Unleashing the Power of Geospatial Analytics with Geobase and MotherDuck

In this post, we will show how Geobase and MotherDuck can work together to create previously impossible applications! MotherDuck handles online analytical processing (OLAP) queries efficiently, while Geobase excels at spatial-temporal queries for movement analytics. With this integration, all API calls are routed through Geobase, enabling stored procedures to generate vector tiles on the frontend seamlessly. This offers a straightforward solution for developers and businesses alike.

Skagerrak & Kattegat — The Region's Importance in World Trade and Shipping

Over 80% of the volume of international trade in goods is carried by sea. For Western Europe, most of this volume passes through the Danish Straits. Like road transport networks, this trade moves from the main trade routes to ports, and from there into channels and rivers.

This region is also home to some of the largest offshore energy farms, such as the Lillgrund Wind Farm. It also hosts major engineering projects like the Oresund Bridge.

The raw data of ship traffic in this region of international waters is available on the Danish Maritime Authority’s website as monthly CSV extracts. We wanted to use Geobase and MotherDuck to bring this data to life!

Once the data was visualized, we started to discover things we never knew existed, like maintenance ships working at the offshore wind farm from 7 AM to 3 PM (see video here) or the preference of ship captains to take certain routes over others (see video here). These are all very human stories hidden in the data.

The site is now live for everyone to discover more patterns and stories in the data at Ship Tracks.

So how did MotherDuck and Geobase help us build this?

MotherDuck and Geobase were instrumental in visualizing the movement of around 5000 ships over a 24-hour period in the Danish Straits. This visualization highlights the density of ships and their common paths. And it would not have been possible without geobase.

Getting Started

Getting started with Geobase and MotherDuck is straightforward. Users can leverage the integration to create compelling geospatial applications and visualizations without managing their servers. This offers a practical and efficient solution for developers and businesses looking to harness the power of big data in the geospatial industry.

The figure above shows how the integration of MotherDuck and the Geobase platform functions.

1. MotherDuck (DuckDB):

   • Offers a big data warehouse service.
   • Securely connects to the Geobase platform.

2. Geobase Platform:

   • Handles both external (big data) and internal tables.
   • Uses stored functions for business logic.

3. Vector Tiles API:

   • Processes data into vector tiles.
   • Includes a caching mechanism for efficiency.

4. Applications:

   • Web, mobile, and VR applications access vector tiles and API functions from the Geobase platform to visualize and interact with the data.

Geobase and MotherDuck overview

Benefits of the integration

The integration of Geobase and MotherDuck offers several advantages. MotherDuck excels at running OLAP queries, making it ideal for big data analysis. Geobase is particularly strong in handling spatial-temporal queries, crucial for movement analytics in the geospatial industry, and also supports H3 integration for efficient spatial indexing. Combining these capabilities allows API calls through Geobase to MotherDuck. Geobase can also process the data to create vector tiles in response to the frontend, thus allowing visualisation of big data. All this without touching the server!

Even more use cases

This integration supports various practical applications, such as real-time maritime activity analysis, global trade insights, and event impact assessment. For example, it can monitor and analyse vessel movements in real-time, track performance at major ports, and evaluate the impact of events like natural disasters or geopolitical conflicts on maritime activities. Of-course the maritime industry is just one of a dozen other industries that create, store & analyse, and build upon geospatial data. These capabilities enable governments, researchers, and businesses to make informed decisions based on comprehensive and timely data.

Conclusion

This is just a highlight of tools from Geobase and MotherDuck which offer much greater possibilities, such as identifying high-density areas, spotting stationary ships, tracking individual ship trajectories, and investigating anomalous ship behaviour.

As we launch geobase we are going to be educating our community on using these tools better and improving the know-how needed to make such powerful applications.