The NOAA Satellite Operations Facility in Suitland, Maryland, houses command and control for POES and GOES as well as other environmental satellite constellations. A team of Aerospace engineers is stationed at this facility.
NOAA's Environmental Satellite-data Processing Center (ESPC) is the central U.S. ground facility that ingests, processes, and distributes environmental satellite data and derived geophysical products to domestic and foreign users. The ESPC receives data from the GOES, POES, DMSP, MetOp, Jason-2, and several NASA satellites and uses it to produce approximately 450 products daily, divided into four broad categories: atmospheric, oceanic, land, and various combinations of these. The data are tailored as input to numerical forecast models of the atmosphere and ocean. Examples include atmospheric vertical temperature and moisture profiles, cloud cover, ozone distribution, ocean surface wind vectors, sea surface temperatures and height, ocean color, ice and snow analysis, vegetation index, smoke, fire, and volcanic ash concentrations.
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The NOAA Satellite Operations Facility in Suitland, Maryland, houses command and control for POES and GOES as well as other environmental satellite constellations. A team of Aerospace engineers is stationed at this facility. |
Major domestic users of these data include NOAA's own National Hurricane Center, Storm Prediction Center, Environmental Modeling Center, National Weather Service Warning and Forecast Offices, National Ocean Service, and Office of Atmospheric Research. Additional federal agencies receiving NOAA satellite products include NASA, the Department of Defense, the Department of Agriculture, and the Department of Transportation. Numerous colleges and universities as well as state and local governments also receive products from NOAA. International users include space agencies and weather forecast centers from England, France, Germany, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Iceland, Italy, Australia, New Zealand, China, Japan, and India.