A new satellite can peer inside buildings

A few months ago, a company launched a satellite capable of taking clear radar images of anywhere in the world, with incredible resolution — even through the walls of some buildings. And can snap a clear picture during night or day, rain or shine.

The satellite can peer right through cloud cover , fog, moisture, smoke , and see just as well in the daylight as in total darkness. The resolution is so crisp that you can see inside individual rooms. That’s because instead of optical imaging, it uses synthetic aperture radar.

Synthetic aperture radar works similarly to how dolphins and bats navigate using echolocation. The satellite beams down a powerful radio signal toward its target, and then collects and interprets the signal as it bounces back up into orbit. And because the satellite is sending down its own signal rather than passively capturing light, sometimes those signals can even penetrate right through a building’s wall, peering at the interior like X-ray vision.

The satellites can collect imagery. Each pixel in one of the satellite’s images represents a 50-centimeter-by-50-centimeter square, while other SAR satellites on the market can only get down to around five meters. When it comes to actually discerning what you’re looking at from space, that makes a huge difference.

One group is already using that trick to measure how much oil is being stored in open-top oil tanks or how much is being extracted from an open-pit mine on a given day — and using that information as a proxy for the value of various commodities.