Engaging the community: the 2nd DestinE User eXchange in Bonn

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The Destination Earth User eXchange in Bonn on 13-14 November will create a space for discussion and engagement among the wider community interested in the European Commission’s flagship initiative to create a Digital Twin of the Earth system.  

The User eXchange meetings gather together prospective users, stakeholders, and members of the wider community with representatives from the three entities entrusted to implement Destination Earth, the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF), the European Space Agency (ESA) and the European Organisation for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites (EUMETSAT), and the European Commission.  

The programme for this event covers key aspects of the initiative such as technology, climate science, and policy. Leena Ylä-Mononen, Executive Director at the European Environment Agency (EEA) will explain how DestinE can contribute to climate adaptation policy needs and what are the expectations from the EEA regarding the initiative.  

The User eXchange starts on 13 November at 14:00 (CET) with a short opening session by ECMWF’s Director-General Florence Rabier, and the Acting Director for Digital Excellence and Science Infrastructures at the DG CNECT, Gustav Kalbe, the three entrusted entities will give  a general overview of each component of the system and the progress made since the previous User eXchange in Italy, which was hosted by the European Space Agency (ESA).  

Irina Sandu, Director for DestinE at ECMWF will give an overview of the DestinE’s system and will introduce the ECMWF contribution to the initiative: the first two high-priority digital twins, about Climate Change Adaptation and Weather-induced Extremes and the Digital Twin Engine.  

Michael Schick, DestinE System Manager and Danaële Puechmaille from EUMETSAT will present the implementation of DestinE Data Lake. 

Kathrin Hintze, Deputy DestinE Project Manager at ESA will expand on the DestinE Service Platform as well as offer insights into communications and the plans to build a strong community.  

Nils Wedi, Technology Lead for DestinE at ECMWF will moderate a session unveiling some of the secrets of DestinE’s visualisation and immersive technologies.  

“The European Commission launched the Destination Earth initiative with a clear goal to benefit society.  As an initiative we are now moving into an exciting phase of development that necessitates continual coordination and cooperation between all parties involved, such as the three implementing entities and their partners involved in developing the key elements of DestinE. The User eXchange events are a key way for us to set the scene for these crucial interactions.” said Irina Sandu.   

“The User Exchange is a great opportunity for the community to gain insights about the different layers that DestinE is comprised of, it also offers room for direct exchanges between attendants, which is equally as important, because it is often in these moments where new ideas and opportunities for collaboration arise. These events are an important element of our broader engagement activities. It will be great to exchange about the progress everyone has made since the last User eXchange in Frascati.” said Jörn Hoffmann, Destination Earth Partnership Lead at ECMWF.    

After EEA’s Leena Ylä-Mononen talk opening Day 2, the meeting splits in parallel sessions. 

Held across two sessions, Adapting to Climate Change will cover several aspects of the Climate Change Adaptation Digital Twin. This will include Use Cases associated with the twin, as well as associated user interaction with the Copernicus Climate Change Service.  Johannes Klumpers, senior expert at the EU Commission’s DG Clima, will bring the session to a close by presenting the potential links between the EU Mission on Adaptation to Climate Change and Destination Earth.   

The other parallel session is focused on the applications of the Weather Induced Extremes DT such as hydrology, air quality and other impact studies that will serve to demonstrate the Extremes DT capabilities. 

The afternoon parallel sessions cover the DestinE Core Service Platform, the DestinE Data Lake and data space as well as a workshop about digital twins’ connectivity for particular applications, use cases and other digital twins in a portable and scalable services landscape. A session on the science and technology needs for further evolutions of the DestinE system components will complete the afternoon.  

Read the programme in detail  

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Destination Earth is a European Union funded initiative launched in 2022, with the aim to build a digital replica of the Earth system by 2030. The initiative is being jointly implemented by three entrusted entities: the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) responsible for the creation of the first two ‘digital twins’ and the ‘Digital Twin Engine’, the European Space Agency (ESA) responsible for building the ‘Core Service Platform’, and the European Organisation for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites (EUMETSAT), responsible for the creation of the ‘Data Lake’.   

We acknowledge the EuroHPC Joint Undertaking for awarding this project strategic access to the EuroHPC supercomputers LUMI, hosted by CSC (Finland) and the LUMI consortium, Marenostrum5, hosted by BSC (Spain) Leonardo, hosted by Cineca (Italy) and MeluXina, hosted by LuxProvide (Luxembourg) through a EuroHPC Special Access call. 

More information about Destination Earth is on the Destination Earth website and the EU Commission website.  

For more information about ECMWF’s role visit ecmwf.int/DestinE   

For any questions related to the role of ECMWF in Destination Earth, please use the following email links:   

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