Hydrosat is recognised for its use of satellite-based thermal intelligence to support growers and water authorities with an increasingly essential capability: an accurate view of how water is being used across agricultural land.
The company operates proprietary thermal infrared satellite missions and combines satellite observations with multispectral imagery and meteorological data to provide information about land-surface temperature, evapotranspiration, soil-water balance, and crop water use. These insights allow growers to identify water stress earlier, target irrigation more precisely, and reduce unnecessary groundwater extraction. Hydrosat supports customers in more than 110 countries and monitors over 2 million hectares of agricultural land.
The impact becomes particularly tangible in California’s Madera County, where agriculture faces severe pressure from groundwater depletion. Hydrosat’s IrriWatch solution provides daily satellite-derived measurements of crop water consumption from county scale to individual farms. Authorities use the data to monitor groundwater allocations and identify potential overuse, while growers see how their own water consumption compares with those allocations and adjust irrigation accordingly.
An analysis covering 1,230 hectares between 2020 and 2025 found reduced applied water together with increased biomass water productivity. Extrapolated across Madera County’s agricultural land, the observed savings would amount to an estimated 41.95 million cubic metres of water.
The Madera County application demonstrates how space-based technology can move beyond observing water scarcity and become part of the practical infrastructure for managing it.
