"INSPIREd computing for EO Based Services" is the title of the presentation made by Paolo Manunta, Head of European Institutions SBU, Planetek Italia. The presentation, held on November 26th, 2013 during the Big Data workshop organized by Italian Space Agency (ASI).

1. INSPIREd computing
for EO Based Services
Paolo MANUNTA1, Giulio CERIOLA1,
Jens STUTTE1
Planetek Italia s.r.l ∙ Via Massaua 12 ∙ I-70132 Bari
1
E-Mail: manunta@planetek.it
Workshop Big Data
Roma, 26/11/2013

2. INSPIRE is many things:
• Yet another Directive of the European Union?
• An instrument of standardization of geospatial metadata
• The attempt to define “reference themes and layers” at
pan-European level
• The standardization of 34 geospatial “Data Themes”
• An obligation of the member states to make accessible their
geospatial data through INSPIRE services
• An example of “Big Data” in the wild
• Many other …
But from a final user perspective, what should it be?

3. INSPIRE as a «one-stop-shop» for
geospatial data
• Whilst INSPIRE is based on the infrastructures of the Member
States, the INSPIRE Directive also requires that:
• “The Commission shall establish and operate an INSPIRE
geo-portal at Community level”.
• In addition Article 15(2) of the Directive requires:
• “Member States shall provide access to the services
referred to in Article 11(1) through the INSPIRE geoportal referred to in paragraph 1. Member States may also
provide access to those services through their own access
points.”

4. For EO folks: INSPIRE as a «onestop-shop» for
• Cross-border
ancillary data
(from all member states)
• Cross-language (thesaurus enabled searches)
• Cross-domain
(34 data themes)
• Cross-scale
(from global to very local)
• Cross-time
(huge amount of historical data)

6. Operational workflow
EO Big Data (L0,L1)
EO Big Data (L0,L1)
ESA
ESA
ASI
ASI
...
...
Single sensor
Single sensor
processing systems
processing systems
Basic and aggregated
Basic and aggregated
products (L2, L3)
products (L2, L3)
Non EO data
Non EO data
Local/National
Local/National
Pan-European
Pan-European
Advanced processing
Advanced processing
Multi sensor
Multi sensor
Data fusion
Data fusion
Big Repositories
Big Repositories
INSPIRE
INSPIRE
System for elaborating EO and non EO data
Added value
Added value
products (L3+)
products (L3+)
• Data fusion and change detection
algorithms
• Direct access to EO Big Data
• Exploitation of INSPIRE
Direct answer to end
Direct answer to end
user requirements
user requirements

7. Example Use Case
Flooding event occurred in Sardinia
Big Data & INSPIREd approach
o
EO Input:
o
SAR scene acquired after the event
Present case
SAR scenes from a same sensor before and after the event, for more sensors (e.g. TSX,
EO Input:Sentinel-1)
CSK,
- one TSX scene before and after the event (e.g. Sentinel-2, Landsat8, RapidEye)
– Optical scenes acquired after the event provided for free*
- COSMO scenes INSPIRE (themes):
Ancillary data fromacquired during and after the event**
o
o

–
–
Non-EO Input: DEM, road network
– Elevation
– Administrative units
Product: map flooded areas (at the timing of acquisition), provided to the
– Transport networks
Sardinia Region authorities
– Buildings
** –
Data Production and industrial facilities
being provided
* Astrium courtesy

Products provided to the Sardinia Region authorities:
–
–
–
map of flooded areas (at the timing of acquisition)
map of damaged areas
classification of damage level/type

8. Example Use Case - INSPIREd
Theme: Elevation
Use: Remove reliefs’ shadows
An accurate DEM allows to define slope and
aspect of the territory vs. SAR sensor view
SAR sensors’ looking direction
Mountain side facing the SAR sensors
Mountain side shadowed to the SAR sensor
Theme: Land Cover
Use: Reduce errors
Water detected (left image) -> from a
Land Cover map the area is composed of
trees and rock (as confirmed in left
image using Bing). So water pounds are
very unlikely there

9. Example Use Case - INSPIREd
Theme: Land use
Use: remove false detection
Airport landing area appears very similar to water on a SAR image (left),
leading often to errors (middle).
Reliable land use map (right) allows to remove or highlight such areas

10. Example Use Case - INSPIREd
Theme: Cadastral Parcels
Theme: Buildings
Theme: Production and industrial
facilities
Use: classification of damage
level/type
Flooded area along a river
- Mainly cultivated fields
- Small houses
- Rural facilities
- Nearby city area

11. Challenges of «INSPIREd
computing for EO based services»
• Integration into an EO production workflow – exploit
backoffice interfaces (CSW) of the geoportal?
• Integration with ESA catalogues (EOLI/ngEO) – in
order to become a real “one-stop shop” for EO workers
• Integration of heterogeneous authentication systems –
go Open Data ?
• Establishment of a feedback loop to INSPIRE of
relevant products

12. Thank you!
Paolo Manunta
Planetek Italia s.r.l.
Via Massaua 12
I-70132 Bari
manunta @planetek.it