Live Geography - Interoperable Geo-sensor Webs Facilitating the Vision of Digital Earth

In the last decade, rapidly declining sensor costs and intense research in sensor technologies lead to the deployment of a number of sensor networks. However, most of these sensor networks are monolithic stovepipe-like systems causing limited interoperability and reusability of both data and workflow components. We present a Live Geography approach which integrates real-time measurement data in a fully standardised infrastructure and couples it with Complex Event Processing (CEP). We demonstrate the interoperability of this geo-sensor web approach and the resulting high degree of flexibility and portability beyond single monitoring applications generally and for five concrete real-world implementations in different application fields. We prove that the Live Geography approach allows for reacting to observed changes through sophisticated embedded processing based on OGC standards such as Sensor Observation Service (SOS) and Sensor Alert Service (SAS). Finally, we discuss how this approach contributes to the vision of Digital Earth as described by Al Gore in 1998 and how it contributes to monitor continuously the status of the environment, of urban infrastructure and the location and health conditions of persons to support an understanding of dynamic processes, to enhance prediction of developments, and to serve Spatial Decision Support Systems.