Ecology and environment are the foundation of human society's survival and development, and main part of the construction of national ecological civilization and receives unprecedented attention. In the past 40 years, research and application of remote sensing in China ecological environment have great achievements, and satellite remote sensing technology is playing more and more important role in the processing ecology, atmosphere, water, soil and other environment protection. According to the published documents, through typical or important study cases, this paper expounds development process of remote sensing technology in ecology and environment, including earth observation ability, supporting ecological civilization construction. The development of remote sensing monitoring capacity is mainly reflected in the expansion of application fields, improvement of monitoring accuracy and enhancement of monitoring effectiveness. The development of earth observation capacity is mainly divided into three stages: the period-based on foreign satellites, the development period of environmental satellites, and the application period of GF series satellites. Major events supporting the construction of national ecological civilization mainly include periodic investigation and assessment of national ecosystem, and environmental pollution management and control, emergency response and supervision of law enforcement. Combined with the national strategy and technology development, some thoughts on the future development of remote sensing of ecology and environment are put forward.