N° 17–2014: Call for Media: The new view on climate change
4 June 2014
Media are invited to a briefing on climate change monitoring with Earth-observing satellites, to be held on 13 June at the Royal Society in London.
Jointly organised by ESA and the UK Space Agency, the ‘Space: the new view on climate change’ event will provide an overview of the scientific achievements of ESA’s Climate Change Initiative (CCI), with a focus on new results from space on the cryosphere and oceans.
CCI is the largest coordinated programme for providing data on key climate parameters to support the analysis of climate change from space.
The UK is involved in both the running of the programme, which is done from the ESA Climate Office, based at ESA’s European Centre for Space Applications and Telecommunications at Harwell-Oxford, and the scientific aspects of CCI.
Representatives from ESA, together with key UK scientists and policy-makers, will highlight the contribution of satellite Earth observations to our understanding of climate change. New results on Earth’s ice and warming oceans demonstrate the UK contribution to CCI and climate science.
The event will be held at the Royal Society’s Khon Centre, 6–9 Carlton House Terrace, London, UK.
Programme
09:30 Welcome by David Willetts, UK Minister of State for Universities and Science
09:40 Volker Liebig Director of ESA’s Earth Observation Programmes discusses the future of climate observations from space
10:00 Coffee break and demonstration of climate data visualisations
10:20 Stephen Briggs, Chairman of the GCOS Steering Committee (GCOS) presents an overview of how satellites contribute to the Global Climate Observing System
10:40 Andrew Shepherd from the University of Leeds presents ‘A new perspective on Earth’s ice’
11:00 Christopher Merchant from the University of Reading presents the latest findings on warming oceans
11:20 Volker Liebig concludes the event
11:25 Q&A
12:00 Light lunch and refreshments
13:00 End of event
Additional coverage
A live webstream of the event will be available at www.esa.int/esalive
Media registration
Media representatives interested in attending the event are requested to register by 6 June via email to sarah.walker@esa.int
For further information on ESA’s climate-related research and activities, visit www.esa.int/climate
About the European Space Agency
The European Space Agency (ESA) is Europe’s gateway to space. It is an intergovernmental organisation, created in 1975, with the mission to shape the development of Europe’s space capability and ensure that investment in space delivers benefits to the citizens of Europe and the world.
ESA has 20 Member States: Austria, Belgium, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom, of whom 18 are Member States of the EU.
ESA has Cooperation Agreements with eight other Member States of the EU. Canada takes part in some ESA programmes under a Cooperation Agreement.
ESA is also working with the EU on implementing the Galileo and Copernicus programmes.
By coordinating the financial and intellectual resources of its members, ESA can undertake programmes and activities far beyond the scope of any single European country.
ESA develops the launchers, spacecraft and ground facilities needed to keep Europe at the forefront of global space activities.
Today, it launches satellites for Earth observation, navigation, telecommunications and astronomy, sends probes to the far reaches of the Solar System and cooperates in the human exploration of space.