Jed Sundwall

On the agenda

1. Satellite State of Play

   May. 16, 09:00am

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   Plenary

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   The Forum

   State of the Space Sector

   State of the Data

   State of Earth AI

   State of Application

   Since SatSummit last convened in 2022, we’ve seen large shifts and exciting new capabilities emerge. Constellations have emerged, and others have matured, notably in weather, SAR, hyperspectral, and GHG monitoring. Numerous Large Earth Models have been deployed, drawing on advances in Generative AI. The commercial space industry continues to work through its post-ZIRP (Zero interest-rate policy) hangover. As we witness an acceleration in climate change, our community is responding by setting new benchmarks in extreme weather monitoring and response capabilities. We are still determining how to gather the data to support new enforcement regimes designed to combat climate change.

   We will hear from individuals at the center of these movements. They will brief us on the current state of play and prospects for the future across the satellite sector, data, AI, and the application of EO data to social and climate issues.

2. Effective Institutions for Affecting Change

   May. 16, 01:15pm

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   Session

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   The Forum

   20th-century institutions were not built to create, manage, or share the data needed to cooperate on the global challenges we face in the 21st century. Both public and commercial institutions face limits in consolidating and harmonizing data at a global scale in a manner that is actionable, trustworthy, technically proficient, and durable. This panel will explore what institutions are needed to produce and maintain global data products and whether a new sort of institution is needed.

3. Cloud Native Tutorial & Workshop

   May. 16, 03:00pm

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   Workshop

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   The Central Hub

   Overview: The cloud native geospatial paradigm has the potential to make Earth observation analysis accessible to more people, more easily. In the simplest terms, instead of downloading data before performing an analysis, it’s now possible to stream data directly from the cloud.

   This workshop will explore this new capability using hands-on practical exercises, introducing participants to the incredible global datasets available online and an opinionated suite of tools that can be used to access them. At the end of the workshop, participants will have gained insight into how this cloud-native geospatial paradigm can simplify working with Earth observation data, along with practical examples to assist in implementing learnings going forward. The workshop will include a real-world use case documenting land productivity metrics, which are used as part of monitoring for the UN sustainable Development Goal indicators for 15.3.1. We’ll explore this metric using NASA’s Harmonized Landsat and Sentinel data accessed through Earthdata.

   The workshop will be run as part of SatSummit in Washington, D.C. on the 16th and 17th of May, 2024. If you’re already attending SatSummit, please let us know you’re interested in attending the workshop by completing this form. If you'd like to attend the workshop independently of the broader event, you can purchase a Cloud Native EO Training Only ticket.

   Requirements: This is an introductory workshop, but some experience with programming languages like Python will be helpful. If you have significant experience working with large volumes of Earth observation data, but haven’t worked with cloud native technologies like Cloud Optimised GeoTIFFs indexed in a Spatio-Temporal Asset Catalog, there are likely some techniques that will be covered that are useful.

   We’ll provide a small hosted development environment, and an Internet connection, so you only need to bring a laptop along. If you have a way of working with Jupyter Notebooks that you like, you can run the workshop in your environment. Key Python libraries we’ll be using include Xarray, Geopandas, PySTAC Client, ODC STAC and ODC Geo.