Since its founding in 2019, VOTO’s observatories have collected over a billion measurements from the ocean – and counting.
This record is set to become one of the largest ocean datasets in northern Europe. Within these measurements of temperature, salinity, oxygen, currents, chlorophyll and more lie the patterns that reveal how the Baltic and nearby seas are changing.
Ocean Data is the VOTO department responsible for transforming these observations into useable knowledge. It processes and visualises data from across VOTO’s scientific operations, helping academics, scientists and the public better understand the state of the sea.
Revealing a sea under pressure
The Baltic is an unusual sea: shallow, fresh, semi-enclosed, strongly stratified, and shaped by inflows from hundreds of rivers.
It is also under growing pressure from warming, eutrophication and oxygen loss.These physical and chemical changes under the surface of the Baltic ripple through ecosystems, fisheries and coastal life. Ocean Data helps to track these changes in unprecedented detail.
Open data for Open science
VOTO believes ocean knowledge should be shared. Ocean Data distributes observations through open-access systems that support international scientific collaboration.
The continuous flow of open data contributes to research into climate change, biodiversity, ecosystem processes and environmental forecasting, helping build a clearer long-term picture of how the ocean is changing, and what that means.
“Technological advances have greatly increased the volume and diversity of data we collect from the ocean. We organise and process these streams of information into usable, impactful ocean data”
Callum rollo, Data Scientist and team lead, Ocean Data
Visit our Observations Portal
VOTO’s Observations Portal enables users to visualise our ocean measurements through interactive maps and graphs, making complex observations easier to explore and understand.
These tools help researchers identify unusual events, compare present-day conditions with historical records and track long-term trends across the Baltic and nearby seas.
