AKIPRESS.COM - Unusually high temperatures, melting ice caps, floods - with the Earth facing an unprecedented challenge of climate change, 11 of the world's space agencies have agreed to launch a constellation of satellites, like a coordinated space observatory to monitor climate change, reports NDTV.

Indian space agency ISRO and America's space agency NASA are also showing progress to jointly launch a satellite four years from now to monitor climate change and deformations in Earth's crust.

Towards that, Indian space agency ISRO and America's space agency NASA have agreed to launch from India a jointly made earth observing satellite, four years from now.

Astronaut Charles Bolden, Head of NASA, says "NISAR or the NASA-ISRO synthetic Aperture Radar helps look at crustal deformations and will help in earthquake detection... We are hoping to fly it in 2020 or 2021."

The ambitious joint Indo-US satellite will also help monitor landslides, estimate biomass and look for sea level changes.

Dr Kiran Kumar, Chairman, ISRO, said, "We are excited about this. It is for the first time that two of our agencies are working on such a big scale."

Dr Jitendra Singh, Minister of State in Prime Minister's Office told NDTV, "There is a lot to share and lots to learn from us, we are also launching foreign satellites."

There are in all 130 Earth observing satellites, but no single coordinated effort - this may change after today's landmark Delhi Declaration by 11 of the world's space agencies.