Modelled density of the seapen Kophobelemnon stelliferum in the North East Atlantic. The Random Forest density model trained on data collected by an ROV was constrained by an ensemble of Maxent and Random Forest presence-absence model trained on a larger dataset also collected by an ROV. This species provides structural complexity in an environment where it is lacking and, thus, promotes higher biodiversity where they settle. They are vulnerable to mechanical disturbance of the sediment by fishing gear and a better understanding of their distribution will lead to better management of their population. This work was performed at the University of Plymouth in 2021.

Species distribution models (GAM, Maxent and Random Forest ensemble) predicting the distribution of Solitary Scleractinian fields assemblage in the Celtic Sea. This community is considered ecologically coherent according to the cluster analysis conducted by Parry et al. (2015) on image sample. Modelling its distribution complements existing work on their definition and offers a representation of the extent of the areas of the north-east Atlantic where they can occur based on the best available knowledge. This work was performed at the University of Plymouth in 2021.

The raster dataset represents the risk of collision of whales with vessels in Europe Seas. The most vulnerable species from ship strikes are cetaceans and turtles, since they go to the surface to breathe. On the other hand, their migration routes can overlap with shipping lanes. The collisions can produce the death or injury of the animals, and are an important threat for the conservation of these species. The dataset has been prepared in the context of the development of the first European Maritime Transport Environmental Report (EMSA-EEA report, 2021: https://www.eea.europa.eu/publications/maritime-transport).

The GEBCO_2020 Grid was released in May 2020 and is the second global bathymetric product released by the General Bathymetric Chart of the Oceans (GEBCO) and has been developed through the Nippon Foundation-GEBCO Seabed 2030 Project. The GEBCO_2020 Grid provides global coverage of elevation data in meters on a 15 arc-second grid of 43200 rows x 86400 columns, giving 3,732,480,000 data points. Grid Development The GEBCO_2020 Grid is a continuous, global terrain model for ocean and land with a spatial resolution of 15 arc seconds. The grid uses as a ‘base’ Version 2 of the SRTM15+ data set (Tozer et al, 2019). This data set is a fusion of land topography with measured and estimated seafloor topography. It is augmented with the gridded bathymetric data sets developed by the four Seabed 2030 Regional Centers. The Regional Centers have compiled gridded bathymetric data sets, largely based on multibeam data, for their areas of responsibility. These regional grids were then provided to the Global Center. For areas outside of the polar regions (primarily south of 60°N and north of 50°S), these data sets are in the form of 'sparse grids', i.e. only grid cells that contain data were populated. For the polar regions, complete grids were provided due to the complexities of incorporating data held in polar coordinates. The compilation of the GEBCO_2020 Grid from these regional data grids was carried out at the Global Center, with the aim of producing a seamless global terrain model. In contrast to the development of the previous GEBCO grid, GEBCO_2019, the data sets provided as sparse grids by the Regional Centers were included on to the base grid without any blending, i.e. grid cells in the base grid were replaced with data from the sparse grids. This was with aim of avoiding creating edge effects, 'ridges and ripples', at the boundaries between the sparse grids and base grid during the blending process used previously. In addition, this allows a clear identification of the data source within the grid, with no cells being 'blended' values. Routines from Generic Mapping Tools (GMT) system were used to do the merging of the data sets. For the polar data sets, and the adjoining North Sea area, supplied in the form of complete grids these data sets were included using feather blending techniques from GlobalMapper software version 11.0, made available by Blue Marble Geographic. The GEBCO_2020 Grid includes data sets from a number of international and national data repositories and regional mapping initiatives. For information on the data sets included in the GEBCO_2020 Grid, please see the list of contributions included in this release of the grid (https://www.gebco.net/data_and_products/gridded_bathymetry_data/gebco_2020/#compilations).

Species distribution models (Random Forest) predicting the distribution of mixed cold-water coral community (Coral Garden) assemblage in the Celtic Sea. This community is considered ecologically coherent according to the cluster analysis conducted by Parry et al. (2015) on image sample. Modelling its distribution complements existing work on their definition and offers a representation of the extent of the areas of the North East Atlantic where they can occur based on the best available knowledge. This work was performed at the University of Plymouth in 2021.

This raster dataset represents input of impulsive anthropogenic sound in Europe Seas. Impulsive sounds are typically brief with a rapid rise time, i.e. a great change in amplitude over a short period of time. The main anthropogenic sources of impulsive underwater noise are typically impact pile driving for inshore and offshore construction, seismic exploration with airguns, explosions and sonar systems. The dataset was created by combining pulse-block-days (PBD) data from the ICES Registry (for HELCOM and OSPAR areas) and ACCOMBAS (for the Mediterranean Sea), resampled using the EEA 10 km grid. The dataset does not include the Black Sea. The temporal reference of this dataset is the period 2014-2016. The cell values have been transformed into a logarithmic scale (log10). This dataset has been prepared for the calculation of the combined effect index, produced for the ETC/ICM Report 4/2019 "Multiple pressures and their combined effects in Europe's seas" available on: https://www.eionet.europa.eu/etcs/etc-icm/etc-icm-report-4-2019-multiple-pressures-and-their-combined-effects-in-europes-seas-1.

This raster dataset presents the number of different hydrographical pressures per grid cell along the European coastlines. Hydrographical pressures are human activities that cause changes in hydrological conditions, i.e. changes to freshwater input, salinity, seawater flows, waves, currents, and temperature. Examples of such activities include riverine or coastal dams, offshore infrastructure, and outflows from power plants. The layer has been created using the Water Framework Directive (WFD) reported data on hydrographical pressures joined with the water body polygon features for the reference year 2016. The dataset was then rasterized into the EEA 10 km grid, and the cell values assigned with the number of different hydrographical pressures in the area covered by the cell. This dataset has been prepared for the calculation of the combined effect index, produced for the ETC/ICM Report 4/2019 "Multiple pressures and their combined effects in Europe's seas" available on: https://www.eionet.europa.eu/etcs/etc-icm/etc-icm-report-4-2019-multiple-pressures-and-their-combined-effects-in-europes-seas-1.

The data set aims to contribute to a better biological characterization of European marine ecosystems. As such it represents probabilities of EUNIS (EUropean Nature Information System) habitat presence at Level 3 for marine habitats including information on sea ice coverage (this corresponds to EUNIS level 2 for terrestrial habitats). The map combines spatially explicit data on marine bathymetry and sea-bed with non-spatially referenced habitat information of the EUNIS classification. The objective of the data set produced by EEA and its Topic Centre ETC/ULS is to improve the biological description of marine based ecosystem types and their spatial distribution. The work supports Target 2 Action 5 of the implementation of the EU Biodiversity Strategy to 2020, established to achieve the Aichi targets of the Convention of Biological Diversity (CBD). It further addresses the MAES process (Mapping and Assessing of Ecosystems and their Services). The data set represents 2 classes of the MAES classification level 3, namely “Marine inlets and transitional waters” and “Marine”. The dataset comprises the following information: • Sea region (1 – Arctic, 2 – Atlantic, 3 – Baltic, 4 – Mediterranean, 5 – Black Sea) • Sea zone (1 – Littoral, 2 – Infralittoral, 3 – Circalittoral, 4 – Offshore circalittoral, 5 – Upper bathyal, 6 – Lower bathyal, 7 – Abyssal,8 - Coastal Lagoons, 9 - Coastal Lagoons) • Substrate (0 – undetermined substrate, 1 – rock and biogenic, 3 – coarse sediment, 4 – mixed sediment, 5 – sand, 6 – mud) • Sea ice coverage (0 – no sea ice presence, 1 – seasonal sea ice presence, 2 – perennial sea ice presence)