Portal

The EOCube.ro portal serves as the central access point to the ROCS/EOCube.RO platform. It provides an overview of available resources and facilitates direct user access to them.

Services and Data Collections

Services

Currently, the platform provides interactive services for application development, visualization of spatio-temporal collections, and data download.

Users can create accounts, manage their workspaces, and download available datasets.

Data Collections

Regarding available data, the platform currently synchronizes a selected set of collections with the Copernicus Dataspace Ecosystem (CDSE):

• Sentinel-1 SLC: Level-1 Single Look Complex (SLC) products are images in the satellite acquisition plane, in slant range and azimuth coordinates. Each pixel is represented by a complex value (I and Q), containing amplitude and phase information, with 16 bits per component. Processing generates a single look per dimension, using the full available signal bandwidth. Images are georeferenced based on satellite orbit and attitude data and are produced in zero Doppler geometry, following the standard convention for SAR products in slant range.

• Sentinel-2 L1C: The Sentinel-2 Level-1C collection contains Level-1C products from the Sentinel-2 mission. The Sentinel-2 mission is a European Space Agency (ESA) program providing high-resolution optical imagery for land monitoring, agriculture, forestry, and disaster management. Level-1C products are processed to provide Top-of-Atmosphere (TOA) reflectance values.

• Sentinel-2 L1C COGS: The same collection as Sentinel-2 L1C, available in Cloud Optimized GeoTIFF (COG) format, which enables fast and efficient access to georeferenced data.

  • In addition to the product distributed through the Copernicus program, EOCube.RO includes a cloud mask generated with the FMask algorithm as an additional asset.

Synchronization with CDSE is performed in near real-time, with data updated within 10 minutes of receiving notifications, through the mechanism provided by ESA under the Collaborative Ground Segment program.

What’s Next

In the coming months, we will focus on:

1. Publishing new datasets: By the end of 2025, the ESA WorldCover 2020 and 2021 collections will be published, along with relevant vector data (Overture Maps).
2. Client applications: Consolidation and optimization of client applications.
3. Federation operationalization: Integration of the infrastructure provided by the Politehnica University of Bucharest.

We invite you to follow the project’s progress for updates on new features and available datasets.

The ROCS project aims to expand the “Copernicus Ground Segment” infrastructure in Romania and, at the same time, to be the foundation for establishing a strategic infrastructure in the geospatial field.

ROCS aims to develop the necessary concepts and provide appropriate technical solutions for creating an operational version of the national infrastructure for storing and processing Earth observation data (satellite, aerial, in-situ), with a focus on Copernicus Sentinel data. The objectives of the ROCS project are:

• Identifying, analyzing, and evaluating specific operational requirements and optimal architectural solutions, taking into account best practices and lessons learned from similar national or commercial implementations (e.g., CDSE, Microsoft Planetary Computer), as well as previously identified specific national needs.
• Designing a distributed and federated solution that integrates cloud-native storage formats and processing tools, according to CEOS and OGC recommendations, based entirely on open-source software applications.
• Designing a centralized security infrastructure that includes a robust authentication and authorization mechanism based on industry standards (e.g., OIDC).
• Developing tools for indexing raster and vector data based on spatio-temporal criteria, with registration in standardized catalogs, using OGC standards and others universally accepted by the community (e.g., STAC).
• Developing efficient solutions for data storage, replication, and distribution, using cloud-compatible formats (e.g., Amazon S3, GeoTIFF, Zarr).
• Implementing individualized, secure, and containerized workspaces for data management and processing execution.
• Developing a pre-operational version of the platform, integrating all relevant data and validating functionalities through specific case studies, demonstrating the platform’s ability to meet user requirements and efficiently process data.