Among the essential tools to address global environmental information requirements are the Earth-Observing (EO) satellites with free and open data access. This paper reviews those EO satellites from international space programs that already, or will in the next decade or so, provide essential data of importance to the environmental sciences that describe Earth's status. We summarize factors distinguishing those pioneering satellites placed in space over the past half century, and their links to modern ones, and the changing priorities for spaceborne instruments and platforms. We illustrate the broad sweep of instrument technologies useful for observing different aspects of the physio-biological aspects of the Earth's surface, spanning wavelengths from the UV-A at 380 nanometers to microwave and radar out to 1 m. We provide a background on the technical specifications of each mission and its primary instrument(s), the types of data collected, and examples of applications that illustrate these observations. We provide websites for additional mission details of each instrument, the history or context behind their measurements, and additional details about their instrument design, specifications, and measurements.

We have conducted spectral and spatial analysis of the Compton-Belkovich Thorium Anomaly (61.1 degrees N, 99.5 degrees E) region on the far side of the Moon based on high-resolution data from recent lunar missions. Chandrayaan-1 Moon Mineralogy Mapper data of Compton-Belkovich volcanic complex (CBVC) reveal the existence of a strong doublet feature near 2800 nm throughout the volcanic construct, which could be attributed to the presence of water and/or hydroxyl in the studied site. Very high resolution Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Camera-Narrow Angle Camera mosaic of the study area shows that the strongest of the hydration features within the CBVC is primarily related with either sunlit inner flanks of small-sized fresh craters or fresh escarpments associated with the central collapse structure. Moreover, Mini-RF Synthetic Aperture Radar data from Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter mission suggests the presence of a thick pyroclastic deposit in the volcanic complex. Our study indicates that the enhanced hydration at CBVC could possibly have originated from the episodic events of eruption and effusion involving silicic magma, which could probably be responsible for the tapping of a zoned magma body with a water-rich cap. Morphology of CBVC also confirms the presence of episodic effusive and eruptive events that probably had led to the formation of elevated topography, central collapsed feature and late eruptive domes in the study area.