Welcome to a new edition of ‘Last Week in Earth Observation’, containing a summary of major developments in EO from the last week and some exclusive analysis and insights from TerraWatch.
Four Curated Things
Major developments in EO from the past week
💰 Contractual Stuff: Funding, Contracts and Deals
Funding
- Indian EO startup GalaxEye, which aims to build a multi-sensor constellation of satellites equipped with SAR and optical instruments, raised $10M in Series A funding;
Contracts
- The UK Space Command awarded a £40M contract to local satellite manufacturer SSTL to build a high-resolution satellite, the second in a series of military satellites;
- NASA, as part of the Commercial SmallSat Data Acquisition program, has secured access to SAR data and WorldDEM digital elevation data from Airbus.
M&A
- BlackSky, which had partly owned satellite manufacturer LeoStella, has bought full ownership of the company to firm up its vertical integration capacity ahead of its launch of the next-generation Gen-3 EO constellation;
- Maxar has divested a small part of its business focused on supporting classified U.S. government sensor programs, which has now been acquired by ARKA Group, a government contractor.
📈 Strategic Stuff: Partnerships and Announcements
Partnerships
- Parametric insurance solution provider Descartes Underwriting and French research lab SERTIT are teaming up for a CNES project to use EO data for conducting post-disaster damage assessments;
- SAR solutions firm Iceye is partnering with Carahsoft, allowing U.S. Government agencies to have access to ICEYE natural disaster insights;
- Stratospheric platform maker Sceye announced cooperating research agreements with NASA and USGS;
- Location data platform Here Technologies is expanding its partnership with Maxar to enhance HERE’s mapmaking process.
🗞️ Interesting Stuff: More News
- China launched 4 commercial radar satellites as part of the PIESAT-2 constellation, orbiting in a wheel-like formation for interferometric SAR-based land mapping applications;
- Deforestation in Brazil’s Amazon has dropped by nearly 31% compared to previous year, according to analysis by the country's EO-based deforestation monitoring system.
- COP29 begins in Baku today as 2024 is expected to be the warmest year and first year above 1.5°C, according to the Copernicus Climate Change Service.
Credit: WMO
🔗 Click-Worthy Stuff: Check These Out
- This research that found that reveals that the ocean's surface could be absorbing more atmospheric carbon dioxide than previously thought;
- This article on how a new wave of satellites is tracking methane emissions;
- Check out this deep dive to learn more about EO for greenhouse emissions
- This briefing from NASA on how satellites with precipitation radars are used to estimate the amount of rainfall by monitoring raindrops from space;
- Precipitation radar instruments measure the size and number of raindrops in the clouds based on the energy reflected from the atmosphere, a concept called radar reflectivity.
It is essential to acknowledge the importance of the technology-impact gap. Just because we have technologies for better weather forecasting does not mean it will lead to actual impact. There is a human component involved in translating technology into action, as the case study from Spain has shown.
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One Discussion Point
Exclusive analysis and insights from TerraWatch
Evolution of NASA's Earth Science Budget
Following the US election results and the expected change of administration, I thought it might be useful to look back at the NASA annual budgets, especially the evolution of the budget for the Earth Science department.
While the space sector overall saw several developments under the first Trump Administration, including the launch of the Artemis program and the creation of the US Space Force, it also saw several attempts to cancel NASA's Earth Science missions, including the recently launched PACE and Orbiting Carbon Observatory-3 (OCO-3) missions (the US Congress restored their funding). Similarly, NOAA, which oversees many weather and climate research initiatives, had funding cuts.
Policy experts are uncertain about the second Trump Administration's priorities regarding space. If the past serves as any indication, I am guessing there might be some potential impacts on EO science and research.
The figure below shows NASA's EO budget between 2014 and 2025, based on the presidential budget requests. Note that the budget allocated to NASA might vary depending on the actual federal budget passed by the US Congress.
Scene from Space
One visual leveraging EO
Smog from Space
Cities like Delhi in India and Lahore in Pakistan are experiencing record air pollution due to a combination of foggy weather conditions and smoke from the fires caused by the burning of stubble on farms. This approach considered a quick way to clear the fields and get ready for the next crop season, is done after harvest by farmers in both countries. In addition, pollution from vehicles and motorbikes also contribute to the worsening air quality.
The following image shows smoke engulfing the countries along with fires across the borders. Scientists at NASA estimate that there have been between 15,500 and 18,500 fires, which is higher than most years.
Until next time,
Aravind.
