The goal of SUMARE is to prove the utility of autonomous sensors for environmental monitoring, i.e. their ability in providing the information required to guarantee a sustainable exploitation of natural resources.

Compared to traditional methods, two main advantages are expected:

• efficiency – smaller operational costs and fast deployment times
• accuracy – better spatial registration, appropriate sampling rates, guarantee of overall coherency.

This implies efficient use of both existing environmental knowledge and of the sensing and navigation abilities of the project groups technology providers, data processing experts and responsibles for environment management around two marine applications — volumetric monitoring of sand banks and mapping of living/dead maerl — which will serve as test-beds for the project's results.

Starting date
01-Jan-2000
Duration
36 months

Milestones for the project are as follows:

• 12th month – Models of a priori Knowledge
• 18th month – Adaptive Sampling Strategies
• 24th month – Contour tracking
• 30th month – AUV final configuration; ROV final configuration
• 36th month – Sea trials. Assessment of quality and efficiency of mapping and classification missions