NIES GOSAT PROJECT NEWSLETTERISSUE #0DEC. 2009 PREPARATION ISSUENIESGOSJ ATPRO ECTNEWSL ETTERCONTENTS

NIES GOSAT PROJECT NEWSLETTER First Issue in Preparation
Greetings from Project Leader
DATA PRODUCTS UPDATEIBUKI's Data Product Public Release Information
GOSAT TOPICS
UNFCCC COP15/CMP5
IMAGE OF THE MONTH
December 1st. One Fine Winter Day in Japan
Snow covered Japanese Northern Alps
INFORMATION
Announcement of IWGGMS-6
CALENDAR

Independent Administrative Institution
National Institute for Environmental Studies
A newsletter on The Greenhouse gases Observing SATellite (GOSAT, IBUKI) projectfrom the NIES GOSAT Project Oﬃce.

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http://www.gosat.nies.go.jp/NIESGOSAT PROJECT NEWSLETTERFirst Issue in Prepartion

Greetings from Project Leader- Tatsuya Yokota
NIES GOSAT Project Leader/ Satellite Remote Sensing Research Section ChiefCenter for Global Environmental Research (CGER)

Hello, everyone.
We, the National Institute for Environmental Studies (NIES),
are promoting the world's first greenhouse gases observing
satellite (GOSAT, a.k.a. "IBUKI") project, in cooperation with theMinistry of the Environment (MOE), and the Japan Aerospace
Exploration Agency (JAXA).
"IBUKI" was launched into space on January 23, 2009
to assess the global distributions of carbon dioxide (CO 2)
and methane (CH 4), and the geographical distribution ofthe emission and absorption of greenhouse gases. "IBUKI"
has been in normal operation for the eleven months after
the launch, and the project has generated various kindsof information including the maps of monthly global
distributions of CO2. In addition, we have started the public
release of the level 1 data products, and are planning torelease the level 2 data products to the public in the comingyear.
“NIES GOSAT PROJECT NEWSLETTER” is published at theone year anniversary of “IBUKI”’s launch. We hope to bring
you the timely and easy-to-understand news on the activities
of GOSAT project and the successful results of “IBUKI” at theNIES with this newsletter. Please stay tuned for the coming
issues.

Tatsuya Yokota : Satellite Remote Sensing
Research Section Chief at the Center for
Global Environmental Research, National
Institute for Environmental Studies. Serving
as the NIES GOSAT Project leader since2006. Specialized in the atmosphericradiative transfer calculation.

DATA PRODUCTS UPDATEIBUKI's Data Product Public Release Information
The data products acquired by "IBUKI" are now available for the public.
The calibrated and validated radiance spectra observed by the Fourier Transfrom
Spectrometer (TANSO-FTS) and the global image data observed by the Cloud andAerosol Imager (TANSO-CAI) are available1 .
You can download the data products of specific location and dates from our GOSAT
webpage in the the National Institute for Environmental Studies (NIES) website. (Theuser registration is required.)
1The data products obtained after 2009.10.29 are available as of 2009.12.24.

"IBUKI" is a nickname for the Greenhouse gasesObserving SATellite (GOSAT.) The Japanese word ibuki
means "breath, or signs of living activity." The nickname
was chosen out of the 12,683 public entries because
it is perfect for the satellite that observes the breathof the earth, carbon dioxide (CO2), and it also gives animpression of the bright and lively future. One of thegodparents of "IBUKI", Ms. Manami Eto, was invited to thelaunch on January 23, 2009 at JAXA's Tanegashima Space
Center to see off "IBUKI" to the space.

＊GOSAT TANSO-FTS LEVEL 1B
Radiance spectra of the TANSO-FTS＊GOSAT TANSO-CAI LEVEL 1B
Global image data of the TANSO-CAI＊GOSAT TANSO-CAI LEVEL1B+
Global image data of the TANSO-CAI(the geometric correction and map projection areapplied so that the top of the images indicates thenorth)1­­

The data products are available on GOSAT
User Interface Gateway（GUIG）on theGOSAT webpage:
http://data.gosat.nies.go.jp/Please refer to the instruction manual forthe step-by-step instruction on how toobtain the data products:
http://data.gosat.nies.go.jp/GosatUserInter
faceGateway/guig/doc/manualForPublicUs
ers_en.pdf

NIES GOSAT PROJECT NEWSLETTERGOSAT TOPICSPROG

NIES exhibited a booth at the Bella
Center in Copenhagen, Denmark, where the 15th
Conference of the Parties (COP 15) to the United
Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change(UNFCCS) and the 5th Meeting of the Parties tothe Kyoto Protocol (CMP5) were being held. The
exhibit introduced the research activities at NIES,
including GOSAT Project, to the representatives fromgovernments, NGOs, and the media.

NIES President Ohgaki (R) and CGER Specialist Kakinuma (L)at the NIES booth during the UNFCCC COP15/CMP5 at theBella Center in Copenhagen, Denmark.

©JAXA/NIES/MOE

2009/12/12 A news program "Newsline"on NHK World reported us at UNFCCC.

IACOP15/CMP5EMTA
EON TV - NHK WorldS

DUNFCCCO JEC T IN T H

Leader Yokota explaining GOSAT toa representative from the Republic ofZambia (L).
（Image：NHK World Website）

IMAGE OF THE MONTH

December 1st.
One Fine Winter Day in Japan
Snow-covered Japanese Northern AlpsIn this "IMAGE OF THE MONTH" section, we will
introduce you one image selected from a variety of dataproducts observed by IBUKI during the previous month.
For this month, we have an image (CAI L1B+ dataproduct) of Japan, including the area ranging from EasternJapan to Kansai, photographed by the Cloud and AerosolImager (CAI) on December 1st, 2009.
The CAI acquires images of almost every place on theearth in about three days. In many cases, the clouds cancover the land surface in those images, but this data
product from December 1st shows a clear image of a large
land area including Tohoku, Kanto, Cyubu, and Hokuriku. Asnowfall can be seen along the Hida Mountain Range. Onthe other hand, a thick cloud covers the south of Kanto andChubu shores, and there are thin clouds over some parts ofinland area. The vegetation appears as vivid green in thisimage because the image uses the near infrared range, akind of wave range the plants have a high reflectance.

CAI L1B+ Data Product from 2009/12/01. Blue = Band 1, Green = Band 3, Red = Band 2

CALENDAR

January 26-27, 2010
Hosting the Sixth International Workshop
on Greenhouse Gas Measurements fromSpace held at the Kyoto International
Conference Center in Kyoto, Japan.
February18-22, 2010
Supporting an exhibition of the Universityof Tokyo's Integrated Research System for
Sustainability Science (IR3S) at the Annual
Meeting of the American Association for theAdvancement of Science held at the San
Diego Convention Center in San Diego, CA,USA.
The further details will be announced on
the next issue.

NIES GOSAT PROJECT NEWSLETTERINFORMATION
Announcement ofthe Sixth International Workshop on
Greenhouse Gas Measurements from Space(IWGGMS-6)
NIES and JAXA will host the Sixth
International Workshop on Greenhouse Gas
Measurements from Space on January 26-27 atthe Kyoto International Conference Center inKyoto, Japan.
The workshop aims to assess the latest scienceand technologies in spaceborne measurement ofgreenhouse gases, and will address new scientificfindings obtained from the current satellite
missions (GOSAT, AIRS, SCIAMACHY, TES, and IASI)
as well as the concepts of the next-generation

ISSUE #0

remote-sensing missions which are underpreparation (OCO reflight, A-SCOPE, ASCENDS,etc.).
The oral presentation and poster sessions fromthe research fields such as instrument calibration,
data validation, and algorithm development arescheduled. There are no registration charges. The
participants are asked to register before midJanuary. Please notify us by email : iwggms@nies.
go.jp.
The further details on the workshop agenda
will be announced in the next issue.

December Preparation Issue. Issued On : 2009.12.24

edited and published by : GOSAT Project Oﬃce

NIES

GOSJ ATPRO ECT
NEWSL ETTER

email : gosat̲newsletter@nies.go.jp
website : http://www.gosat.nies.go.jp
address：16-2 Onogawa, Tsukuba-City, Ibaraki,305-8506 Japan
National Institute for Environmental Studies

This newsletter can be downloaded at
URL : http://www.gosat.nies.go.jp/eng/newsletter/newsletter00e.pdf
If you would like to subscribe or unsubscribe to this newsletter,
please email : gosat̲newsletter@nies.go.jp

Center for Global Environmental Research
Reproduction in any form without publisherʼs permission is prohibited.

GOSAT Project Oﬃce2­­