36th International Symposium on Remote Sensing of Environment

This 36th Symposium will represent a major event in the long series of internationally recognized ISRSE meetings. The overall theme of the symposium is the use of Earth Observation systems and related Remote Sensing techniques for understanding and managing the Earth environment and resources.

ISRSE-36 takes place at a significant moment: The process to define the UN global development agenda post 2015 with its Sustainability Development Goals will be finalized in 2015. The Future Earth initiative has been created as a global platform to deliver solution-orientated research for sustainability. One of its key challenges is innovative approaches to integrate knowledge systems (data, observation, modelling, etc.), including remote sensing of the environment. A second Hyogo Framework of Action with its goal to substantially reduce disaster losses is set to be launched in 2015, where Earth observation approaches play an increasing role in making societies resilient to disasters. The global Group on Earth Observations (GEO), together with its partners, such as the Committee on Earth Observing Satellite (CEOS), addresses all of these political and scientific agendas while it currently prepares for its second implementation phase 2016-2025.

ISRSE-36 will be an excellent forum to present results from past and current scientific achievements related to those international developments, as well as to discuss future plans for them. ISRSE-36 will feature recent milestones in the development of Earth observation programmes addressing sustainable development, global environmental issues and resilience to disasters:

• The Copernicus Programme which is the European Earth Observation and Monitoring Programme led by the European Union has gone operational in 2014. In its dedicated Sentinel fleet of missions developed by the European Space Agency (ESA), the first mission Sentinel-1A has been launched successfully, others will follow soon.
• The Symposium will also devote attention to other significant Earth Observation programmes world-wide, public as well as private, such as the US Land Imaging Program and its Landsat legacy, the SPOT, Radarsat, ALOS or CBERS programmes.
• The German Aerospace Center DLR is operating very successfully the TerraSAR-X mission and, together with its twin satellite, the TanDEM-X mission. Both missions are implemented in a public-private partnership with Airbus Defence and Space. 2015 will witness the full completion of the TanDEM-X global Digital Elevation Model. This will be an unique dataset with unprecedented quality and coverage. The RapidEye mission has been launched in 2008, where DLR supports its scientific exploitation. DLR also prepares for the EnMAP Hyperspectral Imaging mission to be launched in 2017.

ISRSE-36 will provide an outstanding opportunity to learn about these major programmes and their first results. It will be a forum to present applications based on these new missions and to exchange views on future directions of Earth Observation technology and geographic information management. The Symposium will include plenary and thematic sessions, poster sessions and side events on issues of interest to scientists, policy makers and resource managers in the public and private sectors. The programme will feature speakers from around the globe sharing their experiences and knowledge on Earth observation applications and programmes. By attending the ISRSE-36, practitioners, scientists, policy makers, system engineers and students will be able to get a full view of the current situation in a range of fields now deemed critical in the Earth’s sustainable management.