Survivors of Cyclone Sidr wait for help. Photo / Reuters
A global satellite system should come on line next decade, potentially saving billions of dollars and thousands of lives by boosting preparedness for natural disasters, a top scientist says.
Monitoring changes in climate, the Global Earth Observation System of Systems (GEOSS) should also help health officials prevent epidemics
and guard against man-made environmental damage, said Jose Achache, head of the group behind the project.
"I'm an optimistic guy. So, I think in 10 years from now we'll have a fully operational and fairly complete GEOSS," said Achache, director of the Geneva-based intergovernmental Group on Earth Observations.
He spoke as ministers and officials from 70 countries assessed progress on the internet-like monitoring system.
The system links ocean buoys and satellites to reduce vulnerability to disasters and environmental change.
He said technology had already significantly reduced death tolls from disasters, and GEOSS would take that further.
"We've come a long way. The best example we can give today is this tragic hurricane in Bangladesh two weeks ago, where we had to count the victims by thousands," he said.
"But, if you think about it, 15 years ago the same hurricane killed 140,000 people and 15 years before the number was 500,000."
Achache said the lower death toll from Hurricane Sidr was directly due to better preparedness, heightened global observation and sharper modelling, which allowed authorities to track the hurricane and better forecast its intensity.
He said GEOSS could also help authorities control outbreaks of contagious diseases such as cholera and meningitis by monitoring environmental conditions where they occurred.
It would be able to gauge human environmental impact amid global concerns of accelerating climate change, such as that potentially caused by an Indian proposal to divert river flows to irrigate arid land, he said.
But Achache said a "huge task" remained ensuring the complex GEOSS system, officially only two years old, would work.
Securing funding remained a challenge, he said.
"I guess we'll have to demonstrate that it's useful, that it is providing benefits to society," he said.
- Reuters
