The Contribution of Space Technologies to Arctic Policy Priorities

Landsat Data Continuity Mission (LDCM) Facts in Brief Country: United States

Operations: United States Geological Survey Status: Mission development began in 2002; launch planned for 2013 Mission Duration: Design life of 5 years Coverage: Global coverage, with a revisit time of less than two days for OLCI, less than one day for SLSTR at the equator, and a 27-day repeat for the topography package, with a 4-day sub-cycle. Orbit: Sun synchronous polar orbit at 700 km altitude Key Service Areas: Land use planning and monitoring, support of disaster response and evaluations, water use monitoring, and research on climate, carbon cycle, ecosystems, water cycle, biogeochemistry, and Earth surface/ interior. Web link: http://ldcm.gsfc.nasa.gov/index.html LDCM will provide continuity with the 38-year long Landsat land imaging data set, the longest continuous record of changes in Earth’s surface as seen from space and the only satellite system designed and operated to repeatedly observe the global land surface at moderate resolution. The Landsat Data Continuity Mission (LDCM), a collaboration between NASA and the U.S. Geological Survey, will provide moderate-resolution (15 m–100 m, depending on spectral frequency) measurements of the Earth’s terrestrial and polar regions in the visible, near-infrared, short wave infrared, and thermal infrared bands. The LDCM satellite payload consists of two science instruments—the Operational Land Imager (OLI) and the Thermal InfraRed Sensor (TIRS). These two sensors will provide seasonal coverage of the global landmass at a spatial resolution of 30 meters (visible, NIR, SWIR); 100 meters (thermal); and 15 meters (panchromatic). The spectral coverage and radiometric performance (accuracy, dynamic range, and precision) are designed to detect and characterize multi- decadal land cover change in concert with historic Landsat data. The LDCM scene size will be 185 km cross-track by 180 km along-track.

Mission Objectives

System Capabilities

Multispectral images

Measured Parameters

LDCM will contribute to environment and sovereignty and security policy priorities in the Arctic, providing beneficial data for monitoring of changes in land and water use, and disaster response.

Relevance to Arctic Interests

C.5 Surveillance Satellite Systems Inventory The following pages contain templates of existing and planned surveillance satellite systems. C.5.1 Existing Surveillance Satellite Systems Cospas-Sarsat Facts in Brief Country: Canada/United States/France/Russia

Operations: The Cospas-Sarsat Secretariat Head Office is located in Montreal, Canada. Twenty-six countries and 2 organizations provide ground stations for the system. Status: Search and Rescue Signal Repeater (SARR) instruments are onboard 5 geosynchronous satellites called GEOSARs, and SARR and Search and Rescue Signal Processor (SARP) instruments are onboard 6 low-earth polar orbit satellites called LEOSARs. Mission Duration: Continuous Coverage: Global coverage Orbit: Low Earth orbit / geostationary Earth orbit Key Service Areas: Distress alert detection and location; collection, sorting and storage of distress alert data; The International Cospas-Sarsat Programme provides accurate, timely, and reliable distress alert and location data to help search and rescue authorities assist persons in distress. The Cospas-Sarsat System includes two types of satellites: satellites in low-altitude Earth orbit (LEO) which form the LEOSAR System (provides Beacon identification information and location information globally, but not instantaneously); and satellites in geostationary Earth orbit (GEO) which form the GEOSAR System (provides Beacon identification and location information available if encoded in beacon message, with near instantaneous alerting in the GEOSAR coverage area, which includes most of the arctic region). The System is composed of: instruments on board satellites, which detect the signals transmitted by distress radiobeacons; ground receiving stations, referred to as Local Users Terminals (LUTs), which receive and process the satellite downlink signal to generate distress alerts; and Mission Control Centers (MCCs) which receive alerts produced by LUTs and forward them to Rescue Coordination Centers (RCCs), Search and Rescue Points Of Contacts (SPOCs) or other MCCs. Distress signals emitted by: EPIRBs (emergency position-indicating radio beacons), which signal maritime distress; ELTs (emergency locator transmitters), which signal aircraft distress; and PLBs (personal locator beacons), which indicate a person in distress who is away from normal emergency services (e.g., 9-1-1). Cospas-Sarsat contributes to the sovereignty and security and indigenous and social development policy priorities in the Arctic. The system provides crucial data and services for search and rescue operations, to facilitate the saving of lives if emergency response can be expedited, or recovery of assets to aid in accident investigations in the worst case. distribution of alert and location data Web link: http://www.cospas-sarsat.org

Mission Objectives

System Capabilities

Measured Parameters

Relevance to Arctic Interests

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