Iceberg fractional cover Measurements Made by Earth Observation Satellites

CEOS EO HANDBOOK – MEASUREMENT INSTRUMENTS

Measurements > Snow and Ice >
Sea ice cover, edge and thickness >
Iceberg fractional cover

$Iceberg fractional cover Timeline$

Measurement Definition*: Fraction of the ground area covered by icebergs. [Unit of measurement - %]

Instrument	Status/ Accuracy	Instrument Description	Measurement Technology	Timeline
C-Band SAR C-Band Synthetic Aperture Radar	Operational	Marine core services, land monitoring and emergency services. Monitoring sea ice zones and arctic environment. Surveillance of marine environment, monitoring land surface motion risks, mapping of land surfaces (forest, water and soil, agriculture), mapping in support of humanitarian aid in crisis situations.	n/a
OLI Operational Land Imager	Operational	Measures surface radiance, land cover state, and change (e.g., vegetation type). Used as multi-purpose imagery for land applications.	n/a
OLI-2 Operational Land Imager 2	Operational	Measures surface radiance, land cover state, and change (e.g., vegetation type). Used as multi-purpose imagery for land applications.	n/a
PALSAR-2 Phased Array type L-band Synthetic Aperture Radar-2	Operational	Disaster monitoring, land monitoring, agricultural monitoring, natural resource exploration, global forest monitoring, potential use and interferometry.	n/a
TIRS Thermal Infrared Sensor	Operational	Measures longwave thermal infrared surface emittance, land cover state, and change. Used as multipurpose imagery for land applications.	n/a
TIRS-2 Thermal Infrared Sensor 2	Operational	Measures longwave thermal infrared surface emittance, land cover state, and change. Used as multipurpose imagery for land applications. TIRS-2 will adhere to the Landsat 8 TIRS instrument performance specifications but will be built to NASA Class-B instrument standards (including a 5-year design life).	n/a
L-band SAR L-band Synthetic Aperture Radar	Being developed	L-band SAR instrument offering full polarimetry, high spatial resolution, high sensitivity, low ambiguity ratios and capability for repeat-pass & single-pass cross-track interferometry to measure surface deformation of vegetated terrain, soil moisture, land cover classification, crop type discrimination and its temporal analysis. Furthermore, it will monitor Polar ice sheets and ice caps, and the sea-ice conditions (i.e. type, drift, deformation, concentration, lead fraction), as well as contribute to the European maritime situational awareness.	n/a
PALSAR-3 Phased Array type L-band Synthetic Aperture Radar-3	Being developed	Disaster monitoring, land monitoring, agricultural monitoring, natural resource exploration, global forest monitoring, potential use and interferometry.	n/a
Advanced SAR Advanced Synthetic Aperture Radar X band	Proposed	High resolution microwave radar images for ice watch.	n/a
LandIS Landsat Next Instrument Suite	Proposed	Measures surface radiance, land cover state and change (e.g., vegetation type), and longwave termal infrared surface emittance. Used as multi-purpose imagery for land applications.	n/a

* Description adapted from WMO.