€20m marine project to focus on ocean observation
The European Commission has announced that Horizon 2020 will fund the EU’s largest marine science project.
The AtlantOS project will have a budget of €20m and brings together collaborators from more than 60 organisations across a multitude of disciplines throughout the world. The project will focus on how to enhance the efficiency of ocean observation procedures and is due to start in January 2015.
One of the partners in the 51-month project is the UK’s National Oceanography Centre. Speaking about the new venture, Dr Doug Connelly said: “What is really exciting about this project is that it brings together so many different scientific disciplines in a single project in a way that has never been done before. With contributions from biogeochemistry, physics, biology, technology, ocean observation and modelling, this will be a truly multidisciplinary project.”
The research project will aim to address current fragmented Atlantic Ocean monitoring activities and seek to develop a more efficient, complete and lower cost information delivery system. A new service is expected to provide particular benefit to maritime safety organisations, assist offshore weather forecasting and encourage the better implementation of marine policy.
The project received funding under Horizon 2020’s Blue Growth call. It is one of the focus areas during 2014 for the EU’s research and innovation framework programme and has an overall budget of €100m.
