Destination Earth

What is Destination Earth?

Destination Earth (DestinE) is an ambitious initiative of the European Union to create a digital model of Earth that will be used to monitor the effects of natural and human activity on our planet, anticipate extreme events and adapt policies to climate-related challenges. 

Using innovative Earth system models, cutting-edge computing, satellite data and machine learning, Destination Earth will allow its users to explore the effects of climate change on the different components of the Earth system, together with possible adaptation and mitigation strategies.

Specifically, DestinE will:

• Support the prediction of both natural disasters and man-made environmental damage with high precision.
• Enable the continuous and accurate monitoring of the health of the planet by focusing on the effects of climate change, for example on the oceans, water, Earth’s ice caps, land use etc.
• Allow us to better understand the socio-economic effects of climate change and the occurrence of extreme natural disasters.

Who will benefit from Destination Earth?

Destination Earth will help scientists and policymakers to understand the complex interactions that the environment and humans will play in shaping Earth’s future. Destination Earth will also form the baseline for effective European adaptation strategies in support of the green transition, helping the EU reach its goal of becoming carbon neutral by 2050, and the implementation of the European Commission’s Green Deal and Digital Strategy.

Who are Destination Earth’s Partners?

The European Commission will lead and coordinate the implementation efforts among a core group of leading European organisations which will be responsible for developing the main elements of the initiative.

These include ESA, the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) and the European Organisation for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites (Eumetsat).

ESA will be responsible for the DestinE Open Core Service Platform, a user-friendly platform that will rely on the most comprehensive and sophisticated space-based observation data, including data from ESA’s Earth Explorers, the Copernicus Sentinel series, data from ECMWF and, over time, other major data holdings in Europe.

Eumetsat will be responsible for the multi-cloud data lake underpinning DestinE, including its design, establishment and testing, as well as its operations of the online inventory, while ECMWF will be responsible for the Digital Twin Engine, including the development of the two initial Digital Twins: Digital Twin on Weather-Induced and Geophysical Extremes and the Climate Change Adaptation Digital Twin.

How do Digital Twins work?

A digital twin is, in essence, a virtual representation that serves as a real-time digital counterpart of a physical object.

Destination Earth’s digital twins are digital replicas of our planet’s complex Earth system. They will be built under thematic categorisations from the different domains of Earth science, such as extreme natural disasters, climate change adaptation, oceans and biodiversity. The aim is to integrate these digital replicas to form one comprehensive digital twin of the complete Earth system.

Timeline

DestinE will be developed gradually through the following key milestones:

By 2024: Development of the open core digital platform and the first two digital twins: Digital Twin on Weather-Induced and Geophysical Extremes and the Climate Change Adaptation Digital Twin.

By 2027: Integration of additional digital twins to serve sector-specific user cases into the platform.

By 2030: A ‘full’ digital replica of Earth through the convergence of the digital twins available through the platform.

Upcoming Digital Twins

DestinE will be implemented gradually over the next five to six years. The first two digital twins to be developed will be: Digital Twin on Weather-Induced and Geophysical Extremes and the Climate Change Adaptation Digital Twin.

The Digital Twin on Weather-Induced and Geophysical Extremes, managed by ECMWF, will provide capabilities and services for the assessment and prediction of environmental extremes. Decision-makers will be able to anticipate the occurrence and impacts of extreme natural events, such as flooding and forest fires, with increased precision.

The Digital Twin on Climate Change Adaptation will support the generation of analytical insights and testing of predictive scenarios in support of climate adaptation and mitigation policies at decadal timescales, at regional and national levels.

More digital twins will be developed in the following years and brought together to develop a ‘full’ digital replica of the Earth system by 2030. The possible new developments can include digital twins of the oceans, biodiversity and urban environments.