India plans to set up about 1,000 automatic weather stations in the next financial year as part of ISRO's expansion programme to improve meteorological services.
BANGALORE: India plans to set up about 1,000 automatic weather stations in the next financial year as part of ISRO's expansion programme to improve meteorological services.
"About 1,000 automatic weather stations are planned to be deployed during 2008-09," Director of ISRO-Laboratory for Electro-Optics Systems, Dr T K Alex said.
"Automatic weather stations (data collection platforms) send weather data through satellites to the ground station of IMD (Indian Meteorological Department) at Delhi, and processed data required for the regional stations and early warning stations are transmitted through satellites", he said.
The major satellite systems in operation for this purpose are INSAT-2E, KALPANA-1 and INSAT-3A, Alex said at a two-day Indo-Australian workshop on remote sensing which began here at the headquarters of India's space agency.
"INSAT-3D satellite to be launched next year will carry Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometers (VHRR) and atmospheric sounder for obtaining the vertical temperature profile of the atmosphere", he said.
The VHRR on board geostationary satellites facilitate images of the cloud in different spectral bands to provide the data, he said.
"These instruments and a large number of data collection platforms distributed at various parts of the country provide vital data for weather forecasting and cyclone warning", he said.
Alex also said an IRS (Indian Remote Sensing) receiving station in Australia is getting ready for operation."We don't have a receiving station in that part (of the world) which would now get covered".
He said the remote sensing satellites that India proposed to launch include Oceansat-2, Radar Imaging Satellite (RISAT), Resourcesat-2, Third World Satellite (TWSAT) and YouthSat.
Oceansat-2 will be used for identification of potential fishing zones, sea state forecasting, coastal zone studies and provide inputs for weather forecasting and climate forecasting.
TWSAT is a micro-satellite series to provide 100 kg class satellite platform for carrying payloads for earth imaging, space science, atmospheric and ocean studies.
"The data generated will be transmitted to user low cost PC terminals (in third world countries)", he said.
Meanwhile, at the workshop, experts in the field of remote sensing from India and Australia began deliberations on various aspects of remote sensing and specifically exchange views on its applications, hyper spectral imaging, meteorology and its modelling.
The workshop is organised by the Indian National Academy of Engineering and Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering.
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