Imagine having a high-tech digital mirror of the earth's soil that tells you exactly how healthy it is without digging a thousand holes. By combining AI with sensors and genetic data, it creates a virtual map of the ground. This helps farmers and land managers see where the soil is struggling and how to fix it in real-time.
60 to 70% of European soils are in poor condition, yet there is a lack of high-resolution, real-time data to monitor and certify soil health at the farm level.
A Soil Digital Twin infrastructure including a Data Cube, a Rapid Soil Health Assessment Toolbox, a secure API, and a mobile phone app.
If you are an AgTech software provider dealing with low-resolution soil data — this project developed a Soil Health Data Cube that provides farm-scale data at 30m spatial resolution or finer. This allows for precise nutrient management and targeted interventions.
If you are a land management consultancy dealing with complex soil certification for the Green Deal — this project developed a Soil Health Index certification system. This streamlines the process of proving soil health improvements for landowners and policy makers.
If you are an app developer dealing with fragmented soil datasets — this project developed a secure API and a progressive web app. This enables the integration of real-time soil health metrics directly into commercial user interfaces.
Based on available project data, the high-resolution pan-European datasets will be distributed under an Open Data license, though specific pricing for the API or certification services is not mentioned.
Yes, the project is creating a European-wide digital infrastructure and a Data Cube designed to serve users across 14 countries at a 30m spatial resolution.
The project specifies that produced high-resolution pan-European datasets will be distributed under an Open Data license to allow easy access by development communities.
The tools are designed to support the Soil Deal for Europe, the EU Soil Observatory, and the Commission's objective of transitioning towards healthy soils by 2030.
The project period runs from 2023-01-01 to 2026-12-31, with deliverables including an API and mobile app being developed during this timeframe.
The consortium is highly diversified with 30 partners across 14 countries, balancing academic depth (13 universities and 10 research institutes) with commercial viability (5 industry partners, including 7 SMEs). The 17% industry ratio suggests a strong focus on translating research into usable tools, while the broad geographic spread ensures the AI models are trained on diverse European soil types.
Contact Aarhus Universitet (DK) regarding the Soil Digital Twin API
Contact SciTransfer to identify licensing opportunities for the Soil Health Data Cube.
