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NERC & Earth Observation. The UK is a founder member of the European Space Agency. Despite ambivalence about some aspects of space policy, the UK has always shown a whole-hearted commitment to Earth Observation (EO).
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NERC & Earth Observation • The UK is a founder member of the European Space Agency. Despite ambivalence about some aspects of space policy, the UK has always shown a whole-hearted commitment to Earth Observation (EO). • Since 2003, NERC has had the responsibility and administers the budget for the UK contribution to the ESA EO science programme. • NERC spends around £45m per annum on developing new missions and instruments with the European Space Agency (ESA) and NASA. They are responsible for the subscriptions to two ESA EO programmes: • Earth Observation Envelope Programme (EOEP). This is the science and research element of ESA's Living Planet Programme. Includes Earth Explorer missions, e.g GOCE (gravity field and ocean circulation), Cryosat 2 (polar ice), and SWARM (Earth’s magnetic field). • Envisat, the world's largest Earth observation satellite. ENVISAT GOCE
NERC Earth Observation Centres • Prior to 2008, there were six centres concerned with the carbon cycle (CTCD) ocean-atmosphere (CASIX) and land-atmosphere (CLASSIC) interactions EO data assimilation (DARC) polar ice (CPOM) earthquakes and tectonics (COMET) These centres were chosen through competitive bids, two per round, funding of the first two centres starting in 2001. • Aim of EO Centre programme was to create a critical mass of people, and implement a joined-up approach to exploiting EO data for key areas of NERC science similar to those that existed for atmospheric sciences and weather data. Well connected to terrestrial observations and to theory. • Active exploitation of new satellite observations. • Development of new satellite missions and/or instruments. • The EO Centres were distributed over a several universities or research institutions, e.g. COMET had 7 investigators in 4 departments at 4 universities: Cambridge, Leeds, University College London, Oxford.
Terrestrial Earth Observation Modelling Seismology Centre for Observation and Modelling of Earthquakes and Tectonics • To bring to bear the full suite of observations – satellite and terrestrial – in conjunction with simple physical models to obtain the complete picture of the earthquake cycle and deformation of the continents. Each separate observation reveals only part of the natural phenomenon. • Satellite observations include: high-resolution imagery and construction of high-resolution DEMs; deformation measurements using InSAR, GPS, matching of optical images.
Terrestrial Earth Observation Modelling Seismology The Dynamic Earth and Geohazards Research Group within NCEO • Extend remit to include all aspects of solid earth that lead to geohazards. In particular, volcanology added with tsunami generation and landslides as future objectives. • Three sub-themes initially: (i) Continental deformation and the earthquake cycle. (ii) Volcanic processes. (iii) Advancing the measurements. • Sixteen investigators in 8 departments from 6 universities: Cambridge, Glasgow, Leeds, University College London, Oxford and Reading.
Hazardous weather, floods and water resources National Centre for Earth Observation Natural Hazards
