Proposal for Pilot Project by the APRSAF Earth Observation Working Group

Proposal for Pilot Project by the APRSAF Earth Observation Working Group

‘[Project name: e.g. Sentinel-Asia(?)]’: A Satellite Information Distribution Network for Disaster Management of Asia – Oceania.

Table of Contents

Introduction and APRSAF Background 3

Project Outline 5

Suggested Approach 5

Available Services & Infrastructure in APRSAF Region 6

Technical Aspects 7

Basic functions and responsibility at each node: 9

ACTIONS Arising from Workshop 9

Participating Countries & Supporting Agencies 10

Introduction and APRSAF Background

The project described below, arose from discussions at a special workshop held by members of the APRSAF Earth Observation Working Group in Kuala Lumpur – Malaysia in May 2005, to develop a new pilot project designed to assist national and regional emergency management agencies through better provision of information and data sharing focusing on - timely dissemination of information. This project will not replace current initiatives supporting generic disaster prevention, response and mitigation undertaken by specialized agencies. Rather, it is primarily intended to demonstrate more effective and timely provision of satellite-derived data for management and decision-making before, during and after disasters in the Asia – Oceania region.

APRSAF was established in 1993 in response to the declaration adopted by the Asia-Pacific International Space Year Conference (APIC) in 1992, to enhance the development of each country’s space program and to exchange views toward future cooperation in space activities in the Asia-Pacific region.

APRSAF has been holding annual meetings initiated jointly by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology, Japan (MEXT), Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) and co-host organizations to discuss current space related issues and possible cooperation among countries mainly from the Asia-Pacific region. APRSAF intends to ensure wider participation of space agencies, government officials, regional and international organizations and institutions responsible for applying space technology, as well as space agencies from outside the region and private sectors.

As of November 2004, eleven meetings have been held. The co-host countries so far have been Mongolia, Malaysia, the Republic of Korea, Thailand and Australia.

At the 9th Session of the APRSAF (APRSAF-9), 4 working groups (WG) were set up on Earth Observation (EO), Communication Satellite Applications (CSA), Space Environment Utilization (SEU), and Space Education and Awareness (SEA) to embody the cooperation in our region.

Since APRSAF-10 and 11, the Forums have consisted of plenary sessions as well as three working groups: Earth Observation (EO), Communication Satellite Applications (CSA) and Space Education and Awareness (SEA). The issues regarding Space Environment Utilization have been discussed at the SEA-WG.

APRSAF shall provide opportunities for regional space agencies and associated governmental bodies to:

Ø  Gather the representatives from space agencies and international organizations in the Asia-Pacific region,

Ø  Seek measures to contribute to socio-economic development to the Asia-Pacific region and the preservation of the global environment, through space technology and its applications,

Ø  Exchange views, opinions and information on national space programs and space resources,

Ø  Discuss possibilities of future cooperation amongst space technology developers and space technology users to bring mutual benefits of the countries in the Asia-Pacific region, identify areas of common interest, and assign priorities thereto,

Ø  Review the progress of the implementation of the plans and programs for further cooperation within the Asia-Pacific region,

Ø  Consider and recognize the importance to cooperate with space agencies and organizations outside the Asia-Pacific region that support APRSAF objectives.

Under the main theme of "Toward Expansion of the Space Community", the APRSAF-11 was held on November 3 to 5, 2004, at the National Convention Centre, Canberra, Australia. In the APRSAR-11, the Earth Observation Working Group was held with the 30 participants from 12 countries and 2 international organizations.

The action items of the Working Group are as follows:

Ø  Workshop to be held in 2005 on disaster risk reduction and data sharing focusing on - Timely dissemination of information for predicting hazards - Enhanced and better integrated measurement using in situ, airborne and satellite data.

Ø  Definition and coordination of pilot projects among APRSAF members for rapid response to disasters.

Ø  Distribute among member countries a proposal for standardization of data sets such as Digital Asia and means of sharing these data.

In connection with the action item 1, JAXA held the Asian Workshop on Satellite Technology Data Utilization for Disaster Monitoring on 20 January 2005 at the United Nations World Conference on Disaster Reduction in Japan. The workshop had many good discussions, and recommended the following:

Ø  Space technology can effectively provide information for disaster management in Asia, through International and regional frameworks and national programs;

Ø  Space agencies should provide satellite data in a manner that responds to information needs, and translate data into simple and useful information for the end-users;

Ø  Different needs at each phase of disaster should be considered (prevention, early warning, detection, response and recovery );

Ø  Space Agencies and private sector should cooperate and share satellite data for rapid response and application;

Ø  Capacity building for data interpretation is essential. Based on these outcomes, further discussions will be made at this technical workshop and a concrete plan or a pilot project for disaster reduction using space technology will be developed. In order to execute recommendations 2 and 3, space agencies need to jointly develop the appropriate products and services.

Project Outline

The project arose out of the following requirements identified by many of the emergency data-suppliers during the workshop:

Ø  The Asia – Oceania region has one of the highest number of natural disasters and associated deaths

Ø  While there are numerous satellite reception stations and associated space agencies, there is a need for faster access (1-12 hr) to satellite data PRODUCTS for easy interpretation by emergency agencies

Ø  Wide-area coverage by satellite technologies is most useful for regional applications (e.g. flooding, fires)

Ø  Background digital information can be easily sourced from the various national spatial databases, such as population numbers and cadastral data, needs to be combined with the satellite data products.

Ø  Importantly, ‘capacity building’ for the true end-users (e.g. emergency agencies and other government departments) was identified as an urgent need

Ø  Data-sharing across national boundaries needs to improve, especially during disaster situations

Ø  Data-exchange standards are needed for fast and efficient distribution

Suggested Approach

Rather than focusing on a single disaster type and a single country, the workshop attendees resolved to establish a pilot project focused primarily around the demonstration of a data-distribution network of space-agencies and national spatial data providers. The main features of such a system will be:

Ø  Focus on initially demonstration development of derived products for one or two semi-predictable disasters: wildfires and flooding.

Ø  Horizon 1: Detection and tracking of ‘hotspots’ and flooding extents (‘cold spots’), combined with land-cover maps, vector-layers of road-networks, coastlines and urban centres, plus a regional DEM (SRTM),

Ø  Horizon2: Fire weather, fuel loads, fire-rating index, prediction

Ø  Maintain a distributed system of ‘DATA NODES’, to cope with high numbers of users during disaster situations

Ø  Use multiple sensors for data continuity and backup

Ø  Note: Data policy and IP protection is important

Ø  Demonstrate value of web-mapping systems

Ø  Close coordination with regional operational monitoring agencies (e.g. meteorological services) who also use EO data routinely (e.g. to track cyclones, rainfall)

Ø  Link to GEO, CEOS and the IGOS Geohazards initiatives.

Ø  The ‘capacity-building’ activities in the project will be coordinated through close involvement with the ‘Digital Asia’ project by JAXA and AIT and related regional activities by UN-ESCAP and UN-OOSA.

Ø  The project output and linkage to emergency agencies will be through the ‘Asian Disaster Response Centre (ADRC)’, as well as through direct linkages between country NODES and local emergency agencies.

Available Services & Infrastructure in APRSAF Region

The project was not seen as one which requires much investment in ground infrastructure and operations since many of the national space agencies and spatial data providers already operate much of the necessary satellite-data acquisition reception infrastructure, processing systems and baseline internet delivery systems (ie own websites). The following are the major elements already available for this project:

Ø  X-, and L-band Ground-stations and processing systems across at least 10 regional countries

Ø  Specific JAXA contributions of importance to this project such as:

o  Future ‘WINDS” data-relay satellite for rapid, regional data delivery

o  ALOS data access and delivery framework (incl. GEOTIFFs)

o  Digital Asia Program

o  Capacity-Building program through support for ADRC

Ø  Regional communications, and internet backbone

Ø  Many freely available tools for automated processing into some initial products (e.g. fire hotspots)

Ø  Strong capacity-building programs (e.g. UN-Escap, SCOSA, AIT, Digital Asia, etc.)

Ø  Near real-time access to various potential current and planned satellite data sources:

o  Japan: ALOS, MTSAT-1R, ASTER

o  U.S. NASA – NOAA (Terra/Aqua/GOES, NPOESS)

o  China: CBERS, FY-1, and follow-up

o  Other regional satellites available e.g. Thailand, Korea, Malaysia, India

o  EU: ENVISAT (AATSR,ASAR), GMESS (Sentinel1,2,3)

Ø  Several commercial- and semi-commercial airborne systems for fast & opportunistic data-acquisition

Ø  Digital map underlays of topography, population sizes, roads, urban centres, land-use, landing strips, communications infrastructure, etc.

Ø  Potential to add more products through linkages to in-country R&D agencies and universities for development of new products

Ø  Proven experience and semi-operational web-based fire mapping systems operated by:

o  Hokkaido University (BFFCI - http://www.ijis.iarc.uaf.edu/html/pro_Forest_Fire01.html )

o  CSIRO (Sentinel Hotspots – www.sentinel.csiro.au ),

o  MACRES (http://www.macres.gov.my/macres3/forestfire.htm )

o  CRISP ( http://www.crisp.nus.edu.sg/forest_fire/fire.html )

o  NASA – University of Maryland [ http://maps.geog.umd.edu/help.asp ] , with upload of satellite-derived hotspots in near real-time.

Ø  Operational flood & hazard mapping experience by the Mekong River Commission [www.mrcmekong.org ] and Dartmouth College [ http://www.dartmouth.edu/~floods/ ]

Technical Aspects

The proposed [‘name’] system is to operate as a collection of national nodes, all in direct internet communication with each other, and uploading to the network simple, pre-processed satellite-derived information products for rapid incorporation into each nodes’ web-mapping system. The JAXA-AIT ‘Digital ASIA’ project has offered to assist with establishment of hardware systems in countries which require such infrastructure. A central data delivery portal (or full web-based mapping server) at ADRC HQ’s will help in provision of the relevant data products to regional emergency agency users and/or re-direction to the national nodes for more detailed information of specific in-country disasters.

Two types of nodes are envisaged: NODE_A (Satellite-data providers): those that already operate satellite receiving stations and associated data processing and archiving and distribution centre (e.g. MACRES, EORC-JAXA, CRISP, LAPAN); and, NODE_B (‘Digital Asia’ nodes) those that receive the satellite information via the internet and then place it on the web-mapping system.

At each NODE_A, a basic hardware suite and functional operation would be required (see figure below). NODE_B sites only operate the spatial-data engines and internet map services.

Basic functions and responsibility at each node:

Ø  Self-sustaining (infrastructure and operations), except for nodes that require ‘Digital Asia’ (AIT-JAXA) assistance.

Ø  Installation of ‘standard’ software algorithms, producing agreed standard data formats and consistent with all other nodes.

Ø  Production of Horizon1/Horizon2 products, and upload them to the network in near real-time:

o  Wildfire hotspot time-series (e.g. from AVHRR, MODIS, ASTER, ATSR, GOES, BIRD, etc.)

o  Flood risk and flood extents (close cooperation with MRC)

o  Data in vector shapefiles and ASCII text (coordinates)

o  Simple RGB’s image products (e.g. GEOTIFFs, JPEG, PDF)

Ø  Liaison and direct discussion with local emergency agencies

Ø  Make available to the rest of the network any background spatial digital data for their country/region

Ø  Assist in coordination of national ADRC workshops and help showcase data products

Ø  Act as national/regional alerts for disaster mapping activities.

ACTIONS Arising from Workshop

•  Formation of three parallel coordinators for following activities:

•  Coordination of Node Network & Infrastructure Coordination: JAXA-CSIRO

•  Content & User interface: MACRES/SCOSA

•  Capacity-Building

•  Node operations and IT: Digital Asia

•  Interpretation of data to products : ADRC, UN-ESCAP, JAXA-AIT

Participating Countries & Supporting Agencies

Ø  Australia - CSIRO Office of Space Science and Applications (COSSA), Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation, Department of Education, Science and Training

Ø  Bangladesh - Bangladesh Space Research and Remote Sensing Organisation (SPARRSO)

Ø  Brunei - Survey Department, Ministry of Development

Ø  Cambodia - Geography Department, Ministry of Land Management, Urban Planning and Construction

Ø  China - National Disaster Reduction Center of China (NDRCC)

Ø  Indonesia - National Institute of Aeronautics and Space (LAPAN)

Ø  Indonesia - Indonesia National Coordinating Board for Disaster Management and IDPs (BAKORNAS PBP)

Ø  Japan - Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA)

Ø  Japan - Institute of Low Temperature Science – Hokaido University

Ø  Lao P.D.R - Science, Technology and Environment Agency (STEA), Prime Minister’s Office

Ø  Malaysia - National Space Agency of Malaysia (ANGKASA), Ministry of Science Technology and Innovation

Ø  Malaysia - Malaysian Centre for Remote Sensing (MACRES), Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation

Ø  Myanmar - Planning and Statistics Division, Forestry Department, Ministry of Forestry

Ø  Nepal - Department of Urban Development and Building Construction, Ministry of Physical Planning and Works

Ø  Nepal - Survey Department, Ministry of Land Reform and Management

Ø  Philippines - Operations Section and Mitigation and Preparedness Section, National Disaster Coordinating Council (NDCC)

Ø  Philippines - National Mapping and Resource Information Authority (NAMRIA)

Ø  Singapore - Centre for Remote Imaging, Sensing and Processing (CRISP), National University of Singapore

Ø  Sri Lanka - Survey Department of Sri Lanka