Thermography of cities from space

A pioneering project to learn how to use satellite thermal data in cities, Thermocity has delivered a collection of analysis-ready-data thermal images. This collection has been used to generate 4 major product families:

• Evolution of impermeability/artificialization and characterization of vegetation in the city;
• Detection and characterization of thermal anomalies;
• Mapping urban heat islands and diagnosing vulnerability to the associated heat ;
• Urban climate modelling: cross-validation and future climate.

🟢 Free access

Estimating coastal flooding

Created by CLS to help coastal areas reduce their vulnerability to rising sea levels, the interactive LITTOSCOPE interface allows users to visualise several scenarios of rising sea levels, with or without a ten-year storm.

The tool also offers an assessment of the impacts (human, economic, heritage, environmental) generated.

🔵 A commercial service, access to Littoscope requires an account and password.

Identifying the vulnerability of urban environments during summer heat waves

Developed in the cities of Lille (France) and Rayong (Thailand), the project has established a methodology for classifying local climate zones derived exclusively from very high-resolution satellite images.

The issues identified are the vulnerability of urban environments during summer heat waves, and the adaptation and mitigation of local heat peaks.

🟢 The application's coding is open-source on Cerema's github and can be transposed to any city. Shapefile files for Lille and Rayong are available to download in the Resources section of the project page.

Monitoring tropical deforestation

The Tropisco platform provides a near-real-time view of tropical deforestation from 2018 to the present day. Its maps of forest cover loss are updated every 6 to 12 days using radar images from the Copernicus Sentinel-1 satellite.

Aiming for global coverage, Tropisco currently monitors the forests of 7 countries (French Guiana, Suriname, Guyana, Gabon, Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia), which were used to develop the tool.

🟢 Free access

Monitoring territorial dynamics

Developed in the Mato-Grosso region (Brazilian Amazon), the Chove-Chuva demonstrator offers a map-based summary of the territorial dynamics observed in relation to the adaptation and mitigation strategies put in place.

Using multisource data, the tool can produce a 'dashboard' of the territorial situation for an area predefined by a user, based on synthetic indicators covering 4 major themes: climate (rainfall), forest cover, water (hydrology) and agriculture (surface area and practices).

🟢 Free access

Improving coastal governance

Developed by the company BlueCham on Tahiti and a Tuamotu atoll (Tahatai project), the Qehnelo®PF platform offers new digital resources for the governance of the coastal zone, a privileged place for exchanges between land and sea parties. The interface displays three indicators: water quality, anthropogenic pressures in the lagoon environment (including automatic boat detection) and anthropogenic pressures on the coastline (land use).

Development is continuing through the Tahatai Neo project to deploy the system throughout Polynesia and then internationally.

🔵 Commercialised service, access to Qehnelo®PF requires an account and password.

Assessing the vulnerability of coastal populations and economic activities

Developed for the city of St Louis in Senegal and replicable for other coastal areas, the SCO St Louis interface combines all types of data to estimate the socio-economic vulnerability of coastal cities to the effects of climate change and raise awareness among local players.

The mapping platform can be used to select and combine several layers of information, including historical floods, land use and essential infrastructure, as well as simulations of marine and river flooding according to different IPCC scenarios.

🟢 Free access

Improving resilience to extreme hydro-meteorological events

Developed as part of the FLAude project, FORO uses satellite observation to improve the resilience of areas to the risks of flooding caused by intense run-off.

A genuine decision-making tool, FORO offers interactive maps to pinpoint problem areas and the levers for action. It will soon be expanded to include maps of log jams and detection of damaged vines.

🟢 Free access to results for the Aude department