- All Categories (33)
- Data (7)
- News (6)
- Missions (1)
- Events (11)
- Tools (2)
- Activities (2)
- Documents (4)
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 - Success Stories
Trailblazing ERS-2 mission enables climate change applications
As ESA’s ERS-2 satellite approaches Earth’s atmosphere for reentry, it’s time to reflect on the mission’s great achievements in powering climate-related applications.
Event - Training
EO Summer School 7
ESA's series of summer schools, on Monitoring of the Earth System, aims to promote the exploitation of Earth observation data.
Event - Training
EO Summer School 6
ESA's series of summer schools, on Monitoring of the Earth System, aims to promote the exploitation of Earth observation data.
Event - Training
EO Summer School 5
ESA's series of summer schools, on Monitoring of the Earth System, aims to promote the exploitation of Earth observation data.
Event - Training
EO Summer School 4
ESA's series of summer schools, on Monitoring of the Earth System, aims to promote the exploitation of Earth observation data.
Event - Training
EO Summer School 3
ESA's series of summer schools, on Monitoring of the Earth System, aims to promote the exploitation of Earth observation data.
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 - Spotlight on EO community
Interviewing Mirko Albani
ESA’s Heritage Space Programme Manager describes the goals of the programme, some of the challenges involved in preserving and improving 40 years of historical Earth observation data, and his passion for curating this long-term archive.
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.
News - Success Stories
ERS Heritage Data allow for 30 years of science
At their time of launch thirty years ago, the two ERS satellites were the most sophisticated Earth observation spacecraft ever developed and launched by Europe.
News - Infographics
ERS - ESA’s first Earth observation satellites
To mark the 30th anniversary of ERS, we've released a new infographic summarising the mission.
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 - Announcement of Opportunity (Restrained)
Announcement of Opportunity for G-POD
ESA is offering all scientists the possibility to perform bulk processing and/or validation of their own algorithms exploiting the large ESA Earth-observation archive.
Data - Fast Registration with approval (Restrained)
ERS-1/2 ATSR Averaged Surface Temperature [AT1/AT2_AR__2P]
The Averaged Surface Temperature Product (AST) contains averaged geophysical data at two different resolutions, and with respect to two different averaging schemes: measurement data sets at resolutions of 0.5 by 0.5 degrees and 10 by 10 arcmin with respect to a latitude/longitude grid; other data sets contain data averaged over equal area cells of 50 by 50 km and 17 by 17 km aligned with the satellite ground track. Both top-of-atmosphere and surface data sets are provided. The surface temperature data sets provide, for sea cells, nadir and dual view sea surface temperatures, and for land cells, land surface temperature (currently 11 micron BT) and NDVI. Cloud data is also included. No ADS are included in the AST product; auxiliary data is contained within the MDS. The data sets of the AST product are arranged by surface type and resolution. The 3rd reprocessing of ATSR data was performed in 2013; the processing updates that have been put in place and the scientific improvements are outlined in full in the User Summary Note for the Third ERS ATSR Reprocessing.
Data - Data Description
ERS-1/2 ATSR Meteo Product [AT1/AT2_MET_2P]
The data is a fast delivery Meteo product designed for use by meteorological offices, and contains averaged BT and SST at 10 arc minute resolution. The single MDS comprises the fields of MDS#3 (SST record, 10 arc min cell) of the AST product, with the addition of Average Brightness Temperature (ABT) fields (BT/TOA sea record, 10 arc min cell) to make it more self-contained. The 3rd reprocessing of ATSR data was performed in 2013; the processing updates that have been put in place and the scientific improvements are outlined in full in the User Summary Note for the Third ERS ATSR Reprocessing.
Data - Data Description
ERS-1/2 ATSR ARC L2P/L3U [UPA-L2P_GHRSST/L3U_GHRSST]
The L2P product contains full resolution dual-view Sea Surface Temperature (SST) values. These SST use the ARC SST retrieval and cloud screening which differ from the methods used to produce the Gridded Surface Temperature (ATS_NR__2P) products. In addition to SST, the L2P products contain the ATSR Saharan Dust Index (ASDI) and the clear-sky probability estimated by the ARC cloud detection algorithm. The L2P processor also generates L3U products; these are the L2P products averaged onto a regular grid at 0.1 degree resolution (they are therefore similar to the AR / Meteo Envisat-format products). The L2P and L3U products are provided in NetCDF-4 format following GHRSST Data Specifications (GDS) v2. The L2P/L3U archive has been reprocessed with a new processor based upon the ARC SST; the changes are outlined in full in the L2P Reprocessing User Note.
Data - External Data (Restrained)
ERS-1/2 ATSR ARC Level 3 products [AT1/AT2_AVG_3PAARC]
The recommended ATSR Level 3 products for Sea Surface Temperature (SST) applications are the ARC (ATSR Re-processing for Climate) Level 3 products. ARC reprocesses the ATSR multi-mission archive using new cloud detection and SST retrievals to produce a homogenous record of sea surface temperature. The main ARC objective is to reduce regional biases in retrieved SST to less than 0.1 K for all global oceans while creating a very homogenous record with a stability (lack of drift in the observing system and analysis) of 0.05 K per decade. ARC products are available for ATSR-1, ATSR-2 and AATSR. ARC products are provided in netCDF format and contain data for both the skin SST and the SST estimated for depths of 0.2 and 1.0 m (corresponding approximately to drifter and moored buoy depths). The AATSR estimated depth SSTs are adjusted to a local equatorial crossing time of 10:30 (approximately half an hour after observation), to provide continuity with ATSR-1 and ATSR-2 data. The ARC project was led by Chris Merchant (University of Reading, formerly of the University of Edinburgh) and funded by NERC and the UK Government.