ICHARM team wins Judges' Special Award from NEDO Challenge, Satellite Data for Green Earth

The team from the International Centre for Water Hazard and Risk Management under the auspices of UNESCO (ICHARM) (lead applicant: Katsunori Tamakawa, Research Specialist) has been selected for the Judges' Special Award in the "NEDO Challenge, Satellite Data for Green Earth" held by NEDO.

The "NEDO Prize for New Industrial and Innovative Technologies" solicits diverse seeds and solutions that contribute to solving technical and social issues through a contest-style prize money-based research and development approach. By quickly identifying seeds that can solve future social problems and create new industries, the program aims to create opportunities for joint research, practical application of seeds, and promoting commercialization. The first initiative, “Solution Development Utilizing Satellite Data / NEDO Challenge, Satellite Data for Green Earth,” will be implemented in FY2024, with the following three themes open for applications:  

• Theme 1: “Development of Carbon Credit Infrastructure” (Green and Blue Carbon, etc.)
• Theme 2: “Development of Energy Management Infrastructure” (Wind Power, Solar Power, etc.)
• Theme 3: “Development of Climate Change and Environmental Resilience Infrastructure” (Wildfires, Floods, Biodiversity, etc.)

The ICHARM team applied Theme 2, titled "Development of a Real-time Analysis Platform for Snowfall, Snow Accumulation, and Snowmelt: From Japan to the World with High Accuracy and High Temporal and Spatial Resolution" Despite being a familiar resource for people as an energy source, water resource, and tourist attraction, snow remains poorly understood in terms of its quantitative state in real-time, even in Japan, where ground-based observation systems are well-developed. The situation is even more challenging in snow-covered regions such as Asia and South America.

Therefore, the team proposed the development of an analysis platform that integrates and analyzes satellite observation data (GSMaP precipitation data, MODIS leaf area index, snow cover data), ground observation data, and numerical weather model outputs (reanalysis data) on DIAS, enabling the physical calculation and real-time spatiotemporal understanding of snowfall, snow cover, and snowmelt.

This proposal is expected to contribute to the advanced operation of hydropower dams by predicting snowmelt runoff, thereby increasing electrical power generation. It is based on the primary research of ICHARM titled “Research on Technologies to Enhance and Realize Flood Control Functions of Existing Dams Based on Flood Prediction.”

The Special Jury Award given to proposals was that “were recognized by the judges as having particular potential to contribute to solving future issues through the use of satellite data.”

For details on this program, please refer to the official contest website. The final selection process is also available on YouTube. The presentation of this ICHARM proposal can be accessed at this URL.

It has been announced that the entire prize money awarded will be donated to the Public Works Research Institute and used for research and development at ICHARM.

See also: "Topics" page on the ICHARM website