You can’t conserve what you can’t measure. Landsat satellites are designed to measure Earth’s features, from water use in the desert to urban expansion to crop health. Dive into the technology of Landsat 9 in Episode 2: Designing for the Future.
Each new generation of Landsat tech leads to better & better measurements. The Landsat 9 spacecraft provides power and commands to two instruments– the Operational Land Imager 2 & the Thermal Infrared Sensor 2 – that detect visible, infrared, & thermal infrared wavelengths.
OLI-2 is all about light – collecting sunlight reflected off Earth’s surface and filtering it to detect nine wavelengths in the visible and infrared frequencies to tell us different information about the land cover and water below.
TIRS-2 is all about temperature – it detects thermal infrared wavelengths to help data users track irrigation and how much water plants are using. To do this, condensers onboard keep the detectors at -382 F / -230 C.
If you missed the origin story of the Landsat program in Episode 1 of our Landsat 9: Continuing the Legacy series, catch it here:
You can follow @NASA_Landsat.
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