The kickoff meeting of CyCLOPS was successfully held in Limassol, Cyprus on February 20, 2019 with the participation of the project’s partners and the stakeholders. The meeting was a great opportunity for all the involved organizations to meet and interact. Its purpose was to present to stakeholders such as the Department of Lands and Surveys, the Department of Geological Surveys, the Department of Public Works and the Electricity Authority of Cyprus who were among the participants, the project’s mission and main outline, the technical objectives, the expected results and future opportunities. The meeting was welcomed by the Rector of C.U.T Prof. Andreas Anagiotos, who welcomed such initiatives, stressed the importance of this project and wished every success in its implementation. The last part of the meeting involved an open discussion, where the importance of developing such an infrastructure project for Cyprus was highlighted and the public institutions intention to cooperate and support the project was pledged, as its implementation is considered to be of strategic importance for the island of Cyprus.

The CyCLOPS consortium is comprised by the Cyprus University of Technology (CUT), Department of Civil Engineering and the German Aerospace Center (DLR) as a Partner from abroad. CUT Assistant Professor Chris Danezis is the project coordinator. The project is co-funded by European Regional Development Fund and the Republic of Cyprus through the Research Promotion Foundation under the RESTART 2016 – 2020 Research, Technological Development and Innovation Program, Pillar I: Smart Development, New Strategic Infrastructure Units – Young Researchers. It aims at the implementation of a Strategic Research infrastructure Unit for the monitoring of geohazards (i.e. earthquakes and landslides) and critical infrastructures that will lead to the production of critical country-wide products along with an innovative early warning system. These products include very accurate estimates of ground displacements, which combined with weather, geological, geotechnical and demographic datasets will lead to susceptibility and hazard maps. Ground displacement estimation will be carried out using a cutting-edge integrated methodology, which utilizes the most prominent space technologies, namely GNSS and Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) satellite constellations. CyCLOPS will establish a new state-of-the-art network of permanent GNSS stations (CORS) and specifically designed SAR Corner Reflectors, along with precise weather stations and tilt-meters spread throughout Cyprus. The emerging infrastructure combined with the existing national infrastructure (national seismographic network, national GNSS networks etc.) is expected to provide high resolution estimates of ground displacement at the mm-level for the entire country. Furthermore, CyCLOPS will augment the national GNSS infrastructure, namely CYPOS and ATLAS, and increase the accuracy and reliability of positioning services in Cyprus.

Moments from the KO meeting

INFRASTRUCTURES / 1216/0050 is co-funded by the European Regional Development Fund and the Republic of Cyprus through the Research Promotion Foundation.