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Earth Online Newsletter - 17 May 2024
This issue of the Earth Online Newsletter covers a selection of the latest news and events from ESA.
Improving air quality monitoring with inter-agency cooperation
As urban area’s expand, our planet grapples with a relentless environmental challenge: air pollution. Remote sensing satellites play a critical role in monitoring air pollution, and a constellation of three geostationary ultraviolet-visible satellite instruments will soon be in orbit to revolutionise the way scientists observe air quality.
URBIS24
URBan Insights from Space (URBIS24) Workshop will offer an insightful exploration of urban challenges and innovative EO-integrated solutions.
Photosynthetic-Proxy Experiment Final Report
This report summarises the PhotoProxy 2019 campaign.
Rome supersite helps validate atmospheric space data
In the sprawling, urban area of Rome, where atmospheric composition is impacted by complex coastal weather and pollution, ESA supports a powerful observatory spread across several locations.
Overview of the Aeolus Level-1B wind product
Learn about the Aeolus Level-1B wind product, which supports applications for the weather, atmospheric processes and climate research, in our latest infographic.
An overview of the Aeolus mission
In this overview video, ESA's mission manager, Tommaso Parrinello, describes the successes and challenges of this amazing mission, whose impacts will live long beyond its lifetime in space.
EO Summer School 8
ESA's series of summer schools, on Monitoring of the Earth System, aims to promote the exploitation of Earth observation data.
MUltisource data package tools and SErvices (MUSE)
The MUSE project aims to develop and integrate a tool to simultaneously manipulate geospatial data products, satellite, model and in-situ data.
Dragon Cooperation Programme
The Dragon Programme focussed on science and applications development in China using mainly data from the ERS and Envisat missions. The Prgramme was a cooperation between ESA and the National Remote Sensing Centre of China.
Aeolus L2A Aerosol/Cloud optical product
The Level 2A aerosol/cloud optical products of the Aeolus mission include: Geo-located consolidated backscatter and extinction profiles Backscatter-to-extinction coefficient LIDAR ratio, scene classification Heterogeneity index Attenuated backscatter signals. Resolution: Horizontal resolution of L2A optical properties at observation scale (~87 km); Exceptions are group properties (horizontal accumulation of measurements from ~3 km to ~87 km) and attenuated backscatters (~3 km). Note: The resolution of "groups" in the L2A can only go down to 5 measurements at the moment, i.e. ~15 km horizontal resolution. This could be configured to go to 1 measurement - Vertical resolution 250-2000 m (Defined by Range Bin Settings).
Aeolus - ESA's mission dedicated to winds, aerosols and clouds
Learn more about ESA's youngest Earth Explorer - the Aeolus mission - in our latest infographic
GHGSat archive and tasking
GHGSat data produce measures of vertical column densities of greenhouse gas emissions ((currently CH4, but eventually CO2), provided on a pre-defined area of 12 km x 12 km, from the full sensor field-of-view. GHGSat Catalogue and New Collect data are available in three different data types: Single Observation: a single observation of a scene. Monthly Monitoring: guaranteed 12 successful observations in a year over a given site (once per month or flexible best effort cadence depending on weather). Weekly Monitoring: guaranteed 52 successful observations in a year over a given site (once a week or flexible best effort cadence based on weather), to accommodate large & persistent monitoring needs. Data are provided as an Emissions package containing the following products: Abundance dataset (Level 2): Set of per-pixel abundances in excess of the local background (ppb) for a single species, and per-pixel measurement error expressed as a standard deviation for a single site on a single satellite pass. Data format is 16-bit GeoTIFF. Concentration Maps (Level 2): High readability pseudocolour map combining surface reflectance, and column density expressed in ppb for a single species in PNG format. The relevant abundance dataset is provided as well. Emission Rates (Level 4): Instantaneous rate for a detected emission from a targeted source estimated using abundance datasets from a single satellite pass and applying dispersion modelling techniques. The delivered product includes the emission rate estimate with uncertainty and key dispersion parameters (in CSV format) as well as the abundance dataset used for the emission estimate. This product is only delivered in the Emissions package if an emission is detected within the abundance dataset. The Level 2 products will be delivered regardless of whether or not an emission is detected. The properties of available products are summarised in the table. Band(s) / Beam Mode(s) and Polarisation SWIR (1635-1675 nm), multiple bands, unpolarised Spatial Resolution <30 m Scene size 12 km x 12 km Species Measured CH4 Geometric Corrections Radial distortion, perspective projection Radiometric Corrections Detector pixel response, ghosting, spectral response, atmospheric correction including trace gas modelling and surface reflectance Details about the data provision, data access conditions and quota assignment procedure are described in the GHGSat Terms of Applicability.
Copernicus Sentinel-5P
The Copernicus Sentinel-5 Precursor mission is the first Copernicus mission dedicated to monitoring our atmosphere.
Introducing the Newest ESA Third Party Missions
ESA's Earth Observation Programme Board has unanimously approved the integration of the Federated Satellite Systems (FSSCat) mission, the Geostationary Environment Monitoring Spectrometer (GEMS) instrument on-board the GEO-KOMPSAT-2B satellite and the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment Follow-On (GRACE-FO) mission, as Third Party Missions.
Announcement of Opportunity for NoR
ESA invites submissions for the Network of Resources (NoR) call, which aims to support research, development and pre-commercial users to innovate their working practices, moving from a data download paradigm towards a 'bring the user to the data' paradigm.
SciSat-1: ACE-FTS and MAESTRO
SCISAT-1 data aim at monitoring and analysing the chemical processes that control the distribution of ozone in the upper troposphere and stratosphere. It provides acquisitions from the two instruments MAESTRO and ACE-FTS. MAESTRO: Measurement of Aerosol Extinction in the Stratosphere and Troposphere Retrieved by Occultation. Dual-channel optical spectrometer in the spectral region of 285-1030 nm. The objective is to measure ozone, nitrogen dioxide and aerosol/cloud extinction (solar occultation measurements of atmospheric attenuation during satellite sunrise and sunset with the primary objective of assessing the stratospheric ozone budget). Solar occultation spectra are being used for retrieving vertical profiles of temperature and pressure, aerosols, and trace gases (O3, NO2, H2O, OClO, and BrO) involved in middle atmosphere ozone distribution. The use of two overlapping spectrometers (280 - 550 nm, 500 - 1030 nm) improves the stray-light performance. The spectral resolution is about 1-2 nm. ACE-FTS: Fourier Transform Spectrometer. The objective is to measure the vertical distribution of atmospheric trace gases, in particular of the regional polar O3 budget, as well as pressure and temperature (derived from CO2 lines). The instrument is an adapted version of the classical sweeping Michelson interferometer, using an optimised optical layout. The ACE-FTS measurements are recorded every 2 s. This corresponds to a measurement spacing of 2-6 km which decreases at lower altitudes due to refraction. The typical altitude spacing changes with the orbital beta angle. For historical reasons, the retrieved results are interpolated onto a 1 km "grid" using a piecewise quadratic method. For ACE-FTS version 1.0, the results were reported only on the interpolated grid (every 1 km from 0.5 to 149.5 km). For versions 2.2, both the "retrieval" grid and the "1 km" grid profiles are available. SCISAT-1 collection provides ACE-FTS and MAESTRO Level 2 Data. As of today, ACE-FTS products are available in version 4.1, while MAESTRO products are available in version 3.13.
Aura OMI complete NASA dataset
The OMI observations provide the following capabilities and features: A mapping of ozone columns at 13 km x 24 km and profiles at 13 km x 48 km A measurement of key air quality components: NO2, SO2, BrO, HCHO, and aerosol The ability to distinguish between aerosol types, such as smoke, dust and sulfates The ability to measure aerosol absorption capacity in terms of aerosol absorption optical depth or single scattering albedo A measurement of cloud pressure and coverage A mapping of the global distribution and trends in UV-B radiation. The OMI data are available in the following four levels: Level 0, Level 1B, Level 2, and Level 3. Level 0 products are raw sensor counts. Level 0 data are packaged into two-hour "chunks" of observations in the life of the spacecraft (and the OMI aboard it) irrespective of orbital boundaries. They contain orbital swath data. Level 1B processing takes Level 0 data and calibrates, geo-locates and packages the data into orbits. They contain orbital swath data. Level 2 products contain orbital swath data. Level 3 products contain global data that are composited over time (daily or monthly) or over space for small equal angle (latitude longitude) grids covering the whole globe.
AROMAT-I
The main objective of this AROMAT-I campaign was to test newly developed airborne sensors and to evaluate their capabilities as validation tools for future air quality space borne sensors, in particular TROPOMI.
AROMAT-I
The main objective of this AROMAT-I campaign was to test newly developed airborne sensors and to evaluate their capabilities as validation tools for future air quality space borne sensors, in particular TROPOMI.