Tag Archives: Earth Observation

With space nations such as China and the United States forging ahead with ambitious plans, where does Europe stand in the global space community? Can Europe successfully compete and is there a willingness to collaborate with other nations? Torsten Kriening sat down with Jean-Jacques Tortora, Director of the European Space Policy Institute, to pose some key questions.

WattTime, an American not-for-profit fighting climate change, announced on 7 May 2019 a new project, funded by a U.S.$1.7 million grant from Google.org, which will use a global network of satellites to measure carbon emissions from all large power plants worldwide and render the information public.

The UK's long awaited defence space strategy has been leaked to The Times, one of Britain's leading newspapers, and reveals a growing acknowledgement of threats against satellites by the Ministry of Defence (MoD) and hints at the development and procurement of intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) and positioning, navigation, and timing (PNT) satellites.

The EDRS-C satellite, the second node of the SpaceDataHighway network (also known as the European Data Relay System - EDRS), will be launched into geostationary orbit at 31° East on 24 July 2019 by an Ariane 5 launcher.

A Rocket Lab Electron launch vehicle successfully lifted off from Launch Complex 1 on New Zealand’s Mahia Peninsula at 06:00 UTC, Sunday 5 May 2019 (18:00 NZST). The STP-27RD mission launched three research and development satellites for the DoD Space Test Program that will demonstrate advanced space technologies, including a satellite to evaluate new ways of tracking space debris.

On 5 April 2019, the University of Maribor (Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science) and SAB Launch Services S.r.l. (SAB-LS) signed the Launch Services Agreement (LSA) for the launch of the TRISAT satellite.

SatSure, the Indian geospatial data analytics company that utilises advances in Earth observation satellites, machine learning, and big data analytics, has announced that it has won the Imkan Innovation Award worth U.S.$10,000 at startAD’s Venture Launchpad.

Pakistan signed a space cooperation agreement with China at a ceremony in Beijing held on 27 April 2019 providing a framework for the training of Pakistani astronauts, space science and exploration, as well as the establishment of a Sino-Pakistani space committee that will discuss other cooperative initiatives in space.

Surrey Satellite Technology has signed a contract with Airbus to provide high resolution optical data from the SSTL S1-4, an Earth observation satellite which was launched in September 2018.

The South Korean Ministry of Science and ICT has approved 300 billion Won funding (U.S.$264 million) for the development of three remote sensing satellites to be used for resource management, environmental monitoring, and space science.