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DMC International Imaging Ltd (DMCii) took over the chairmanship of the International Charter: Space and Major Disasters at the Executive Secretariat meeting in May.

The Charter is an organisation that coordinates space agencies worldwide in gathering vital satellite images of disaster-stricken regions – providing the images to civil protection authorities to inform their response efforts and save lives.

As Chair, DMCii is responsible for ensuring the operational elements of the Charter run smoothly and supporting strategy and policy decisions. It is a particularly exciting time to lead the Charter as the membership is committed to finding ways of widening national access to the Charter’s services.

Speaking ahead of his keynote address at the Charter Board Meeting in London, UK Minister for Universities and Science David Willetts said:

“The Charter is a great example of the enormous benefits space can bring to our everyday lives. It provides invaluable and immediate satellite images during times of crisis, from tracking extreme weather or to dealing with the aftermath of earthquakes and tsunamis, as we saw very recently in Japan.

“During the UK’s chairmanship we’re keen to build on the Charter’s success and open up international access to the world’s satellite resources. This means the Charter will play an even bigger role in helping countries respond effectively to emergencies, and ultimately help save lives.”

Since it was set up in 1999, the Charter has provided images during more than 300 disasters in more than 100 countries – most recently following the earthquake in Japan and the recent severe tornadoes in the southern United States.

Membership of the Charter is open to all space agencies able to contribute satellite images. Uniquely, the UK is a member on a public-private basis that makes optimal use of the available government and commercial expertise. The UK Space Agency holds a seat on the Charter’s Board, providing direction and examining ways to improve Charter performance in future. DMCii coordinates the Disaster Monitoring Constellation (DMC), currently a five-strong international satellite constellation made available as part of the Charter satellite fleet, and implements the day-to-day Charter process as a member of the Charter’s Executive Secretariat.

David Hodgson, DMCii’s member of the Charter’s Executive Secretariat said:

“The Charter is still being run in much the same way as when it began in 2000 with three members. Now, with the German Aerospace Center (DLR) joining last year, membership is up to 14. We need to address the practical implications of this growth to keep the Charter operating in the same efficient and streamlined manner.”

So far this year, the Charter has been activated for the flooding in Australia, Brazil, Mozambique, Namibia and most recently in central Midwest America, as well as hurricane Yasi, earthquakes in Pakistan and New Zealand and Japan, and a volcanic eruption in Argentina.


UK-DMC2 satellite image© [2011] SSTL, all rights reserved, supplied by DMCii

(Source DMCii)

GRAS is involved in mapping of water quality of Danish lakes using WorldView-2, Landsat and MERIS.

With the implementation of the EU Water Framework Directive there is a need for better knowledge on water quality in all larger lakes in Denmark by 2015. Currently, the national monitoring programme in Denmark (NOVANA) is based on traditional in-situ sampling and an extension of this monitoring programme would be a very expensive and time consuming task.

Activities related to monitoring of the marine environment by use of satellite (for examples see http://www.grasdk.com/Solutions/MarineApplications )
have proven to be a cost-efficient addition to the in-situ based monitoring programme. Monitoring of water quality through remote sensing is one of the core competences at GRAS and the thorough knowledge gained in this field will be applied in this project to investigate the potential of very high resolution satellite images for water quality monitoring. In order to test the possibilities of transferring the methods and experiences from the marine monitoring activities in Denmark to the monitoring of lakes a research project funded by the EcoInnovation sector of the Danish Ministry of Environment has been initiated with the aim of optimizing monitoring of the freshwater lakes in Denmark.


Example of Chl-A mapping based on 8 band WorldView2 data

The project will focus on chlorophyll mapping using time series of both the newest very high resolution satellite data (2m resolution) and the traditional medium resolution satellite data (300 m resolution). Furthermore, it will be investigated how the integration of satellite data into ecological lake models can be improved and extended. The DK Lake Monitoring Project is a partnership between GRAS, DHI Water and Environment, the National Environmental Research Institute (NERI) – Department of Freshwater Ecology and TBJ Consult. GRAS’ competences in satellite based monitoring of the environment in general and the marine environment in particular will be a key part of the project that will run from 2010 – 2012.

Satellite data to be used in the study includes Landsat, WorldView-2 and MERIS Full Resolution data.

Further information at GRAS

(May 2011) GAF AG, an internationally active geo-information technology and consulting company, announces that it has been awarded by World Bank (WB) and European Space Agency (ESA) with Service Production in Bolivia. In the framework of eoworld, which is a partnership program of WB and ESA, together with its partner EOMAP GAF will provide dedicated state of the art Earth Observation products regarding Water Quality, Land Use and Land Use change for the Lake Titicaca sub-basin in Bolivia and Peru.

International financial institutions (IFI) provide financial support and professional advice for development activities on local to regional scale in developing countries. Their activities are generally organized in dedicated projects financed by long-term loans or grants covering social and economical development aspects in a wide range of fields. For certain fields Earth Observation (EO) products and services have been identified as a useful tool to support the monitoring and management of IFI projects, to improve the efficiency of the investments made and finally to assess the impact and social benefits of the financed development activity.

ESA, as part of its Value Adding Element (VAE) programme, has been interacting with the IFI and their stakeholders to understand their working environment and information requirements in particular for EO services. Especially with WB, ESA started a partnership program named eoworld in 2010. Within this programme, first dozen of Bank teams from across a variety of sectors and representing all regions were selected through a competitive process to receive assistance of ESA to apply Earth Observation services in selected operations.

“The main aim of the eoworld initiative is to demonstrate the value of European and Canadian satellites, both ESA and national missions, and the capabilities of specialised value-adding companies that can provide information services to benefit the World Bank’s operations,” said Stephen Coulson, ESA’s Head of Industry Section.

This process has resulted in dedicated service specifications for World Bank, which have been put out for tender. GAF has been awarded with the MONITORING OF WATER QUALITY AND LAND USE CHANGES IN THE LAKE TITICACA BASIN project, which is directly driven by the requirements of the supported WB project and its local stakeholders in Bolivia.

During a 2 days meeting in April at WB’s headquarters in Washington DC, together with ESA, WB and EOMAP, all service products have been finalised. For an area of about 47 000 km² in Bolivia and Peru (Lake Titicaca sub-basin), together with EOMAP GAF will provide dedicated state of the art EO products which have been customised to meet the specific user requirements of WB best possible. Including Water Quality products such as information on Turbidity, Suspended Matter and Chlorophyll-A as well as mapping products on Land Use/Land Cover and Land Use/Land Cover Change, the service will deliver products for environmental monitoring of Lake Titicaca between the years 2003 and 2010. All delivered products will be validated together with the service performance by WB and local stakeholders. The benefit of the information service will be assessed relatively to the objectives of the project as well.

Project activities started in April 2011 and will be concluded in February 2012.

For more detailed information, please consult the news section of ESA’s website or the EOWORLD project website from WB

About World Bank – Washington DC/USA

The World Bank is a vital source of financial and technical assistance to developing countries around the world. Our mission is to fight poverty with passion and professionalism for lasting results and to help people help themselves and their environment by providing resources, sharing knowledge, building capacity and forging partnerships in the public and private sectors.

We are not a bank in the common sense; we are made up of two unique development institutions owned by 187 member countries: the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD) and the International Development Association (IDA).

Each institution plays a different but collaborative role in advancing the vision of inclusive and sustainable globalization. The IBRD aims to reduce poverty in middle-income and creditworthy poorer countries, while IDA focuses on the world’s poorest countries.

Their work is complemented by that of the International Finance Corporation (IFC), Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency (MIGA) and the International Centre for the Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID).

Together, we provide low-interest loans, interest-free credits and grants to developing countries for a wide array of purposes that include investments in education, health, public administration, infrastructure, financial and private sector development, agriculture and environmental and natural resource management.

The World Bank, established in 1944, is headquartered in Washington, D.C. We have more than 10,000 employees in more than 100 offices worldwide.

About ESA / ESRIN – Frascati/Italy

ESRIN, known as the ESA Centre for Earth Observation, is one of the five ESA specialised centres situated in Europe. Located in Frascati, a small town 20 km south of Rome in Italy, ESRIN was established in 1966 and first began acquiring data from environmental satellites in the 1970s. Since 2004, ESRIN has been the headquarters for ESA’s Earth Observation activities.

ESRIN acts as an interface between ESA and those who use its services. The centre has close links with European industry, the European Union and the civil protection, agriculture and environment ministries within ESA Member States. ESRIN also cooperates with international organisations including UN agencies and the European Commission, and plays an important role in many international projects. More on the ESA programme Value Adding Element

About GAF AG – Munich/Germany

GAF AG, an e-GEOS, Telespazio company, is globally active and has an international reputation as a competent provider of project design, management and implementation services in the fields of geo-information, satellite remote sensing and GIS consultancy to private and public clients. Within the past 25 years, GAF has been active in more than 100 countries throughout Europe, Africa, South-America and Asia. More on GAF

To obtain more information, please contact:
GAF AG | Tel. +49 (0) 89 12 15 28 0 | www.gaf.de | info@gaf.de |

About EOMAP GmbH&Co.KG – Gilching/Germany

EOMAP is a private enterprise and worldwide active for the offshore industry, environmental agencies and research organizations. EOMAP is specialized in coastal and inland water monitoring services, e.g. high resolution water quality monitoring and water depth mapping. Using an operational physical based processing approach, EOMAP offers the best possible temporal and spatial resolution with manifold sensors. More on EOMAP

SAFER fire services, based on EO data and led by INSA, cover all phases of crisis management in order to provide a complete support to authorities for the prevention, correct management of resources and analysis of effect of fire events

INSA leads the European fires platform of SAFER (www.emergencyresponse.eu), coordinating the activities of Spain, Portugal, France, Italy and Greece. (www.insageoservices.com)

Forest fires can be a major ecological disturbance agent that modifies landscapes, especially when normal fire frequencies and /or intensities are modified. The main negative fire effects are vegetation biomass loss, soil degradation, greenhouse gas emissions and, in the worst cases, the loss of lives.

A comprehensive study of a fire event requires prevention, early warning, crisis monitoring and, after the fire occurs, the interpretation of causal factors, fire effects and ecosystem responses, in a wide range of spatial (local to regional) and temporal (short to long term) scales. Often, this assessment is incomplete due to economic reasons, the lack of data or the use of standard methodologies that are not efficient.

SAFER project proposed several fire services in order to support all phases of crisis management:

  • Preparedness/Prevention: Global Fire Risk Service (GRF) provides fire danger forecast on the basis of meteorological weather forecasts. Information content includes the identification of the area that can be under risk classified into 5 classes (from very low to very high risk).
  • Emergency Response: Fire monitoring (FMM-1) – They contain the continuous near-real time monitoring of active fires. This product includes fire location and several associated parameters: estimated fire power, fire temperature, size of burning area and background temperature. In addition, cloud cover is provided per each satellite image- and Rapid burned area mapping (FMM-2) – fire perimeters at medium resolution by the daily MODIS acquisition and processing can be provided, between 1 and 7 days after fire extinction.
  • Recovery: Recovery products are intended for an in-depth analysis of fire event, e.g. damage assessment or a synthesis of the fire event. High resolution fire perimeter (BSM-1) can be provided at the end of the fire season, for fire inventory. Fire severity (BSM-2) product is the estimation of damage levels in the different vegetation strata.

Example of FMM-1 product provided through the dedicated GeoPortal by INSA (with the collaboration of LATUV, ©INSA)

A detailed and rapid knowledge of the level of damage and its spatial distribution is essential to:

• quantify the impact of fire on landscape;
• select and prioritize treatments applied on site;
• plan and monitor restoration and recovery activities;
• provide baseline information for future monitoring.

Between all these services proposed by SAFER, INSA is service provider of FMM-1, FMM-2, BSM-1 and BSM-2. (www.insageoservices.com)

Example of FMM-2 kmz-product (Fire in Kalmthout NationalPark, Belgium, May 2011, © INSA)

SAFER fire products have a strong scientific base, demonstrated by the number of scientific papers published in high impact journals and PhD thesis related to their development and testing. On the other hand, the methodologies developed are automatic or semi-automatic, what confirms the operational generation of fire products.

SAFER fire services were selected among the most mature products provided in previous GMES projects. During 18 months, the products were tested and improved, taking into account both the validation results and users’ feedback. In 2010, all products, except for GFR, were independently validated and checked by other partners and users of the project in order to evaluate their incorporation in the portfolio of operational services. User feedback results quantified the overall agreement with an average value of 4.15 over 5 (where 1 corresponds to “very low” and 5 to “very high” agreement), with a homogeneous trend for all products.

After all this validation process, the SAFER fire services have been considered fully operational and have been included to the core SAFER services (since July 2011). Any authorized user can now activate SAFER and ask for our products in case of natural disaster. (www.insageoservices.com)

Example of BSM-1 product (Fire in Kalmthout NationalPark, Belgium, June 2011, © INSA & ASTRIUM)

Active fire location and rapid burned area mapping (FMM-1 and FMM-2 products) will be provided in “emergency” mode within 8 hours from the receipt of the first suitable satellite image of the disaster, whereas detailed burned area mapping and fire severity will be delivered within 45 days (“emergency support” mode).

The distribution of these products to a wide number of users will contribute to better understand and forecast fire behavior, to manage the crisis in a more cost-effective way, to reduce the impacts and to plan and monitoring the mitigation and recovery activities.

(Source INSA)

Gisat serves the World Bank in eoworld

Gisat has been selected as one of the European EO services provider within the frame of the joint ESA and the World Bank eoworld initiative to support the World Bank specialists in sustainable urban management and planning activities in megacities around India and Bangladesh. The required services consists of historical assessment of spatial growth of built-ups in metropolitan areas of 3 selected cities: Delhi, Mumbai and Dhaka and includes both production of spatially explicit multi-temporal information monitoring urban development using satellite imagery data as well as the subsequent assessment report provision.

In this value added services, funded under the ESA VAE programme, Gisat capitalizes his long standing worldwide experience in EO based land cover / land use applications in general and in urban monitoring context in particular.

About eoworld initiative

Recognising the value of using Earth observation satellite data to support development activities, ESA and the World Bank decided to work together on several projects through the eoworld joint initiative

ESA and the World Bank first started collaborating two years ago when ESA carried out small-scale pilot projects that demonstrated the potential of Earth observation for the Bank’s operations. Based on the pilots’ promising outcomes, Earth observation information will now be scaled up and incorporated into 12 World Bank activities in the marine environment, water resources management, urban development, urban and disaster risk management, and agriculture and forestry.

World Bank teams defined the requirements for the geo-information that will be provided across operations in Africa, South and Latin America, South Asia, East Asia and the Pacific.

The Earth observation information products are generated by selected specialist companies from across Europe and will delivered to the Bank’s staff and local stakeholders by the end of 2011.

Related information:
ESA news
World Bank news

Steering land cover mapping in Europe

Gisat is a member of the European consortia working in the HELM project. The HELM acronym stands for the *H*armonised *E*uropean *L*and *M*onitoring. The overall objective of HELM is to initiate a move that will make European land monitoring more productive by increasing the alignment of national and sub-national level land monitoring endeavors and enabling their integration to a coherent European Land Use and Land Cover (LULC) data system.

The consortia forms the extensive network of national and sub-national authorities mandated regarding land monitoring with a shared vision, common knowledge, established modes of exchange, and a collective identity to support further GMES, INSPIRE, SEIS related development in land monitoring context in Europe. Gisat with long-standing experience in land monitoring both on European and national level contributes to HELM objectives as member of General Consortia.

The HELM project receives funding through the Seventh Framework Programme of the European Commission. Related information. HELM website:http://www.fp7helm.eu

Planetek Italia is starting the activities to set up the INSPIRE Geoportal, the central portal for environmental information in the European Union.

The company, prime contractor of the temporary consortium with the German company lat/lon, has been awarded the tender for the “Development of the technical components of the INSPIRE Geoportal at European Level”, of the Joint Research Centre (JRC) – Institute for Environment and Sustainability

The INSPIRE Geoportal will be the unique access point to global European environment geoinformation resources shared and made available by all member states within the framework of the “Infrastructure for Spatial Information in the European Community” (INSPIRE) Directive. The compliance with the requirements and the guidelines included in the Directive 2007/2 EC establishing INSPIRE, is identified as being crucial for the success of the GMES service component. In particular the service provider community is called already to contribute with technical solutions meant to promote the use and sharing of the EO data and information.

LINKS

ReSAC participates in a strategic initiative and capacity building programme

ReSAC in joint collaboration with the Agency for Sustainable Development and Eurointegration (ASDE) and other Bulgarian R&D organizations and companies, united under the Bulgarian Information Office on Earth Observation – GMES (BIOG), takes part in the elaboration of a conceptual and services driven project in support of the Initiative/Strategy/Capacity Building program for a

Regional unit for risk and security management for South East Europe (RURSE)

This activity is following the actions, postulated in the Conclusions of the 2nd Earth Observation-GMES Operational Capacity Workshop , organised in Sofia with the support of the Bulgarian Government and the European Commission on 17-18 March 2011 as a first step towards an European network for balanced centralized and decentralized operational capacity approach in risk prevention, harmonizing local and national risk modelling and probabilistic scenarios, and strengthening integrated methodologies for risk assessment, prognosing and estimating natural and anthropogenic disasters impact; Preliminary exchange of different ideas under the initiative were realised with experts from DG ENTRGMES Bureau, JRC-IPSC, Czech Republic, Germany, Greece, Poland, Romania, Slovenia, UK.

The RURSE initiative includes:

  • help decentralised implementation of GMES core and downstream services in a big pan-region of SEE in a sustainable way;
  • development of operational capacity in the countries in the region – South East Europe, including the Danube region;
  • integration/synergy of EU programs/initiatives and strategies;
  • realisation of Europe 2020;
  • reduce the natural and anthropogenic hazards impact in Europe; preliminary modelling and forecast/early warning;
  • increase the role of risk prevention and early warning;
  • strength the direct access to data and services;
  • support pilot initiatives;
  • disseminate good practices;
  • support the harmonisation of data, procedures, methodologies, indicators, Data Quality, Data Validation.

(Source ReSAC)

EARSC affairs are run by an elected Board of Directors, its policy-making body, and an Executive Secretariat who acts on behalf of EARSC, in the administration of the smooth running of the Association and handles the communication with Stakeholders and Members.

We would like to express our congratulations to our two new Directors Stephane Israel and Nöel parmentier and to express our deepest appreciation to André Jadot who served for several years officially as Treasurer and now is leaving the association to embark in new endeavours.

We would like indeed to take this opportunity to stress the role of our Board of Directors. It is essential indeed that our members know about the dedication and competence of all those who are defending our industry interests through so many internal discussions, BoD , or external discussions within other statrekholers aas ESA, EC…etc

The actual Board is:

Position Name Company
Chairman Han Wensink BMT-ARGOSS
Vice-Chairman Nikolaus Faller Astrium Satellites
Vice-Chairman Chetan Pradhan Logica
Treasurer Michael Prechtel RapidEye
Director Christian Hoffmann Geoville Group
Director Antonio Rodrigues de Sousa Edisoft
Director Erik Willén Metria
Director Eric Pailharey Thales Alenia Space France
Director Stephane Isräel Astrium Services
Director Nöel Parmentier Eurosense Belfotop
Secretary General Geoff Sawyer EARSC
Executive Secretary Monica Miguel-Lago EARSC

The EARSC Board of Directors meets quarterly to progress EARSC business and to review the service it is providing to EARSC Members

The European Space Agency has contracted Astrium GEO-Information Services – Infoterra GmbH to work on the “Geographic Expansion for European and Canadian EO Services”, with a specific focus on fostering the uptake of geo-information services based on High Resolution Radar Data in the fast growing market China.

Thus, Astrium GEO – Infoterra GmbH is now calling for proposals for small projects, so-called ‘service trials’.

This activity is aimed at supporting the European Value-Adding Sector in expanding its commercial activities beyond Europe. The limited uptake by non-EU markets being a key challenge for these companies today, the service trials can be an ideal opportunity to study what the opportunities are and propose activities for how they can be realized within a 5 year development action plan.

The focus of the Geographic Expansion activity is to develop business opportunities outside Europe for mature services that are already available on a commercial basis today and rely (at least partially) on using EO data from European missions.

Bidders are requested to deliver a service demonstrator, a service trial’s technical report and a short service specific business.

More details and the complete ITT documents are now available for download at http://www.infoterra.de/itt_servicetrials