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(Nov 2008) GMV successfully organized a toxic gas leak emergency drill in Valladolid (Spain).

The drill, simulating a toxic gas leak from a tank truck, involved the participation of the local police, the fire brigade and GMV’s Healthcare Services. An Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) then overflew the zone to check the damage and assess the risks in the area; finally, a software tool analyzed the scope of the leak and helped in decision-taking procedures.

This drill was one of the scenarios organized by the European Commission’s R&D protect called OSIRIS, which is responsible for Europe’s standard monitoring of all types of geographically referenced phenomena based on in situ sensors, i.e., within a few-kilometer range around the object or phenomenon under observation (such as a toxic cloud, polluted water, etc). To do so it uses GPS systems and suitable measuring devices to record the information on the actual site of the event in question. This project involves the participation of over 7 countries and 14 companies.

OSIRIS has 4 specific areas (air, water, industrial fires and forest fires). GMV is one of the companies participating in this project and is in charge of organizing the air quality scenario. Italy is dealing with water quality, Germany with industrial fires and France with forest fires. During this process the results of OSIRIS’s air quality scenario have been demonstrated and assessed. The information from the OSIRIS sensors has been used for monitoring pollution levels in the city of Valladolid, keeping track of the contaminants after an emergency situation.

The objective of this project is to develop the necessary technology and software for setting up the intelligent sensor networks, thus facilitating the subsequent data analysis operations. This system will be conducive to a much more efficient management of environmental crises. Toxicity levels can now be measured in situ and the various environmental factors impinging on the event can be more accurately ascertained. Images of the situation can also be obtained. This will improve the performance protocol in each situation.

The drill was supported by the Town Council of Boecillo, keen to promote management systems for emergencies of this type, and also by the Technology Park of Boecillo, which made its site available for carrying out the drill.

More info: [ http://osiris-fp6.eu/ ]

Source GMV#

Supervised Crop Classification from Medium Resolution Multitemporal Images.

The European Space Agency (ESA) has organized its second joint MERIS and (A)ATSR workshop, which was hosted at ESA ESRIN in Frascati, Italy from 22 to 26 September 2008.

The workshop was intended to address the utilisation of MERIS and (A)ATSR data for remote sensing of open oceans, coastal waters, land surfaces and atmospheric processes with the main objectives as listed below:

  • Present the latest results and status of research and development projects (including AO and cat-1).
  • Review capabilities and achievements in the use of MERIS and (A)ATSR data for applications development in the land, marine and atmosphere domains.
  • Update MERIS and (A)ATSR data users on instrument performance and product quality.
  • Formulate recommendations for improved data access and utilization, including ordering and analysis tools, algorithms and new product development.
  • Foster enhanced collaboration between MERIS and (A)ATSR research groups
  • Inform users on the current status of the GMES Sentinel 2 and 3 payloads.

from Gisat website

Gisat has presented our experiences with the use of multitemporal medium resolution satellite imagery for the agricultural land use mapping and crop classification in particular.

Workshop presentation

New GIM website (Geographic Informaitn Management)

GIM is an independent consultancy and GIS software integrator. We guide your projects, offer you support and make bespoke applications. We help you to study spatial problems and keep you informed about the latest technologies in the GeoICT domain.

The customer is king! For GIM this means :

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We share our expertise with you in many different ways:

  • Consultancy and project management
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  • GIM online services

Geodata in focus … You are looking for the most suitable data for your GIS? Have a look at our Geodata section

Source from GIM website

(Nov 2008) GeoVille Group and Intermap Technologies – highly accurate elevation models

As published in the Nov. issue of AGEO, GeoVille Group and Intermap Technologies announced the first sale of their highly accurate elevation models to a state government in Austria. The digital map data will be used for the geo-rectification of orthophotos and the general planning of the new Vienna International airport.
The Intermap NEXTMap® 3D digital mapping data can be requested here

Link to the press release of AGEO

GEO-ID News

December 2008
GeoID writes an article in the professional magazine GeoPlatform. Have a look at the GeoPlatform-website here. Subscription is free of charge if you live in Flanders or Brussels.

November 2008
GeoID delivers an imagery coverage for a mining company in République Démocratique du Congo. SDG is our local partner.

(Winter 2008) GAF has been awarded a contract to design and establish the new automated and countrywide Mining Registry and Cadastre System for Mongolia.

After the successful completion of contract negotiations GAF will start work on%site in November 2008. The project under the Governance Assistance Program (GAP) aims to improve governance in the mining sector, through the establishment of a transparent system to grant, manage and cancel permits. The efficient and reliable management of mining titles is considered as a backbone to increase investment and growth in the mining sector of Mongolia.

The Project’s objective is to strengthen the property rights and security of tenure within the mining sector; enhance the transparency of the mineral licensing process and government’s regulatory capacity through improved efficiency, information availability and management.

A core element of the Project is the supervision, development, equipping and implementation of a fully computerized mining registry and cadastre system. Existing analogue and digital data will be inventoried and re%organised. Institutional strengthening including focussed training activities and legal advice shall enhance the overall framework created by the new Mineral Law for the benefit of the administration, miners, investors as well as the public.

Works will be performed for the Mineral Resources and Petroleum Authority of Mongolia, MRPAM. The project duration is 24 months, including a maintenance and support phase of 12 months. Activities are funded by the World Bank, International Development Association.

The contract value amounts to 0.5 million EUR. The activities in Mongolia follow countries like Nigeria, DRC, Madagascar and Namibia, where GAF has set up nation wide computerised mining titling systems, some successful in operation for more than 10 years.

About GAF
GAF, a 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 and spatial IT consultancy to private and public clients. The company has set new standards in quality, competence and reliability, while simultaneously developing a
high%performance and multi%disciplinary range of products and services.

GAF offers fully integrated technical and institutional assistance and management consultancy underpinned by geo%spatial services and products.

GAF AG has a proven track%record in performing technical assistance projects in the natural resources sector and is delivering customized cadastral and registry as well as geological and land information systems.

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

Every day, remote sensing provides thousands of images from a huge variety of sensors – from simple black and white photographs to hyperspectral imagery with hundreds of channels.

The images range in scale from hundreds of square miles for monitoring large areas of land and sea to high resolution images of individual objects.

Standardized image analysis and information extraction are essential to compare results across geographic areas and support political directives like the Kyoto Protocol, sustainable management of natural resources and future-proof infrastructure planning. Similarly, in natural disasters and other emergencies, image analysis can rapidly provide maps of remote territory to assist emergency operations, save lives, reduce costs and support insurance and reinsurance services.

Attempts to automate image analysis and information extraction have been continuing for decades. But despite increases in computational power and imaging capabilities, fundamental advances in automated image analysis have been limited. Looking at a satellite image, it is easy, even for an untrained eye, to distinguish a river from a lake. But traditional automated image classification tools often fail to recognize features that are obvious to any person because they only use information contained within individual pixels and their immediate neighbors.

From the perspective of an image analyst, there is so much more to an image than the color and intensity of pixels. There is shape, texture, area, scale and the relationships of the objects, all attributes which analysts use to understand the content of an image and data set.

Image analysis in Infrastructure Planning
Accurate mapping and change detection are essential tools in the sustainable planning of urban infrastructure and traffic corridors. They are vital in reducing the cost of constructing and operating new oil and gas pipelines or telecoms infrastructure. They support urban planning should be supported by helping to ensure that land is used appropriately and that quality of life is enhanced by reducing noise and pollution.

Image analysis in Natural Resource Management
An accurate and up-to-date picture of land cover and of the surface of the ocean is vital for assessing the health of the planet. It is used to measure the impact of climate change, assess biodiversity in natural habitats, and support sustainable farming and forest management. It is also invaluable in finding and exploiting natural resources like oil and gas fields.

Image analysis in Security and Emergency Response
Rapid mapping and data fusion are necessary to create detailed maps of any territory. Object detection needs to be linked with feature extraction in order to understand fully the situation on the ground. For example, in order to assess damage after disasters and monitor reconstruction, change detection is an essential tool. Similarly, monitoring and identifying changes over time supports geo-professionals in making timely and well-informed decisions.

Definiens enables organizations involved in Earth Sciences to extract accurate and reliable geo-information rapidly, from any kind of remote sensing imagery. Enterprises and organizations all along the value chain – data providers, service providers and end users – rely on our software to bridge the gap between Earth Observation and remote sensing on the one hand and Geographical Information Systems (GIS) on the other. By correlating image analysis with other geospatial information, Earth Sciences organizations can generate, with minimal manual intervention, accurate GIS-ready information.

Source Definiens from website

(Nov 2008) This past 26th November Aurensis has signed an agreement with CatUAV to be sole distributors of value-added geo-information services with UAV technology.

Aurensis, faithfull to its commitment to continuous innovation in management technologies and territory data collection, takes a step forward and becomes thus the first provider of Earth observation services in Spain using UAV (Unmanned Air Vehicles).

The UAV platform – light, undetectable, fast and secure – enables loading different sensors: high-resolution digital optical sensor, video, near-infrared and thermal to obtain high-resolution video and images (1 cm / 1 pixel) of the Earth surface, data suitable for high-accuracy mapping, to identify and monitor changes, for vegetation monitoring, obtaining temperatures, etc. ….

With the UAV platform, Aurensis provides new services for natural resources, public works, infrastructure (water, gas, electricity, etc. ..) monitoring through georeferenced images and videos, as well as real-time information for emergencies’ management (fire, discharges, etc …) never available before in the sector.

For more information: UAV Services, R+D+I ITUMA

Source Aurensis

(Nov 2008) The Final Report on the Initial Period of the GMES Action Plan, which was presented on 26 November 2003, has recognised the European Civil Protection (ECP) as one of the GMES service categories and stressed the need to develop enabling e-infrastructures and virtual organisation services for specific GMES applications.

Indeed, the EU EGEE (Enabling Grids for E-Science in Europe) project provides a powerful GRID platform to implement services for specific application communities but focuses rather on technology than on services, while GMES is more user-oriented. In order to bring together these two important Communities: GMES and GRID, the CYCLOPS (CYber-Infrastructure for CiviL protection Operative ProcedureS) project focuses on the needs of ECP and thus aims at:

1. Disseminating EGEE results to the ECP Community, possibly in close relation with EGEE events, and promoting a close collaboration between the two communities;
2. Providing the EGEE Community with knowledge and requirements that characterise the ECP services;
3. Evaluating the possibility to use existing EGEE services for ECP applications;
4. Developing research strategies to enhance EGEE platform, especially for Earth sciences resources.

By establishing liaisons and synergies with other existing projects and initiatives dealing with GMES, GRID and complementary sectors, CYCLOPS will contribute to the EU policy developments.

In the framework of CYCLOPS, a workshop named ‘Towards a European e-Infrastructure for Civil Protections’ will take place on 5 December 2008 in Rome. The main objective of this workshop is to discuss the innovations necessary to build a unified e-Infrastructure for Civil Protection applications in Europe, whilst involving the Civil Protection, the Geospatial and the GRID communities. Amongst others, the current status of GMES and the applications of downstream services to fires and floods will be discussed.

More information at:
http://www.cyclops-project.eu/Default.aspx?id_menu=0

Source

(Dec 2008) EUMETSAT, the European Organisation for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites, held its 66th Council meeting in Darmstadt, Germany, from December 9th through 10th.

The meeting was chaired by General Dr. Massimo Capaldo, Head of the Meteorological Department (Chief of the Staff Office — Ufficio Generale Spazio Aereo e Meteorologia) in the Italian General Meteorological Office.

This was the first EUMETSAT Council attended by Hungary as a full Member State, having joined on October 9, 2008. The Council approved resolutions on the accession of Poland and Latvia with a view to them becoming full Member States in 2009. The EUMETSAT Council extended the Cooperating State Agreement with Romania until the end of 2010. Negotiations on Romania becoming a full Member State will start in early 2009. The Council also approved an amendment to the Cooperating State agreement with Serbia, paving the way for the ratification of this agreement.

The Council also approved the organization of a meeting of potential participants in the Jason-2 ocean altimetry satellite follow-on program in early 2009, with several delegates expressing support for a Jason-2 follow-on mission. The Council adopted a Preliminary Programme Proposal on the Sentinel-3 Third Party Programme. This will allow EUMETSAT to initiate activities in January 2009 in anticipation of the later approval of a GMES/Kopernikus Sentinel-3 as a Third Party Programme in EUMETSAT under the responsibility of the European Space Agency (ESA). EUMETSAT will be the operator of Sentinel-3, serving the marine user community with near-real-time and off-line products.

The Council endorsed the concept for cooperation with the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration on the Joint Polar System to follow the current generation of polar satellites. It also extended the cooperation agreement with the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) on the exchange of data from geostationary satellites to include polar-orbiting and ocean altimetry satellites. The Council approved a new technical building to support EUMETSAT’s present and future operational activities.

Finally, the Council discussed plans for promoting further EUMETSAT climate monitoring activities. This includes being a proactive contributor to new climate initiatives by, and implementing cooperation with, the European Commission and ESA; reinforcing cooperation on climate with the World Meteorological Organization, the Group on Earth Observations and the Committee on Earth Observation Satellites; improving existing EUMETSAT communication activities on climate monitoring; updating the EUMETSAT Satellite Application Facility strategy to further support climate monitoring; and implementing a climate section in the EUMETSAT Earth Observation portal.

Source SATNEWS