Leads: Ake Rosenqvist (JAXA), Ekaterina Tymofyeyeva (NASA/JPL), Bjorn Rommen (ESA), Magdalena Fitrzyk (ESA), Irena Hajnsek (DLR)
SG3 is a cross-cutting subgroup, developed as an evolution of the ICGS-SAR Thematic Areas on Interferometric and Polarimetric SAR Applications (TA-1/TA-2). Recommendations from the science community were published in Earth and Space Science in 2026, in a paper titled Observation and Coordination Needs for Current, Near-Future, and Next Generation Earth-Observing SAR Systems.
Activities of SG3 include:
Action SG3-1: SAR-VC will work with agencies to implement the recommendations outlined in this paper, including:
- Provide open access to more data, even if only contained in archives or acquired for selected areas. For L-band, consider making SAOCOM-1A/B, ALOS, and ALOS-2 global archives open for scientific use.
- Prioritize consistent observation modes over changing modes for systematic monitoring to enable shorter temporal baseline InSAR over longer time scales and more dense time series for change detection in general.
- Coordinate observations for the Arctic, Antarctic, Greenland, and Siberia regions to provide spatially comprehensive coverage with sustained observations at the orbit repeat period. Recently WMO revitalized a polar task group with a similar charter. SAR-VC will provide a representative and work specific technical aspects of the WMO recommendations within the CEOS umbrella.
- Acquire ALOS-4 and SAOCOM-1 wide-swath full-polarimetric observations of global vegetated areas with dual seasonal (summer/winter & dry/wet season) or four-season coverages (this complements NISAR’s dual polarization 12-day repeat).
- Coordinate with LiDAR and optical missions for campaigns and supersites.
Action SG3-2: SAR-VC will establish a performance model validation framework to create confidence among Agencies that constellation performance is properly and sufficiently estimated as input to decision-making on international coordination. The VC will develop data sets and ground truth to estimate performance from observations and compare to model predictions.
Action SG3-3: Furthermore, SAR-VC will lead the CEOS Polarimetric SAR (PolSAR) activity, which aims at catalyzing the development of SAR polarimetry. Activities include coordination of the PolSAR Science Team, liaising with contributing CEOS SAR Agencies for the coordination of multi-mission polarimetric observations over PolSAR Reference Sites, and collection of science results.
This subgroup functions as a source of information and requirements for the coordination subgroups 1 and 2.