Excerpt
TWENTY years ago this summer, the United States launched the world's first civilian satellite designed to collect images of Earth from space. This marked the beginning of the Landsat program, which has encompassed five satellites during the past two decades. These satellites collect multispectral images that are used throughout the federal government by both civilian and national security users, broadly within the private sector, and around the globe for such purposes as environmental management, crop assessments, and oil and gas exploration.
The continuous 20-year record of Landsat data represents an invaluable component of global change research. This data base provides a unique record of environmental conditions on the planet over the past two decades-a record that will be vital for such applications as tracking the rate of deforestation in the tropics and the extent of desertification in Africa. In fact, the design of the U.S. Global Change Program was predicated on the continuation of the Landsat program.
Landsat also has a fundamental role in national security operations. The Department of Defense remains the largest single user of Landsat data and …
Footnotes
George E. Brown, Jr. is the 36th district representative to the US. House of Representatives from California and chairman of the Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, 2300 Rayburn House Office Building, Whington, D.C. 20515.
- Copyright 1992 by the Soil and Water Conservation Society
This article requires a subscription to view the full text. If you have a subscription you may use the login form below to view the article. Access to this article can also be purchased.