G09 · ABOUT · aboutGCRI dossier · service level R0
GCRINexus FoundryEstablished
Nexus Foundry · Purpose and publisher

Purpose and publisher

Nexus Foundry is the technical work environment of the Nexus Consortiums. This page sets out who publishes its public gateway, who operates the service, which roles other parties hold and the limits that apply to all of them. The Global Centre for Risk and Innovation (GCRI) publishes the gateway and answers for its content. The current service level is R0: information and enquiries, and nothing on this page describes a live allocation or a signed agreement.

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In this dossier6 parts
  1. 01In briefThe short answer
  2. 02PurposeWhy Nexus Foundry exists
  3. 03RolesWho holds which role
  4. 04LimitsWhat Nexus Foundry does not do
  5. 05Key termsTerms used on this page
  6. 06StatusEstablished gateway, R0 service level

GCRI · Established · service level R0

STEM methods
6
Canonical methods this field applies
Topics
8
Subject pages in the field
Counterparts
1
Platforms in shared fields at GCRI, GRF and GRA
Report series
1
Nexus Reports series it contributes to
01In brief

The short answer.

Nexus Foundry is a specialist platform of The Global Centre for Risk and Innovation for data and compute as well as methods and modelling. Its mandate covers public gateway to the technical work environment while keeping project permissions and privileged services within Foundry. GCRI publishes it, answers for its content and takes no decision on anyone's behalf. It is established and works at service level R0, information and enquiries.

02Canvas

Mandate to authority.

Canvas · mandate to authorityDesign, not a record
How Nexus Foundry is governedA mandate sets the platform's scope; an editor and reviewers govern what it publishes; programmes and the community supply the work; the integrity route handles corrections; authority over decisions stays outside. Design of the governance, not a record.

Fig.How the platform is governed, from its mandate to the authorities who decide. Design, not a record.

03Geography

Connected activity in North America.

For purpose and publisher, in GCRI's spatial-intelligence reading, the map opens on night lights, true-colour imagery and population density, framed on North America; every other NASA layer, live feed and forecast waits in the layer list.

The interactive map needs JavaScript; the layer list and sources are below.

Layers 3

Connected activity, for this page

Latest available

NASA GIBS / EOSDIS · ASTER GDEM (METI, NASA) · Blue Marble (NASA) · © OpenStreetMap contributors (ODbL) · Natural Earth

Loading the latest NASA imagery.

Drag to move. Ctrl or ⌘ and scroll, pinch or the buttons to zoom; hover for the values under the pointer; reset returns to the region.

For purpose and publisher, in GCRI's spatial-intelligence reading, the map opens on night lights, true-colour imagery and population density, framed on North America; every other NASA layer, live feed and forecast waits in the layer list.Satellite and model products as NASA publishes them, each with its own date; indicators, not assessments of any place; claim ceiling INTEGRATED.

Data: NASA GIBS · ASTER GDEM · Blue Marble · © OpenStreetMap contributors · Natural Earth · Copernicus Sentinel-2 L2ASources and licences

  • We acknowledge the use of imagery provided by services from NASA's Global Imagery Browse Services (GIBS), part of NASA's Earth Science Data and Information System (ESDIS). Colours redrawn from the published colour map; values averaged into H3 cells where shown (modified). NASA open data
  • We acknowledge the use of imagery provided by services from NASA's Global Imagery Browse Services (GIBS), part of NASA's Earth Science Data and Information System (ESDIS). Colours redrawn from the published colour map; values averaged into H3 cells where shown (modified). NASA open data
  • VIIRS Black Marble night-time lights, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center; distributed by the NASA Level-1 and Atmosphere Archive and Distribution System (LAADS DAAC); imagery via NASA GIBS. Colours redrawn from the published colour map; values averaged into H3 cells where shown (modified). NASA open data
  • VIIRS near-real-time products (flood, land surface temperature, snow cover, corrected reflectance), NASA LANCE; imagery via NASA GIBS. Colours redrawn from the published colour map; values averaged into H3 cells where shown (modified). NASA open data
  • Center for International Earth Science Information Network (CIESIN), Columbia University. 2018. Gridded Population of the World, Version 4 (GPWv4): Population Density, Revision 11. NASA Socioeconomic Data and Applications Center (SEDAC). Licensed under CC BY 4.0. Colours redrawn from the published colour map; values averaged into H3 cells where shown (modified). CC BY 4.0
  • MODIS land products (vegetation indices, gross primary production, land cover), NASA LP DAAC and LANCE; imagery via NASA GIBS. Colours redrawn from the published colour map; values averaged into H3 cells where shown (modified). NASA open data
  • ASTER GDEM is a product of METI and NASA (ASTER Global Digital Elevation Model V003, NASA LP DAAC); imagery via NASA GIBS. Colours redrawn from the published colour map; values averaged into H3 cells where shown (modified). NASA open data
  • Made with Natural Earth. Free vector and raster map data @ naturalearthdata.com. Public domain
  • © OpenStreetMap contributors (ODbL), via NASA GIBS (coastlines, boundaries, roads and place names). Colours redrawn from the published colour map; values averaged into H3 cells where shown (modified). ODbL
  • Blue Marble, NASA Earth Observatory; imagery via NASA GIBS. Colours redrawn from the published colour map; values averaged into H3 cells where shown (modified). NASA open data
  • Context on the globe and flat map: coastlines, boundaries, roads and place names from NASA GIBS reference layers (OpenStreetMap data, ODbL, © OpenStreetMap contributors); Blue Marble imagery as an optional base; 3D terrain and the elevation read-out from the ASTER GDEM elevation colour index (5 m to 200 m classes, exaggerated for legibility). Boundaries are drawn as published and imply no position on any territory.
  • Globe: MapLibre GL JS 6.9.1, BSD-3-Clause, © MapLibre contributors.
  • Observed (EO): Copernicus Sentinel-2 L2A (contains modified Copernicus Sentinel data 2026), Microsoft Planetary Computer
  • Optional layers (35 sources in the layer list: live, forecast, observed and context) print their provider credit on the map and here when switched on; forecasts are model output and derived indices are estimates.

Layers and dates

  • Night-time lights, daily: VIIRS Black Marble (VNP46A2), NASA LAADS DAAC · 12 Oct 2026
  • True colour: VIIRS NOAA-20 corrected reflectance, NASA LANCE · 13 Oct 2026
  • Population density, 2020: Population: CIESIN, Columbia University, Gridded Population of the World v4.11 (2018), NASA SEDAC, CC BY 4.0 · static
  • Land cover type (IGBP), yearly: MODIS Terra and Aqua land cover (MCD12Q1), NASA LP DAAC · 2024
  • Enhanced vegetation index, rolling 8 days: MODIS Terra EVI, NASA LANCE · 13 Oct 2026
  • Vegetation greenness (NDVI), rolling 8 days: MODIS Terra NDVI, NASA LANCE · 13 Oct 2026

04Purpose

Why Nexus Foundry exists.

The purpose is a public gateway to the technical work environment, while project permissions and privileged services stay inside Foundry. Projects, data, models, maps and evidence are kept there with lineage and permissions, so that risk work can be reproduced, corrected and handed over between institutions.

Audience

Who it serves

Engineers, model builders, researchers, technology operators and project owners working on authorized projects.

Methods

How it works

System specifications, APIs, geospatial model workflows and authorization, applied through 20 technical systems.

Outputs

What the gateway publishes

A capability catalogue, installation guidance and public technical examples, each as it is released.

05Roles

Who holds which role.

PartyRole
The Global Centre for Risk and Innovation (GCRI)Publishes this gateway and is responsible for its content
GCRI CanadaLead organization, Consortium Secretariat and global contracting party; runs the global-to-local deployment of Nexus Foundry in service of the consortiums, under a not-for-profit mandate
Nexus ConsortiumsOperate Nexus Foundry at national and regional level through their host and lead organizations
GCRI, The Global Risks Forum (GRF) and The Global Risks Alliance (GRA)The three pillar not-for-profit institutions that lead the multilateral programme

The programme is built on a public-private-planet partnership. Use of the service itself is governed by the service's own terms, published with the service, not by this page.

06Limits

What Nexus Foundry does not do.

  • It does not take decisions that belong to institutions, officials or competent authorities, issue official warnings, dispatch resources or release funds.
  • It does not regulate, certify, license or approve any person, model, product or institution; experiment results are not certification.
  • It does not treat a membership, a payment or an offer of infrastructure as a compute allocation or as access to restricted data.
  • It does not publish project data, participants or privileged information on public pages.
  • It does not charge for anything that was not disclosed in writing beforehand; see usage and billing.
07Key terms

Terms used on this page.

Each term as this page uses it. Where a standard-setting body defines the term, the wording follows that body.

TermDefinition
Service level R0The current service level of Nexus pages: information and enquiries only. An enquiry receives a reference and a named next step; it creates no membership, contract, assignment or commitment.
Conflict of interestA situation in which financial, professional or personal interests could compromise, or appear to compromise, judgement in research or review.
Digital twinA computational representation of a physical system that is updated with data from it and used to explore its behaviour.
Data pipelineA sequence of automated steps that ingests, validates, transforms and publishes data.
08Status

Established gateway, R0 service level.

Nexus Foundry is an established GCRI platform, preserved at its existing address while its existing activity is confirmed against records. The twenty technical systems are described as designed; a description is not a statement that a system is operating for any tenant. Enquiries go to the Consortium Secretariat at contact@therisk.global, and the acknowledgement gives a reference and names the next step.

09Questions

Questions and answers.

Is Nexus Foundry a separate company?
No. It is a platform of The Global Centre for Risk and Innovation (GCRI). GCRI Canada is the contracting party for the service.
Who decides what a project may do?
The project's accountable owner and the data owners set its terms, and the Nexus Sovereignty Framework applies those terms to each request. GCRI does not decide on behalf of a project's institutions.
Is the service run for profit?
No. It operates under a not-for-profit model for research, development and public-interest use in non-profit projects; any fees support its operation and are disclosed in writing first.
Where are the service terms?
They are published with the service itself. This page describes purpose, roles and limits, not contractual terms.
Related

Around Nexus Foundry.

Nexus Foundry

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The current service level is R0: information and enquiries. An enquiry receives a reference and names the next step; applications, payments, compute allocations and registrations open only when their team, terms and review capacity exist.

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