A first-of-its-kind satellite that will be able to see through clouds and leafy canopies to assess how the world’s rainforests are protecting the planet from climate change, has successfully launched.

The Biomass satellite, from the European Space Agency, will “weigh” the Earth’s forests, revealing how much planet-warming carbon is being stored within trees and therefore kept out of the atmosphere.

Until now the amount of carbon stored by the 1.5 trillion trees in the planet’s rainforests has been impossible to calculate.

Led by European aerospace group Airbus, the project hopes to help scientists more accurately model climate change and track rates of deforestation.