The European Space Agency (ESA) is Europe’s gateway to space. Its mission is to shape the development of Europe’s space capability and ensure that investment in space continues to deliver benefits to the citizens of Europe and the world.
Find out more about space activities in our 23 Member States, and understand how ESA works together with their national agencies, institutions and organisations.
Exploring our Solar System and unlocking the secrets of the Universe
Go to topicProtecting life and infrastructure on Earth and in orbit
Go to topicUsing space to benefit citizens and meet future challenges on Earth
Go to topicMaking space accessible and developing the technologies for the future
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Developing instruments and algorithms for remote sensing of plastics requires standardised global in-situ observations. Compared to aquatic environments, dry shores are more accessible to frequent in-situ observations. The HyperDrone project aimed to develop a standardised indicator for in-situ radiometric detection of plastic debris with the view to be deployed globally on different platforms.
Plymouth Marine Laboratory (PML), with the support of the NERC Field Spectroscopy Facility and the Scottish Association for Marine Science (SAMS), undertook field campaigns collecting radiometric data using handheld spectrometer and hyperspectral images from sensors mounted on Remotely Piloted Aircraft Systems (RPAS). To make a robust dataset, the data was collected along the shore in real environmental conditions and uncertainty budgets were tailored for those acquisitions.
The data collected are made freely available in the Centre for Environmental Data Analysis Archive (CEDA Archive, UK) along with the uncertainty budgets to encourage other researchers to test their methods or design new sensors. Find out more here.
The project was funded through the Discovery element of ESA’s Basic Activities. It was selected through an Open Space Innovation Platform (OSIP) call for ideas on remote sensing of plastic marine litter.
Access the other Final presentations of ESA Discovery element activities videos.