The sixth satellite in ESA's Earth Explorer Program, EarthCARE (named after Earth Cloud, Aerosol and Radiation Explorer) is a collaborative European/Japanese (ESA / JAXA / NICT) mission.The primary objective of the mission is to measure the infrared radiation released from Earth's surface and atmosphere, as well as to observe and characterize clouds and aerosols.With the goal of providing unprecedented datasets to enable scientists to study the relationship of clouds, aerosols, and radiation at accuracy levels that will significantly improve our understanding of these highly variable parameters, EarthCARE will make use of high-performance lidar and radar technology that has never been flown in space.