Objectives of the service
Hydropower operators, water authorities and service providers rely on infrequent boat-sonar surveys that are costly, logistically demanding, and difficult to repeat at scale, leaving limited baselines and little predictive insight across multiple assets. BathyScope provides remote satellite-based bathymetry and sedimentation monitoring with quarterly updates, quantified uncertainty, centralized dashboards, and 6–12-month sedimentation trend forecasts to support maintenance planning and reporting. The service combines satellite-derived depth mapping in shallow waters with physics-informed machine learning and hydraulic/sediment-transport modelling to estimate accumulation in deeper basins, calibrated with available reference data.
The project activity develops and optimizes the bathymetry and sedimentation algorithms, automates data preparation and continuous evaluation, integrates components into a cloud platform with intuitive visual interfaces, and validates performance on pilot areas against ground truth.
Users and their needs
User communities currently targeted and involved include hydropower operators, national and regional water authorities, bathymetry and environmental monitoring service providers, and environmental non-governmental organizations. These groups are involved in monitoring, oversight, and decision-making for rivers and reservoirs where sedimentation affects storage capacity, safety, compliance, and maintenance planning.
User needs:
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Regular bathymetry and sedimentation updates to reduce dependence on infrequent boat-based sonar surveys
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Cost-efficient monitoring and reporting across multiple assets/sites
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Clear uncertainty information to support defensible decisions
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Centralized dashboards and periodic reports usable by non-specialists
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Sedimentation trend analysis to support maintenance planning
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Remote delivery for hard-to-access areas
Key challenges: variable satellite observability (cloud cover and water turbidity), limited reference data for calibration/validation at some sites, and producing outputs and interfaces that support regulatory-grade confidence and straightforward interpretation.
Targeted region: Europe.
Service/ system concept
BathyScope delivers depth and sediment intelligence for rivers and reservoirs through a software-as-a-service web map dashboard and downloadable data layers.
Information and functions delivered
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Bathymetry (water depth) maps refreshed quarterly for shallow waters
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Sediment accumulation indicators for deeper basins
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Uncertainty layers for depth and sedimentation, supporting defensible reporting
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Time-series views, standardized monthly reports, and 6–12-month trend forecasts
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Portfolio view for multiple monitored locations, with exports for reporting and sharing
How it works
In simple terms, satellite images are collected, clouds are removed, water areas are identified, and models estimate depth and sediment change; results appear as clear maps, uncertainty, and trends in the dashboard.
Space Added Value
Space assets used
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Copernicus Sentinel-2 multispectral imagery for satellite-derived bathymetry in shallow waters and long historical baselines.
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Commercial high-resolution and very-high-resolution imagery (e.g., PlanetScope; optionally SPOT/Pleiades/WorldView) where finer detail materially increases decision value.
Added value versus current methods and typical alternatives
Open satellite missions provide repeatable, wide-area monitoring at high predictable revisit time, enabling quarterly updates and historical reconstruction without field presence. Multispectral imagery enables depth mapping in shallow waters when turbidity is low to moderate, while automatic catchment analysis and hydraulic models enable sedimentation estimation in deep water. Compared with boat-sonar, drone surveys, or LiDAR campaigns, satellite inputs scale across many sites with lower mobilisation effort and cost, and support consistent indicators and uncertainty layers for reporting.
Current Status
The feasibility study phase is completed (2025) and BathyScope predictive indicators (sediment accumulation and capacity-loss forecasting) are demonstrated on hydropower pilot reservoirs.
Current work strengthens automated preprocessing, model evaluation, and cloud operations. Pilot cases run against available ground truth data with structured feedback loops, alongside iterative improvements of the web dashboard (map navigation, date comparison, sediment layers, analytics) and user documentation.
