About the Organisation and Its Role in TERRA

Can you briefly introduce the TERRA project and MEEO’s involvement?

The TERRA project (An InTelligEnt PlatfoRm for IntegRating ClimAte Services) is a Horizon Europe initiative designed to bridge the gap between Earth Observation and climate resilience. Its goal is to develop an innovative platform capable of integrating Copernicus tools to analyse and forecast water-related risks such as pollution, drought, coastal erosion, flooding and sea-level rise. The platform also leverages advanced technologies such as Artificial Intelligence (AI), SWOT (Surface Water and Ocean Topography), and Intelligent Digital Twins (iDTs).

MEEO is a technical partner with deep expertise in Copernicus data and services. Within the project, our mission is to contribute to the system architecture and the development of cloud services that facilitate geospatial data access and visualisation. We play a central role in several project activities, including data and Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) management, the assessment of state-of-the-art smart technologies, the definition of platform requirements and architecture, as well as the configuration, integration, testing and validation of the system.

Can you briefly introduce your organisation — mission, expertise and core activities?

MEEO (Meteorological and Environmental Earth Observation S.r.l.) has specialised since 2004 in developing products and services based on Earth Observation, climate data and geospatial information. The company primarily operates within the institutional space sector and plays a key role in regional, national and European digital and climate infrastructures.

MEEO works across multiple economic sectors. It develops platforms that support the management of climate-related emergencies, such as floods and droughts, by combining satellite data, mathematical models and in-situ measurements to understand where and when critical events may occur and to support decision-making before, during and after emergencies.

Its solutions are applied in areas such as precision agriculture, atmospheric and climate monitoring, air quality assessment, cultural heritage protection and the development of urban digital twins for more sustainable and resilient planning.

A core strength of MEEO lies in simplifying the use of large volumes of geospatial and socio-economic data. Within major initiatives such as Destination Earth (DestinE) — the European Commission’s flagship initiative to develop a highly accurate digital model of the Earth — MEEO delivers and operates harmonised access to global environmental datasets from sources including Copernicus, the European Space Agency and third-party missions. This allows even non-expert users to visualise, combine and download only the information they need.

The company also applies artificial intelligence and machine learning techniques to improve data quality, integrate data from diverse sources and develop reliable models for applications such as ecosystem monitoring, satellite image analysis and agricultural yield forecasting.

Through its projects, MEEO contributes to strengthening public awareness and supporting evidence-based policies by promoting broader access to environmental data and digital literacy. At the same time, the company invests in training and knowledge transfer, fostering new professional profiles dedicated to communicating geographic and environmental data and helping to build a bridge between scientific research, technology and society.

Which TERRA work packages or key activities are you primarily involved in?

MEEO plays a significant technical role in TERRA, contributing to the project’s core development and implementation activities across several foundational work packages. Leveraging its expertise in data fusion, Copernicus data management and cloud data processing services, the company supports the definition of the overall platform architecture in alignment with Copernicus services and user needs, and contributes to the development of data workflows and visual analytics tools.

MEEO is also actively involved in platform integration and testing, ensuring that all system components operate seamlessly together and that the final platform delivers reliable and high-performance services to end users.

TERRA’s Mission and MEEO’s Contribution

How would you describe TERRA’s main mission to someone unfamiliar with the project?

TERRA aims to build an intelligent platform that transforms complex climate data from the Copernicus Programme into clear and practical information for decision-making.

The platform uses artificial intelligence to improve forecasting and Digital Twins — virtual models that replicate real-world systems — to simulate how environmental conditions may evolve over time. Combined with advanced modelling techniques, these tools help anticipate risks and test possible responses before they are implemented in reality.

By integrating these technologies, TERRA supports the protection of communities from water-related hazards such as coastal erosion, flash floods, water contamination and illegal human activities.

What specific part of TERRA’s objectives resonates most with your expertise or work?

Our objective in the TERRA project is to establish a unified interface across all demonstrators that enables faster and better-informed decisions for climate adaptation, water management and coastal resilience.

Innovation and Technical Impact

TERRA works at the intersection of Copernicus services and cutting-edge technologies such as AI, Digital Twins and data fusion. How does your work contribute to this innovation?

MEEO contributes to TERRA’s innovation by providing the technological backbone that transforms Copernicus data into scalable, operational climate intelligence services. With its expertise in Earth Observation data exploitation and cloud-based processing infrastructures, MEEO enables the large-scale ingestion, harmonisation and analysis of Copernicus products.

Moreover, MEEO promotes the Open Science approach and the adoption of FAIR services, leveraging its expertise in Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) standards to ensure that the platform remains accessible, interoperable and sustainable.

Collaboration and Consortium Experience

What have you learned from other partners since joining TERRA?

Through collaboration with domain experts — such as the University of Thessaly and the University of Glasgow — who work directly on environmental monitoring topics, including water quality parameters such as chlorophyll-a and turbidity, MEEO has gained valuable insight into how Copernicus data and services can address real environmental challenges.

This collaboration helps ensure that the platform’s technical architecture is not only advanced but also relevant and useful for real-world environmental monitoring.

What makes cross-disciplinary collaboration valuable in TERRA?

Collaboration is essential for building truly augmented solutions. In TERRA, technology providers such as MEEO deliver scalable cloud-based data processing services, while domain experts contribute advanced algorithms and scientific knowledge.

The result is a platform that is not only technically robust but also scientifically sound and aligned with European Green Deal objectives and real-world disaster risk reduction needs.

Outreach, Visibility and Stakeholder Engagement

Why is it important to communicate TERRA’s outcomes to stakeholders, policymakers and the public?

Communication is vital because, although the Copernicus Programme provides high-quality data, it remains underutilised by industries and policymakers due to integration challenges. TERRA’s mission is to bridge this gap by transforming climate data into actionable insights.

For stakeholders and industry, it is essential to demonstrate how AI-driven solutions can address real-world challenges such as water pollution and coastal erosion, which threaten a large share of global economic activities.

For policymakers, clear and accessible information supports evidence-based policies aligned with the European Green Deal and strengthens climate-resilient planning.

For the public, outreach helps raise awareness about how space technologies contribute to protecting communities from major environmental risks such as flooding and sea-level rise.

Have you been involved in any TERRA outreach events or activities?

MEEO has actively contributed to dissemination and outreach activities. In particular, Simone Mantovani, CEO of MEEO, presented the TERRA project at EU Space Days 2025 in Gdańsk, Poland, an event organised by the European Commission that brought together European space policymakers, industry leaders, entrepreneurs and innovators.

During the event, the presentation highlighted how TERRA contributes to the evolution of Copernicus services through Horizon Europe research and innovation projects. Simone emphasised that TERRA’s innovation lies not only in integrating technologies but also in transforming Earth Observation data into actionable climate services. The presentation also provided an overview of the status and roadmap of TERRA demonstrators and explored synergies with other projects supporting the future evolution of Copernicus services.

Personal and Team Motivation

What motivates your team to work on TERRA?

MEEO is motivated by the opportunity to apply more than 20 years of expertise as an ESA partner to address one of the most urgent challenges of our time: climate-related water risks.

According to Moris Pozzati, technical leader of the Harmonised Data Access solution:

“Our core mission is facilitating geospatial data access. In TERRA, we achieve this by supporting the demonstrators in providing a common and harmonised data model and by visualising this data through a digital interface.”

The team is also driven by the challenge of moving technologies from low to high technology readiness levels, transforming research results into operational solutions with measurable social and economic impact.

Finally, working at the intersection of Artificial Intelligence, Digital Twins and Earth Observation allows MEEO to push the boundaries of technological innovation while collaborating with leading scientific and policy experts across Europe.

If you had to summarise TERRA in one sentence for your network, what would it be?

“TERRA is a collaborative effort to develop an intelligent platform that bridges the gap between Earth Observation and climate resilience, transforming Copernicus data into actionable solutions for water-related risks and coastal resilience across Europe.”