Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
Table 11.2 Current international charter members
International charter members
Space resources
European Space Agency (ESA)
ERS, ENVISAT
Centre national d'études spatiales (CNES)
Spotimage
SPOT
NSPO
Formosat
Canadian Space Agency (CSA)
RADARSAT
Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO)
IRS
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)
POES, GOES
Argentina's Comisión Nacional de Actividades Espaciales (CONAE)
SAC -C
Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA)
ALOS
United States Geological Survey (USGS)
Landsat
Digital Globe
Quickbird
GeoEye
GeoEye-1
DMC International Imaging (DMC)
Centre National des Techniques Spatiales (Algeria)
ALSAT-1
National Space Research and Development (Nigeria)
NigeriaSat
Tübitak-BILTEN (Turkey)
BILSAT-1
BNSC/Surrey Satellite Technology Limited (UK)
UK-DMC
BNSC/Qinetiq (UK)
TopSat
China National Space Administration (CNSA)
FY, SJ, ZY satellite series
Source: International Disaster Charter: http://www.disasterscharter.org/participants_e.html
These constellations have more recently been joined by the European Union's
geo-positioning constellation, Galileo, and by China's Beidou Satellite Navigation
and Positioning System, also known as Beidou-2 or Compass.
It is envisioned that future handheld or mounted receiving devices may be
able to interchangeably access any satellite signals from these four constella-
tions, in order to quickly obtain highly accurate latitude/longitude or Universal
Transverse Mercator (UTM) coordinates, as well as elevation data. With the demise
of “Selective Availability,” a deliberate distortion of the GPS signal instituted
by the US Department of Defense, a practice terminated during the presidency
of William Jefferson Clinton, the advent of dual base station/rover receivers
with post-correction capability, and subsequent signal enhancement, contemporary
geo-positioning systems have achieved centimeter-level accuracy.
Within the United States, several states have initiated high spatial resolution
ortho-photography over-flights. Data from these missions, while lacking the tem-
poral and spectral resolution of satellite data, have demonstrated their utility in
contributing to accurate base maps, user-friendly graphical interfaces and to broad
distribution either directly by state governments or by academic institutions for
heterogeneous applications. Additionally, real-time satellite ground stations for
acquisition, processing and distribution of near-real-time data products have been
established at selected universities, primarily to address time-critical phenomena.
As a case in point, Purdue University's Purdue Terrestrial Observatory (PTO)
( http://www.itap.purdue.edu/pto /) disseminates image data through several differ-
ent avenues. The near real-time image data collected by the PTO are distributed
 
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