Contact us

Objectives and benefits

Objectives

The Marine Environment Reanalysis Evaluation Project (MER-EP) is an international scientific initiative aimed at the systematic evaluation of marine environment reanalyses and at enhancing their optimal use for ocean and climate monitoring, prediction, and applications.

MER-EP seeks to:

  • Establish a coordinated and traceable evaluation framework for marine environment reanalyses, addressing both global and regional products and covering time scales from monthly variability to decadal trends.
  • Quantify the performance, consistency, and uncertainty of reanalyses across multiple ocean components, including:
    • Physical ocean variables (temperature, salinity, circulation, sea level, waves),
    • Sea ice properties (concentration, thickness, drift, snow),
    • Marine ecosystem and biogeochemical variables (e.g. chlorophyll, oxygen, low and high trophic levels).
  • Identify fitness-for-purpose of reanalysis products for a range of scientific and operational use cases, including ocean state monitoring, climate studies, AI-based forecasting systems, and ecosystem modelling.
  • Develop, document, and disseminate best-practice recommendations for the use of reanalyses as:
    • Diagnostic tools for ocean variability and change,
    • Training and validation datasets for machine-learning applications,
    • Environmental forcing fields for coupled physical–biogeochemical and ecosystem models.
  • Promote common methodologies, metrics, and tools for evaluation and intercomparison, notably through cloud-based computing environments.

MER-EP is positioned at the interface between OceanPredict and CLIVAR activities, ensuring scientific consistency between operational oceanography and climate research communities.

Benefits

MER-EP delivers added value through a structured, community-driven approach to reanalysis evaluation and use:

  • Rigorous and documented validation studies
    Evaluation activities are based on:

    • Clearly defined use cases,
    • Comprehensive identification of required datasets, considering a wide range of international reanalysis products,
    • Publication of validation methodologies and results to ensure transparency and reproducibility.
  • Efficient data handling and analysis workflows
    MER-EP facilitates:

    • Shared access to large reanalysis datasets through cloud infrastructures,
    • Common tools and workflows for data extraction, analysis, and visualization,
  • Enhanced downstream and user-oriented applications
    By explicitly linking evaluation to applications, MER-EP:

    • Supports the development and benchmarking of downstream services,
    • Provides scientifically grounded recommendations on product selection and usage,
    • Fosters exchanges between data producers and users to better align products with user requirements.
  • Strengthened international scientific coordination
    MER-EP establishes a sustainable collaboration framework, enabling long-term coordination between operational centers, research institutes, and application developers, and reinforcing the role of marine environment reanalyses in ocean and climate science.

 

MER-EP original proposal

MER-EP as a project of  ForeSea and DITTO was submitted to the UN Ocean Decade call for action in July 2025.

MER-EP UN OCEAN DECADE PROPOSAL

The submission document includes details on:

  • project partners and supporting organisations
  • project objectives
  • planned project activities and expected outcomes
  • and more …

Share