News - General News

ESA's improved Earth system data records: what is in store for the future?

Fundamental Data Records (FDRs) are instrumental in advancing our understanding of Earth systems and for addressing societal challenges effectively. These long-term records contain uncertainty-quantified, calibrated and geo-located multi-instrument/multi-platform satellite sensor data spanning several decades to support climate-related applications.

News - Data Release news

FDR4ALT - ESA unveils new cutting-edge ERS/Envisat Altimeter and Microwave Radiometer Datasets

The European Space Agency (ESA) has developed a comprehensive suite of innovative Earth system data records as part of the Fundamental Data Records for Altimetry project - FDR4ALT.

Data - EO Sign In Authentication (Open)

Land Ice Thematic Data Product [ALT_TDP_LI]

This is the Land Ice Thematic Data Product (TDP) V1 resulting from the ESA FDR4ALT project and containing estimates of ice sheet surface elevation and associated uncertainties. The collection covers data for three different missions: ERS-1, ERS-2 and Envisat, and based on Level 1 data coming from previous reprocessing (ERS REAPER and the Envisat V3.0) but taking into account the improvements made at Level 0/Level 1 in the frame of FDR4ALT (ALT FDR). The Land Ice TDP focuses specifically on the ice sheets of Greenland and Antarctica, providing these data in different files. For many aspects, the Land Ice Level 2 and Level 2+ processing is very innovative: Improved relocation approach correcting for topographic effects within the beam footprint to identify the Point of Closest Approach Homogeneous timeseries of surface elevation measurements at regular along-track reference nodes. The FDR4ALT products are available in NetCDF format. Free standard tools for reading NetCDF data can be used. Information for expert altimetry users is also available in a dedicated NetCDF group within the products. Please consult the FDR4ALT Product User Guide before using the data. The FDR4ALT datasets represent the new reference data for the ERS/Envisat altimetry missions, superseding any previous mission data. Users are strongly encouraged to make use of these datasets for optimal results.

Data - EO Sign In Authentication (Open)

Inland Waters Thematic Data Product [ALT_TDP_IW]

This is the Inland Waters Thematic Data Product (TDP) V1 resulting from the ESA FDR4ALT project and containing improved Water Surface Height (WSH) data record from the ERS-1, ERS-2 and Envisat missions estimated using the ICE1 retracking range for its better performance on the hydro targets. The FDR4ALT products are available in NetCDF format. Free standard tools for reading NetCDF data can be used. Information for expert altimetry users is also available in a dedicated NetCDF group within the products. Please consult the FDR4ALT Product User Guide before using the data. The FDR4ALT datasets represent the new reference data for the ERS/Envisat altimetry missions, superseding any previous mission data. Users are strongly encouraged to make use of these datasets for optimal results.

News - Success Stories

Decades of satellite data reveal the risks of climate tipping points

Decades-long time series that draw on ESA’s Earth observation archives are enabling scientists to uncover the threat of sudden and potentially irreversible changes to the icy parts of the planet.

Event - Conference

Living Planet Symposium 2022

Learn about the 2022 edition of ESA's Living Planet Symposium.

News - Thematic area articles

Transforming space data into climate action

ESA’s Earth observation activities are playing a key role in the revitalised global drive to combat climate change.

News - Events and Proceedings

Data preservation takes centre stage at Living Planet Symposium

Against the backdrop of the famed Rhine River, world-class scientists and Earth observation data-users are gathered this week in the historical city of Bonn, at the Living Planet Symposium (LPS).

News - Spotlight on EO community

Introducing Mirko Albani

In this short introduction, ESA's Heritage Missions Programme Manager describes what he likes most about ESA's long term archive of satellite mission data and his role in the programme.

Activity - Projects

Dragon 2 Cooperation Programme

The Dragon 2 Programme focussed on the exploitation of ESA, ESA's Third Party Missions and Chinese Earth observation data for science and applications development in land, ocean and atmospheric applications.

Tools - Apps

Heritage Missions app for iOS

Download the Heritage Missions application to discover what the missions were about, how it worked and what the elements of the space and ground segment that make these missions unique.

Tools - Apps

Heritage Missions app for Android

Download the Heritage Missions application to discover what the missions were about, how it worked and what the elements of the space and ground segment that make these missions unique.

Data - Fast Registration with approval (Restrained)

ALOS PRISM L1B

This collection provides access to the ALOS-1 PRISM (Panchromatic Remote-sensing Instrument for Stereo Mapping) L1b data acquired by ESA stations in the ADEN zone, in addition to worldwide data requested by European scientists. The ADEN zone was the area belonging to the European Data node and covered both the European and African continents, a large part of Greenland and the Middle East. The full mission archive is included in this collection, though with gaps in spatial coverage outside of the ADEN zone. The full mission is covered, though with gaps outside of the ADEN zone: Time window: from 2006-07-09 to 2011-03-31 Orbits: from 2425 to 24189 Path (corresponds to JAXA track number): from 1 to 668 Row (corresponds to JAXA scene centre frame number): from 55 to 7185. Two different Level 1B product types (Panchromatic images in VIS-NIR bands, 2.5 m resolution at nadir) are offered, one for each available sensor mode: PSM_OB1_11 -> Composed of up to three views; Nadir, Forward and Backward at 35 km swath PSM_OB2_11 -> Composed of up to two views; Nadir view at 70 km width and Backward view at 35 km width. All ALOS PRISM EO-SIP products have, at least, the Nadir view which is used for the frame number identification. All views are packaged together; each view, in CEOS format, is stored in a directory named according to the view ID according to the JAXA naming convention.

Data - EO Sign In Authentication (Open)

ALOS African Coverage ESA archive

ALOS Africa is a dataset of the best available (cloud minimal, below 10%) African coverage acquired by AVNIR-2 in OBS mode and PRISM in OB1 mode (all Backward, Nadir and Forward views, in separated products), two different collections one for each instrument. The processing level for both AVNIR-2 and PRISM products is L1B. This dataset is a subset of the main ALOS AVNIR-2 and ALOS PRISM ESA collections. ALOS AVNIR-2: https://doi.org/10.5270/AL1-d9cfa6d ALOS PRISM: https://doi.org/10.5270/AL1-5e400fd.

Mission - Heritage Missions

ERS

The ERS programme was composed of two missions, ERS-1 and ERS-2, which together observed the Earth for 20 years, from 1991 to 2011.

Activity - Quality

SCIRoCCo

The SCIRoCCo project is an interdisciplinary cooperation of scatterometry experts aimed at promoting the continuing exploitation of ESA's unique 20 years' worth of ERS Scatterometer data.

Document - General Reference

DRAGON 2 Programme - Brochure 2009

The Dragon Programme is a cooperation between ESA and the Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST) of the P.R. China. This brochure presents the activities undertaken since the formal start of the programme in April 2009, its background, objectives, partners and project themes.

Document - Proceedings

2004 Envisat and ERS Symposium

The 2004 Envisat and ERS Symposium was held in Salzburg - Austria from 6 to 10 September 2004. The 2004 Envisat and ERS Symposium provided a forum for investigators to present results of ongoing research project activities and assess the development of applications and services.

Document - Proceedings

ERS-Envisat Symposium

Document - Proceedings

Dragon Programme Mid-Term Results

Proceedings of the 2005 Dragon Symposium held on 27 June - 1 July 2005 in Santorini, Greece.