MERCATOR OCEAN JOURNA: 
SEPTEMBER 2021 
2. STATUS AT 2021: BS-MFC OFFER 
TOWARD COPERNICUS 2 
BS-MFC service evolution programme provides state-of- 
the-art modelling infrastructure for improving forecasting 
capabilities and climate studies in the Black Sea basin: 
being interconnected with an operational framework, it 
guarantees also users‘ engagement and stakeholders’' 
-equirements. As a result, the last phase of Copernicus 1 is 
dedicated to the provision of additional upgraded products, 
completing the offer to support Blue Growth, coastal 
communities and society. BS-PHY is going to contribute 
with a new operational analysis and forecasting system - 
EAS4 system version - characterized by: 
higher spatial resolution spatial grid (2.5 km and 121 
„ertical levels), 
optimal interface between Mediterranean and Black 
Sea through the Marmara Sea: High resolution 
temperature, salinity, sea surface height and zonal 
and meridional velocity from the Unstructured Turkish 
Strait System (U-TSS, [18]) are provided to the BS-PHY 
NRT by edging the model in the Marmara Sea. This 
improves the representation of the Mediterranean 
Sea water inflow; 
The Danube River interannual dataset from historical 
data provided by NIHWM to improve land forcing 
-epresentation; 
A novel implementation of the OceanVar, which uses 
a spatially varying set of 45 EOF to describe the 
covariance of sea surface height and temperature 
and salinity in the water column. 
The new system significantly improves both temperature 
and salinity along the water column with respect to EAS3. 
For BS-BIO, new optical products are delivered for the next 
entry into service. Since May 2021, BS-BIO contributes, 
with additional datasets, to complete the biogeochemical 
catalogue with transparency and turbidity - associated to 
the amount of photosynthetically active radiation and light 
attenuation coefficients. Together with PHY and BIO, BS- 
WAV is going to start the operational update of the multiyear 
products in interim mode, with provision of monthly 
datasets, to support climate community and policy makers 
in the Black Sea reaion, enriching the product cataloque. 
3. POST 2021 PERSPECTIVES 
Sontinuous development of BS modelling framework for 
the next generation of NRT and MY systems accounts for a 
number of scientific challenges the BS-MFC is foreseeing 
co achieve in the next years. CMEMS has supported many of 
such scientific R&D priorities thanks to Implementation of 
dedicated Service Evolution projects, that will be exploited 
by BS-MFC to improve product quality (Table 3). The plar 
‚ncludes a focus on coupling strategy for the representation 
of small scale processes in the Black Sea region such as: 
- afully coupled physics and waves systems to improve 
essential variables forecasting, 
an enhanced connection (several strategies of 
coupling online/offline, Join data assimilation will be 
tested) between biogeochemistry with physics and 
waves will help in representing Suspended Particulate 
Matter dynamics and light penetration schemes, 
an Implementation of a coupled high resolution 
wave-atmosphere system for improving the air sea 
interaction representation, 
an ensemble forecasting (using perturbation of 
atmospheric forcing, model parameters and initial 
conditions) to improve NRT skills and to support 
coastal applications will be developed for the 3 PUs 
Data assimilation scheme will evolve toward high frequency 
zorrection and the ingestion of new data such the future 
Sentinel-6, CFOSAT, SWOT and SL L3 at 5 Hz, ocean colour 
spectral products that require dedicated Observing Systerr 
Experiments (OSE) to assess their impact in the overall BS- 
MFC NRT qualitv