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In a newly published article by the Joint Research Centre of the European Commission (JRC), the researchers examine the concept of satellite remote sensing Essential Biodiversity Variables with their challenges and future directions.

To successfully prevent future biodiversity loss, swift progress on the way specialists track and report biodiversity changes is needed. Effective and continuous environmental monitoring is key to collect the knowledge and make decisions for prevention and mitigation actions.

The amount and type of Earth observation data collected by satellites is expected to steadily increase in the future. The concept that satellite-based variables are key components to a unified and global biodiversity monitoring strategy has gained traction in recent months.

The Group on Earth Observation – Biodiversity Observation Network was guided by the process of identifying Essential Climate Variables (ECV) and development of the Essential Biodiversity Variable (EBV) framework for biodiversity variables observable from space.

The list of EBVs (satellite remote sensing EBVs – SRS-EBV) that can be routinely monitored from space should be agreed by ecologists and space agencies.

Technological and algorithmic developments are rapidly expanding the set of opportunities for satellite remote sensing in monitoring biodiversity, and so the list of SRS-EBVs is likely to evolve over time. This means that a clear and common platform for data providers, ecologists and remote sensing experts to interact and share ideas needs to be identified to support long-term coordinated actions.

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Source JRC and Copernicus.eu

The UK plans to capture 10% of the global space market and tech startups are being targeted for investment

The UK has big ambitions for its space sector. The Space Innovation and Growth Strategy, has set a goal of capturing 10% of the global space market by 2030 (up from about 6.5% in 2010, when the plan was published). That amount would represent about £40bn of space-related revenues. The plan relies on the growth of small businesses in the sector.

Matt Perkins, who was the chairman of the UKspace (the space trade association) between 2013 and 2014 and now represents its SME forum, says: “We have a relatively small number of very big players in the UK who are involved in space, and we need to get a few more to be able to achieve the growth targets that we’ve identified.” As such, tech startups (both in and outside of the space sector ie technical businesses whose expertise could be applied to the industry) are being targeted with investment.

Most recently, the UK Space Agency awarded a business group in Durham £50,000 to set up a space technology incubator. Business Durham, which promotes economic development on behalf of Durham county council, will be overseeing the incubator in North East Technology Park (NETPark). Simon Goon, Business Durham’s managing director, says the area has proven its expertise in the space industry by nurturing a cluster of around 30 space-related startups. “They’re not all traditional space companies, some are more general tech companies,” he adds.

Oxfordshire is another region of growing activity in the space sector. Space technology business Oxford Space Systems, has shown the potential for attracting backers in the area. It launched in January 2014 after receiving £150,000 investment from Innovate UK, (the UK’s innovation agency) conditional on raising matched funding. It obtained this by winning another £500,000 from Longwall Ventures, a venture capital firm.

Mike Lawton, founder and CEO, a serial entrepreneur who previously worked in the biofuels and food and drinks industries, says of space tech: “I’m attracted to the sector because I think it’s a bit of a wild west at the moment: there’s a lot of unchartered territory.”

Oxford Space Systems’ equipment is used in satellites, it includes antennas for data communication and boom systems – which allow tech (such as a magnetometer for measuring the potential for earthquakes) to be extended outside the satellite and into space at various distances. These sensitive measuring instruments need to be pushed out into ‘clean’ space and away from the noisy electrical environment of the spacecraft. Oxford Space Systems is part of a wave of companies that are fuelling a revolution in the sector, called ‘New Space’.

These new space tech companies are building smaller satellite systems, often using off-the-shelf components, which are far cheaper to make than previous systems. This has made using satellite technology more accessible for a range of organisations, from energy companies to agriculture businesses.

Glasgow is another thriving area for space tech. It hosted the first UK Space Conference in 2013 and the University of Glasgow helped to develop the LISA Pathfinder – a vital piece of equipment used in a recent European Space Agency project.

With access to highly trained engineers – there is a high proportion of graduates and post graduates with experience relevant to the industry in Glasgow – and capital, the city also attracts space entrepreneurs. In 2005, Craig Clark set up satellite manufacturer Clyde Space in the city. He used the proceeds of a house sale and investment from friends and family (in 2010 the business also received funding from private equity firms Nevis Capital and Coralinn). Clyde Space’s satellites are called cubesats, which are about the size of a loaf of bread.

Clark says: “If you go back 10 years and there was an entrepreneur who wanted to start a space data company, they would need to raise hundreds of millions of dollars, whereas you can now have the same entrepreneur, the same idea for data, and you only need to raise maybe $20m-$30m (£14m – £21m).” Clyde Space’s turnover for this financial year (2015/2016) is expected to be about £5 million, a £2 million growth on the previous year.

Manufacturing satellites and other hardware is termed the ‘upstream’ side of the space industry. However, the majority of growth is expected to come from the ‘downstream’ side: creating applications using data collected from space to provide information to customers.

One business exploiting the growing demand for satellite data is Earth-i, based in Guildford, Surrey, which went into business last September, backed by private equity funding. Earth-i collects data from three high definition earth imaging satellites that Surrey Satellite Technology Limited (SSTL), a satellite manufacturer, launched last year.

The cameras on the satellites take pictures and store these as data onboard the satellites. When the satellites next pass over a ground station – a satellite dish on earth – they transmit the data to that dish. Earth-i analyses the data and then extracts specific information requested by clients. These clients include analysis firms like Rezatec, which requires the data for use in agricultural and environmental monitoring. A farmer might want them to track the health of vegetation, to see where fertiliser should be applied, for example.

Steve Young, Earth-i’s, director of sales and business development, says it’s a good time to be working in the UK space industry. “We’ve stepped into the opportunity gap, underpinned by support from government and the growing demand for satellite derived information and services worldwide.”

With the proven demand and earning potential for space-related tech, funding opportunities are on the rise. Seraphim Capital, a UK-based venture capital firm, is preparing to launch the world’s first venture fund focused on the space sector of £83m. It will be backed by capital from seven large players in the industry, as well as the British Business Bank, and supported by the UK Space Agency and the European Space Agency.

Mark Boggett, managing director at Seraphim Capital, says: “You can build a global company [in the sector] focused on a particular vertical [such as agriculture or security] for a relatively low amount of equity – that’s really attractive to venture capitalists.”

The space sector is reaching a tipping point where the market understands the potential for smaller satellites, says Brian Aitken, a partner at Nevis Capital, one of the investors in Clyde Space. “[The combination of] technical expertise, UK government support for export and the growth rate of the market should create a healthy environment for UK companies to flourish.”

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(04th March) Following the first impressive images from Sentinel-3A’s Ocean and Land Colour Instrument, this latest Copernicus satellite is now showing us how another of its instruments, an altimeter, will track sea level change

Following the first impressive images from Sentinel-3A’s Ocean and Land Colour Instrument, this latest Copernicus satellite is now showing us how another of its instruments, an altimeter, will track sea level change.

Just after the Synthetic Aperture Radar Altimeter (SARL) instrument was turned on, it traced the height of the sea surface over a stretch of the North Atlantic, some of the most dynamic ocean waters in the world.

Showing features relating to the Gulf Stream, the track compares very well with the background map of sea surface height. The map, produced by the Copernicus Marine Environment Monitoring Service, comprises near-realtime data for one day from the CryoSat, Jason-2 and SARAL/AltiKa satellites.

SRAL has been designed to deliver accurate measurements of sea surface height, significant wave height and surface wind speeds over the world’s oceans for Copernicus ocean forecasting systems and for monitoring sea level change.

On average, the global sea level has been rising at a rate of just over 3 mm/yr over the last 20 years., However , this figure varies considerably around the world.

The Sentinel-3 mission will offer valuable insight into these important variations.

Pierre-Yves Le Traon from Mercator Ocean said, “These first results are very promising and illustrate the great potential Sentinel-3 has for the Copernicus Marine Environment Monitoring Service.

“Sea surface height data from the satellite’s altimeter will, for example, significantly improve our capability to analyse and forecast ocean currents. This is essential for the applications we serve such as marine safety, ship routing and predicting the fate of marine pollution events.”

Another set of data show how SRAL will be used to map ‘significant wave height’, which again is important information needed for ship safety.

It will also provide accurate topography measurements over sea ice, ice sheets, rivers and lakes.

SRAL is based on heritage from the CryoSat and Jason missions. This first image is in low-resolution mode but it will provide measurements at a resolution of approximately 300 m in the along-track direction after processing.

It will be the first satellite altimeter to provide 100% coverage over all of Earth’s surfaces in synthetic aperture radar mode, directly resulting from experience with CryoSat .

Sentinel-3A has shown that these first two instruments are working well, now engineers and scientists are expecting the first data from its radiometer, which should come through in the next couple of days.

More info – Sentinel-3, Jason-3 and Jason-CS/Sentinel-6
To ensure accurate measurements of sea level change it is important to have altimeters on board a number of satellites, and key among these are the Jason ocean altimetry satellites, which act as the reference mission against which other altimeter instruments are calibrated against.

This means that Sentinel-3’s sea level measurements will be cross-calibrated against those of Jason-3, which will be the reference altimeter mission until after 2020, when Jason-CS/Sentinel-6 will take over.

With the optimum combination of the Jason-3 satellite and the future Sentinel-6 reference altimeter missions, and the altimeter mission of Sentinel-3, Europe will, in cooperation with the United States, provide both the reference and the backbone of the constellation expected to meet the requirements for operational oceanography and sea level monitoring for the next two decades.

EUMETSAT

Urban areas will play a critical role in achieving sustainable development and combating climate change. Many cities have already taken bold steps to reduce their environmental footprint, and have often been able to do so much more quickly and pro-actively than their national governments.

Based on the premise that greener cities are the key to a more sustainable future, the World Bank and the Global Environment Facility launched the new Global Platform for Sustainable Cities (GPSC) earlier this month in Singapore. The new platform will help mobilize funding for urban sustainability programs, while also facilitating knowledge exchange between cities.

Thanks to this innovative approach that closely connects finance to knowledge, the GPSC will be uniquely positioned to make cities the driving force of sustainable development.

By 2050, more than 2 billion more people will live in cities, a 50 percent increase from today, and the vast majority of this growth will take place in developing countries, mostly in Asia and Africa.

The new Global Platform is designed to help mayors and other municipal leaders take more informed decisions in the day-to-day management of their cities, including improving access to clean water, energy, and transport, as well as efforts to mitigate climate change. It supports cities in pursuing evidence-based approaches to urban planning, including geospatial data, and establishing urban sustainability indicators.

“Linking knowledge to finance is critical to directing investment flows to quality and sustainability. We see this platform as a great opportunity to connect cities not only to cutting-edge knowledge, but also to development banks and financial institutions,” said Ede Ijjasz-Vasquez, Senior Director of the World Bank’s Social, Urban, Rural, and Resilience Global Practice. “The World Bank will work closely with the partner institutions and the existing city networks to build a broad cooperation to support cities in translating knowledge into action and investment.”

In particular, the GPSC will provide cities with ways to help confront issues like climate change, to which cities are uniquely vulnerable, as almost half a billion urban residents live in coastal areas, increasing their exposure to storm surges and sea level rise. Cities also consume over two-thirds of global energy supply, and are responsible for 70 percent of greenhouse gas emissions.

The products and services provided by the GPSC will include studies, workshops, and online data that will leverage existing expertise in order to promote an integrated approach to tackling complex, multi-sector issues. With common metrics and guidelines in place, the lessons learned from the initial 23 cities can also be shared with hundreds of other cities via a wide range of city networks and other partners.

The GPSC is the foundation of the wider GEF sustainable cities initiative that is expected to create a strong network of cities that will act as global ambassadors for urban sustainability planning, with tangible benefits at both the local and global levels. As a GEF partnership, the initiative, formally called the ‘Sustainable Cities Integrated Approach Pilot’, will involve city municipalities, GEF agencies, development entities, city networks, and technical institutions. Civil society organizations will also contribute.

It will be implemented by the World Bank in partnership with the African Development Bank, the Asian Development Bank, the Development Bank of South Africa, the Inter-American Development Bank, the United Nations Environment Programme, the United Nations Development Programme, and the United Nations Industrial Development Organization.

The GPSC launch event was held during Singapore Urban Week, organized by the World Bank in partnership with the GEF and key partners in Singapore, including the Center for Liveable Cities and IE Singapore.

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Egypt, fearing its access to the Nile river will be hindered, plans to use a new satellite to track Ethiopia’s construction of Africa’s largest dam.

The Egysat, launched earlier this month, will monitor Ethiopia’s Grand Renaissance Dam by capturing high quality photos of the construction site along with other sources of the Nile, said Alaa El-din El-Nahry, vice president of Egypt’s National Authority for Remote Sensing and Space Sciences.

Ethiopia is more than 30 percent finished with the hydroelectric dam, which will be the largest in Africa and capable of producing 6,000 megawatts of energy. Egypt believes the dam will hugely impact its share of the Nile, the country’s main source of potable water.

El-Nahry said the satellite will come into operation in mid-June after a two-month test period. It will track the dam’s height, storage capacity and water discharge. It will also monitor the Kongo River basin to assess the effectiveness of a proposed project to link the Kongo and Nile rivers, El-Nahry said.

Egyptian officials said the satellite will be a reliable source of information which will be used in case it must resort to international arbitration over any violations in the dam’s stated purpose of electricity generation, El-Nahry said, according to Al-Ahram’s daily Arabic newspaper.

Last year, Ethiopia and five other Nile-basin countries – Rwanda, Tanzania, Uganda, Kenya and Burundi – endorsed the Co-operative Framework Agreement, which replaces a 1929 treaty granting Egypt veto power over any project on the Nile in upstream countries.

Sudan, Egypt’s immediate downstream country, has backed Ethiopia’s plans to build the dam.

Original article

European scientists are worried they could soon lose a vital tool for monitoring Earth’s ice fields.

The Cryosat-2 radar spacecraft has transformed studies of the Arctic, the Antarctic and Greenland, but is now operating beyond its design lifetime.

A group of 179 researchers is concerned the ageing mission could die in orbit at any time.

They have urged the European Commission (EC) and the European Space Agency (ESA) to start planning a replacement.

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The European Union is taking first steps to help European SMEs and start-ups fund recruitment of the best talent for research and innovation from around the world. The EU will fund the recruitment of post-doctoral research associates from other countries to explore an innovation business idea in the European SMEs and start-ups.

What’s the big deal?

Innovation in SMEs is often hampered by a lack of access to specialised skills and knowledge. At the same time, many companies find it difficult to manage innovation processes effectively and struggle to recruit specialised knowledge as they don’t tend to have extensive international Networks or the well-known brand names of large enterprises.

This is where the SME Associate programme comes in. By developing such enterprise-led mobility programme, the EU aims to increase access to talent for SMEs and start-ups by encouraging mobility. Because of this experimental nature it applies a fixed period for the recruitment of the researcher aligned to Academic year in most European countries.

So who is it for?

The SME Associate is accessible to all SMEs and start-ups established in the EU Member States and countries associated to Horizon 2020. The researchers must at least hold a PhD (or equivalent), have demonstrated expertise in line with the job advertisement, and comply with the transnational mobility criteria.

The SMEs will receive an individual grant covering salary and related costs of employing a post-doctoral research associate, including full training costs. This could allow the company to employ the right talent from anywhere across the globe to conduct research for their innovation idea.

If you are a researcher, on the other hand, you will be able to partake in the business’s innovation process, learn industrial innovation and business management skills, as well as boost your CV with business experience abroad.

What’s next?

Read more about the programme; see whether you meet the requirements and apply as of 11 February 2016!

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China: With a successful launch of Beidou-22, China on Tuesday conducted its third successful orbital launch of the year. Beidou-22, which is a navigation satellite, was launched by a Long March-3A rocket from the Xichang Satellite Launch Center. The new satellite, the sixth Beidou-2IGSO, is based on the DFH-3 Bus and features a phased array antenna for navigation signals and a laser retroreflector.

According to reports, the new satellite will be used to replenish the current operating regional system. The current Beidou constellation of geostationary (GEO) and four middle Earth orbiting (MEO) spacecraft are transmitting open and authorized signals at B2 (1207.14 MHz) and an authorized service at B3 (1268.52 MHz). Real-time, stand-alone Beidou horizontal positioning accuracy was classed as better than 6 meters (95 percent) and with a vertical accuracy better than 10 meters (95 percent). The Compass Navigation Satellite System (CNSS) is China’s satellite navigation system, approved by the Chinese government in 2004, capable of providing continuous, real-time passive 3D geo-spatial positioning and speed measurement. The Chinese navigation system is being developed and deployed in three phases: Phase 1 (starting in 2003), consisted of an experimental regional navigation system, BeiDou-1, which provided active navigation service; Phase 2 (started in 2012), consisted of a reduced satellite constellation and provides open service over China. This phase aimed at deploying a system with passive positioning and timing capability over a regional area; Phase 3 (starting in 2020), by 2020, the system would reach full operational capability with a constellation of 27 MEOs plus 5 GEOs and the existing 3 IGSOs satellites of the regional system. CNSS would provide global navigation services, similarly to the GPS, GLONASS or Galileo systems. –

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Nasa Space Flight

Satellite technology plays a crucial role in measuring greenhouse gas emissions globally, the heads of several space agencies agreed Sunday as they vowed to work together to develop a coordinated monitoring system.

The pledge comes after a landmark climate accord in Paris last year at which world leaders agreed to cap global warming by “well below” two degrees Celsius above pre-Industrial levels.

Satellites will play a “major role” in ensuring that ambitious target is met by measuring harmful emissions that contribute to the planet’s warming, said Jean-Yves Le Gall, president of France’s National Space Studies Centre (CNES), at the meeting in the India capital.

“The idea is to bring together all these ideas about satellite projects from different agencies” to measure carbon and methane emissions in order to eventually achieve “global coordination”, he told AFP.

Some countries already have satellites measuring emissions, but efforts have not been linked between countries, and as such there is no comprehensive measurement system in place.

Japan’s GoSat and the US OCO-2 satellites are already at work measuring carbon emissions.

China is developing its own TanSat and France is working on the MicroCarb satellite to survey Co2 emissions.

Meanwhile France and Germany are working together to develop a methane monitoring satellite that they have dubbed Merlin.

Le Gall said heads of space agencies around the world, including from China, France, India, Japan and the United States, agreed to work together to “achieve maximum cross-collaboration of tools and cross-verification steps” to coordinate and fact-check measurements.

The goal is to be able to track global emissions and also to record emissions per country, CNES said.

The meeting was organised by Le Gall and Kiran Kumar, president of the Indian Space Research Organisation.

It follows a similar conference last year in Mexico at which space agencies said satellite observation technology was a “key element of a global measurement system” and integral to reducing greenhouse gases around the world.

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