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DMC International Imaging (DMCii) is helping The Algerian Space Agency (ASAL) to predict the spread of locust plagues across North Africa as part of a pro-active approach to tackle the destructive phenomenon using satellite imagery.

Every year, North Africa is subjected to locust plagues that threaten to decimate crops and endanger countries’ food security. The satellite imagery is used to assess vegetation conditions, which helps to predict the locations of locust breeding grounds. The imagery, from the UK-DMC2 satellite, is used in conjunction with weather data to help create locust forecasts and focus the application of pesticides to prevent the spread of swarms.

Last year, in a six-month summer campaign to fight the spread of locusts, DMCii acquired monthly images of regions in Southern Algeria, Northern Mali and Northern Niger for ASAL. Now, imagery is being acquired before the summer season starts, to predict as well as monitor the threat of locusts.

Paul Stephens, Director of Sales and Marketing at DMCii, said: “The ability to get timely imagery of large areas is vital because locust swarms can develop quickly and travel about 100km a day. Our 650km wide images allow large areas of land, spanning multiple countries, to be rapidly monitored, helping the local authorities combat locust swarms before they can migrate across the continent.”

Mr Karim Houari, International Cooperation Director of the Algerian Space Agency commented: “The use of satellite imagery has helped us in the past, during the invasion period, to identify and control areas at risk of locust swarms. This year, in terms of locust risk prediction in remission period, we used DMCii data for the ecological assessment of locust breeding areas (biotopes). It is an important contribution for the rationalisation of local response and to reduce damage of this destructive phenomenon.”


Figure1. The DMC images enable regular monitoring of very large areas at high resolution, allowing detection of small areas of new vegetation after any rainfall. These show up as false colour red patches in the desert, and are where locusts can hatch and grow rapidly before they head off to look for more food

About DMC International Imaging Ltd
DMC International Imaging Ltd (DMCii) is a UK-based supplier of remote sensing data products and services for international Earth Observation (EO) markets. DMCii supplies programmed and archived optical satellite imagery provided by the multi-satellite Disaster Monitoring Constellation (DMC). DMCii’s data is primarily used in a wide variety of commercial and government applications including agriculture, forestry and environmental mapping, which benefit from reliable high temporal resolution optical imagery.
In partnership with the UK Space Agency and the other DMC member nations (Algeria, China, Nigeria, Turkey and Spain), DMCii works with the International Charter ‘Space and Major Disasters’ to provide free satellite imagery for humanitarian use in the event of major international disasters such as tsunamis, hurricanes, fires and flooding.
DMCii was formed in October 2004 and is a subsidiary of Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd (SSTL), the world leader in small satellite technology. SSTL designed and built the DMC with the support of the UK Space Agency and in conjunction with the other DMC Consortium member nations listed above.
DMC International Imaging Ltd is not affiliated in any way with Intergraph Corp., Z/I Imaging Corp., or their registered trademark DMC.

This press release can be downloaded from http://tinyurl.com/dmciipr
Paul Stephens, Sales & Marketing Director, DMC International Imaging Ltd., www.dmcii.com
Tel: +44 (0)1483 804299 Email: p.stephens@dmcii.com

DMCii is offering ISPRS Student Consortium members the chance to get their hands on free DMCii archive imagery scenes as part of an ISPRS competition.

The ISPRS is an organisation devoted to the development of international cooperation for the advancement of remote sensing and its applications and the ISPRS Student Consortium is an important connection between academic research and the industry.

Winners of the competition will benefit from the wide area coverage of 22m resolution DMC data and the increased temporal resolution of the DMC constellation. Our data is used for all sorts of applications from forestry to urban planning and we look forward to seeing how the winners use this data.

To be in with a chance of winning, students must put together a presentation on their proposed use of the imagery and why they think it’s worthy of study. Competition winners will be selected by an ISPRS committee and awarded up to 10 tiles each from the DMCii catalogue.

The deadline is almost upon us (31st April), so if you’re an ISPRS Student Consortium member and interested, get you entry in now by submitting a 1-2 page proposal by e-mail to elenastudent (at) hotmail (dot) com.

Make sure you read the full list of T&Cs at the following address:
http://www.isprs.org/news/announcements/130318-DMCii4SC.pdf

Good luck with the entries!

About DMC International Imaging Ltd
DMC International Imaging Ltd (DMCii) is a UK-based supplier of remote sensing data products and services for international Earth Observation (EO) markets. DMCii supplies programmed and archived optical satellite imagery provided by the multi-satellite Disaster Monitoring Constellation (DMC). DMCii’s data is primarily used in a wide variety of commercial and government applications including agriculture, forestry and environmental mapping, which benefit from reliable high temporal resolution optical imagery.
In partnership with the UK Space Agency and the other DMC member nations (Algeria, China, Nigeria, Turkey and Spain), DMCii works with the International Charter ‘Space and Major Disasters’ to provide free satellite imagery for humanitarian use in the event of major international disasters such as tsunamis, hurricanes, fires and flooding.
DMCii was formed in October 2004 and is a subsidiary of Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd (SSTL), the world leader in small satellite technology. SSTL designed and built the DMC with the support of the UK Space Agency and in conjunction with the other DMC Consortium member nations listed above.
DMC International Imaging Ltd is not affiliated in any way with Intergraph Corp., Z/I Imaging Corp., or their registered trademark DMC.

The G-NEXT (GMES pre-operational security services for supporting external actions) is a project in the Copernicus security context under the Seventh Framework Programme.

G-NEXT follows on its GMES security and emergency precursors G-MOSAIC and SAFER. The service will provide geospatial products supporting intelligence, early warning and crisis management operations responding to man-made or natural disasters. The target user community will include main actors and stakeholders involved in the context of EU Missions and Operations in support of EU External Actions: European External Actions Service (EEAS), national ministries and institutions and international institutions such as UN bodies.

The products are pre-operationally delivered either in rush (rapid), non-rush or monitoring mode. Thus wide range of crisis phases are covered by rich service products portfolio: pre-crisis phase and prevention (contingency plans, reference mapping), phase immediately after the event (event mapping, crisis area mapping, critical assets), and the post-event phase (damage assessment, monitoring mode). The project started on January 1st, 2013 and will run for 27 months. The project consortium involves 15 partners under the lead of e-GEOS.

Gisat contributes both in rush and non-rush mode by its proven capacity in EO data processing, semi-automatic feature extraction and satellite image interpretation. It follows up and build-ups on previous mapping activities carried out within emergency response RESPOND, SAFER and security G-MOSAIC projects.

More information at Gisat

ReSAC experts are actively involved the development of common resources for a territorial planning for the cross-border area between Bulgaria and Romanian, which comprises large part of Lower Danube. The work is in the scope of a Cross-Border Cooperation (CBC) Project “Common Strategy for Sustainable Territorial Development of the cross-border area Romania-Bulgaria”, funded by the European Regional Development Fund.

The Bulgarian Agency for Sustainable Development and Eurointegration (ASDE) is the leading partner of the work package, related to the development of a comprehensive spatial database for the cross-border area for the needs of the elaboration of common strategy for sustainable territorial development. The project started in February 2012 and will end in February 2014.

The detailed technical activities comprise a setting-up and development of systems and information services allowing the integration of the new, harmonized spatial databases and services with the existing information systems at county/district level. The database will ensure the necessary data for a comprehensive set of indicators at NUTS 3, 2 and LAU (local administration unit) level.

A particular output of the project will be the generation of detailed common land cover database for the cross-border area, built-up on the base of the philosophy of the Land Cover Meta Language (ISO 19144-2) and fully in compliance with INSPIRE principles. Common specification will ensure efficient cross-border analysis and reporting.

In parallel to that, ASDE and ReSAC initiated a technical collaboration with the Joint Research Centre of the European Commission (JRC) in Ispra within the scope of the Danube Strategy, and in relation to the CBC project. The MARS Unit of JRC currently prepares a set of activities, aiming to provide a methodological support in various land monitoring aspects of the project, such as:

  • Use of the CAP management tools (LPIS, CwRS …) as a successful example of ‘project’ development and good governance practice of EU fund expenditure
  • Land cover classification and harmonization approaches (TEGON concept, test-bed of INSPIRE data specification for land cover – Annexes F and G).
  • Tool to extract land cover information from IACS data (land cover/land use, indicators, geo-referenced statistics).
  • Selection of relevant indicators (agri environment indicators, urban indicators).


Fig. 1: Reference Land cover and Land Use (LC/LU) Layer for the Danube border area of Bulgaria, scale 1:50 000

Source ReSAC

Neustrelitz, Germany, April 5, 2013: Euromap GmbH, the exclusive supplier of Indian Remote Sensing data in Europe, introduces Euro-Maps 3D, an innovative DSM product developed in close co-operation with DLR’s Remote Sensing Technology Institute (IMF), offering a unique combination of 5 m DSM and 2.5 m ortho layers in a very good vertical (LE90) and horizontal accuracy (CE90) between 5 and 10 m.


Euro-Maps 3D is a brand new, homogeneous 5 m resolution digital surface model (DSM) of unique quality derived by Euromap from the 2.5 m in-flight stereo data provided by the Indian IRS-P5 Cartosat-1 satellite. This new and innovative product has been developed in close co-operation with the Remote Sensing Technology Institute (IMF) of the German Aerospace Center (DLR). The very detailed and accurate representation of the surface is achieved by using a sophisticated and tailored algorithm implemented on the basis of the Semi-Global Matching approach. A comparison of the surface representation provided by Euro-Maps 3D and by other available elevation models, such as DTED2 or SRTM Level1 data, is shown in 1. This highlights the very accurate mapping of buildings (red circle), roads (red arrow) and even slight differences in height (black arrow) in the Euro-Maps 3D product.


Figure 1: Comparison of surface representation provided by Euro-Maps 3D, DTED2 and SRTM Level 1 data; buildings (red circle), roads (red arrow), slight differences in height (black arrow)

The final product also includes detailed additional information consisting of several pixel based quality and traceability layers also including an ortho layer. This combination provides maximum accuracy, reliability and transparency.

The pan-European, off-the-shelf DSM product will be continuously made available by Euromap till the end of 2013 and offers transnational, homogenous quality covering most parts of Europe and North Africa. The first countries, including Kosovo, Macedonia and Albania, have already been processed and are available yet off-the shelf. Thanks to the good worldwide archive situation for IRS-P5 Cartosat-1 stereo data, other areas in regions such as the Middle East, Asia and America will be processed on request. Examples of DSM products can be seen in Figure 2. The preliminary prices for the DSM product are 4.50 €/km² for areas larger than 50,000 km² and 7.50 €/km² for smaller areas.


Figure 2: 2D view of Turin, Italy, and surroundings (left) and 3D view of Bandar Abbas, Iran, including the ortho layer (right)

The product is highly accurate and offers reliable vertical (LE90) and horizontal accuracy (CE90) of between 5 and 10 m. Accuracy tests, with kinematic GPS tracks being used as independent ground control, have been carried out at 22 selected test sites featuring different terrain and vegetation types in Europe and North Africa, and these show a mean horizontal accuracy (CE90) of 6.7 m and a mean vertical accuracy (LE90) of 5 m.

The combination of a 5 m DSM and a 2.5 m ortho image layer, processed in exactly the same geometry from the same data source, make Euro-Maps 3D an outstanding and unique product. The ortho image is useful for verifying height information and can also be used as an accurate geometric reference for other geo-data layers.

The characteristics of the Euro-Maps 3D product enable usage for a wide range of geo-applications that depend on the input or processing of elevation data. Basically, the DSM product can provide ideal elevation reference information for any satellite image orthorectification procedure. Also, its corresponding 2.5 m Cartosat-1 ortho image layer makes Euro-Maps 3D an excellent geo-reference data set for VHR and HR satellite image orthorectification. Other proven fields of application include 2D/3D visualisation and fly throughs, infrastructure and urban planning/monitoring, checking and monitoring of open cast mining, flood modelling, volume calculations, radiation and wave propagation, line-off sight analysis and risk analysis.

For further information regarding prices and availability of the DSM product please contact the Euromap customer support at data@euromap.de.

About Euromap
Euromap Satellitendaten-Vertriebsgesellschaft mbH was founded in 1996 as a 100% owned subsidiary of GAF AG in order to create an efficient commercial structure to receive, archive and market Earth observation satellite data in Germany. Experience and expertise in data reception and processing is optimally combined in the company with marketing and distribution activities – thus providing the essential conditions for supporting a growing user-market for remote sensing data. Euromap GmbH is located in Neustrelitz, Germany.

About IMF
The Remote Sensing Technology Institute (IMF) is an institute of the German Aerospace Centre (DLR). Together with the centre’s German Remote Sensing Data Center (DFD), it comprises DLR’s Earth Observation Center (EOC). IMF focuses on the development of algorithms and methods for the extraction of geoinformation from remote sensing data.

For more information, please contact:
Euromap GmbH
Phone +49 3981 4883 0.
info@euromap.de
German Aerospace Centre, Remote Sensing Technology Institute
Phone +49 8153 28 2757.
Peter.Reinartz@dlr.de|

Latest since large scale oil spill events, such as BP’s Deepwater Horizon accident, it became clear that technology for effectively monitoring, documenting and analysing oil spill dynamics is urgently needed. Moreover, the techniques shall allow a spatiotemporal explicit identification and quantitative assessment of the interaction with terrestrial and marine habitats of natural and economic value.

GeoVille Group, specialized in the development and application of state of the art satellite remote sensing and Geographic Information System(GIS) based spatial analysis techniques, was contracted to establish the first full spatial chronology of the Deepwater Horizon accident oil spill evolution and the identification as well as quantification of its site impacts. The coupled multi-source satellite monitoring and GIS approaches, with the involvement of world class institutions, allowed documenting the temporal evolution and dimensions. This provided accurate information on the location, extent, and temporal evolution of the oil spill and delivering means for a quantitative assessment of the impact on marine/coastal habitats affected.

Project Background

On April 20, 2010, catastrophe struck the Gulf of Mexico with the explosion and sinking of BP’s Deepwater Horizon oil rig, which left the drilling hole open. Crude oil has been expelled, affecting the marine and onshore environment, as well as the marine dependent economy throughout the Gulf. Not until September 19, 2010, a relief well successfully closed the original drilling hole. Meanwhile the controversy over the use of dispersants, the fate of the oil and the impact on the marine environment as well as economy in the Gulf has made clear that technology for effectively monitoring, documenting and analysing the oil spill dynamics as well as an assessment of its interaction with natural habitats is needed.

To be able to fully respond to such events on all levels of solution management, a multi-source satellite based documentation of the geographical and temporal impact of an oil spill on a variety of coastal and marine is required. Specifically, a standardized documentation in digital map and statistical form featuring:

  • Daily and weekly maps documenting the maximum extent of the oil spill and identifying site impacts of critical terrestrial and marine habitats of natural and economic value
  • Summary statistics and graphs quantifying area and sequences of oil interaction with terrestrial and marine habitats of natural and economic value
  • High resolution assessments for “hotspot” impact areas

Issues and Needs

The dynamic nature of oil spills due to the ocean’s changing environment is a huge challenge for management authorities, institutions involved in habitat protection as well as the full range of marine economic operators – from hotels to fishermen to local communities.

The specific needs were:

  • the geospatial explicit assessment on the extent and location of the oil spill, identifying also areas that were most frequently affected, for the entire duration of the oil spill.
  • an assessment of the oil spill interaction with natural habitats, in particular seagrass and turtle nesting beaches. A focus was placed on where and how often the oil occurred and which habitats were affected.
  • Detailed information for sites most impacted by the oil spill.
  • the geospatial and temporal interaction between the oil spill and the spawning habitat of the endangered Atlantic Bluefin Tuna (ABFT) that was located in the GOM during the time of the oil spill.
  • a detailed documentation of the oil spill interaction with the various habitats and a quantification of the affected areas and habitat types.
  • digital data for further analytical studies as well as communication material summarizing the impact of the oil spill in the GOM.

The geographic and temporal focus of this particular assessment was the north-eastern part of the Gulf of Mexico (GOM), including Florida and Cuba, for the time period from the start of the accident on 20th of April until 30th of September.

Solution

The coupled approach of employing multi-source optical and radar satellite data (i.e. from various satellite systems) allowed for a timely, synoptic, consistent and precise mapping of the oil spill extent in the Gulf of Mexico (GOM). Radar satellite data in particular is very suitable for water surface oil slick mapping due to the strong absorbance of the radar signal by the oil slick. To derive a consistent chronology of the oil spill the custom mapping productions were combined with oil spill delineations made available through public identities to accumulate a complete database of the temporal oil slick coverage’s. These were analysed through a GIS to produce daily and weekly summary frequency maps depicting how often an area was covered by oil from the beginning to the end of the drilling hole opening. The accumulation of satellite derived oil spill extents allows identification and quantification of areas that have been affected hardest, on the ocean as well as on the coast.

To determine the oil interaction within coastal habitats, the cumulative weekly maps were intersected coastal land cover data classified into habitats of particular interest. In this way, the length of the shoreline affected by the oil spill was identified for each land cover class, indicating also the frequency of oil contact. The resulting GIS database provided the basis for statistical analyses that were carried out for the affected shorelines in Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and western Florida.

Sea turtle nesting sites and Atlantic Bluefin Tuna spawning habitat spawning index grids were intersected with the cumulative weekly oil spill maps to identify affected sites of this marine species of particular interest.

Results and Perspectives

The oil slick summary frequency maps derived from satellite data depict for each area how often it was affected by the oil spill between 20 April and 29 August 2010. The continuous monitoring of the oil spill extent from space allowed the area covered by the oil spill to be estimated and the sites of landfall to be identified from the first week of the accident until the oil could no longer be monitored from space 19 weeks later.

Analysis of the satellite data and the shoreline land cover revealed that mainly unconsolidated shores, bare areas (i.e. beaches) and estuarine wetlands were affected by oil landfall in Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and western Florida. For example, in Louisiana, the percentage of affected wetland shorelines exceeded 15%. These habitats are home for many species and include important breeding sites and nursery grounds of marine animals, such as fishes, shrimps, sea turtles and birds.

Common straight-line distance assessments of the affected coastline, revealed that approximately 167 km of Gulf Coast shoreline experienced moderate to heavy oil impacts. Satellite technology allows assessing the exact length of the affected shoreline, defined as the length of the edge of a body of water, thereby including all water boundaries of inlets, estuaries etc. This methodology reveals the fine scale impact and was used to gather the oil spill interaction information. To allow comparability of results with other impact assessments, the summaries of the presented key results were therefore provided in proportions of the affected shoreline versus the total length of the shoreline.

To understand how far sea turtles were affected by the oil landfall, a detailed map of sea turtle nesting sites was intersected with the cumulative weekly maps. The number of weeks the oil spill was present at the nesting site is an important indicator for the state of the sea turtle population. Besides the impact on the coasts, marine species, such as the Atlantic Bluefin Tuna, were also affected by the oil spill. Using various satellite data and models it was possible to get a preliminary estimate of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill impact on the ABFT spawning habitat and larvae survival.

The study demonstrated well how large scale disasters can be efficiently monitored from space to identify most impacted areas. Multi-source satellite data provided valuable input for models and for the direct mapping of oil slick extents, allowing a timely, synoptic, continuous and precise mapping of the oil spill extent in the Gulf of Mexico (GOM). The intersection of satellite derived oil spill extents with various GIS datasets on valuable coastal and maritime habitats allows providing detailed information on the impacts of the oil spill on natural habitats, on the shoreline and in the GOM. The results derived in this study also highlight hot spot areas where increased restoration efforts are needed.

Necessary tools and processing chains to derive products for almost near real time and historical oils spill status and impact assessments were developed and are ready for operational applications or refinement for other oil related monitoring tasks.

Key Words

  • Year: 2010
  • Location: Gulf of Mexico
  • Market sector: Earth Observation, oil spill monitoring and impact assessment
  • Service: Weekly oil spill maps, oil spill chronology, oil spill statistics, land fall identification, coastal and pelagic habitat impact assessment, coastal land cover mapping

About


Tel: +43 (0)512 56 20 21-0
Fax: +43 (0)512 56 20 21-22
Email:info@geoville.com
Web: www.geoville.com
GeoVille Group is a private sector enterprise located in Austria and Luxembourg. GeoVille Group specialises in products and services related to Earth Observation (EO) and Geographic Information Systems (GIS) applications.
GeoVille is Europe’s leading company in using satellite data for land monitoring and spatial planning applications.
Our services provide the bridge from user needs to technical implementation – merging geospatial explicit data with statistics – to the analysis of what on-going processes and trends mean for real world applications.

Looking down from orbit is an attractive way of monitoring historical sites in remote or politically unstable regions – and can even help archaeologists to make new discoveries.

The ancient city of Samarra was a powerful Islamic capital during the ninth century, located in what is today Iraq. It is the only surviving Islamic capital that retains its original plan, architecture and arts, although only about 20% of the site has been excavated.

In 2007, during the height of the Iraq War, it was named a UNESCO World Heritage Site in Danger because of the responsible authorities’ inability to control and manage its conservation.

That same year, insurgents launched a second attack on the city’s mosque and damaged the clock tower.

Monitoring sites like Samarra during periods of political instability is both difficult and dangerous for archaeologists. Satellites, however, offer a non-invasive solution to monitor these remnants of the past, and can even help to identify new areas to excavate.

The most obvious way to keep tabs on excavated sites from space is with high-resolution optical images. But new techniques reveal that satellites carrying radars can also see how underground structures influence the soil.

Radar is sensitive to properties like slight differences in soil density and water content – things the human eye cannot see. Changes in soil moisture and in vegetation growth can also be detected by radar. These factors are influenced by underground structures and can be used to infer historical features.

Radar can also see through clouds and darkness, providing consistent observations day or night and under all atmospheric conditions.

Radar imagery is complex, so not all radar detections can be easily explained. But some of these detections may identify unexcavated sites.

Along the Nile River in Sudan’s Northern state, tombs, temples and living complexes make up the Gebel Barkal archaeological sites. Registered on the UNESCO World Heritage List, they are testimony to the Napatan and Meroitic cultures of about 900 BC to 350 AD.

Using the ‘polarimetric synthetic aperture radar’ technique, scientists from Italy’s La Sapienza and France’s Rennes 1 universities were able to look at the pyramids and temples of Gebel Barkal. Their observations not only allowed them to monitor the site remotely during a time of political instability, but revealed that there may be more beneath that soil that has not yet been excavated.

Satellite observations can also be useful for monitoring and identifying buried archaeological structures in densely populated areas. In Rome, Italy, major ancient sites like the Colosseum and Roman Forum are part of the cityscape. But there are also hidden treasures beneath the hustle and bustle of the modern metropolis.

A student from Italy’s Tor Vergata University has found that optical satellite imagery can reveal buried archaeological features in the eastern outskirts of Rome due to differences in the spectral reflection (particularly in the near-infrared) of the overlying vegetation.

Future missions such as Japan’s ALOS-2 satellite, scheduled for launch this year, will build on previous missions with their unique capabilities to further archaeology from space. ESA’s Biomass candidate mission would also contribute with its novel radar.

Source ESA and Spacedaily

Efforts to monitor the world’s forests and other ecosystems got a big boost in February with the launch of Landsat 8, NASA’s newest earth observation satellite, which augments the crippled Landsat 7 currently orbiting Earth (technically Landsat 8 is still named the Landsat Data Continuity Mission (LDCM) and will remain so until May when the USGS turns control of the satellite over to NASA).

Last week Landsat 8/LDCM sent back its first image, showing the meeting of the Great Plains with the Front Ranges of the Rocky Mountains in Wyoming and Colorado. The image showcases the satellite’s nine spectral bands, which include three visible light bands, two near-infrared bands, and two shortwave infrared (SWIR) bands, among others, as well as two thermal sensors.

Landsat 8/LDCM is the most advanced Earth observation satellite to date. It is the eighth Landsat since the initial launch in 1972.

Landsat 8/LDCM will circle the Earth every 99 minutes and cover the entire globe every 16 days, beaming 400 high resolution images to ground stations every 24 hours. The images, which are freely distributed, are used for a wide range of applications, including efforts to monitor environmental change, detect fires, and watch crops. Google is one of the biggest commercial users of Landsat images, which feed into Google Earth, but other users include scientists and conservationists involved in tracking deforestation and forest degradation. Accordingly, the new satellite was welcomed by members of the conservation community.

“Landsat 8 is a much anticipated and critically needed satellite for Earth resource mapping, monitoring and analysis,” Greg Asner, a senior scientist at the Carnegie Institution for Science’s Department of Global Ecology, told mongabay.com. “Nearly every country serious about deforestation monitoring uses the Landsat series, which are made available for free by the U.S. government.

Asner, who leads a team that developed advanced deforestation monitoring platforms known as Carnegie Landsat Analysis System (CLAS) and CLASlite, says the new system marks a sharp improvement over the recently-failed Landsat 5 and Landsat 7, which suffers from partial data loss due a 2003 sensor failure.

“Of course, our Carnegie Landsat Analysis System (CLAS) and CLASlite – the mostly widely disseminated forest change mapping software in the world — will fully support Landsat 8, just as it has for the previous Landsat instruments,” he said. “I am really looking forward to helping the community continue to use Landsat data for conservation and management of tropical forests.”

Christopher Potter, a researcher at NASA-Ames Research Center, added that Landsat 8 will provide critical continuity in forest monitoring efforts.

“Images from Landsat 8 will provide the ongoing capability to monitor land cover change around the world by extending the 30+ year historical record of Landsat 5 and 7,” Potter told mongabay.com. “Continuity of high-quality data make Landsat unique for tracking forest conservation efforts.”

Conservationists say they intend to use imagery captured by Landsat to monitor forest cover in near-real time, potentially enabling authorities to take action against illegal deforesters. In the past, Landsat images have provided an important baseline for tracking land use change over time, including the expansion of oil palm plantations in Malaysia and Indonesia, conversion of rainforests for industrial timber production in Sumatra, selective logging of rainforests in Peru, and deforestation for soy farms and cattle ranches in the Brazilian Amazon.

Landsat data can also help forest conservation projects under the proposed Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD+) quantify reductions in carbon emissions, potentially generating cash for forest-dependent communities and project developers.

“Without question, Landsat 8 is the most important new satellite of this century for monitoring land cover change,” said Asner. “No other satellites, other than previous Landsat systems, have proven to be as accurate for tropical deforestation and forest degradation monitoring as Landsat 8 will prove to be in the coming years.”

Read more at

SPOT-VEGETATION turns 15 in May 2013!

After a long and successful career as Europe’s first truly operational system for global monitoring of vegetation, the mission is now nearing the end of its life cycle.

But the story continues! The role of SPOT-VEGETATION will be taken over by ESA’s technologically advanced PROBA-V mission from the summer of 2013 onwards.

To celebrate with us the operational and scientific achievements of SPOT-VEGETATION and to look forward to the intriguing perspectives that will offered to the user’s community by PROBA-V,

BELSPO and VITO are delighted to invite you to the conference “PROBING VEGETATION”

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Registration
Venue

Almost unknown to the public, a constellation of satellite guardians is flying overhead, and all it takes is a phone call for them to intervene when a country is hit by a storm, earthquake, tsunami or flood.

Armed with cameras or ground radar, these Earth-observation satellites were sent into orbit for scientific and commercial missions.

But under an international agreement, they can also be called on for humanitarian work.

Assigned to fly over a disaster zone, they send back high-resolution images that can be crucial for rescue teams on the ground.

Which towns or streets are most at risk of flooding? What route can be found for relief trucks after a bridge has collapsed? And where is a secure location to pitch tents for survivors?

This pooled effort gathers 14 space agencies or national organisations, which together have 20 satellites, ranging from France’s SPOT commercial satellite to the United States’ scientific satellite, Landsat.

Their cooperation comes under an agreement called the International Charter Space and Major Disasters.

When catastrophe strikes, an ‘authorised user’ of the Charter simply phones a number at the European Space Agency (ESA), where space technicians are on round-the-clock duty.

After confirming the request, the team looks at what satellites are available, determines which is best suited for the job and then sends a programming request to its operator.

Within three hours, a scout can be instructed to take pictures as it swings over the site, said Philippe Bally, ESA’s representative on the Charter’s secretariat in Paris.

The data is usually available within 24 hours, and the service is provided for free, rather as ships at sea divert course to pick up a seafarer in distress.

‘We select the satellite according to what is needed — visual images or radar images, the type of resolution — and this is determined by the type of disaster,’ said Catherine Proy of France’s National Centre for Space Studies (CNES), which devised the initiative with ESA in 1999.

‘We also have to factor in differences in the time zone and overflight opportunities.’

To make the information usable on the ground, the raw data is sent to specialist cartographers, who highlight the disaster zone and compare the latest pictures against those from previous years in order to show the change.

Since 2000, the Charter has been ‘activated’ 369 times in 110 countries. Floods and tsunamis account for roughly half of the activations, followed by storms (16 percent) and earthquakes (11 percent).

The beneficiary countries are generally poor economies that do not have access to an Earth-observation satellite.

Haiti, for instance, was helped after the January 2010 earthquake with satellite pictures that pinpointed terrain that offered the best opportunities for clean water and identified areas at risk of landslip.

One of the 41 authorised users of the Charter is the United Nations, which can activate it on behalf of member states.

The most recent activation was after Cyclone Haruna smashed into Mozambique in February.

Rich countries, too, can ask for an activation. Germany activated the Charter in 2003 to provide images for Iran after the 2003 Bam earthquake that left 35,000 people dead.

In November last year, parts of northern England experienced their heaviest rainfall in 50 years.

By getting satellite pictures from Germany’s TerraSAR system and Canada’s RADARSAT system, engineers on the ground were able to rush pumps to ease key locations before floodwater built up dangerously.

Diverting a satellite from a scheduled orbit entails a sacrifice for the operator, because it uses up a precious supply of onboard propellant to manoeuvre it into place.

But the Charter tries to avoid this.

With 20 satellites looping around the world in different trajectories, vast areas of the planet are covered, and one satellite is usually close enough to a disaster site to take images as it flies over. Ease of coverage will be helped after Russia joins the club.

Source