Earth Science Decadal Survey

[1] Agencies like NASA use the recommendations from the decadal survey to prioritize funding for specific types of scientific research projects.

[6] In the intervening years prior to the official decadal surveys, the Space Studies Board of the National Research Council produced many reports outlining Earth observation goals.

For example, the survey recommended a continuation of NPOESS (dissolved), which is now called JPSS, including instruments like VIIRS on the two satellites Suomi-NPP and NOAA-20 which launched in 2011 and 2017.

In “Thriving on Our Changing Planet: A Decadal Strategy for Earth Observation from Space,” the Earth observation topics that ranked as the most important in the 2017 survey were: aerosol properties, atmospheric winds, greenhouse gases, surface biology and geology, terrestrial ecosystem structure, ocean ecosystem structure, aquatic-coastal biogeochemistry, soil moisture, ocean surface winds and currents, vegetation-snow-surface energy balance, and surface topography and vegetation.

[4] The 2017 survey recommended that United States agencies NASA, NOAA and USGS work on a coordinated approach to earth observations in the next decade.

[19] The 2017 survey explained that out of the missions laid out in the 2007 survey, some were successfully launched (“implemented”), some were recommended but required further planning (“partially implemented” or a “designated program element”), and some were given an undetermined status (called “incubation,” “unallocated,” or “recommended as a candidate for Earth System Explorer” missions in the future).

[20] This mission is still in the early planning stages as of 2021 but will likely have 10s of meters spatial resolution, 16-day revisit time, and a combination of hyperspectral and multispectral coverage.