Christchurch Mayor Lianne Dalziel and representatives from the United States Embassy opened the Space for Planet Earth Challenge at the Turanga library last night.
The regional space prize competition, which is being led by Christchurch-based social enterprise SpaceBase Ltd, will run from August to February 2022 and aims to address climate change in New Zealand, Australia and the Pacific Islands.
Applications are open to both university/startups and high school students. For the university level, the problem statement focuses on Carbon Sequestration. Using satellite data, in combination with other data sources, applicants are asked to help develop verifiable methods to measure carbon sequestration on land and in coastal areas. This could include improving the measurement of carbon sequestration in forests, native bush, pastures, wetlands, or coastal zones or monitoring the change in extend of carbon sequestration zones. For the high school category, the problem statement focuses on Coral Health, with applicants asked to help improve the monitoring of coral health changes due to climate change using satellite technology.
Dalziel spoke at the opening along with US Embassy representative Wes Jeffers, Xerra senior scientist Duncan Steel, and other collaborators from US earth observation satellite, Company Planet, and the Allen Coral Atlas project in collaboration with National Geographic.
The winners of the six-month competition will receive up to $30,000, mentorship, and data vouchers to further develop their solutions. For more information and to apply, visit SpaceforEarth.org.
