National Land Imaging Program
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Our Nation’s economic security and environmental vitality rely on continuous monitoring of the Earth’s continents, islands, and coastal regions in order to record, study, and understand land change at local, regional, and global scales. The USGS National Land Imaging (NLI) Program helps meet this need.
Image of the Week
Water levels in Lake Powell, which supplies water to millions in the southwestern U.S., hit historic lows in 2021. Comparing Landsat imagery from 2017 and 2021 highlights the dramatic difference.
Lake PowellLandsat 9 Road to Launch
Landsat 9 is a partnership between NASA and the U.S. Geological Survey. Learn about the process of building Landsat 9 and how it extends Landsat's unbroken record of our planet to over half a century.
Road to LaunchMore to Explore
Follow these links to learn more about our remote sensing research partnerships, how to access and download data, our image collections, news articles, and more.
National Land Imaging Program Fact Sheet
Landsat Benefits, State By State
2020 Remote Sensing Satellite Compendium
Landsat's LegacyNews
Upcoming changes to Landsat 7 and 8 CPF RSS filenames
As of December 1, 2021, the locations and filenames of RSS feeds that alert you to new Calibration Parameter Files (CPF) for Landsat 8 and Landsat 7 data will be changing as described below.
USGS, EROS Process ‘First Light’ Images from Landsat 9
The first images from the joint USGS-NASA Landsat 9 mission have been released, offering a preview of the high-quality Earth observation data that will be available from the program’s newest observatory in early 2022.
ESPA now includes Landsat Collection 2 Normalized Difference Snow Index
A new science product easily separates snow from vegetation in processed Landsat Collection 2 scenes from 1982 to present.
Publications
South Dakota and Landsat
Few states derive as much of their social and economic well-being from the land as South Dakota. Agriculture is the State’s primary industry. Hunting, fishing, tourism, mining, and hydroelectric power are also important economic and cultural drivers. Data from the U.S. Geological Survey Landsat program, archived at the U.S. Geological Survey Earth...
California and Landsat
California has remarkable geographic diversity, from 1,100 miles of Pacific shoreline to 33 million acres of trees, including its famous redwood forests along the Pacific Coast Highway, U.S. Route 101. And although California’s nickname is “The Golden State," it may also deserve the title of “The Extreme State.” Mount Whitney, the highest peak in...
System characterization of Earth observation sensors
This U.S. Geological Survey Open-File Report provides information from assessments of Earth observation sensors completed by the U.S. Geological Survey Earth Resources Observation and Science Cal/Val Center of Excellence. These reports are provided as independent measures of basic system performance by the Earth Resources Observation and Science...
Ramaseri Chandra, Shankar N.