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MALAREO and REDDINESS, two FP7 projects led by EUROSENSE as the prime leader, finished in January 2013. Both projects were dedicated to the international cooperation between European and African partners. Within MALAREO, a Map Atlas for malaria research and control community was created. REDDINESS helped Gabon and the Republic of Congo to get ready for a future REDD+ mechanism.

MALAREO Map Atlas for malaria research and control community

MALAREO focused to develop technology and implement earth observation data that contributes to the fight against malaria in southern Africa. Within the project a Map Atlas for malaria research and control community was created. The Map Atlas contains all map products created in the MALAREO project aiming to support the daily work of the National Malaria Control Programs (NMCP) in the project area.

Based on a variety of thematic maps, the management of integrated vector control, including the planning of indoor residual spraying (IRS), the distribution of insecticide treated nets (ITN) or larvaciding, can be substantially improved and can result in more effective vector control measures.

All geo-data were provided to the NMCPs as geo-referenced shape files and raster files to implement the data in their data management systems. All data presented in this Map Atlas can also be downloaded via the MALAREO website. The use of these data and of this Map Atlas for the work of the NMCPs was also part of three capacity building sessions. MALAREO organized courses in GIS, Earth Observation and spatial statistics for the end-users. The courses were held at the University of KwaZulu-Natal (Durban, South-Africa) and targeted at the NMCPs in Southern Africa.

Click here to download the MALAREO Map Atlas

REDDiness helped Gabon and the Republic of Congo to get ready for a future REDD+ mechanism

REDD+ aims at decreasing carbon losses from the forest sector through five activities: reducing deforestation, reducing forest degradation, forest enhancement, sustainable management of forests, and forest conservations. Obtaining compensations due to REDD+ presupposes the development of a robust, reliable and transparent forest monitoring system and requires an accurate measuring, reporting and verification (MRV) system at the national level. REDDiness offered support in the definition and set up of this system in the Republic of Congo and Gabon. The main impact of REDDiness has been the stimulation of the exchange of EO (Earth Observation) knowledge and capacity in the context of forest monitoring between European and African partners. The project revised the state-of-the-art forest monitoring methods, especially in the field of forest degradation, and helped the Central African countries further towards an operational use of EO products and solutions supporting the sustainable management of forests. This has been performed by analyzing the capacity gaps first, and subsequently building the needed capacity for the exploitation of existing or future GMES and GEO services, and by developing and customizing EO methodologies according to local user needs.

Based on the in-depth assessment of requirements on technical and practical aspects and advises obtained from scientific experts, capacity building activities have been established in both countries in reference to existing regional capacities either in EO methodologies and in forest monitoring:

  • Training sessions provided the participants with a very useful overview of EO data, methods and applications in the field of forest monitoring. In addition, the participants had the opportunity to use image processing software with project data on the study area. These are relevant contributions for participants involved in the definition, elaboration and implementation of the national MRV systems.
  • Field missions in study areas provided the participants with increased knowledge on field protocols development and data collection. Data collected allowed for a much better understanding of forest degradation drivers and a much better analysis of the remote sensing imagery than would have been the case without it.
  • The user workshop allowed for a detailed description of the research outcomes in forest monitoring by remote sensing, associated with practical exercises with experts based on the developed applications. The link between EO monitoring applications and the field mission was very positive and also ascertained a stronger involvement of local partners in the project by including them in the research component. Formal and informal evaluations of the support activities clearly indicate a positive appreciation by the participants.

The research component of REDDiness allowed to estimate the potential of optical and radar satellite imagery to detect forest degradation. REDDiness concluded that satellite imagery has potential to detect forest degradation, but requires good quality cloud-free remote sensing imagery at frequent intervals (at least once per year), and at high spatial resolutions (<10m). This has implications on the cost of a national monitoring system, which may need to implement a sampling approach. Persistent cloud cover is the main problem for optical image acquisition in the Congo Basin, but radar has its own intrinsic difficulties. These include 1) the relative complexity of image products and pre-processing requirements for non-experts, 2) the strong dependence of the radar backscatter on viewing geometry meaning that some changes in these can drastically affect what is observed in the scene, 3) the difficulty of interpretation requiring a good understanding of radar scattering mechanisms by the interpreter, and 4) strong terrain-related effects in mountainous or undulating terrain.

For more information about the project and its outcomes, please visit the REDDiness website and the EUROSENSE website

Contact us for more information
Eurosense

AeroGRID Ltd (England) operates a geo-imagery wms and tiling web-server that now has available over 4 million km² of orthorectified imagery from 12.5cm to 50cm resolution covering most of Europe all produced by professional photogrammetry organisations both government and private. The data is accessed through a high performance web server system in any required projection.

WMS is the standard protocol for streaming georeferenced map imagery over the Internet to web based applications, GIS and CAD software. As WMS feeds only load the imagery that a user needs to see, it is a very convenient and cost-efficient way for clients to access very high resolution imagery.

With the European market gradually integrating, more and more organisations need to access data from all over the continent. Although satellite imagery has been available world-wide since the beginning it is only recently that such solutions are becoming available for aerial photography. AeroGRID is the most extensive European solution available covering not only Western Europe but also Scandinavia, Central and Eastern Europe.

The imagery is accompanied by comprehensive metadata including a statement of accuracy upon which users can confidently base their projects. As the data is produced by professional photogrammetry organisations accuracies are generally higher and the orthophotos often of higher resolution than rival products.

As a result the service is used by mapping organisations, utilities and network planners and other branches of professionals. The European Joint research Centre in ISPRA has recently conducted tests whose results will shortly be published. The Project Manager stated that they found the service very useful.

AeroGRID is a one-stop-shop for international archived aerial imagery providing speedy access to aerial photography from 65 countries with off-the-shelf high resolution satellite orthophotos for many others. By marshalling an impressive network of partner’s survey aircraft and high resolution digital cameras AeroGRID is able to extend coverage around the world. In this manner we produce orthophotos, DEMs and building models from new aerial photography, DigitalGlobe and Geoeye satellite data worldwide.


For further information please contact:
Miles Taylor
T: + 33 671 156 116 E: info@aerogrid.net
www.aerogrid.net

As a valued member of the European Earth Observation community we would like to invite you to the upcoming 3rd WorldView Global Alliance User Conference in Munich 19-20 June 2013

  • A new, dynamic conference format
  • Everything you want to know about the changes at DigitalGlobe
  • Updates on recent developments in the European earth observation industry
  • Opportunities for our resellers and partners to information share in a congenial atmosphere.

Mailing address:
European Space Imaging
Arnulfstrasse 197, Munich 80634
Germany

Registration

(02 Apr 2013)Posted by Quirin Schiermeier. A €400-million (US$513 million) radar project that is designed to measure global forest biomass in unprecedented detail will very probably launch around the end of the decade as the next Earth-observation mission by the European Space Agency (ESA).

ESA’s Earth Science Advisory Committee (ESAC) says that it found BIOMASS the technically and scientifically most convincing of three candidate missions discussed last month at a user meeting in Graz, Austria (see Nature 495, 15; 2013). The two other missions — COReH2O and PREMIER — would have measured global snow cover and atmospheric composition, respectively.

The committee’s recommendation must still be ratified by ESA’s Earth Observation Programme Board, which comprises representatives of the agency’s 20 member states. The board, which meets 5–6 May in Svalbard, Norway, has never overturned an ESAC recommendation.

Estimated construction costs for BIOMASS amount to around €400 million. A spacecraft, scheduled for launch around 2020, will fly a 70-centimetre wavelength radar sensor capable of probing trees’ heights and structures, such as trunks and canopies, in minute detail. Multiple repeat orbits are to produce three-dimensional maps of most of the world’s forests.

Radar measurements of forest biomass are one indicator of changes in biodiversity and are particularly valuable across the tropical forest belt, where ground inventory data are scarce or do not exist. Accurate space observations of biomass will also help quantify carbon emissions resulting from deforestation and land-use changes.

But the BIOMASS mission might come with a caveat. The frequency band of its radar interferes with military applications such as the US space-object tracking radar. If planned discussions between ESA and the US department of defence over frequency allocation come to nothing, it might mean that the mission radar cannot operate over large swaths of North America and, possibly, Europe.

“We would certainly like to look at deforestation and forest re-growth in the United States and Europe,” says Shaun Quegan, a carbon-cycle researcher at the University of Sheffield, UK, who chairs the BIOMASS project. “But our main interest lies in the tropics — and it is there where the mission will make a real difference.”

Source

Source Sensors & Systems

The sciences, technologies, and practices of remote sensing and of geographic information systems (GIS) arose separately, developed in parallel, intersected, and are now inextricably linked. Nearly all the features in most GIS are collected by means of satellite imagery or aerial photogrammetry, and GIS is the application where this imagery is most commonly visualized. “All the foundation elements of GIS come from remote sensing: cultural features, roads, buildings, water features, topography, terrain, soils, slopes, geology, and many more,” points out Lawrie Jordan, Director of Imagery at Esri.

Merging Two Approaches

It was not always this way. In the 1970s, 1980s, and early 1990s, remote sensing and image processing, on the one hand, and GIS on the other, were separate worlds—each with its own culture and software. The former stored data in a raster format and used multispectral classification; the latter stored data in a vector format and used topology. Software vendors specialized in one or the other—even though their customers were acquiring and using both types of data. Until recently, in a GIS context, imagery was thought of only as a background or a base map to the information that was being analyzed.

Over the last decade, however, remote sensing and GIS have become increasingly integrated. “Now people are seeing imagery as a source of a lot of GIS information,” says Jennifer Stefanacci, Director of Product Management at Exelis. “So, the analysis workflows that our users are doing incorporate both analysis of the imagery and analysis of their GIS data.” While GIS gives you the information about ‘where,’ through information extraction routines, remote sensing gives you the information about ‘what,’ explains Mladen Stojic, V.P. of Geospatial at Intergraph, “By merging the two, we now have the opportunity to do modeling with raster data, vector data, and, on top of that, terrain data.”

Today, GIS is the most practical and efficient platform to combine remote sensing with other layers of information. “People do not acquire and process imagery just to make a pretty picture out of it,” says Jordan. “They want to combine it with other spatial information to solve problems and create meaningful results.”

more info

Source

(Beijing, Mar 29) China’s first satellite for its high—resolution system for Earth observation, aimed at reducing disasters and protecting resources, will be launched in April.

Examinations of the satellite and its carrier rocket — the Long March 2D — have been completed and the satellite is now in the launch stage, State Administration of Science, Technology and Industry for National Defence (SATIND) said.

China plans to launch five to six satellites before the end of 2015 in order to build a spatial, temporal and spectral high—resolution observation system.

The system is expected to help reduce disasters, protect resources, the environment and national security, as well as support geographic and oceanic surveys and urban transportation management, the SATIND said.

It will also enhance China’s ability to obtain high—resolution observation data and accelerate its development of satellite application technologies, state run Xinhua news agency reported.

Source

Meteosat-10 Data Utilization For All 2met!® Processing Software Versions

After the successful launch in 2012 of MSG-3, the latest European meteorological satellite, the spacecraft has now been moved to 0º and officially replaces Meteosat-9 as EUMETSAT´s prime geostationary weather satellite. In this context, MSG-3 has been renamed to Meteosat-10.

While all current 2met!® products and solutions fully support from the very beginning the utilization of data from Meteosat-10, SCISYS is pleased to announce that corresponding software enhancements are also available for previous 2met!® Processing software versions. New radiance tables for the calibration of Meteosat-10 data are now available.

The software updates are available for two versions:

  • For 2met!® Processing versions lower than v3.2 (e.g. PUMA)
  • For 2met!® Processing versions v3.2 to v3.4

The software update is available free of charge for existing SCISYS (or formerly VCS AG) customers. Please go to the Meteosat-10 update page and use the online form for your request.

For more than 25 years, our company is successfully acting in the business of earth observation and meteorological user stations as one of the leading suppliers. 2met!® is the SCISYS-developed multi-mission concept for real-time data acquisition, processing, visualisation and distribution of earth observation satellite data. It is a commercial off-the-shelf solution, based on standard hardware and software. 2met!® supports a variety of remote sensing satellites such as METEOSAT, MSG, GOES, MTSAT, NOAA, METOP, NPP and TERRA/AQUA as well as telemetry standards in line with the CCSDS recommendation.

Chelys was established in 2002. Our core business focuses on software development and supplying services in the Earth Observation sector, by providing processing stations for Earth Observation satellites.

We are specialized in satellite data management and real time satellite (raw) data processing, data quality control, image generation, projection and mosaics (composite satellite images).

Our main product, the Satellite Rapid Response System, is a multimission real-time data processing and quality control system that is able to simultaneously process data coming from several different missions. It can be used to process data from the following satellite instruments:

  • ALOSAVNIR-2 level0 (raw data) and level 1
  • ENVISATASAR level0 (raw data) and level1
  • ENVISATMERIS level0 (raw data), level1 and level2
  • ENVISATMERIS level0 and level1 FAPAR/MGVI Processor for Monitoring Vegetation Cover
  • METOP/NOAA – AVHRR3 level1b
  • SUOMI-NPPVIIRS level1b
  • TERRA and AQUAMODIS level1b

The SRRS system used by ESA, called MIRAVI, has been installed in all Envisat satellite acquisition stations and has been delivering thousands of images per month since June 2006, processing the Envisat/MERIS Full Resolution raw data as soon as they are acquired.

Our current areas of activity are:

  • software development
  • environmental acquisition and processing systems
  • data acquisition systems (ESA/DDS, Eumetsat/EUMETCAST)
  • image generation from raw data, orthorectification and mosaics

We also provide services such as:

  • a comprehensive maintenance and support program that provides operational support, software and hardware maintenance and enhancementsts
  • technical consultancy
  • feasibility, design and pre-phase studies
  • system prototyping

Rapidly processing great quantities of satellite data makes it possible to generate an incredible number of Value Added Products. The SRRS post-processing systems are able to generate extremely quickly products such as:

  • Mosaics (Multispectral, Radar, FAPAR, etc.)
  • Interferometry
  • Orthorectification
  • Projection
  • Export in KML/KMZ format (Google Earth)
  • 2D/3D Animations
    Our systems are flexible enough to permit the implementation of your processing algorithms inside our SRRS infrastructure. If you have data and/or algorithms to be processed, we can create post-processing modules in order to make that processing fast and carried out systematically on all acquired data.
    Please contact us, we would be happy to suggest the best solution for processing specific to your needs.

We are looking for an experienced, self-motivated and team-oriented project manager to join our team in Innsbruck, Austria, for working in international projects related to satellite Earth Observation and Geographic Information Systems.

Specifically, this full-time position is situated in the Technical Department and will cover high level, self-reliant technical and administrative project management for international customers. The position will also support the Commercial Department in project acquisition, proposal writing, and preparatory marketing and sales activities.

The ideal applicant has a proven track record in project management in the international Earth Observation and GIS domain and should have more than 5 years of working experience after graduation.

  • Proven record of working in and managing sizeable projects, preferably in a private industry environment
  • In depth knowledge of satellite and airborne remote sensing, GI technology and applications; expertise in land-related EO applications (land cover/use mapping, urban planning, hydrology, forestry) is a key asset
  • Excellent experience in project management (minimum of 3 years)
  • Proof of experience in proposal writing; know-how in sales, acquisition and promotion activities advantageous
  • Excellent command in English and German, other EU language advantageous
  • Excellent writing and communication capabilities
  • Willingness to travel (also international), motivation skills and team leadership an asset
  • Applicants form related industries, such as engineering, geo-products and IT are welcome!

Please visit our website (www.geoville.com) for more information and send your CV with a covering letter outlining how your experience and interests match our requirements to Dr. Andreas Walli, walli@geoville.com

GeoVille group provides a wide range of value-added services in the land domain with focus on urban, regional and spatial planning as well as environmental monitoring, forestry and agriculture applications. Registered offices are in Innsbruck, Austria, and Niederanven, Luxembourg.
GeoVille Information Systems, based in Innsbruck, Austria, is an internationally operating company providing consultancy, services and products related to satellite earth observation, geo-information and geographic information systems.
The company is ISO 9001:2008 and 14000 certified and offers an attractive work environment in the city centre of Innsbruck, Tyrol, and a competitive entry salary in a growing high-tech market.

GeoVille Information Systems GmbH
Sparkassenplatz 2, 3rd floor
A – 6020 Innsbruck, Austria
Tel: +43 (0)512 56 20 21-0
Fax: +43 (0)512 56 20 21-22
Email: info@geoville.com