The Belgian coast and the southern part of the North Sea is a dynamic tidal marine environment. Close to highly-urbanised land areas, it receives significant water loads from a local estuary of the Scheldt river.
The VLIZ Thornton Buoy is deployed at the Thorntonbank Wind Farm and is visited once a month by the Simon Stevin research vessel to collect samples, validate and calibrate sensors and maintain equipment.
Serving both ICOS ERIC and LifeWatch ERIC, the VLIZ Thornton Buoy is equipped with sensors for measuring pCO2, dissolved oxygen, temperature, salinity, fluorescence (chl-a), turbidity, passive acoustic receiver.
VLIZ Thornton Buoy is part of the ICOS Ocean Network, which monitors greenhouse gases in the Atlantic and the Nordic, Baltic and Mediterranean Seas. The data collected at the ocean stations are processed and quality controlled by the Ocean Thematic Centre, which coordinates the network of ocean stations.