Planet Labs' team writes about satellite imagery, geospatial data formats, and mapping and monitoring projects using their Earth observation data.
HN commenters link it as an example of satellite imagery used for practical estimates, such as measuring oil tank fill levels for trading strategies.
Maybe so. I'm aware of satellites used to measure oil tank utilization [0], so sometimes odd information is informative for a specific trading strategy even if it is not useful in general.
0. https://medium.com/planet-stories/a-beginners-guide-to-calculating-oil-storage-tank-occupancy-with-help-of-satellite-imagery-e8f387200178
An interesting application of shadow/depth detection is estimating the level of oil in those giant circular storage tanks..!
https://medium.com/planet-stories/a-beginners-guide-to-calculating-oil-storage-tank-occupancy-with-help-of-satellite-imagery-e8f387200178
Check out: https://medium.com/planet-stories/earths-wonders-like-you-ve-never-seen-them-before-ac9e2f39aa56