More precise knowledge of crop areas and field locations will provide policy-makers, regulatory agencies and land managers with better evidence to inform planning and decision-making. The Land Cover plus: Crops vector product will be available to licence from March 2016 for the whole of the UK or for customised areas or crop types. Dr Daniel Morton, lead CEH scientist on the project, said: “This product follows a fascinating and successful body of research funded by NERC and Innovate UK and highlights the importance of the ESA Sentinel programme. A colleague once likened the pre-Sentinel era to sitting under a dripping tap not knowing when the next useful satellite image would arrive. The arrival of freely available Sentinel data is analogous to the tap now gushing and the research and business opportunities this presents are countless. “It is a great privilege to be associated with the first national-scale product to exploit the Sentinel-1 mission and I look forward to future collaborations with Remote Sensing Applications Consultants Ltd.” Nicholas Corker, Innovation Manager at the Centre for Ecology & Hydrology, said, “The Crop map project with RSAC is a great example of collaboration and co-production to produce an innovative product that will benefit both business and science. In its use of Copernicus data, this project fits squarely within the aspirations of Defra’s road map for Earth Observation.” Remote Sensing Applications Consultants Ltd Managing Director Mike Wooding said, “Not only is Land Cover plus: Crops the first ever crop map of the UK, we also believe it to be the world’s first detailed national or regional crop map based on satellite radar data. “It is a product of excellent collaboration between Remote Sensing Applications Consultants Ltd and the Centre for Ecology & Hydrology. With the enlarging family of Sentinel satellites, we are now working at ways of providing earlier crop intelligence and planning the launch of another significant new product."
First ever UK digital crop map from satellite data
The first ever digital map of the UK’s arable crops has been created through an innovative collaboration between environmental researchers and business using data from the Copernicus Sentinel-1 Radar Satellite.
More precise knowledge of crop areas and field locations will provide policy-makers, regulatory agencies and land managers with better evidence to inform planning and decision-making. The Land Cover plus: Crops vector product will be available to licence from March 2016 for the whole of the UK or for customised areas or crop types. Dr Daniel Morton, lead CEH scientist on the project, said: “This product follows a fascinating and successful body of research funded by NERC and Innovate UK and highlights the importance of the ESA Sentinel programme. A colleague once likened the pre-Sentinel era to sitting under a dripping tap not knowing when the next useful satellite image would arrive. The arrival of freely available Sentinel data is analogous to the tap now gushing and the research and business opportunities this presents are countless. “It is a great privilege to be associated with the first national-scale product to exploit the Sentinel-1 mission and I look forward to future collaborations with Remote Sensing Applications Consultants Ltd.” Nicholas Corker, Innovation Manager at the Centre for Ecology & Hydrology, said, “The Crop map project with RSAC is a great example of collaboration and co-production to produce an innovative product that will benefit both business and science. In its use of Copernicus data, this project fits squarely within the aspirations of Defra’s road map for Earth Observation.” Remote Sensing Applications Consultants Ltd Managing Director Mike Wooding said, “Not only is Land Cover plus: Crops the first ever crop map of the UK, we also believe it to be the world’s first detailed national or regional crop map based on satellite radar data. “It is a product of excellent collaboration between Remote Sensing Applications Consultants Ltd and the Centre for Ecology & Hydrology. With the enlarging family of Sentinel satellites, we are now working at ways of providing earlier crop intelligence and planning the launch of another significant new product."
Event Information
Date: 02.02.2016
Time: 17:53 Uhr