Topics

Sustainable Development Goals

Date of acceptance

March 2020

Location

France

Steering

SCO France

Available tool

See the EducSCO Temperatures interface ➔

EDUCSCO

EDUCSCO is a cross-cutting initiative supported by the SCO’s inter-agency committee. Its purpose is to disseminate knowledge in order to accelerate awareness of climate change issues in our society. It takes the form of presentations, training and teaching materials. It is aimed at school children, students and – above all – the educational community.

[fr]

The educational component of Space for Climate Observatory

OVERVIEW

EDUCSCO is an SCO project with a difference. Whereas the purpose of conventional SCO projects is to address issues relating to the impact of climate change and suggest solutions based on satellite data, EDUCSO is positioned further upstream with the aim of targeting the public directly.

The purpose of this project is to disseminate knowledge in order to accelerate awareness of climate change issues in our society.

The subjects below make up the main focus of the project:

Mechanisms of climate change: the greenhouse effect and essential climate variables, most of which are accessible only by satellite.
Measuring the causes of change through atmospheric sampling from space: greenhouse gases.
Measuring the consequences on a large scale from space: rising ocean levels, higher temperatures, the cryosphere and melting ice caps, drought, extreme climate events, etc.
The role of the SCO in risk management and regional adaptation to climate change: practical cases of use based on SCO projects!

The first step involves setting up a dedicated training programme to raise awareness across the educational community on the cause of climate change and the key role played by space applications in understanding, measuring and – ultimately – confronting it. The Toulouse regional education authority will pilot the programme during the 2020/2021 school year, with training organised for secondary school teachers. Training will be deployed on a larger scale over the following years.

▲ Merlin, a satellite to study methane © CNES/DUCROS David

TERRITORY FOR EXPERIMENTATION

Toulouse regional education authority, France

DATA

Satellite

All families of earth observation satellites will be used as part of this project, covering the following areas:

Optical and radar imagery
Atmospheric sampling
Oceanography
Meteorology

Other

Land use plan, land register, graphic parcel register
Socio-economic data

1RESULTS - FINAL PRODUCTS

👨‍👩‍👦‍👦 Informed citizens aware of the stakes of climate change!

Training

Tailor-made training for secondary school teachers in the Toulouse academy with the prospect of extending them to the national level. 🎥 See the videos
Interventions within the framework of the Precious Earth training for school teachers

Educational material

EducSCO-temperature, an application dedicated to the study of temperature changes from space.
- The instructions, which are in one pdf page, are available here (in French).
- Video tutorial here.

2 Educational videos (in French)

Thermocity, adapting cities to climate change

Thermocity is a SCO project pioneering the use of thermal satellite imagery. By measuring urban surface temperatures, Thermocity is able to detect heat loss from buildings in winter and heat islands in summer.

Vincent Lonjou, CNES engineer and head of the SCO Thermocity project, answers 4 questions from students at the Jean-Lagarde centre in Ramonville-Saint-Agne (Haute-Garonne).

FLAude, greater resilience to flooding

Implemented in the Aude department following the dramatic floods of 2018, the FLAude project has developed a system based on satellite imagery to identify water run-off, limit flooding and provide practical solutions for better management of these natural disasters.

Christelle Iliopoulos, CNES engineer and head of the SCO FLAude project, answers 5 questions from pupils at Vauquelin secondary school in Toulouse (Haute-Garonne).

ADOPT, Earth observation data applications for regional nature parks and their territories

Thanks to satellite data and the ADOPT project (Applications des Données d'Observation de la Terre pour les Parcs naturels régionaux et leurs Territoires - Earth Observation Data Applications for Regional Nature Parks and their Territories), it is possible to study the evolution and concrete impacts of climate change on the grasslands, forests and mountains of Occitanie.

Gérard Dedieu, remote sensing expert for the E2L cooperative, former researcher at CESBIO/CNES and head of the SCO ADOPT project, answers 4 questions from students at the Lycées Stéphane Hessel in Toulouse (Haute-Garonne).

Resources for the classroom

French translation of ESA Climate Change Initiative Teaching Packs

Comprising a guide for teachers and worksheets for students, each resource offers stories about the climate, practical experiments and integrates the ESA web application "Climate from Space".

The initial English-language resources are available on the ESA Climate Office website.

👉For primary education

The water cycle - The effect of global warming on floods and droughts
Is ozone good or bad? - The role of human pollution in the deterioration of the ozone layer
Countries at risk - The role of global warming in sea-level rise and the flooding of coastal towns and small islands

👉For secondary education

A passageway opens - The threat of melting sea ice due to global warming
Taking the Planet’s pulse - How satellite data helps us understand climate change
Biodiversity and habitat loss - How climate change is leading to the loss of biodiversity and habitats