Who are the PCP WISE partners driving innovation in water management and climate resilience across Europe through Pre-Commercial Procurement? 

Our Partner Interview Series highlights the leading organisations in the PCP WISE consortium, showcasing their expertise, contributions, and key roles in the project. 

Each partner also shares its vision of how PCP WISE advances the European Green Deal’s objectives—whether by leveraging Environmental Observation (EO) data to tackle critical challenges or pioneering innovative governance and procurement approaches like PCP. 

🔍 Discover our latest interview to learn more about the Institut Cartogràfic i Geològic de Catalunya and (ICGC) and its impact! 

Briefly introduce your organisation

The ICGC has been created in 2014 and belongs to the Department of Territory and Sustainability of the Government of Catalonia. The ICGC sum-up the legacies of the former cartographic and geological agencies, both created in 1982. The ICGC has a staff around 270 people and is a beginning-to-end cartographic and geological institution comprising:

  • Data acquisition
  • Processing capabilities (geodetics, aerial triangulation, photogrammetry, orthoimage, remote sensing, cartography)
  • Technical support to Land and urban planning
  • Geological hazards assessment and prevention

The ICGC is the official Catalan Geoinformation Agency and reference public service of the applied geo-scientific knowledge. It was created in 1979 and belongs to the Department of Territory and Sustainability of the Government of Catalonia.

Area of Earth Observation is specialized in remote sensing, starting with the image processing of the satellite and airborne images, designing and manipulation data and capture requirements, programming and customizing the required applications for the customer and integrating it at the customer field, as a capacity building added value.

Introduce the team working on PCP WISE within your organisation

Dra. ANNA TARDÀ LLEGET
Head of Remote Sensing Applications of Earth Observation Area, ICGC
Email: anna.tarda@icgc.cat
https://www.linkedin.com/in/anna-tardà-geografa/

She graduated in Geography in 1988 at the University of Barcelona (Spain) and obtained his PhD in 2022. She also postgraduated in Economics and Environmental Management in 1991 at University of Barcelona, in Forest Planning and Management in 2005 at University of Girona and in Management and Applied Techniques in Cartography in 2014 at the Polytechnic University of Catalonia.

Her professional activity focused on the analysis of images and Earth Observation data obtained by different techniques and their subsequent exploitation in derived products and services. From 1989, she has been working at Cartographic and Geological Institute of Catalonia (ICGC) and she was in charge of the hyperspectral sensors’ operations and, nowadays, she is head of Remote Sensing Applications in Earth Observation Area of ICGC. During these years, she has been involved in different thematic cartography projects such as Corine Land Cover and SIOSE in some areas of Spain, different versions of land covers and land use maps of Catalonia, also in specific issues such as forest decay in some forest areas of Catalonia and the first regional map of fibrocement’s rooftops of all Catalonia. She is also involved in radiometric and geometric corrections of multispectral and hyperspectral images where the main project has been to process the aerial hyperspectral images of agricultural precision project for Farmstar-AIRBUS in France for 20 years.

She is the professor of Innovation and Smart Cities course in the Geoinformation Master at the Autonomous University of Barcelona from 2015.

Dr. JORDI CORBERA SIMON
Head Earth Observation Area, ICGC 
Email: jordi.corbera@icgc.cat
https://es.linkedin.com/in/corbera-jordi-109371a6

He is graduated in Physics obtained his PhD in 1995 as researcher for the National Program in Antarctica, with two field campaigns at the Antarctic Base about Earth Observation and climate change. From 2001 to 2007, he served as Chair of the Spanish Institute of Navigation, cooperating in the conception of the European satellite navigation system (Galileo) and worked for various European Commission agencies as an expert evaluator on over 60 projects. From 2001 to 2008 he taught at the University Polytechnic of Catalonia as professor of radio-navigation systems. Since 2008 is leading the Catalan Earth Observation Program at the Institute Cartographic and Geological of Catalonia. Co-leaded two PhD on Geography, Physics and Earth Observation and coordinates an official master on geoinformation with the University Autonomous of Barcelona. Currently is the ICGC representative at the operational committee of the NewSpace Catalonia Strategy for future exploitation on products and services. In 2023 he cursed the Executive Space Course at International Space University.

Since 2015 he has been participating in knowledge transfer activities to promote Art and Science on Earth Observation capabilities for institutions and initiatives such as Institut Cartogràfic i Geològic de Catalunya (2015), Universiat Autònoma de Barcelona (2016), Museu Nacional d’Art de Catalunya (Mil anys de Llum -2020) , Centre d’Art Santa Monica (Ecosistema urbà, art i la ciencia -2023) and own exposition and workshops  in 2021 and 2023 at the gallery Espai d’Art Bartomeus in Barcelona or the recently European initiative space4ourplanet.org.

What is your organisation’s role in the project? What unique contribution does it bring to PCP WISE?

The project has a precedent in the SCARBO (Space CARBon Observatory), also funded by the EU and executed between 2017 and 2021. The sensor test campaign with a Safire Falcon aircraft was carried out between September and October 2020 but its results, in a situation of reduced industrial activity due to the pandemic, are considered not representative. It is therefore proposed to repeat these tests within the current SCARBOn project, now counting on the air capacity of the ICGC.

The objective of the ICGC’s participation is focussed on the provision of an aerial platform to test the NanoCarb sensor but also to contribute knowledge and experience in the field of remote sensing and, if necessary, to supplement the project with its own hyperspectral sensors (AISA Eagle or TASI thermal sensor) in order to complete and contextualize the information collected by NanoCarb. The test flights will be carried out over an area of ​​Catalonia and the sea, and over a large thermal power plant in Germany, near Cologne. The results obtained will be useful and applicable in the Catalan area and will enhance the role of the ICGC in this type of studies.

To what extent do you think PCP WISE will contribute to enhance Europe’s ability to adapt to and mitigate the effect of climate change?

PCP WISE contributions will be especially relevant in Catalonia which faces significant challenges related to water resources such as frequent droughts, climate change, high population density, touristic pressure, extensive agricultural activities, and illegal groundwater extraction. In this context, space data fused with ground or aerial datasets will provide a comprehensive monitoring system that will allow to improve water management practices. This is essential not only for maintaining the sustainability of water resources but also for ensuring the economic viability and social cohesion of many communities and industries across the region.

To what extent do you think Environmental Observation (EO) and Innovation Procurement (IP) can help develop innovative solutions for water management and climate resilience across Europe?

Innovative procurement of products and services based on Environmental observation, particularly from space will allow us as official mapping agency to properly suit and accommodate to territorial challenge the investment and business activity on the Environmental Observation and the role of earth observation data and space assets. The prosperity and security benefits for Catalonia, with a so severe water management could be multiple, such as more efficient water management, adequate irrigation policies and surveillance of water use among others.