworthy, well-documented observations which capture the entire complexity of the Earth system and the manifold interactions between the atmosphere, the land and the ocean; encompassing impacts both from and onto life in all its forms.

Environmental data provides a scientific basis for analysing the physical, biological, and economic processes in the Earth system which affect all sectors of society, in addition to wildlife and biodiversity. Easy and fast access to reliable, high quality environmental data is fundamental for research, and for the development of environmental prediction and assessment services. It’s also key to assessing past policies and defining future policies, thereby underpinning the development of environment-friendly innovations.

The demand for Earth system observation data is rapidly increasing, but the tools to manage, document, provide, find, access, and use such data are still underdeveloped owing to a combination of data complexity and data volumes.

Research Infrastructures (RI) of the Environment Domain as defined by ESFRI cover the main four subdomains of the complex Earth system (Atmosphere, Marine, Solid Earth, and Biodiversity/Terrestrial Ecosystems), thus forming the cluster of European Environmental and Earth System Research Infrastructures (ENVRIs). ENVRIs are crucial pillars for environmental scientists in their quest to understand and interpret the complex Earth System. They are the most comprehensive producers and providers of environmental research data in Europe collected from the in-situ and space-based observing systems. ENVRIs often contribute to global observation systems and they generate relevant information for Europe and worldwide.

RI facilities were developed to respond to the needs of specific research communities, acknowledging the individual requirements and methods of specific disciplines. However, the necessity of interdisciplinary cooperation has been evident for decades.

Therefore, the ENVRI community has increasingly cooperated within the cluster projects of ENVRI (2011-2014, FP7), which paved the way for the ENVRIplus project (2015-2019, H2020). ENVRIplus gathered all subdomains of the Earth system science field to work together. This fulfils a dual purpose – to capitalize on progress made in the various disciplines, and to strengthen interoperability amongst Research Infrastructures and subdomains.

The evolution from the first ENVRI project to ENVRI-FAIR

The overarching goal of ENVRI-FAIR is to implement the FAIR principles in the ENVRI community and connect it to the European Open Science Cloud (EOSC). Common policies, open standards, interoperability solutions, operational services, and stewardship of data on the basis of FAIR (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, Re-usable) principles require a common approach. The final aim is to provide an open access platform for interdisciplinary environmental research data in the European Research Area utilising the EOSC.

Specifically, ENVRI-FAIR will work on

  1. Common data policies for further development of the common standards and policies for data life cycle, cataloguing, curation, provenance and service provision within Environmental Research Infrastructures;
  2. Open science in for an adoption of an open approach to sharing data and software;
  3. Capacity building for improved skills of the Research Infrastructure personnel so they can develop and maintain the FAIR infrastructures;
  4. Innovation potential for Increased potential for innovation of each Research Infrastructure by establishing a specific ENVRI-FAIR service catalogue section in the EOSC catalogue;
  5. Global cooperation for a cohesive global Research Infrastructure landscape, including other Research Infrastructure clusters, regional and international initiatives in the environmental sector;
  6. expose thematic data services and tools from the RI catalogues to the EOSC catalogue of services,COPERNICUS, GEO and other end-users.

 

 

ENVRI-Hub

The ambition of ENVRI-FAIR is to establish technical preconditions for the successful implementation of a virtual, federated machine-to-machine interface called ENVRI-hub – central gateway for easy access to environmental data and services provided by the contributing research infrastructures.

Full integration of services across research infrastructures is continuously progressing within the ENVRI community, with a focus on environmental data and scientific research objectives.

 

ENVRI-hub – central gateway to research infrastructure services

The ENVRI-Hub will be a central gateway to environmental data and services offered by the European environmental research infrastructures. The data offered through the hub will be interoperable across the Earth system disciplines and therefore easy to use for interdisciplinary environmental research. Our data will be open and free to use by anyone. Users of the ENVRI-Hub will be also able to use the Virtual Research Environments and do their science computing directly inside the hub.

 

 

Users should be able to test the first demonstrator of the hub at the end of 2022. ENVRI-Hub will be part of the European Open Science Cloud, a European Commission initiative aiming at developing an infrastructure providing its users with services promoting open science practices. Are you interested in what can ENVRI-Hub offer to scientific users? Watch our short video featuring three young scientists who ask questions about the ENVRI-Hub and how it is going to make their work easier.