“The NESIS Network and its Outcomes for the ICT Implementation of SEIS” Giorgio Saio - GISIG INSPIRE Conference 2011 ICT PSP Grant Agreement No

why NESIS To provide a coherent ICT roadmap for the SEIS implementation, with the consolidation of existing best practice. To promote the uptake of ICT solutions to address the fundamental problems faced by public authorities in providing information related to monitoring and reporting environmental data. To support a shared vision for streamlining current information and reporting systems and to promote the adoption of an interoperable information infrastructure INSPIRE Conference 2011

Criteria Awareness that there is not a single model to organise data flow, to be developed upon diverse needs in the topic areas  exploit the lessons of Good Practices From local to global and vice-versa, i.e. to improve data sharing at and among all levels  promote the mutual exchange between different level authorities (Local-Regional-National-European) rather than a one-way flow A top down and bottom-up approach  Top down requirements, from the SEIS communication  Bottom-up requirements, from existing Good Practices INSPIRE Conference 2011

Objectives vs. Outcomes Analysis of the SoP in Environmental Information Systems and services for monitoring and reporting (from national to a European synthesis) Creation of an inventory of Good Practices and analysis of them ICT Roadmap for implementing SEIS, that focuses on what to do for evolving towards a distributed, standards-based infrastructure for spatial and non- spatial environmental information, based on the principles of shared access Guidelines on ICT supporting environmental monitoring and reporting, that focus on how to do it Communication forum and network of stakeholders INSPIRE Conference 2011

NESIS Results Analysis of the State of Play in the Countries participating in the Network, about the ICT components that will contribute to the development of SEIS  12 coutries contributed Synthesis of the State of Play at European level of environmental information systems for monitoring and reporting Good Practices in environmental data management and methodologies for their analysis  NESIS GP Catalogue (44 GP available) A contribution for the SEIS implementation: a proposal for a SEIS ICT roadmap and technical Guidelines  Towards the ICT implementation of SEIS The NESIS Network (43 Members, 24 Countries, starting from 16 Partners, 14 Countries) INSPIRE Conference 2011

I.NESIS approach and SEIS requirements A combined Top-Down and Bottom-Up approach for the identification of the requirements for the ICT component of SEIS II.SEIS ICT Component Envisions an overall network architecture for SEIS III.Guidelines for technical implementation Contains the discussion of potential technological approaches to implement SEIS ICT services and components. IV.SEIS specific ICT aspects Other SEIS issues not directly target by INSPIRE V.Towards SEIS implementation It proposes a possible action plan for the SEIS implementation MAIN NESIS OUTREACH “Towards the ICT implementation of SEIS” – Structure Roadmap: what to do Guidelines: how to do it INSPIRE Conference 2011

“Towards the ICT implementation of SEIS” – Users Who should read this document? This document intends to be a “handbook” suitable for understanding, commenting and amending, and in perspective implementing, the NESIS proposal for SEIS According to a criterion of role and profile, the following categories of potential users can be identified: decision makers and managers, for the Parts I, II, IV and V of the document ICT technicians and operators for all Part, with Part III and IV being the most technical INSPIRE Conference 2011

“Towards the ICT implementation of SEIS” – ICT focus SEIS envisioned as a network of distributed services Under focus on service provider side:  service interface technology  metadata elements and encoding  data exchange models and formats Under focus on service consumer side:  data processing and information synthesis  data semantics and linked data Also discussed:  handling reference data (e.g. thesauri, global identifiers, etc) INSPIRE Conference 2011

“Towards the ICT implementation of SEIS” – general remarks The Roadmap section defines services on a high level, allowing to consider different technology options for implementing them (e.g. SOAP, REST, …) Potential technology bindings discussed in Guidelines. The document is generally dealing with environmental reporting issues, but also briefly addressed are:  voluntarily collected and provided data  sensor monitoring SEIS policy options (under discussion) affect the choice of technologies and overall implementation approach INSPIRE Conference 2011

“Towards the ICT implementation of SEIS” – ICT direction (1) The possibilities for using INSPIRE interfaces and formats for discovering, viewing and downloading non-GIS data (e.g. SOER, statistical data, …) were assessed. INSPIRE’s OGC services and ISO standards provide indeed extensibility points for doing that, but things to consider:  it is not trivial ;  OGC clients unlikely to request non-GIS data from OGC services, so different client-side tools still required;  overhead for organisations with only tabular data to offer;  EEA’s experience: GML and XML Schema based formats in general are not effective for data analysis and processing. INSPIRE Conference 2011

“Towards the ICT implementation of SEIS” – ICT direction (2) Complementary approach: data and metadata exchanged over RDF syntax and model, based on previously developed ontologies and taxonomies (RDF Schema, OWL, SKOS, etc). Linked Data principles for linking diverse data. Semantic Web features for automated data understanding. Why?  universal model: well suited for analysis and processing, same client-side tools for diverse data  expressibility of relations between different taxonomies and thesauri: less streamlining efforts  easy to link with data from INSPIRE  doesn’t suffer from constantly changing reporting specs INSPIRE Conference 2011

II.SEIS ICT COMPONENTS 4.Metadata 5.Data Specifications 6.Service Oriented Architecture Definition of SOA and services, Network Services Architecture 7.Proposed ICT Services Discovery, View, Download, Data Quality, Feedback, Sensor Observation, Notification, Registry, Service Chaining 8.Service Security 9.Summary, conclusions, open issues “Towards the ICT implementation of SEIS” – Contents (1) I. NESIS APPROACH TOWARDS SEIS REQUIREMENTS 1. Definitions 2. Top- down and bottom-up, two complementary vision 3. SEIS Requirements

III.Guidelines for technical implementation: 10. GUIDELINES ON SEIS METADATA Existing standards, The choices for SEIS, SEIS metadata encoding 11. GUIDELINES ON SEIS DATA SPECIFICATIONS Modeling approaches and data encodings, XML Schema and XML, OWL, RDF Schema and RDF 12. GUIDELINES ON SEIS NETWORK SERVICES Discovery Services, View Services, Download Services, Data Quality Services, Feedback Services, Sensor Observation Services, Notification Services, Registry Services, Services Chaining 13. Summary, conclusions, open issues INSPIRE Conference 2011 “Towards the ICT implementation of SEIS” – Contents (2)

IV. SEIS Specific ICT aspects 14.Voluntarily provided data Guidelines on voluntarily provided data,Acquiring voluntary provided data 15.Documents and information products 16.Reporting support 17.Data processing and semantics Problem background, What SEIS could do?, Potential issues, Potential solutions 18.Linking spatial and environmental domains 19.Streamlining thesauri and other reference data 20.Conclusions INSPIRE Conference 2011 “Towards the ICT implementation of SEIS” – Contents (3)

V.Towards SEIS implementation 21. PROPOSED ACTION PLAN FOR SEIS IMPLEMENTATION 21.1General remarks and assumptions 21.2Legislation’s impact on SEIS implementation 21.3Implementing Rules and Guidance Documents 21.4Groups and responsibilities 21.5SEIS components to be specified 21.6Reusing INSPIRE IR & DT 21.7Action plan illustrated 21.8Action plan 22. SUMMARY AND NEXT STEPS 22.1Next steps towards SEIS implementation INSPIRE Conference 2011 “Towards the ICT implementation of SEIS” – Contents (4)

Network exploitation and follow- up initiatives The NESIS Network is still operational to support the ICT implementation of a Shared Environment Information System for Europe and the SEIS initiative, through: a NESIS Secretariat supported by GISIG to guarantee the operativeness of the Network a strict link with INSPIRE (NESIS has been registered as a Thematic SDIC and with EEA, supporting the EEA ICT strategy the further development of the NESIS Good Practice Catalogue, to share experiences on environmental data and information management actions devoted to the training and awareness activities promotion of new projects and initiatives, such as an Environmental Thesaurus Framework the Network development and enlargement INSPIRE Conference 2011

NESIS: a line of activity within the GISIG Association NESIS

NESIS as SDIC INSPIRE Linkage with INSPIRE: NESIS as a Thematic SDIC I.Collect and describe user requirements related to Environmental policies II.Submit reference material as input to the Drafting Teams (D6.2, Good Practices, etc) III.Contribute to awareness raising and training IV.Contribute, with reference to environmental information management, into the review process and the release of the INSPIRE Implementing Rules INSPIRE Conference 2011

44 Good Practices registered so far INSPIRE Conference 2011

A Training Framework

I.NESIS approach and SEIS requirements A combined Top-Down and Bottom-Up approach for the identification of the requirements for the ICT component of SEIS II.SEIS ICT COMPONENTS NESIS proposal for a technological Roadmap for the SEIS implementation III.Guidelines for technical implementation About “how” SEIS could be developed IV. SEIS specific ICT aspects V. Towards SEIS implementation It propose a possible action plan for the SEIS implementation NESIS main outcomes -> Training Courses A - “Towards the ICT implementation of SEIS” B - “NESIS Good Practices for SEIS” – about ICT aspects of environmental data management (methods, technology, procedures) INSPIRE Conference 2011

The NESIS network is intended to continue its original objective to support the ICT implementation o SEIS, starting from D6.2 “Towards the ICT implementation of SEIS”, involving other interested stakeholders May 2008, 16 Members – 14 Countries Now, 43 Members – 24 Countries The NESIS Network INSPIRE Conference 2011

NESIS Members by Institution type (77% of them EIONET NFPs) INSPIRE Conference 2011

NESIS and SEIS potential stakeholders (source EEA) NESIS is an open Network INSPIRE Conference 2011

Next NESIS event: a NESIS Workshop at You are all invited! INSPIRE Conference 2011

NESIS kick-off meeting Copenhagen May Thanks to all the NESIS Members for the support during the Project and for the future of the Network Giorgio Saio INSPIRE Conference 2011