Summary
Satellite-based ocean-colour observations can track these surface river plumes, providing valuable insights into the fate of organic matter from rivers. They help monitor local production, as well as the movement and exchange between dissolved and particulate forms of carbon through processes such as adsorption and desorption. At present, our ability to observe riverine plumes has been limited by the spatial and spectral resolution of sensors and the lack of available physical data (sea surface temperature) at a matching scale. The upcoming Sentinel Expansion Missions—CHIME and LSTM—will significantly boost Europe’s ability to monitor coastal environments, especially for tracking carbon. CHIME will provide high spatial and hyperspectral data on land and coastal waters using advanced hyperspectral imaging, while LSTM will deliver high-spatial resolution temperature measurements for land and sea surfaces. Together, these missions will give us an unprecedented view of coastal ecosystems, helping to track changes caused by natural processes such as tides and river outflows.
The Sentinel User Preparation and Carbon from earth Observation between Ocean and Land (SUPaCOOL) will provide a Reference Open Dataset that simulates data as they would be measured at water level by CHIME and LSTM. This dataset will be constructed including: existing datasets for development of algorithms for DOC-CDOM, POC and PP including phytoplankton size classes and data from a dedicated in situ Experimental campaign in the Western English Channel coast (tidally dominated) and in the Northern Adriatic coast, specifically designed to collect new data for PP and POC, DOC gradients and phytoplankton diversity. Additionally, the new algorithms will be deployed in the same coastal sites to produce time series or spatial distributions that will allow the investigation of the scale of spatial and temporal variability that can be resolved. The lessons learned from the experiment will be used for a roadmap to prepare users for the upcoming opportunities opened by the new satellites and to inform ESA about the areas of future development.
In particular, SUPaCOOL will create a CHIME-LSTM simulated dataset with three parts:
- Development: constructed from the data collected during the TARA-TREC/HyperBOOST campaign.
- Validation: constructed from a new, dedicated, sampling campaign in two highly dynamic, river plume influenced coastal areas, i.e., the Western English Channel and the Northern Adriatic Sea, complementary and extension of the TARA-TREC/HyperBOOST campaign.
- Application: constructed from historical-time series in-situ datasets with inputs that would allow the deployment of algorithms to address scientific questions.
