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The Bassin de la Rivière des Pluies is located on Réunion Island (French Overseas, Indian Ocean). This volcanic island results from the emission of basaltic products from the Réunion hotspot that initiated 65 Myrs ago with the development of the Deccan traps. Rivière des Pluies drains a watershed of 46 km2 located on the windward side of the dormant Piton des Neiges volcano, from 2276 msl to the sea shore. The Rivière des Pluies catchment is mainly composed of lava flows and breccias aged from 1.4 Ma to 200 ky. The overall watershed is made of a main canyon deeply incised in the volcano flank and a large planeze covered by the deposits of the last explosive eruptions of Piton des Neiges. The combined action of the vegetation and alteration along a strong altimetric gradient produced a wide range of soils typically ranging from 0.5 to 6 meters. Vegetation is dominated by tropical rainforest. The hydrologic regime is torrential: flow rate is characterized by abrupt variations due to tropical rains. Storms and cyclones only occur during the rainy season from december to april.

The Seine estuary is a megatidal estuary located in northern France. It is the third largest estuarine ecosystem in the country after the Gironde and Loire along the French Atlantic coast; its waters flow into the English Channel. The geographical zone of influence of the Seine estuary runs from just upstream of the Poses dam, at the limit of the tidal penetration into the estuary — 160 km upstream of Le Havre —to the eastern part of the Bay of Seine. It can be divided into three sections: the fresh water upstream section (125 km), the mixing zone characterized by varying salinity levels (35 km), and the marine downstream section under the influence of the Seine River. The megatidal regime generates a turbidity maximum in the mixing zone (middle estuary) between the marine and fluvial sections of the estuary. The Seine estuary is a typical estuarine ecosystem: highly stressed by natural fluctuations and anthropogenic pressures, and hosting a rich ecological system. The Seine valley and its estuary are of major economic importance for France, with the presence of two maritime ports. It’s watershed (79,000 km2) is the home to 17 million people, and accounts for 50 % of the river traffic in France, 40 % of the country's economic activity, and 30 % of its agricultural activities. In addition to the Greater Paris area (> 11 million inhabitants), which contributes heavily to the Seine estuary's upstream inputs, two other major river settlements — Rouen (500,000 inhabitants) and Le Havre (300,000 inhabitants) — are maritime ports of international importance. Due to economic development, the Seine estuary has been subjected to major hydrodynamic, ecological, biogeomorphological and biogeochemical changes. The importance of studying the effects of anthropogenic impacts on estuarine ecosystems has increased in the last decade, especially under the Water Framework Directive, which aims to achieve “good environmental status” of all European water bodies.

The Ploemeur-Guidel observatory (Britanny, France) is focusing on surface-depth relationships in a fractured crystalline geological context and oceanic climate. It is built on 2 sub-sites, one highly anthropized, the other in natural state. In Ploemeur, groundwater has been pumped since 1991, supplying more than 1 million m3 of clean drinking water annual at a sustainable rate. Such high productivity is explained the specific fractured network in granite and micaschists, draining deep geological layers (~400 m). Extracted water quality is very good, with limited nitrate concentration, in a region that has been strongly affected by widespread pollution. Guidel site is in a similar, but natural context. Deep iron-rich groundwater is upflowing, creating surface and deep groundwater-dependent ecosystems, and feeding a classified coastal wetland. Both sites have a very dense equipment to study rapid to long-term surface-depth exchanges: a flux tower, unsaturated zone monitoring, a network of ~50 shallow (<10m) and deep boreholes (>80m), hydrochemical, temperature and deformation. An well-characterized fractured experimental site offers the possibility to conduct experiments to test innovative instruments and develop new methodologies

In the framework of TERENO "terrestrial observatories" are set up in selected German regions for climate and landuse change studies. The Harz/Central German Lowland Observatory is one of these observatories that are equipped with a combination of in situ measuring instruments and ground-based, airborne and satellite-borne remote sensing techniques. Additionally a network of biodiversity observation plots is installed. Within the Harz/Central German Lowland observatory the climate feedback experiment SoilCan using a lysimeter network will be realized. Soil monoliths with different vegetation are transplanted along the existing natural gradient in temperature and precipitation within the four TERENO observatories. Within the Harz/Central German Lowland observatory three main intensive test sites have been selected: Sauerbach, 27 ha, forest/agriculture, Schäferbach, 27 ha, agriculture, Selke Catchment, forest/agriculture. Instrumentation and surveys enable: Dense Soil Moisture Monitoring, Groundwater Monitoring, Runoff and Solute Monitoring, Eddy covariance tower (CO2, NO2, CH4, available end 2011), Geophysical Monitoring (ERT, GPR, EM), Airborne Monitoring using Hyperspectrum Imagery (flight campaigns), Soil Respiration Monitoring (available end 2011), Climate station, Deposition station (available end 2011), Biodiversity Assessment, DTS-observation of groundwater-surface water interactions (Distributed Temperature Sensing, using fiberoptics and temperaturprobes), Vadose Zone Monitoring System (in-situ soil water budget observation), Rainscanner (small weather radar, available end 2011). At the GCEF in Bad Lauchstädt opportunities will be given to manipulate climate change and land environment, from which visiting scientists may benefit. This infrastructure is available since 2013. The monitoring, observation, and research activities within the Harz/Central German Lowland Observatory are organized in four main platforms: 1. Hydrological Platform: catchment of the river Bode (shape on the map) 2. Biodiversity Platform (green dots on the map) 3. Floodplain Platform (pink dots on the map) 4. Urban Platform: the city of Leipzig as focus area