ESA - Biomass

ESA title

The mission

Carrying a novel P-band synthetic aperture radar, the Biomass mission is designed to deliver crucial information about the state of our forests and how they are changing, and to further our knowledge of the role forests play in the carbon cycle.

The launch

Date: 29 April 2025
Site: Kourou, French Guiana
Rocket: Vega-C

1st P-band radar in space
666 km altitude
1250 kg mass
12 m diameter antenna

Biomass

Gallery forests of the Angola–DRC borderlands

Stunning images from Biomass mark its one year in orbit

29/04/2026 2071 views 58 likes

Map of forest carbon from ESA’s Biomass mission

ESA’s Biomass goes live with data now open to all

26/01/2026 11878 views 103 likes

Forest floor and forest canopy

Brazil gears up to harness ESA’s Biomass data

13/11/2025 4138 views 44 likes

Global map of vegetation optical depth, 2018

SMOS adds long-term view on carbon stored in forests

01/08/2025 3336 views 55 likes

Bolivian forest and landscape from Biomass

Biomass satellite returns striking first images of forests …

23/06/2025 45813 views 144 likes

Austria Center Vienna

Media invitation: register for Living Planet Symposium 2025

Biomass in orbit

Biomass is now in space – what happens next?

More items

Applications
Biomass images
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Biomass videos
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Biomass mission kit
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Documents and publications
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Discover Biomass

Seeing the wood through the trees

Introducing Biomass

9281 views 8 likes

Tropical forest

Forests and climate

2050 views 3 likes

Measuring biomass

Biomass on biomass

3470 views 3 likes

Biomass beyond forests

Biomass beyond forests

1919 views 5 likes

Testing the deployment of Biomass' solar wing

The satellite

3294 views 4 likes

Biomass instrument open

The instrument

7760 views 19 likes

Kiruna station

Operations and data flow

2127 views 1 likes

Biomass in the anechoic chamber

Facts and figures

4236 views 11 likes

Above ground biomass

Biomass and the Climate Change Initiative

1231 views 4 likes

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