ESA announced Tuesday it has donated a composite satellite image of Earth's land cover provided by its Envisat satellite to the United Nations. The mosaic will be exhibited permanently in the new access building by the Pregny gate in the Palais des Nations compound in Geneva, Switzerland.
Sergei Ordzhonikidze, director general of the U.N. Office in Geneva, accepted the mosaic on behalf of the United Nations from Volker Liebig, ESA's director of Earth observation program, who donated it on behalf of the space agency.
The mosaic was compiled from images taken by the MERIS instrument aboard the environmental satellite. The global image required 1,561 satellite passes during the period from May 2004 to November 2004.
"Forests, desert, mountains and oceans are clearly visible. The mosaic shows the state of the planet at the beginning of the 21st century from a perspective that only satellites can deliver", Liebig said.
Launched in 2002, Envisat is the largest Earth observation spacecraft ever built. It carries 10 sophisticated optical and radar instruments to provide continuous observation and monitoring of the Earth's land surface, atmosphere, oceans and ice caps.
The Medium Resolution Imaging Spectrometer measures the solar radiation reflected by the Earth, at a ground spatial resolution of 300 meters (975 feet), with 15 spectral bands in the visible/near-infrared regions and programmable in terms of width and position. It provides global coverage of the Earth every three days.
ESA and UNOSAT – the U.N. project concerned with satellite imagery access and applications – are partners in several initiatives and programs aimed at extending the use of satellite technologies to facilitate the work of the international community and UN agencies in particular.
UNOSAT, which forms part of UNITAR – the United Nations Institute for Training and Research – promotes projects and programs designed to enable developing countries and local communities in particular to gain access to such technologies and supports humanitarian aid activities.
