Destination Earth and Horizon Europe research infrastructures

In recent years, the increasing frequency and intensity of extreme weather events, such as floods, droughts, hurricanes, and heat waves, have underscored the urgent challenges posed by climate change. These events present significant risks to human lives, ecosystems and the global economy. As a result, there is an urgent need for comprehensive research and immediate action to develop strategies and technologies that can protect vulnerable communities and ecosystems from the impacts of global warming. In response to these pressing challenges, Destination Earth (DestinE) is an ambitious initiative launched by the European Commission aimed at developing a highly accurate digital model of the Earth: a digital twin of the Earth. This digital twin model monitors and simulates natural phenomena, hazards and the related human activities, enabling policymakers and researchers to better understand environmental challenges and anticipate climate change impacts. With the advent of big data analytics and supercomputing, DestinE will help key actors gain insights into how to integrate artificial intelligence (AI) into environmental research and policymaking. Climate change remains a high priority on the European Commission’s agenda and DestinE is an essential pillar of the European Commission’s efforts towards the Green Deal and Digital Strategy. This is reflected in funding opportunities in EC programmes, notably in the Horizon Europe Research Infrastructures work programme (INFRA), that funded six projects between 2021 and 2024. In this context, the European Research Executive Agency (REA) and the Directorate General for Communications Networks, Content and Technology of the EC (DG CNECT) jointly organised a thematic meeting involving the six funded INFRA projects contributing to DestinE and representatives of the DestinE implementing entities, European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF), the European Space Agency (ESA) and the European Organisation for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites (EUMETSAT).