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The European Space Agency’s BIOMASS mission will monitor forest biomass and disturbances in unprecedented detail.
• 📡 New technology: BIOMASS uses a powerful radar wavelength (P-band) never before used in space. This allows it to “see” deeper into forests than any previous satellite.
• 🌐 Global reach: BIOMASS will provide a detailed map of biomass across Earth's dense forests, helping researchers monitor forest status and dynamics like loss and recovery.
• 🌲 Why it matters: Forests store huge amounts of carbon, thus dampening the climate impacts from human emissions. Knowing how much is stored—and where—helps scientists and governments to make better decisions on nature conservation, climate adaptation and mitigation to climate change.
The Mission:
Today marks a major leap forward in the way we see and understand our planet. On Tuesday, April 29, 2025, the European Space Agency (ESA) successfully launched the BIOMASS satellite into orbit, a cutting-edge Earth observation mission designed to track the health of the world’s forests with more detail than ever before. The launch took place from Europe’s Spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana, and signals the start of the first-ever mission to carry a P-band synthetic aperture radar (SAR) into space.
The BIOMASS mission is dedicated to mapping and monitoring the world’s densest forests with unprecedented detail. Its primary objective is to provide accurate measurements of forest above-ground biomass, a crucial indicator for understanding carbon stocks and supporting global climate action.
“With the successful launch of BIOMASS, we'll be looking at dense forests through completely new lenses. This is the first satellite with a P-band radar in space, which enables us to see deeper into forest canopies than ever before and thus estimate biomass, and its changes, much more precisely.”, says Dr. Nuno Carvalhais, Project Manager at the BIOMASS Project Office from Max Planck Institute for Biogeochemistry in Jena, Germany.
Why BIOMASS Matters:
Forests play a key role in the global carbon cycle. Monitoring dense forests, and in particular how much carbon is stored in tropical forests is crucial because these ecosystems, accounting for one third of the total photosynthesis of all terrestrial ecosystems, store about half of the world’s biomass carbon. This equals four times the annual global CO₂ emitted by anthropogenic activities. Foremost, tropical forests support invaluable biodiversity and ecosystem services that sustain global climate stability and human well-being.
Tropical rainforests are increasingly vulnerable to climate and human pressures, making it more so important to be tracking changes in deforestation, forest degradation, and carbon emissions. Accordingly, the BIOMASS mission’s primary goal is to provide globally consistent, accurate maps of forest above-ground biomass (AGB). This is a critical metric for understanding carbon storage in terrestrial ecosystems and contributes directly to international climate monitoring efforts.
Until now, limitations in existing satellite technologies have made it difficult to gather reliable global biomass data, especially in the tropics. BIOMASS addresses this gap with a new level of detail and sensitivity. The mission’s innovative P-band radar can penetrate the forest canopy and measure the woody structure of trees – something no previous spaceborne system could achieve. For the first time, scientists will be able to monitor how biomass changes over time, helping to quantify deforestation, forest degradation, and regrowth with much greater certainty.
These observations will provide vital information not only for researchers but also for policymakers and conservationists around the world, to support efforts aiming to reduce deforestation as well as adaptation measures to climate change. These measurements are essential for global carbon accounting and will feed into global climate models for informing policy frameworks such as the Paris Agreement, Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD+) programs.
Beyond its core objective, BIOMASS opens the door to a host of secondary scientific opportunities. Its long-wavelength radar allows researchers to not only study forest height and structure, but also to monitor subsurface features like glacial dynamics and underground topography in dryland regions. These capabilities have never before been available at global scales.
BIOMASS will orbit the Earth for at least five years, collecting free and open data for the global scientific community, environmental organizations, and governments, fostering international collaboration in climate and Earth system research. It’s a core component of ESA’s Earth Explorer program and plays an important role in supporting international climate agreements.
The Project Office:
In Germany, the Project Office BIOMASS plays a key role in supporting the scientific community in harnessing the full potential of the mission. Coordinated by Dr. Nuno Carvalhais at the Max Planck Institute for Biogeochemistry (MPI-BGC) in collaboration with the Friedrich Schiller University Jena (FSU), the German Aerospace Center (DLR) and the Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research (UFZ), the Project Office acts as a central hub for scientific exchange. Its mission is to synthesize, produce and share critical knowledge with the BIOMASS community, identifying knowledge gaps, and driving forward solutions within the mission framework. It also fosters communication to maintain an active dialogue on BIOMASS science and application.
To actively engage researchers and practitioners, the Project Office offers a dynamic program of training courses, workshops, and scientific events, all designed to empower users to make the most of BIOMASS data for advancing forest research, climate studies, and ecological applications. By fostering a vibrant dialogue between scientists, stakeholders, and decision-makers, the Project Office BIOMASS ensures that the mission’s groundbreaking data translates into real-world impact.
Dr. Nuno Carvalhais
ncarvalhais@bgc-jena.mpg.de
Dr. Nicole Börner
nboerner@bgc-jena.mpg
Project Office BIOMASS
Max Planck Institute for Biogeochemistry, Jena, Germany
+49 3641 576250
https://www.esa.int/Applications/Observing_the_Earth/FutureEO/Biomass Webpage of European Space Agency, ESA
https://eebiomass.org Project office
left: The BIOMASS satellite encapsulated in a rocket faring, which protects it on its way through Ea ...
Stefan Kiryenko
ESA
Merkmale dieser Pressemitteilung:
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Geowissenschaften, Meer / Klima, Tier / Land / Forst
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Forschungsprojekte, Organisatorisches
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left: The BIOMASS satellite encapsulated in a rocket faring, which protects it on its way through Ea ...
Stefan Kiryenko
ESA
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