Current

After years of in depth scientific and technical studies, ESA member states have formally selected Harmony as its 10th Earth Explorer flagship mission, set to be launched in 2029. Harmony was proposed in 2018 by an international scientific team lead by Dr. Paco López Dekker. Earth Explorer (EE) missions address questions that have a direct bearing on climate change research and other societally relevant issues.

The EU aims to have a net-zero greenhouse gas (GHG) economy by 2050. At present, heating and cooling represent around 50% of the final energy demand in Europe and are for a large part supplied by fossil fuel derived energy. Large scale seasonal heat storage is a key strategy to decarbonize heating in order to achieve EU ambitions, because sustainable sources like geothermal and solar provide a lot of heat in summer, while we need it in winter. The PUSH-IT consortium receives this Horizon Europe grant to demonstrate and develop such heat storage systems. PUSH-IT stands for Piloting Underground Seasonal Heat Storage In geothermal reservoirs.

Environmental Engineering student Jessie-Lynn van Egmond is on a thesis adventure, hunting down old groundwater wells to analyse their water quality. So how is the island’s fresh water doing? Has it been subject to salinization or other pollution trends? That’s what Jessie-Lynn hopes to find out.