Space probe to assess health of forests from Earth's orbit
STORY: :: ESA/M.Pedoussaut
This space probe will soon be sent into orbit to help scientists uncover the health of our world's densest rainforests.
:: ESA/ATG Media Lab
Attached to the European Space Agency's Biomass space probe is a new radar scanner that will map the carbon content of tropical forests - showing how deforestation and climate change are impacting what some refer to as the Earth's "green lungs."
FEHRINGER : 'The forests are under threat. We need this data.'
:: ESA/ATG Media Lab
The probe is due to launch into space on April 29 and will orbit the Earth for several years.
It will use interferometry technology to collect data on rainforests across Africa, Asia and South America.
:: Kourou, French Guiana
Biomass Project Manager at the European Space Agency Michael Fehringer explains.
:: Michael Fehringer, Biomass Project Manager, European Space Agency
'What we want to measure is how much of the fossil fuel that is burned and produces CO2, how much of that goes into the forests and stays there and is captured. And we do several maps over the years in order to see the changes. That is the main goal."
:: ESA - European Space Agency
The probe's instruments are designed to measure carbon levels accurately, even through dense forest canopies.
"You need to get the volume basically of the trees and with what we do, we have a radar instrument that can penetrate to the ground. We use a technology that is called interferometry, where we can also detect the height of the trees. And all that together helps us to estimate the volume and the weight, basically, of the roots in the forests."
Forests draw in around 9 billion U.S. tons of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere annually.
But ongoing deforestation and degradation, especially in tropical regions, means this stored carbon is being released back into the atmosphere.
Fehringer says the data Biomass collects is crucial to understanding the full impact of these changes on our forests.
"It's basically daily in the news, the threat of climate change to human mankind. So it will provide data to combat, to provide information for politicians to make decisions, so it's absolutely timely to do it now."
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