Tuesday, March 9. 2010

Remote Sensing Tidbits

The European Investment Bank (EIB) lends money in 130 countries. More and more of the money is going to projects with environmental considerations. So, among its other responsibilities as a lender, the Bank has to monitor those projects. One solution: high resolution imagery. The European Space Agency shows off some of the EIB's use of its imagery in case studies in a nickel-cobalt mining and processing project in the Ambatovy region in Eastern Madagascar, looking after reforestation on Kolombangara, a small island located in the Western Province of the Solomon Islands and the construction of the Egnatia Highway in Greece.

- First Science

FCW details a number of apps that try to respond to hazard events using GIS and sensors. There are some interesting tidbits including this one related to a National Weather Service implementation.

Kirkwood said NWS’ core partners, such as the Homeland Security Department and Federal Emergency Management Agency, obtain their data via ESRI’s ArcGIS Server. The public can get a version of the RIDGE 2 data that NWS has created using OpenLayers, which is free, open-source software that displays map data by using a standard Web browser.

- Federal Computer Week

Last week Orbital Sciences Corp. announced it would buy the satellite-making business of General Dynamics Corp. for $55 million in cash The deal is expected to close in four to five weeks and does not require any external approvals. General Dynamics builds platforms for the government and private industry (it's working on the bird for NASA’s Landsat Data Continuity Mission and built the one for GeoEye-1).

- press release
- Space News (1, 2)

Also last week: ITT Corporation announced two of its weather sensors were successfully launched into space from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida to fly on the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite-P (GOES-P).

- press release

Finally, China has successfully put into orbit another remote-sensing satellite, "Yaogan IX" from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center last week.

- Xinhuanet.com