GROOM II Project structure

  • WP1 - Project Management and Conceptual Design Reporting

WP Leader: ARMINES

The coordination of the project and its general orientation is the responsibility of ARMINES and relies on the work of the Project Management Team (PMT). The PMT is in charge of day-to-day management, anticipating any problem or delay, finding and proposing adequate solutions to reach the objectives of the project and solving any conflict that may appear within the consortium.

The Project Management Team (PMT) is composed of:

  • Scientific Coordinator - SC (Prof. Laurent Mortier)
  • Project Scientific Director - PSD (Dr Kamil Szafranski)
  • Administrative, Financial and Contractual Manager - AFC Manager (Mrs Clara Flack & Mr Mathieu Reboul)
  • Technical Manager - TM (Mr Yves Ponçon)

The SC and PSD are responsible for the overall scientific direction of the project and the reporting to the EC and the funding and policy bodies, the TM is responsible for the overall technical management of the project and the AFC Manager is responsible for all non-scientific issues.

The main tasks of WP1 consist of:

  • Scientific and Technical Coordination
  • Administrative, Financial and Contractual Management
  • Dissemination/Communication/Outreach to the scientific community, industrial stakeholders, the general public and potential end-users
  • Reporting on the conceptual design for funding and policy bodies.
  • WP2 - European Research Infrastructure landscape

WP Leader: HCMR

State of the art in marine observation requires different platforms from the coastal areas to the open ocean and from the surface down to deep waters, operating in synergy under a common framework. With this in mind, European Marine Research Infrastructures (RIs) are presently facing a significant challenge: how platform-oriented or sub-system RI’s will participate and become integral components of a holistic marine “observatory-oriented” RI. Several stakeholders are investigating this but the organization of Marine RI’s is currently being discussed and debated at a high-level within the European Commission. With regard to this perspective, it is crucial for the glider community to co-develop its position with these stakeholders – this is the main objective of this work package.

Dedicated activities will analyse several strategic issues related to gliders, such as:

  • Access provision and rules
  • Analysis for new stakeholders/disciplines
  • Enhancing skills and building capacities
  • Relations/integration with other observation platforms, infrastructures and systems.
  • WP3 - Governance and Financial Sustainability

WP Leader: ARMINES

The objective of this work package is to design the appropriate organization of GROOM RI for marine/maritime research, for ocean monitoring and for meeting the needs of all concerned maritime industrial sectors.

Organizational aspects include:

  • governance work (management of the infrastructure and its local components),
  • assessment of the regional/national commitments to support the national RI components,
  • evaluation of ways in which the EC can contribute (through Copernicus and/or structural funds for the establishment of the GERI hub and its nodes/”gliderports”, for example),
  • investigation into how the private sector can support the GROOM RI by direct participation and/or by accessing its facilities (nodes/”gliderports”) and by the use of the products generated by the GROOM RI.

Finally, according to the different options described by WP2 (fully new RI, update of existing ERIC, merging with emerging RIs), the pros and cons of the potential future legal organization (ERIC, International Association (AISBL), private status …) will be described. This last objective also includes evaluating the implications of new legislative and regulatory developments regarding autonomous unmanned vehicles.

  • WP4 - GROOM RI Integration and contribution to sustained observing efforts

WP Leader: GEOMAR

Sustained observations of the marine environment are motivated by the need for a better understanding of ocean climate and ecosystems, as well as better assessing the human impacts and vulnerabilities. It requires the coordination of a continuous and long-term system of ocean observations in a global context as well as in a European specific context. The GOOS coordinates observations around the global ocean for three critical themes: Climate, Ocean Health, and Real-Time Services. These themes contribute to the UNFCCC Convention on climate change, the UN convention on biodiversity and the IOC/WMO mandates to provide operational ocean services, respectively. In a European context these three critical themes remain but have specific requirements to it (e.g. MSFD). Because of the glider specifics in time/space sampling behaviour, sensor payload, and data access (real-time and quality controlled delayed mode data) the GROOM RI will have a unique role in data provision for the sustained observing.

The objective of this WP is to evaluate:

  • The GROOM RI in context of the defined Essential Ocean Variables (EOV) and Essential Climate Variables (ECV) and its ability to address observing needs related to ocean phenomena, on a global scale and on a European specific
  • conceptual work for the planning of international research services, in this case through support for innovation and growth.
  • WP5 - Services for Public policies, Market & Innovation

WP Leader: CSCS

Research infrastructures in the design stage, like the GROOM RI, must include an analysis of “the potential user community – both science and innovation oriented” and the “outline of a business case” (See ESFRI ROADMAP, 2021).

As foreseen in the call text, the WP5 will carry out:

  • technical activities which will ensure rapid exploitation of the RI by scientific users, in this case through identification of services meeting current needs and
  • The physical, biogeochemical, and biological/ecosystem requirements for a coordination of the GROOM RI in a European & International context (GOOS/GCOS/EOOS)

Both of these activities contribute to the analyses of user communities (WP2 and WP4) and business cases (performed in WP3).

The GROOM RI will provide services to a wide range of stakeholders. Among them are research scientists, public governmental or intergovernmental regulatory agencies, and industry, both large and small. In this work package, we will further define how a future, pan-European infrastructure of autonomous gliding vehicles, could more generally and sustainably address stakeholders’ needs across Europe far into the future.

In particular, this work package aims at a concrete set of recommendations on:

  • Evaluating key areas in which GERI can (uniquely) respond and support societal needs,
  • Designing partnerships between SMEs providing services and developing innovative solutions, large industries that may commercialize and use those solutions, and public bodies that promote and regulate the joint activities,
  • possible emerging markets and ways to use GROOM RI to support Blue Growth and innovation in Europe.

The output from this WP will aid the structural development of a flexible GROOM RI capable of responding to science and societal needs and aspirations, in the face of pressures on the marine environment and climate change.

  • WP6 - Technical benefits of a Glider European Research Infrastructure

WP Leader: NOC CLG

The main objective of the work-package is to provide the full technical framework that will allow the project to consider the cohesive integration of existing national infrastructures into the GERI and the generation of added value and cost saving, which facilitates access to the GROOM RI facilities, their vehicles and services across Europe and beyond. The adoption of a cohesive set of tools and procedures will help to maximise and harmonise data quality across partners. This framework will provide a solid technical foundation for the GROOM RI Integration and contribution to sustained observing efforts (WP4), establish Services for Public policies, Market & Innovation (WP5) and facilitate the relation with ESFRI and other marine Research Infrastructures (WP2) and the Governance and Financial sustainability (WP3).

GROOM II will deliver a concept design for the GROOM RI technical framework, building on the work previously completed as part of the original GROOM-FP7 and other European projects (NeXOS-FP7, BRIDGES-H2020 and Atlantos-H2020, etc.). The integration with European data infrastructures (Copernicus, Emodnet and Seadatanet) will be explored, to both facilitate the integration of GROOM RI assets into those data infrastructures and to leverage the data they manage to assist with mission planning and the deployment of novel Artificial Intelligence (AI) services within the GROOM RI.

Under the technical framework WP6 will produce:

  • the technology roadmap for the GROOM RI, including a revised data roadmap for European gliders to cope with the emerging science questions, evolving global data management landscape, and trends that emerged from OceanObs’19
  • a series of ontologies and machine-to-machine interfaces to facilitate a quick integration of software planning tools, AI systems and new vehicle technologies within the GROOM RI core systems
  • a compilation of best practices in the form of standard operating procedures on how to maintain, deploy and recover the gliders and other long range autonomous vehicles.