Current situation and needs in man-made and natech risks management using Earth Observation techniques

•Earth Observation techniques are increasingly important in risk management.•We summarize the current state of art EO for industrial and natech events.•We discuss the future challenges EO techniques in this field of application.

The Earth Observation (EO) techniques are becoming increasingly important in risk management activities not only for natural hazards and natural disaster monitoring but also to ride out industrial and natech accidents. The latest developments in the aerospace industry such as sensors miniaturization and high spatial and temporal resolution missions, devoted to monitoring areas of specific interest, have made the use of EO techniques more efficiently and are vready to be used in near real time conditions. This paper summarize the current state of knowledge on how EO data can be useful in managing all the phases of the Industrial/natech disaster, and from the environmental conditions before the accident strikes to the post accident relief, from the scenario setting and planning stage to the damage assessment.