MissionsFuture missionsSentinel 3

Instruments | Orbit | Objectives

4.2.4.3. Mission's objectives

The pair of Sentinel-3 satellites will routinely monitor ocean and land surfaces to generate valuable information for the European Union (EU) and its Member States as part of the Global Monitoring for Environment and Security (GMES) programme.

The MyOcean project is the EU Marine Core Service (MCS). Operational oceanography services have been developed within the MERSEA 6th Framework Programme and through the ESA GSE Marcoast and Polarview projects. The MyOcean will deliver regular, systematic products on sea-surface topography and sea-state and ecosystem characteristics over the oceans and the European regional and shelf seas. The information from Sentinel-3 will be assimilated into models in near-realtime to provide routinely the best-available estimate of the state of the oceans, together with forecasts (from days to weeks) and reanalyses (‘hindcasts’ of ocean state over long time-series in the past).

Sentinel-3 will deliver routine operational services to policy-makers and marine and land service users:

• Marine and Coastal Environment
  • Sea-surface topography
  • Mesoscale circulation
  • Water quality
  • Sea-surface temperature
  • Wave height and wind speed
  • Sediment load and transport
  • Eutrophication (excessive plant growth in water bodies)
• Polar Environment
  • Sea-ice thickness
  • Ice surface temperature
• Maritime Security
  • Ocean-current forecasting
  • Water transparency
  • Wind and wave height
• Global Change Ocean
  • Global sea-level rise
  • Global ocean warming
  • Ocean carbon dioxide flux
• Land Cover & Land-Use Change
  • Land-use mapping
  • Vegetation indices
• Forest Monitoring
  • Forest cover mapping
• Food Security Early Warning
• Regional land-cover mapping
• Drought monitoring
• Humanitarian Aid
  • Land-use mapping
• Air Pollution (local to regional scales)
  • Aerosol concentration
  • Risk Management (flood and fires)
  • Burned scar mapping
  • Fire detection
• Global Change Land
  • Forest-cover change mapping
  • Soil degradation mapping