Landsat’s Role in Managing Water Resources
Water is essential for life. A third of Earth’s populace has unreliable access to clean water. With current population growth and environmental trends, the U.N. Environmental Program estimates that 1.8 billion people will face water scarcity by 2025. Water means survival for people and other species we rely upon to thrive, making proper stewardship of our water resources vital. Good decisions require good data. Since 1972 the Landsat series of satellites has been providing such data. Landsat-based decisions on how to manage limited water resources have impacted millions of people worldwide. From finding water for refugees in arid nations to reducing pollution in our national waterways, Landsat enables decisions that directly help people.
Landsat Documents Rapid Disappearance of Antarctica’s Ice Shelves
Contributors: Joan Moody (DOI); Jessica K. Robertson (USGS) Antarctica’s glaciers are melting more rapidly than previously known because of climate change, according to a new U.S. Geological Survey report prepared
Landsat Used to Map Persian Gulf Coral Reefs
Contributor: Rashmi De Roy, World Wildlife Foundation In 2006, the WWF helped prepare the first map of coral habitats in the southeastern Persian Gulf, highlighting some of the most extensive
Landsat, Potholes, and Climate Change
Contributor: Laura E.P. Rocchio What could Landsat, potholes, and climate change have in common? Well—when you use the term “potholes” to refer to the glacially-formed wetland depressions of the Prairie
Taking Earth's Temperature via Satellite
Contributor: Don Comis, USDA ARS Imagine adding a thermometer to Google™ Earth. That’s the vision of Agricultural Research Service (ARS) scientists Martha Anderson and Bill Kustas, who see the need for
USDA Researchers Use Landsat to Estimate Horticultural Canopy Cover and Crop Water Demand
Horticultural crops account for almost 50% of crop sales in the United States, and these crops are carefully managed to ensure good quality. But more information is needed about the
USDA FAS Uses GIS, MODIS, and Landsat to Monitor Rice Production in Burma
Source: ESRI Press Release, Redlands, California, USA Subsequent to Cyclone Nargis, a category 3 tropical storm that struck the low-lying and heavily populated coastline of Myanmar (Burma) on May 2,