Earth observation data supports effective policy and decision making for climate change mitigation and adaptation.

The Copernicus Earth Observation programme and its six services provide valuable tools, data and opportunities for policy-makers, businesses and scientists for the UN-COP conferences, not least from the Atmosphere Monitoring Service and Climate Change Service managed by ECMWF.

Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service contributed to COP21 in 2015, when the Paris Agreement on a global reduction to climate change was negotiated, as well as the most recent COP23 in 2017, providing essential monitoring data about atmosphere to support the treaty negotiation and, in future, to support governments to meet their obligations. The ECMWF-run Copernicus Climate Change (C3S) and Atmosphere Monitoring Services (CAMS), joined the European Commission at COP-23, and participated in 4 side events including the ‘Global monitoring of greenhouse gases for a better understanding of our climate’ event.

Earth Observation has also supported the needs of the climate change community though the Essential Climate Variables (ECV), of which EO provides data for. There are 50 ECVs defined in 2010 split into 3 domains, one of which is Atmosphere.

Featured Educators

• Dr Kenneth Holmlund

• Dr Richard Engelen

Don’t forget you can download the video, transcript and take any quizzes available with the links on the right