DCCEE using an Australia-wide image base

In 2010 the Department of Climate Change and Energy Efficiency (DCCEE) awarded a contract to the Australian company Geospatial Intelligence to supply high-resolution satellite image products for public use to support the first methodology approved under the Carbon Farming Initiative (CFI).

The product selected by DCCEE was the Australia-wide coverage of SPOTMaps tiles - a seamless image mosaic generated from imagery collected by the SPOT 5 satellite at a resolution of 2.5 m. SPOTMaps are highly reliable and have been independently tested to have a positional accuracy of 5 m.

This imagery forms the base map in the CFI mapping tool and allows the users to define their project areas by visually showing them their properties and the location of existing surface features such as forests, creeks, agricultural fields, water bodies and farm infrastructure such as roads, fences and canals.

A key feature of the contract is the option to permit all levels of the Australian government (federal, state and local) to use this contract to purchase SPOTMaps coverage of their jurisdictions by paying an additional uplift fee. Subsequent users from all tiers of governments in Australia can access uplifted scenes free of cost by signing a user licence with Geospatial Intelligence.

SPOTMaps is a suitable image base for the Catchment Management Authorities and Natural Resource Management groups to monitor and evaluate change at the paddock level - a 1:10,000 scale map base as accurate as GPS coordinates, yet consistent across an entire management area.

A large number of farmers and many CMAs, NRM groups and state and federal government departments are now using the imagery for a wide variety of purposes ranging from property management plans under the Delbessie Agreement in Queensland to mapping infrastructure and environmental features previously unmapped at these scales.

This multiyear contract has the added advantage of facilitating the purchase of updated imagery and SPOTMaps products, allowing users to monitor change of both land cover and land-use patterns.