Latest ESA Centre for Earth Observation Stories

ESA This week, ESA opened a new Space Weather Coordination Centre to gather up-to-date information on our Sun. It is the first such data coordination center opened under the Agency’s Space Situational Awareness Programme. The new Space Situational Awareness (SSA) Space Weather Coordination Centre (SSCC) will serve as the central access point to a portfolio of European space-weather expertise for customers, including satellite operators, industrial sectors including telecommunications...

ESA The effects of climate change, population growth and economic development in the Mediterranean are posing a threat to the water supply in the region. As part of ESA’s TIGER initiative, satellite data are supporting water management by identifying water resources. The demand for water is growing around the Mediterranean and is especially crucial in areas that do not receive regular rainfall. This is especially true for the southernmost parts of Europe and the countries lying along...

The sixth ESA Earth Observation Summer School wraps up today. The two-week course saw 70 students from more than 20 countries worldwide convene at ESRIN, ESA’s centre for Earth observation in Frascati, Italy. The students, mostly PhD students and young postdoctoral scientists, attended daily lectures covering issues related to remote sensing, Earth system modelling and data assimilation. Jean-Noël Thépaut, Head of Data Division at the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather...

ESA and industry have built a strong relationship in the 35 years they have worked together. But with changing times, we should review this relationship to see what has worked well and what needs to be improved, so that it continues to grow. On 10 May, the last of a series of workshops at the various ESA establishments concluded at ESRIN in Frascati, Italy. Part of a ‘consultation with industry’ process, each workshop dealt with a number of important topics regarding the cooperation...

The deadline for abstract submissions for the April 2012 symposium on the Sentinel-2 satellite is just around the corner. The first Sentinel-2 Preparatory Symposium will be hosted at ESA’s ESRIN centre for Earth observation in Frascati, Italy, from 23 to 27 April 2012. The symposium is open to anyone interested in Sentinel-2 data or involved in the development of the mission, including ESA Principal Investigators, co-investigators, Sentinel-2 users, scientists, students and...

Over 30 years of archived data from the US Landsat Earth-observing satellites are now available, free of charge. The majority of these products are unique to ESA’s archive and have never before been accessible anywhere else by the scientific user community. In its archives, ESA holds around two million products that cover Europe and North Africa. The total amount of data available is worth about 450 terabytes – that’s equivalent to about 900 000 hours of audio recorded at CD quality....

Watch the celebration and scientific workshop on the legacy of the two ERS satellite missions. The events were held on 27 September at ESRIN, ESA’s centre for Earth observation, in Frascati, Italy. Earlier this month, the veteran ERS-2 satellite was shut down after its orbit was lowered to reduce the risk of collision with other satellites and space debris. ERS-2 was launched in 1995, four years after ERS-1, the first European Remote Sensing satellite. With 20 years of continuous...

  Join ESA as it celebrate 20 years of Earth observations by the ERS satellites via live web stream on 27 September. A scientific workshop on the legacy of the two European Remote Sensing missions will be held 13:00–17:30 CEST (11:00–15:30 GMT) at ESRIN, ESA’s center for Earth observation, in Frascati, Italy. Those unable to attend the event can follow the program that covers the ERS history, development, operations and exploitation via live web streaming. Earlier this...

Members of the Italian Coast Guard have gathered at ESA to attend an advanced training workshop on the latest space technologies for maritime monitoring and surveillance and to identify future opportunities for collaboration. ESA and the Italian Coast Guard have been collaborating for nearly 20 years on satellite-based services for vessel and oil pollution surveillance in the Mediterranean Sea as well as international waters.Italian Coast Guard Comandante Sirio Fae said: "This course...

Meeting the environmental needs of an ever-expanding Europe requires consistent and regularly updated information on its land cover and use. As part of ESA's GlobCorine project, a pan-European land cover and use map for 2009 is now available online. The map, based on ESA's Envisat MERIS data from 1 January to 31 December 2009, is the first of its kind to be produced in such a short time "“ nine months as opposed to years.GlobCorine shows how an automated service can generate and...