LPS 2022 Climate Detectives School Award winners revealed

The ESA Climate Detectives school project challenges school students to ‘make a difference’ in understanding and protecting Earth’s climate. Teams have to identify and analyse a local climate problem and propose actions that may help to improve it and/or raise awareness in their communities. 

Thirty-eight Teams, out of the 195 teams participating in the 2021-2022 edition of the Climate Detectives project, submitted the results of their investigation to the LPS 2022 Climate Detectives School Award. An evaluation panel, composed of ESA Education and EO and Climate experts, selected the four winning teams. The projects were evaluated based on their relation to climate, the use of Earth observation data, their scientific correctness, and the impact of the project on the local/regional communities.

The winning Teams will travel to Bonn, Germany, where they will present their findings to an international audience at the ESA’s Living Planet Symposium 2022 on 24 May 2022.

Selected Teams

• Detectives Clima Hercules, Spain – The team investigated the relationship between climate change, and the water stress of the vegetation in four different ecosystems in their town (golf course, pine forest, marshes and dry land. For that, they analysed Copernicus Sentinel-2 data and historical weather data.

• Flash Floods Children, Greece – The team investigated the problem of urban flash floods in their town and their effects on the local community.  For that they analysed weather data for a timeseries of 30 years (1991-2020), investigated the Normalized Difference Water Index (NDWI) using satellite images and collected their own ground data using rain gauges.

• La Carrasqueta, Spain – The team investigated the effects of climate change in their local forest. For that they planted 500 acorns to identify the variables that affect their growing; investigate the climate changes since the 16th century in the records of the city historical archive and the National Meteorological Agency; and studied the evolution of their local forest using Copernicus Sentinel-2 data. 

• PDS-LEBON-4NAWI6, Belgium – The team investigated if the floods that hit parts of their town in the summer of 2021 had an impact on the amount of microplastics in affected waters. For that, they have taken samples from various water sources to determine the amount of microplastics in the inland waters and examined satellite images of the extraction sites.

ESA would like to express their sincere appreciation to all the teams, teachers and students, who participated and for their great work. Congratulations to all!