Evolution of the Copernicus DEM: beyond today's elevation data with WorldDEM Neo

The Copernicus DEM has established a programme-level reference for Digital Elevation Models, serving all Copernicus elements (Space, Services and In-situ) over a large array of Earth-Observation based applications. Originating from the TanDEM-X SAR-mission, interferometric data have been acquired between December 2010 and January 2015 to process a global, homogenous and highly accurate Digital Surface Model (DSM), which has been made available to ESA and its partners in a 10m resolution version. The 30m and 90m resolution versions have been made available to the general public. The value-adding of the TanDEM-X DEM (removal of terrain artefacts and hydrologic editing) conducted by Airbus created the WorldDEM^TM dataset, which served as input for Copernicus DEM.

Based on the source data of the Copernicus DEM (WorldDEM) and fresh data acquisitions (2017-2020), a new generation of global DEM has been developed and validated which show improvements in actuality (2017-2020) and level of detail due to its new grid spacing of 5m. The global SAR-based DSM is commercially available as “WorldDEM Neo” with fully automated production processes, so as the DTM that is currently in production. Furthermore, known deficiencies in WorldDEM Neo caused by side-looking SAR (layover, shadow, high-rise buildings) are compensated through advanced processing. This comprises the local/regional integration of high-resolution DEM data from evolving techniques such as SAR image reconstruction or from optical sensors (primarily for DSM).

This document will focus on the processes to create an up-to-date high-resolution DSM/DTM on a global scale and the prospect of serving further applications in the Copernicus / Sentinel ecosystem.