Serving data from the SCAR Southern Ocean Observing System (SOOS) using the SeaDataNet infrastructure

Abstract

The Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research (SCAR) and the Scientific Committee on Oceanic Research (SCOR) jointly intend to build a Southern Ocean Observing System (SOOS). This paper addresses the required data flow infrastructure. SOOS will use a system of systems approach, using existing observation programmes and projects. Data should be submitted to professional data centres. The problem arises how to link all these data centres and get a central overview of the SOOS data as well as direct access to the data. The Netherlands National Oceanographic Data Committee (NL-NODC) has successfully built a national distributed oceanographic data acccess infrastructure, adopting and implementing technology developed by the European SeaDataNet project. The Dutch system has been operational since early 2009. The conclusion is that the SeaDataNet technology can be used to build an operational, distributed data delivery infrastructure, featuring all elements required by the Southern Ocean Observing System (SOOS).