The availability of Earth observations from space has revolutionised Earth science and the study of geo-dynamic processes. The quantity and quality of geodetic measurements of tectonic processes from satellite data have increased dramatically over the past two decades. This has improved our ability to monitor and model also in near-real-time the deformation of the Earth’s surface and plate motion. Sharing satellite data is essential to process and analyze them to generate scientific products for understanding Earth’s dynamics.
The Thematic Core Service (TCS) Satellite Data (SD) uses satellite measurements to aid research on ground deformation phenomena and their trigger events, such as earthquakes, landslides and volcanic activity. The TCS SD will allow users to discover and download satellite products generated over selected areas, and to remotely process satellite datasets. Using mainly radar techniques from the ESA Sentinel-1 constellation of the Copernicus Programme, satellite data and images are collected night and day, under all weather conditions, by satellites orbiting at several hundred kilometres away from the Earth’s surface.
The Thematic Core Service (TCS) Satellite Data develops, harmonises and integrates these satellite measurements into services and products that can be exploited by the solid Earth science community. To reach this goal, TCS Satellite Data is developing in collaboration with the European Space Agency (ESA), the Geohazards Thematic Exploitation Platform, or GEP, a user-driven environment specifically designed for the advanced exploitation of Earth Observations data. GEP uses cloud processing facilities to enable the community to tailor different ways of visualising data, in a user-friendly way.
By coordinating the interactions between national and international space agencies, such as European Space Agency (ESA), the TCS Satellite Data provides a common and collaborative framework within the EPOS community. With the integration of data and services from other TCSs, Satellite Data helps the community to have a better understanding of events, like earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, and unrest episodes, that have a high impact on societies and their surrounding environments.