Coordinating and Monitoring Quality Information within the GMES Space Component Data Access System
Saunier, Sebastien1; Ottavianelli, Giuseppe2; Camlong, Nathalie1; Floissac, Patrick1
1Magellium, FRANCE; 2ESA/ESRIN, FRANCE

One of the key elements of GMES is its Space Component (GSC). Beyond the development of the Sentinel missions, the GSC also entails the coordination of assets made available by the data providers GCMs (i.e. GMES Contributing Missions) to realise a synergistic and complete operational system-of-systems in Europe for the provision of Earth Observation (EO) data. In the framework of GMES, ESA is therefore in charge of developing an efficient and harmonised system to facilitate access to relevant EO data and services by the GMES Service Projects (GSPs). This is achieved through the implementation of the GMES Space Component Data Access (GSCDA).
The Coordinated Quality Control (CQC) is the GSCDA component in charge of monitoring the quality of the EO DataSets and of coordinating the provision of data quality information to the users. Quality information is based upon GCM input specifications and quality parameters, that are made available to the users in a harmonized way. The CQC thus monitors that the data providers maintain the specified quality level and also monitors the related user satisfaction. More in details, the CQC gathers reference data specifications for each type of product or instrument, perform regular data quality checks to ensure that the delivered products are conform to the specifications, initiates and discusses harmonisation and standardization possibilities across data providers and provides helpdesk support to process data quality related issues.
The paper introduces the dynamics of the GSCDA and explains the role of the CQC with respect to data providers and data users. It then presents the activities that are performed by the CQC to achieve this objective within this system-of-systems. The concept of Quality Information Item is presented and detailed. Finally the future perspectives and guidelines concerning the benefits from the work of the CQC are presented.