|
|
|
Institutions | Training | Online Education | Papers / Articles
|
Education and Training in Earth Observation Technology and Applications - Indian Initiative
|
Future Application Thrust Areas
In order to consolidate and enhance the achievements that have been made by India, a dual mission strategy is planned. This would address the understanding global scale problems of climate change, environmental assessment (by considering applications in atmospheric and climate dynamics, atmospheric chemistry, geodesy, ocean etc.). The local scale problems of land and water resources management (by considering the applications for biodiversity assessment and its monitoring, forest cover and fire monitoring, operational farm management, crop inventory and yield assessments, landuse management, irrigation planning, water budgeting, coastal dynamics, minerals exploration, and disaster management).
The thrusts of the future remote sensing missions are:
- High accuracy resource management applications, where the emphasis is on multi crop studies for type mapping, vegetation species identification and utilities mapping.
- High accuracy terrain applications, where the emphasis will be on target identification, utilities mapping, and obtaining Digital Terrain Models of 2-5 meters height accuracy and approximately 1:10,000-1:4,000 scales of mapping.
- Global change applications, specifically for atmospheric constituents study, pollution study, climate applications and monitoring the ozone and greenhouse effects.
- All weather applications, with multi frequency and multi polarization microwave payloads, both Synthetic Aperture Radar and other Passive instruments. These data sets could also be useful for soil moisture estimation applications and oceanographic studies.
Important EO Missions on which future Education and Training needs to be focussed are:
- OCEANSAT-1 , launched in May, 1999, has payloads specifically tailored for the measurement of physical and biological oceanography parameters. An Ocean Colour Monitor (OCM) with 8 narrow spectral bands and a Multi-frequency Scanning Microwave Radiometer (MSMR) operating in 4 frequencies will provide valuable ocean-surface related observations capability.
- CARTOSAT-1 , will have a cutting-edge technology in terms of sensor systems and will provide state-of-art capabilities for cartographic applications. The satellite will have only a PAN camera with 2.5 m resolution and 30 km swath and Fore-Aft stereo capability. The 2.5 m resolution data will cater to the specific needs of cartography and terrain modeling applications. This satellite will provide cadastral level information upto 1:5,000 scale for thematic applications and will be useful for making 2-5m contour maps. The Cartosat-1 is slated for launch in the near future using PSLV-C3.
- RESOURCESAT-1 , will be that state-of-art satellite mainly for resources applications and will have a 3-band multi-spectral LISS-4 camera with a spatial resolution better than 6m and a swath of around 25 km with across - track steerability for selected area monitoring. An improved version of LISS-III, with 4 bands (green, red, near-IR and SWIR), all at 23 meters resolution and 140 km swath will also provide the much essential continuity to LISS-III. These payloads will provide enhanced data for vegetation applications and will allow multiple crop discrimination, species level discrimination and so on. Together with an advanced wide-field sensor, WiFS with ~ 70 m resolution and ~ 800 km swath, the payloads will aid greatly for crop and vegetation applications and integrated land and water applications. The data will also be useful for high accuracy resources management applications, where the emphasis is on multi crop studies for type mapping, vegetation species identification and utilities mapping. The Resourcesat-1 is slated for launch by PSLV towards the end of 2000.
- CLIMATSAT/OCEANSAT-2 , In order to meet the information requirements to study the Planet Earth as an integrated system, satellite missions are planned which would enable global observations of climate, ocean and the atmosphere, particularly covering the tropical region, where sufficient data sets are not available. The instruments like radiometers, sounders, spectrometers etc. for studying the land, ocean and atmospheric interactions are being planned for these missions. It is expected that the payload for these mix, thus arrived at, will also address specific applications related to oceanography, atmospheric sciences and climate /meteorological studies.
The emphasis beyond 2000-2003 will be oriented towards development of missions having all weather applications with multi-frequency and multi-polarization microwave payloads with fine spatial and spectral resolution dove-tailed for micro level applications.
Real time Disaster Management System (DMS), integrating space technology applications with components for monitoring early-warning, damage simulation and prevention, etc. are to be developed. The EO capabilities will be merged with the communication capabilities so that information on disasters can reach the end-user in an optimal manner.
National (Natural) Resources Information system (NRIS) - as a key Decision Support system for planning and decision making at different levels i.e. - Central, Statel, District & Taluk/Panchayat will provide systematic databases of remote sensing, thematic maps and non-spatial developmental data - all organised around a GIS core. These databases will have customized application models for different management issues, decision support that provides information to decision-makers. Establishing a network for RS data access/browse and transfer and also in support of NRIS, and Disaster Management System is another objective.
|
|
|