China is boosting its weather forecast and natural disaster prevention capacity with a new weather satellite delivered to the China Meteorological Administration on Monday.
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"FY-3C, a polar orbiting meteorological satellite, marks a milestone for China's meteorological satellite development, making China one of the most advanced countries in this field," said Zheng Guoguang, director of the administration.
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The delivered satellite will replace FY-3A, the test satellite launched in 2008, and provide global air temperature, humidity profiles and meteorological parameters such as cloud and surface radiation required in producing weather forecasts.
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The FY-3C satellite, designed to last five years, carries 12 remote sensing instruments, including microwave temperature and humidity sounders and GNSS occultation detectors, a new payload for the global three-dimensional and vertical soundings of the atmosphere.
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The satellite, launched in September from the Taiyuan Satellite Launch Centre in Shanxi province, will be the country's 13th weather satellite launched since 1988.
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"The performance of the FY-3C is quite outstanding," said Zhang Peng, deputy director of the National Satellite Meteorological Centre.
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The FY-3 series has more than 20,000 domestic and foreign users registered for the data, and the European Organization for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites has daily operational data exchanges with CMA.
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Another 10 meteorological satellites are planned for launch before 2020, according to a national meteorological satellite development plan, which envisions an investment of at least 20 billion CNY (33 million UD).
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Experimental satellites are not covered in the launch plan.
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Another weather satellite of the FY-2 series to be launched by the end of this year will strengthen monitoring capacity on greenhouse gas.
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 China is boosting its weather forecast and natural disaster prevention capacity with a new weather satellite delivered to the China Meteorological Administration on Monday.
