From environmental risks, as problems, to Earth observations as solutions to those problems

This paper introduces the topic of space techniques for environmental risks. It does this by giving some examples of the damage and havoc wrought in recent tragic events - mudslides. floods, cyclones, earthquakes and the Chernobyl disaster. It introduces the concept of a Geographic information System where information derived from remote sensing observations made from space is combined with other types of information and processed in a computer. Seven examples are then considered in more detail - the early 1995 flood in The Netherlands and other hydrological issues, land use studies for agriculture, the Vegetation Index and land degradation or desertification, hurricane Fran over South and North Carolina in September 1996. change detection, ocean catastrophes and atmospheric disasters. They illustrate some ways in which information derived from space observations can be used to benefit the Earth's population.