Safeguarding ocean ecosystems and coastal regions while at the same time ensuring maritime and coastal economies is the aim of the European Commission’s Integrated Maritime Policy, adopted in October, 2007, which is part of the global ambitious EU agenda for economic growth, research, energy, environmental preservation and the fight against climate change.
With the first 'European Maritime Day' that has been celebrated on 20 May across Europe, the crucial role of oceans and seas in the EU citizen’s everyday life has been highlighted. This celebration day was a good occasion to raise awareness of the opportunities and challenges facing the sector.
GMES services outgoing from long and fruitful research EU projects will be essential tools for the implementation of the Maritime Policy.
The European Space Agency (ESA) has also been actively involved in over the last 25 years in Earth Observation of the ocean and with the GSE projects in building up a monitoring capacity for maritime services.
In the field of marine environment protection, GMES and GSE projects could demonstrate and qualify the capacity for pan-European oil spill surveillance since 2002. Later in 2006, an operational satellite-based oil slick detection service was set up for all European waters to provide notification when pollution occurs. In the field of maritime security, the MARISS project (MARitime Security Service, part of GSE - GMES Services Element) works with police, border guards, coast guards, intelligence services, European and international agencies in order to extend the integration of different Earth Observation (EO) data sets to new areas of surveillance.
EO provides also unprecedented measurements over all ocean areas for supporting the marine research. For instance, monitoring the temperature of the sea surface over a 17-year period helped to better understand global warming.
With the support to be provided by the Sentinel satellites and Earth Explorer missions within the framework of GMES, ESA is contributing to ensure continuity of all these key data streams.
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