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Policy-makers, industry leaders, scientists and civil society representatives will gather in Brussels on 29-30 January for the fifth high-level conference on EU space policy.

The conference, entitled ‘EU Space Policy: Building up a Global Tool for Global Challenges’, takes as its starting point the fact that satellite navigation, observation and telecommunications systems have become ubiquitous and are affecting almost every aspect of our daily lives. From travel to security, farming to the environment, broadcasting to phoning, there are few areas where satellites cannot reach.

But how can policy-makers foster the technological and entrepreneurial boom while devising a sound regulatory framework? The conference will address the key challenges facing EU space policy: boosting the competitiveness of the EU space industry, promoting the key role of research and development, and ensuring an effective governance of EU space activities.

Leading names in space policy

The conference will feature an exhaustive list of leading names in European space policy, and the breadth of issues covered is reflected in the names taking part. Alongside European Commission President José Manuel Barroso, Vice President Antonio Tajani (Enterprise and Industry), Commissioners Michel Barnier (Internal Market and Services), and Cecilia Malmström (Home Affairs) will take part in the conference.

Carlo des Dorides, the Executive Director of the European GNSS Agency (GSA) will also take part, speaking during a debate on January 30 about the relationship between the European Commission and the various national and European agencies dealing with space policy.

Research, industry and governance challenges to debate

The conference organisers say the debate will challenge speakers on whether the 27 Member States are ready to mobilise the financial resources needed to meet the EU’s commitment with regard to a space policy mentioned in the Lisbon Treaty. The conference has sessions that correspond to the two pillars on which EU space policy is expected to rely on: (1) an industrial policy, and (2) a research and innovation policy tailored to the specificities of the space sector.

In addition to discussing EU space policy, the conference will look at the European space programmes – the Galileo satellite navigation system and the EGNOS signal enhancing system and Copernicus, the European Earth observation programme – along with the EU’s research plans for the 2014-2020 budgetary period. There will also be debates on governance issues, from questions like data management and the future European system for space surveillance and security to broader ones about how, by whom should these different space programmes and initiatives be managed – a particularly tricky issue given the increasing dual use of space services and applications for both civil and defence purposes.

More Information:

EU Space Policy

Source GSA

The Centre for Earth Observation Instrumentation (CEOI) is hosting ‘Innovations in Remote Sensing’ on January 23rd 2013. This event will provide a great opportunity to catch up with the latest Earth observation instrumentation technologies, as well as highlighting potential areas for licensing, collaboration or supply.

The CEOI has a vision to develop and strengthen UK expertise and capabilities in Earth observation (EO) instruments and works to position the UK to win leading roles in future international space programmes. The programme supports mainstream projects and smaller ‘seedcorn’ projects, both selected through Open Calls to the EO community. However, although the technical drive has been to produce instruments for space, in many cases the resulting technologies have non-space applications. A number of sectors which could be potential beneficiaries of such technologies include healthcare, defence and security, analytical instrumentation, marine industries and environmental.

The event is open to all interested parties and aims to:

  • Highlight collaborative opportunities emanating from remote sensing technologies in space
  • Outline the particular needs in Earth Observation for spin-in technologies
  • Showcase a number of CEOI projects

The format for the day will include a schedule of formal presentations – outlining technology needs and collaborative opportunities for several of the CEOI projects. Another key feature will be the exhibition element, showcasing CEOI projects, which starts at lunch time.

The event will take place at the NUT, Hamilton House, Mabledon Place, London WC1 9BD (Kings Cross or Euston tube stations). It will start at 10.00 and is scheduled to finish at 16.00, with refreshments including lunch being provided. Click here for map and directions.

Participation is free. To register and for further information, please visit the CEOI website

A satellite processing platform for high resolution forest assessment

Preface
The FORSAT project is a research project co-funded by the national funding authorities of the participating countries under EUROSTARS and the European Commission. The consortium met on 29.11.2012 in the kick-off meeting, hosted in Nicosia, Cyprus.

The concept
The aim of project is to raise the current technological level of aerial imagery in combination with airborne laser scanning for forest cover mapping applications to a standalone satellite based monitoring capacity. Specifically, the project aspires to transfer the existing precise processing capabilities of airborne techniques to VHR optical, stereographic satellite data, thereby providing a single source forest information solution. The envisaged FORSAT platform will enable high resolution thematic mapping of forest areas along with canopy height, thereby allow derivation of forest volume. Based on historical data, the system will allow automatic change detection of forest / non-forest areas along with change in forest volume. The FORSAT functionalities, accuracy, capacities and applicability to specified market segments shall be tested, improved and benchmarked.

We aim to test the capacity and benefits of FORSAT to European champion users in Austria, Cyprus, Greece, Spain, Switzerland and Turkey, by executing 6 application case studies. This will generate the necessary facts and needed trust of other public bodies and private organizations to use VHR satellite data for many forest information needs, which do not require centimetre accuracy. Finally, the project shall develop the marketing strategies and business agreements among the partners (and future service providers) for the sale of the FORSAT platform and the accompanying services.

In summary, the direct objectives of the proposed project FORSAT are to:
1. develop and validate a VHR satellite imagery based processing suite and dedicated application solutions products (FORSAT 3D software suite and FORSAT 3D Forest Geo-Products);
2. test user required applications with viability for future operation and prospect for wider service uptake to the European market;
3. set the business framework and promote the developed capacity to provide VHR satellite based forest assessment solutions.
The results of FORSAT will provide single source, flexible forest information solutions with a very competitive price/quality ratio, allowing for new market entry in the forest sector. The project is conceived as a fully user driven project and the consortium setup ensures know how transfer between the European EO software development and service application industry.

Other related info

  • Starting Date: November 1, 2012
  • Duration: 24 months
  • Initial budget: 1.642.280,00 €
  • Website: http://www.forsat.eu (under construction)
  • Coordinator: Dr Stratos Stylianidis[stratos@geoimaging.com.cy]
    GeoImaging Ltd, Cyprus
  • Code: E!7358
  • Funding scheme: EUROSTARS

Partners

  • GeoImaging Ltd, Cyprus
  • 4DiXploer AG, Switzerland
  • Ekinoks Surveying Software Eng Ltd. Co, Turkey
  • Ingeniería Y Soluciones Informáticas S.L., Spain
  • GeoVille GmbH, Austria

On 3-4 December 2012 the Research Infrastructures Unit of Directorate General Research & Innovation hosted a workshop entitled “Towards an integrated atmospheric observing system in Europe”.

At this occasion a presentation was made by MACC-II, the project responsible for the implementation of the pre-operational version of the Copernicus atmosphere monitoring service.

The presentations made during the workshop are available here

(Source European Commission) and Copernicus website

Applications are now open for the MACC-II “Modeling and Forecasting of atmospheric composition at different scales” summer school.

The lectures will focus on issues such as the acquisition and analysis of in situ and satellite observations, the development of global and regional chemistry-transport models, the data needed as input to the models such as surface emissions, and the use of observations in data assimilation and inverse modelling. Working groups will be organized, where more advanced lectures on specific topics will be organized, and demonstrations and work on the MACC-II products will be also organized.

Applications deadline: January 31st 2013

The school will take place on June 9-16 in Anglet in the South-West of France. More indications on how to reach this place by train and plane will be given later. The school is open to all PhD students, post-docs, users of MACC-II products, and data providers. The attendance is limited to 60 people. Applications will be reviewed by a committee, and the selection of applicants will be announced before the end of February 2013.

The cost for attending will be about 450 euros, which includes full board (from diner on June 9 to breakfast on July 16), based on 2 persons sharing a room. A few individual rooms might also be available for an extra cost of about 120 euros. At the present time, no grants are available: a very small number of grants might be available later.

Apply here

Source Copernicus website and MACC

(9 January 2013) GeoEye announced that it has received antitrust clearance from the U.S. Department of Justice in connection with its pending combination with DigitalGlobe.

As previously announced, on July 23, 2012, the boards of directors of both GeoEye and DigitalGlobe unanimously approved a definitive merger agreement under which the companies will combine. Completion of the transaction is subject to satisfaction of other customary closing conditions, including obtaining regulatory approval from the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). GeoEye is working cooperatively with the FCC and NOAA, and the transaction is expected to close by January 31, 2013. Shareowners of both GeoEye and DigitalGlobe have previously voted overwhelmingly in favor of the combination. Simultaneous with the closing of the transaction, the company expects to complete a $1.2 billion refinancing, which is expected to include a combination of senior notes and senior secured credit facilities.

About GeoEye

GeoEye is a leading source of geospatial information and insight for decision makers and analysts, who need a clear understanding of our changing world to protect lives, manage risk and optimize resources. Each day, organizations in defense and intelligence, public safety, critical infrastructure, energy and online media rely on GeoEye’s imagery, tools and expertise to support important missions around the globe. Widely recognized as a pioneer in high-resolution satellite imagery, GeoEye has evolved into a complete provider of geospatial intelligence solutions. GeoEye’s ability to collect, process and analyze massive amounts of geospatial data allows our customers to quickly see precise changes on the ground and anticipate where events may occur in the future. GeoEye is a public company listed on NASDAQ as GEOY and is headquartered in Herndon, Virginia with more than 700 employees worldwide.

(source: GeoEye)

In the image acquired with the German Aerospace Center TerraSAR-X radar satellite, one thing is clear – even today, tropical rainforest proliferates on the island and the coastal cliffs continue to make life difficult for mariners. Captain William Mynors was not particularly creative as he sailed past a remote island in the Indian Ocean on the ‘Royal Mary’, a ship belonging to the British East India Company, on 25 December 1643. He named the 135-square-kilometre island, which he could not even disembark on, ‘Christmas Island’.

The island is surrounded by some 80 kilometres of cliffs. The choppy waters of the surf on the south coast are not easy to image clearly for the radar on TerraSAR-X – the waves reflect the radar signals back to the satellite very irregularly.

It looks different in the bay between the only harbour on the island, Flying Fish Cove in the northeast, and West White Beach in the northwest: “When the image was acquired on 26 November 2012, the water there was apparently calm,” explains mission manager Stefan Buckreuss from the DLR Microwaves and Radar Institute. “The smooth surface reflects the signals away from the satellite, so it appears as a dark surface.”

Radar view of manmade structures

The fact that the small villages on the island are detectable even from space, at an altitude of over 500 kilometres, is down to the numerous right angles and corners on the buildings. The radar signals from TerraSAR-X encounter the walls, are partly reflected onto the street, and only travel back towards the satellite’s receiving antenna after being deflected a number of times.

A retroreflector, such as the reflector on a bicycle, works in a similar way, consisting of numerous mirrors arranged at right angles to one another so that a large part of the incident light is always reflected back towards the source, almost independent of its position.

When analysing radar images, DLR scientists can use this to determine where TerraSAR-X has imaged manmade structures, as the existence of right angles is primarily a characteristic of artificial objects. In the image of Christmas Island, the small communities appear magenta.

Anyone wanting to celebrate Christmas 350 kilometres south of Java and over 2600 kilometres northwest of Perth will have little company. Of the 1400 inhabitants, the majority are Buddhists, then Islamists and finally Christians.

The island, which belongs to Australia, has principally been of interest in the past for its phosphate deposits – hence, its ownership has shifted from Britain to Japan, then back to Britain and finally to Australia. The inhabitants today include Chinese, Australians, Europeans and Malays.

Crab migrations in the impenetrable forest

However, the most unusual inhabitants live in a place where the radar signals from the TerraSAR-X satellite are largely absorbed – in the thick tropical rainforest, which has been protected since 1980 as the Christmas Island National Park.

Since early December 2012, the start of the rainy season, millions of red Christmas Island crabs have been on a journey to the shore in order to breed there. In doing so, they abandon their habitat in the forest and travel miles to the water. However, the thickly forested island remains largely impenetrable to TerraSAR-X.

“The forest canopy reflects radar signals in only very limited amounts,” explains Buckreuss. Only routes through the forest that people have created are apparent from space, appearing as just indentations. It is easier to reach Christmas Island nowadays than it was for Captain Mynors – there is a small airport in the northeast of the island, with flights from Kuala Lumpur and Perth.

TerraSAR-X is the first German satellite manufactured under what is known as a Public-Private Partnership between the German Aerospace Center (Deutsches Zentrum fur Luft- und Raumfahrt; DLR) and Astrium GmbH in Friedrichshafen.

The satellite travels around the Earth in a polar orbit and records unique, high-quality X-band radar data about the entire planet using its active antenna. TerraSAR-X works regardless of weather conditions, cloud cover or the absence of daylight and is able to provide radar data with a resolution down to one metre.

Source

DLR

Captain William Mynors was not particularly creative as he sailed past a remote island in the Indian Ocean on the ‘Royal Mary’, a ship belonging to the British East India Company, on 25 December 1643. He named the 135-square-kilometre island, which he could not even disembark on, ‘Christmas Island’

China’s first high-resolution, stereo mapping satellite Ziyuan III meets international standards, ridding the country of its reliance on imports of satellite images.

It was announced at a seminar reviewing the research and development of Ziyuan III held on Wednesday, one year after the satellite was launched.

China used to import over 90 percent of its remote-sensing data, according to the seminar.

The launch of Ziyuan III has enhanced the country’s capability to capture space remote-sensing images, bolstered state security and boosted the geo-information industry.

Also according to the seminar, China plans to build a remote-sensing mapping satellite system in 10 to 15 years. Three follow-up mapping satellites are already in the pipeline.

The Ziyuan III 02 satellite is likely to be launched in early 2014, allowing the two orbiters to form a network, so that real-time data on any given point on earth can be retrieved throughout the day.

The satellite, a high-resolution remote-sensing satellite for civilian use, was launched on Jan. 9, 2012. It is expected to compete with its foreign counterparts that currently dominate the country’s hi-res remote-sensing and mapping market.

The satellite is tasked with offering services to aid the country’s land-resources surveys, natural-disaster prevention, agricultural development, water-resources management and urban planning.

It has a designed life expectancy of five years.

Source: Xinhua News Agency and Spacedaily

WASHINGTONNASA’s Landsat Data Continuity Mission (LDCM) is scheduled to launch Feb. 11 from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. A joint NASA and U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) mission, LDCM will add to the longest continuous data record of Earth’s surface as viewed from space.

LDCM is the eighth satellite in the Landsat series, which began in 1972. The mission will extend more than 40 years of global land observations that are critical in many areas, such as energy and water management, forest monitoring, human and environmental health, urban planning, disaster recovery and agriculture. NASA and the USGS jointly manage the Landsat Program.

“For decades, Landsat has played an important part in NASA’s mission to advance Earth system science. LDCM promises to extend and expand that capability,” said Michael Freilich, director of the Earth Science Division in the Science Mission Directorate at NASA Headquarters in Washington. “USGS’s policy of offering free and open access to the phenomenal 40-year Landsat data record will continue to give the United States and global research community a better understanding of the changes occurring on our planet.”

After launch, LDCM will enter a polar orbit, circling the Earth about 14 times daily from an altitude of 438 miles (705 kilometers), returning over each location on Earth every 16 days. After launch and the initial checkout phase, the USGS will take operational control of the satellite, and LDCM will be renamed Landsat 8. Data will be downlinked to three ground stations in Gilmore Creek, Alaska; Svalbard, Norway; and Sioux Falls, S.D. The data will be archived and distributed at no cost to users from the USGS’s Earth Resources Observation and Science Center in Sioux Falls.

“The Landsat program provides the nation with crucial, impartial data about its natural resources,” said Matthew Larsen, USGS associate director for climate and land use change in Reston, Va. “Forest managers, for instance, use Landsat’s recurring imagery to monitor the status of woodlands in near real-time. Landsat-based approaches also now are being used in most western states for cost-effective allocation of water for irrigation. This mission will continue that vital role.”

LDCM carries two instruments, the Operational Land Imager (OLI), built by Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corp. in Boulder, Colo., and the Thermal Infrared Sensor (TIRS), built by NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. These instruments are designed to improve performance and reliability over previous Landsat sensors.

LDCM will be the best Landsat satellite yet launched in terms of the quality and quantity of the data collected by the LDCM sensors,” said Jim Irons, LDCM project scientist at Goddard. “OLI and TIRS both employ technological advances that will make the observations more sensitive to the variation across the landscape and to changes in the land surface over time.”

OLI will continue observations currently made by Landsat 7 in the visible, near infrared, and shortwave infrared portions of the electromagnetic spectrum. It also will take measurements in two new bands, one to observe high altitude cirrus clouds and one to observe water quality in lakes and shallow coastal oceans as well as aerosols. OLI’s new design has fewer moving parts than previous versions.

TIRS will collect data on heat emitted from Earth’s surface in two thermal bands, as opposed to the single thermal band on previous Landsat satellites. Observations in the thermal bands are vital to monitoring water consumption, especially in the arid western United States.

The LDCM spacecraft, built by Orbital Sciences Corp. in Gilbert, Ariz., will launch from Vandenberg’s Space Complex 3 aboard an Atlas V rocket provided by United Launch Alliance. NASA’s Launch Services Program at Kennedy Space Center is responsible for launch management.

For more information on LDCM and the Landsat Program, visit:
http://www.nasa.gov/Landsat
and
http://landsat.usgs.gov

Source

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(January 2013) Arianespace will launch an Earth observation satellite on behalf of the Vietnamese Academy of Science and Technology in 2013.

AsianScientist (Jan. 7, 2013) – Arianespace and Astrium today signed the launch contract for the VNREDSat-1A Earth observation satellite, on behalf of the Vietnamese Academy of Science and Technology.

This ceremony was attended by the European Space Agency’s (ESA) Director General and by representatives of the Directorate of Launchers, and comes at a time when Vietnam and France are celebrating their 40th anniversary of diplomatic relations.

VNREDSat-1A will be launched by Arianespace during the second quarter of 2013 by the second Vega launcher, VERTA 1, at the Guiana Space Center, French Guiana.

The satellite will be carried in the lower position on the Vespa multiple launch structure used for this mission.

An optical observation satellite, VNREDSat-1A will be injected into sun-synchronous orbit (SSO) at an altitude of 670 km. The 120-kg satellite is being built by Astrium, which will supply to Vietnam the complete satellite system and ground receiving facilities.

“We are especially proud of once again being able to work with Vietnam, following the successful launches of Vinasat-1 and -2 communications satellites. We are very pleased to be working once more with Astrium, after having launched five of their satellites during the last four months of 2012,” said Arianespace Chairman and CEO Jean-Yves Le Gall.

Vinasat-2 was flown into orbit by Arianespace’s Ariane-5 ECA rocket in May 2012, four years after its predecessor, Vinasat-1, was launched in 2008.

Source