ESA and the Tri-agency Dashboard

Abstract:

Space based Earth observation has once again demonstrated its unparalleled capacity and potential during the COVID-19 crisis. Satellite imagery has allowed to assess the extent and the impacts of the pandemic emergency. It will also contribute to ensuring and improving human health in the future.

As the associated challenges are global by nature, international cooperation in Earth observation is essential. The European Space Agency (ESA) is pursuing various activities and projects with various partners worldwide, including NASA and JAXA, in order to make sure the best space assets are made available to mankind in this unique situation.

The ESA-NASA-JAXA cooperation involves relevant missions of the three agencies (e.g. ALOS-2, GOSAT, Landsat, OCO 2, Copernicus Sentinels) in a complementary manner. It enables the agencies to share data, develop joint methodologies and provide results on topics of common interest such as environment and climate change. One central element is a dashboard where all three space agencies put their examples onto one digital platform to show the impacts of COVID-19, with common areas of investigations across the globe.

The intervention by Dr Aschbacher will provide general information on the approach and the implementation of the cooperation between the three space agencies, as well as further details on the specific ESA contributions to the dashboard.