Analysis ready data for water security

UNICEF reports that a third of children in the Pacific do not have access to good sanitation, and one in ten do not have access to safe drinking water. The Pacific Island’s small size, natural vulnerability and limited resources all contribute to the water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) problems throughout the countries. 

Pacific Small Island Developing States (Pacific SIDS) Kiribati, Vanuatu and the Solomon Islands host 81% of the Pacific population that don’t have access to safe drinking water and improved sanitation. The Pacific Community’s (SPC), Geoscience, Energy and Maritime Division (GEM) is working on a multitude of projects and initiatives to improve these communities’ access to sanitary water.

In 2020, the SPC was awarded grant funding and a support package through the GEO-GEE program run by Google, GEO and EO Data Science. The EO Data Science team is providing essential Google Earth Engine (GEE) training, support and billing capabilities to help improve Pacific Island Communities access to safe and reliable drinking water supplies. 

Readily available imagery 

Using GEE, the project team can harness its datasets catalogue and imagery from Landsat, Sentinel, Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) satellites. They can also leverage GEE’s cloud services for better detection of surface water, groundwater and other climate datasets. Further, GEE will help do this in a manner that is scalable at both a region and national level.

Funding from the GEO-GEE program will also directly support access to training through capacity building with the EO Data Science team. This will improve the project teams utilisation of geospatial data and tools, including GEE. This will also compliment the work they do on the ground and contribute to the upskilling of their regional partner organisations and Pacific Governments.
 

EO Data Science's role in the GEO-GEE program

EO Data Science partnered with Google Earth Engine and the Group on Earth Observations to launch the GEO-GEE Program in July 2020. Across 22 countries, 32 projects were selected for the program which offers $3 million USD towards product licenses and $1 million USD in technical support from EO Data Science to help operationalise their science as they strive to tackle the world’s biggest sustainable development challenges. So far EO Data Science has: