Bangalore, 11 April 2007: The images captured by CARTOSAT-2, the 12th satellite of the Indian Remote Sensing (IRS) satellite series, were released by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) here on Wednesday.
ISRO released panchromatic images captured by the satellite at an altitude of 630 km in sun-synchronous orbit with a spatial resolution of one metre. The satellite has a lifespan of approximately five years.
The one-metre spatial resolution has its uses in cartography, disaster management, urban and rural infrastructure planning and monitoring, watershed management and coastal land use monitoring. IRS data has already been applied in land-use mapping, agro-climatic zones planning and crop acreage and production estimation.
“These satellite images will be far more affordable for domestic users than those bought from the United States, which are priced at $20 for one sq km,” said K. Radhakrishnan, Director, National Remote Sensing Agency. He added, “CARTOSAT -2 in the next three years is bound to become one of the key players in the international market worth $120 million, for remote sensing data products”.
