Geological Survey of Denmark and Greenland Bulletin 41, 2018, 95-98 95 Geology does not respect national borders. Hence, in order to get geological overviews of Europe, input from geologi- cal surveys in more than 35 countries is required. European policy makers have several times been forced to rely on the US Geological Survey to provide e.g. resource estimates from the European continent, but for obvious reasons there is a wish to base European decision making on European knowledge. Consequently, the European Commission and the European Parliament have formulated a request for the establishment of a ‘Geological Service for Europe’. In its strategy towards 2020, EuroGeoSurveys (EGS) addresses the creation of such a ser- vice through three pillars. EGS is an umbrella organisation through which national geological survey organisations of 36 European countries cooperate, referred to below as national surveys. The three pillars are designed to integrate input from all national surveys into a system that can swiftly act on ur- gent needs for knowledge-based decision support. The three pillars relate to joint research, data integration and sharing of facilities (Fig. 1). Whilst the third pillar has only recently been dealt with, the two first have already advanced through a number of recent initiatives. Having been a key player in numerous EU projects for many years, the Geological Survey of Denmark and Greenland (GEUS) has attained a central role in the implementation of these two pillars of the strategy, both as coordinator of the European Geological Data Infra- structure (EGDI, www.europe-geology.eu) and as one of the biggest players in the so-called GeoER A programme. GEUS participates in ten projects and is a partner in the secretariat and the coordinator of the GeoER A Information Platform. The present paper outlines the main steps towards the current situation and provides a background for GEUS’ role in this. Towards a EU geological knowledge base The European Commission has contributed financially through several framework programmes to increase knowl- edge sharing, capacity building as well as cross-border and pan-European research within different geoscience domains. In most cases, data play a central role, and EGS members have many years of experience in working together with the purpose of making geological data FAIR (Findable, Ac- cessible, Interoperable and Reusable). In many cases, Euro- pean projects have historically only had the participation of a limited number of national surveys, but in 2008 a f lagship project funded by the EU was launched with the participa- tion of 20 national surveys as a logical follow-up of the global OneGeology initiative (www.onegeology.org). OneGeology aimed at assembling a geological map of the world on a scale of 1:1 000 000 by piecing together national contributions in whatever format they had, using distributed web services. The OneGeologyEurope project went a step further. GEUS and the 19 other European national surveys worked together for two years to produce a distributed, web-based surface geological map of Europe on a scale of c. 1:1  000  000 that was harmonised with a common data structure and agreed geological classifications. At that time, the project represent- ed a leading edge activity, as it demonstrated the power of national organisations working together around a common data structure and nomenclature for geological units (geo- chronology and lithology). Importantly, the project built on principles and rules from the INSPIRE directive from 2007 and was thus not only a step on the way for the national sur- Towards a common geological data infrastructure for Europe Jørgen Tulstrup and Mikael Pedersen The Geological Surveys of Europe Jo in t Re se ar ch (G eo ER A ) D at a In te gr ati on a nd H ar m on is ati on (E G D I) Kn ow le dg e, C ap ac it y an d In fr as tr uc tu re S ha ri ng European Geological Service Fig. 1. The three pillars of the EGS strateg y for the establishment of a European Geological Service. © 2018 GEUS. Geological Survey of Denmark and Greenland Bulletin 41, 95–98. Open access: www.geus.dk/bulletin http://www.europe-geology.eu http://www.onegeology.org http://www.geus.dk/bulletin 9696 veys to fulfil their obligations towards the directive, but also served to demonstrate the feasibility of making geological data interoperable for Europe and beyond. The results of the project were fed into the legal process to define the EU-wide INSPIRE geological data specification, which since 2014 constitutes the implementing rules. Upon the success of OneGeologyEurope, a natural ex- tension came with the increased attention on securing the supply of critical raw materials for European industry. This was partly based on the rare-earth element trade dis- pute that began in 2010 when China imposed strict export quotas for rare-earth elements. Such elements are used in a number of high-technology industries, and since China ac- counts for 97% of the world production, the situation was considered critical (Kalvig & Machacek 2018, this volume). Consequently, the European Commission urgently needed an overview of raw materials resources in Europe. This led to a number of EU projects. Especially one of them had strategic importance for the EGS, namely the Minerals4EU project. GEUS cooperated with 27 other national surveys and other EU organisations to build the foundation for a European raw materials knowledge base, by extending the OneGeolog- yEurope philosophy and by complying with and contributing to INSPIRE. Subsequently, other EU projects like EURare, ProSUM, MICA and the recently launched OR AMA pro- ject have extended and/or improved this common knowledge base. At the same time GEUS also participates in the Knowl- edge and Innovation Community (KIC) for Raw Materials, through which a number of complementary projects are run in cooperation with universities and industrial partners. Simultaneously with these raw materials projects, a num- ber of other European data harmonisation projects were carried out within other EGS research areas such as ground- water, energy, geohazards and soil. However, it became in- creasingly clear along the way that there was a need for co- ordination in order to increase the efficiency, reusability and sustainability – not only to meet European expectation, but also for the sake of geoscientists. This was addressed in the EGS strategy that was published in 2014 and laid the founda- tion for the European Geological Data Infrastructure. The European Geological Data Infrastructure In 2012, EGS’ members were granted a two-year EU project called EGDI-Scope, aiming to assess the possibilities of set- ting up a long-term sustainable European geological data in- frastructure in line with the second pillar of the EGS strategy. The initiative addressed the fact that almost all previous com- mon European geoscience projects had succeeded in producing good European datasets and commonly also web-based dis- semination platforms, but that such systems would typically disappear after a certain period because of lack of financial sup- port for basic operation and maintenance. The EGDI-Scope project revealed that data from more than 80 past European projects, worth 400–700 million Euro, could potentially be ‘saved’ and made available through a common data infrastruc- ture which should also be the natural dissemination platform for future projects. GEUS was part of the EGDI-Scope core team and was in charge of stakeholder consultation, thereby analysing both end-user needs and interfaces to other large European earth science projects and initiatives. An important goal of EGDI-Scope was to pave the way for a larger EU project, whereby EGDI could be implemented. Fig. 2. The interactive map viewer of the Euro- pean Geological Data Infrastructure (EGDI) portal through which hundreds of different data themes can be viewed in combination. The map shown here illustrates the concentration of lead in grazing land (coloured dots) on top of a geological map of Europe. 97 Unfortunately no appropriate Horizon 2020 (EU’s frame- work programme) calls were launched, and two proposals targeting some generic electronic infrastructure calls were rejected. However, the concept of EGDI was widely used in strategic communication, and eventually the situation became critical: everybody talked about EGDI, but it did not exist. Consequently, GEUS mobilised the so-called ‘Spatial Infor- mation Expert Group’ of the EGS, and after a long process of argumentation and communication the EGS General Assem- bly accepted to provide in-kind resources from the national surveys to establish a first basic implementation of the EGDI. EGDI version 1 On 14 June 2016, the first version of EGDI was launched at the premises of the EGS secretariat in Brussels. Besides di- rectors and other EGS key persons, the audience comprised a number of distinguished EU commissioners representing different parts of the commission, including DG GROW (raw materials), DG MARE (maritime affairs), DG ENER (geoenergy), DG RTD (research) and DG JRC (joint re- search and INSPIRE). The participants were very happy with what they saw. Even though it is not fully-f ledged, EGDI V.1 contains most parts of the system that was identi- fied under the EGDI-Scope project. A number of datasets from past European projects are included and made available through a common web portal (www.europe-geology.eu; Fig. 2), which was to a large extent developed by GEUS. However, the portal is only a small part of EGDI. The infrastructure itself consists of a complex of central databases, a metadata catalogue and distributed web services that all conform to the same standards. Roles and responsibilities are agreed in- ternally in EGS, and work is in progress to establish a more permanent governance structure. EGDI in the European landscape of electronic infrastructure EGDI is not alone! There are many other related European initiatives (Fig. 3) and a few will be mentioned here. The European Plate Observing System (EPOS) is a research in- frastructure for solid-earth sciences in Europe and is of stra- tegic importance to the EU. It aims to facilitate research into natural disasters such as earthquakes and volcanic eruptions through the integration of geoscience data from a number of different research communities. Geological data represent one of the domains that EPOS will integrate; the EGS com- munity is the main provider of such data. GEUS has a role in the implementation project EPOS-IP and actively uses this position together with other participating national surveys to ensure the complementarity between EGDI and EPOS through various coordination activities. The European Marine Observation and Data Network (EMODnet) is a large programme aiming at providing uni- form access to marine data from Europe’s coastal states. EMODnet is divided into seven discipline-based themes, one of which deals with geological data. The EMODnet- geology project has been running in several phases since it started in 2008. In the current third phase, GEUS has lead- ing role in the work package dealing with data management and web portal development – again a strong position that GEUS uses to strengthen the coherence of the European e-Infrastructure landscape through technical coordination with EGDI, EPOS and other large initiatives. The role of EGDI as a central data-bearing component in European geoscience research is continuously being strengthened through coordination with other European projects and programmes. One of these is GeoER A. RMIS, OpenEcho... Fig. 3. The central position of the EGDI in the European e-Infrastructure landscape. EGDI serves geological data from a lot of different geological re- search areas and thereby contributes geological data to numerous European information systems through interoperable web services. 9898 GeoERA The first pillar of the EGS strategy, the joint research pillar, is on its way to be implemented through an ER A-NET on ‘Es- tablishing the European Geological Surveys Research Area to deliver a Geological Service for Europe (GeoER A)’. The main objective of GeoER A (http://geoera.eu) is to contrib- ute to the optimal use and management of the subsurface. Forty-eight national surveys from 33 European countries will participate in research projects under GeoER A with the purpose of supporting a more integrated and efficient man- agement as well as a more responsible and publicly acceptable exploitation and use of the subsurface. GeoER A covers the three geoscientific themes of geo-energy, groundwater and raw materials; the projects will run for three years starting in July 2018. The three geoscientific themes share the objective of or- ganising and disseminating a large amount of results in the form of digital maps and other data. Furthermore, cross- thematic integration of information is an important aspect of GeoER A. It has therefore been decided to establish a com- mon ‘Information Platform’ for the efficient integration of all IT-related and technical issues (database and dissemination) from all GeoER A projects. The platform will be capable of integrating up-to-date data, interpretations and models from different and distributed sources, both within and across the three main geoscientific themes of GeoER A. The platform will be based on EGDI which contains some of the functionality foreseen to be required by the GeoER A projects. EGDI will, however, have to be extended in order to handle and disseminate for instance 3D/4D geological mod- els. In addition to organising the geoscientific projects, Geo- ER A also carries out ‘foresight activities’ with the purpose of assessing how longer-term funding of the activities can be obtained and eventually lead to a ‘Geological Service for Europe’. The safeguarding of the GeoER A results through the information platform and the long-term operation and maintenance of the entire EGDI should be seen in this con- text. The future One of the main challenges for all these European initia- tives, including EGDI, is to make them sustainable. All EU projects are run for a limited period after which the funding ends, and due to budget mechanisms, the European Com- mission is not in a position to fund permanent maintenance of any system. EGS has therefore continuously tried to find sustainable funding models to keep EGDI alive in a techni- cal and organisational sense. Currently the EGS members are able to finance the very basic operation of EGDI. From 2018–2021 work within the GeoER A projects will ensure that EGDI will be significantly upgraded with much more data and functionality. With EGDI becoming a continu- ously bigger and more integrated piece in the European puz- zle, the chances of finding a long-term solution are on the increase, but a sustainable solution will probably have to be connected to the establishment of the ‘Geological Service for Europe’ at least partly funded by EU. Other challenges facing the generation of truly pan- European harmonised geological datasets are that some of the most relevant data are considered confidential in some countries. This is for instance the case for some data about mineral occurrences in certain East European countries. In other countries the organisation and provision of data are the responsibility of regional authorities instead of national sur- veys, who are less committed to the European viewpoint on data than EGS. Finally, it has turned out that it is difficult to convert na- tional geological databases and make them interoperable ac- cording to the requirements in the INSPIRE implementing rules. Many of these rules are very complicated, and many resources have been allocated to the database administrators at the national surveys in order to make their data compliant with the standards. References An effective raw materials strateg y for Europe. European Parliament reso- lution of 13 September 2011 on an effective raw materials strateg y for Europe. https://eur-lex.europa.eu (2011/2056(INI)). Communication from the Commission to the European Parliament, the Council, The European Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions. Making raw materials available for Europe’s future wellbeing. Proposal for a European Innovation Partnership on raw materials. https://eur-lex.europa.eu (Com(2012) 82). Kalvig, P. & Machacek, E. 2018: Examining the rare-earth elements (R EE) supply-demand balance for future global wind power scenarios. Geologi- cal Survey of Denmark and Greenland Bulletin 41, 87–90 (this volume). The EuroGeoSurveys vision towards a Geological Service for Europe. htt p://www.eurogeosurveys .org/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/EGS- Strategy-Document-2014-A4.pdf. Authors’ address Geological Survey of Denmark and Greenland, Øster Voldgade 10, 1350 Copenhagen K, Denmark. E-mail: jtu@geus.dk. https://eur-lex.europa.eu https://eur-lex.europa.eu http://www.eurogeosurveys.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/EGS-Strategy-Document-2014-A4.pdf http://www.eurogeosurveys.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/EGS-Strategy-Document-2014-A4.pdf mailto:jtu@geus.dk