Moderate Resolution Satellite Imagery for the United States 2013 Crop Season

**Revised March 7, 2013** This is a Sources Sought ONLY for ANY Small Business! Please respond via email to the Points of Contact stated for this request, with your corporate capabilities and any other relevant information as they pertain to being able to support the stated requirement and would allow USDA to determine your ability to perform the following type of requirement. 1:0 BACKGROUND The mission of the USDA Satellite Imagery Archive (SIA) is to make satellite imagery available to USDA subscriber agencies in a timely and economical fashion during the US crop growing season. Key performance indicators are measured by timely distribution and receipt of requested satellite imagery during the 2013 crop season, and providing bulk satellite imagery during the 2013 crop season at a measurable economic benefit to the USDA subscribing agencies from April 15, 2013 through September 31, 2013. The USDA's Remote Sensing Coordinating Committee (RSCC) recommended the formation of the SIA, which evolved from annual imagery purchased by USDA's Foreign Agricultural Service (FAS) and Farm Service Agency (FSA) from approximately 1985-2000. The SIA was officially established in March, 2000 by a signed Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between the Foreign Agricultural Service, Farm Service Agency, Forest Service (FS), National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS), and the Agricultural Research Service (ARS). The National Resources and Conservation Service (NRCS), the Risk Management Agency (RMA) and the Animal Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) later became SIA subscribers. The members of the RSCC include the above USDA subscribing agencies and the RSCC meets quarterly to review SIA activities, as well as exchange satellite imagery information between the USDA subscribing members. The SIA facility is managed and operated by the SIA Manager, with the assistance of one contractor (the Archive Assistant). The SIA Manager reports quarterly to the USDA's RSCC pertaining to imagery request fulfillments and he/she is responsible for the purchase, receipt, inventory, storage, and dissemination of satellite imagery to USDA agency subscribers, as well as the physical management of the SIA facility and the online Archive Explorer (AE) system at http://www.pecad.fas.usda.gov/archive_explorer/default.cfm. The SIA facility and AE system is located in the USDA South Building in Washington DC and it is managed by the International Production Assessment Division (IPAD) of the Foreign Agricultural Service (FAS), Office of Global Analysis (OGA). All satellite imagery for the current SOW will be delivered by the satellite vendor to the USDA's SIA, and the imagery later distributed to subscribing USDA agency members through the AE (Archive Explorer) system. 2:0 OBJECTIVE The objective is to acquire moderate resolution satellite imagery to monitor the United States upcoming 2013 crop season from April 1, 2013 through September 31, 2013. The base coverage Area of Interest (AOI) is the lower 48 states of the United States 3:0 SCOPE OF WORK The Scope of Work is to deliver moderate satellite imagery within the lower 48 states of the United States to USDA's SIA and according to the requirements specified below. a. Pixel Resolution: The horizontal ground resolution or ground sample distance (the area of the ground represented in each pixel in x and y components) of the multispectral imagery shall be no less than 20 meters and no greater than 29-meters and no imagery should be resampled to meet this resolution requirements. Proposals with multispectral ground sample distance outside the specified range will be considered. b. Geo-referencing: Orthorectification within 72 hours of image acquisition to a CE90 (Circular Error of 90%) or within one pixel of image ground sample distance is desired. c. Band Combination: A minimum requirement of three (3) multispectral imagery bands are required consiting of two visible bands and one near infrared (NIR) band but four (4) bands of multispectral imagery are preferred, consiting of two visible bands, one near infrared (NIR) band and one short-wave infrared band (SWIR). d. Resampling method: Cubic Convolution e. Cloud Cover: Imagery with 30% or less cloud cover is required. f. Swath Width: Satellite imagery with swath width equal to or greater than 185-kilometers is required. Satellite imagery with swath widths less than 185-kilometers will not be considered. Larger swath width greater than 185-km is preferred. g. Temporal Resolution or Overpass Frequency: Orthorectified satellite imagery to be delivered daily to USDA SIA within 72 hours of acquisition, with overpass frequency of minimum of two (2) times (3 preferred) per month. That is, the frequency of satellite-image collection should result in at least two scenes per month of 30% or less cloud-free imagery over the cropland pixels. h. Cloud Coverage over Cropland Pixels: Due to constraints caused by clouds that can appear in any portion of the scene when a satellite is overhead, FAS/IPAD will accept all satellite images that are more than 30% cloud cover for the entire image but cloud cover is less than 30% over the cropland pixels within the image. A predefined crop mask that is accepted by FAS/IPAD can be used by the vendor to define "cropland pixels" and for determining if less than 30% of the cropland pixels are covered by clouds. i. The place of performance for this project (Sources Sought Number: AG-3151-SS-13-ModerateResolutionSatelliteImagery) will be the contractor's office location. But: All satellite imagery for the SOW will be delivered by the satellite vendor to the USDA's SIA and other Decision Support Systems as described in the SOW, and the imagery later distributed to subscribing USDA agency members through the AE (Archive Explorer) system.