Groundwater is one of the most important freshwater resources for humanity and ecosystems. Thus, assessing groundwater resources is essential for science, water authorities and consultancies worldwide.

Due to its fundamental role in the Earth’s water cycles, groundwater has been declared an Essential Climate Variable (ECV) by GCOS, the Global Climate Observing System. However, the Copernicus Services of the European Union do not yet deliver data on this fundamental resource. Further, there is no other data source that operationally provides information on changing groundwater resources in a consistent way, observation-based, and with global coverage. This gap will be closed by G3P, the Global Gravity-based Groundwater Product.

The G3P consortium combines essential expertise from science and industry across Europe that optimally allows to

1. capitalize from the unique remote sensing technology of GRACE and GRACE-FO satellite gravimetry to observe the whole water storage, including groundwater, for large areas;
2. incorporate and advance the wealth of products in the Copernicus portfolio that observe and monitor storage compartments of the water cycle;
3. disseminate unprecedented information on changing groundwater storage to the global and European user communities, including a European use case as a demonstrator for industry potential in the water sector.

In combination, the G3P development is a novel and cross-cutting extension of the Copernicus portfolio towards essential information on the changing state of water resources at European and global scales

Further members of the G3P consortium:

GFZ Sektion 4.4

Astronomical Institute of Uni Bern

Climate and Environmental Remote Sensing Group of TU Wien

Collecte Localisation Satellites SA

Department of Geography Universität Zürich

EODC GmbH

Finnish Meteorological Institute

Future Water SL

IGRAC

Institute of Geodesy of TU Graz

LEGOS

Magellium SAS