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Tag: European Data Relay System

  • Making space work for you

    Making space work for you

    The European Space Agency’s ARTES programme for Advanced Research in Telecommunications Systems, helps to create products, services and infrastructures that benefit millions of people worldwide and make a major contribution to the European economy.

    The economic engine of the space industry is satellite communications, generating over $140 billion a year in global revenues. The ARTES programme exists to support innovation, helping to transform research and development into commercial products and services.

    ESA’s telecom programmes often take the form of public–private partnerships. ESA joins forces with industry to share the cost and risk, resulting in faster and more innovative technological advances than if either undertook the project alone.

    The most recent high-profile telecom programmes are Alphasat, the largest European telecom satellite ever built and the European Data Relay System, a groundbreaking space and ground infrastructure that uses laser links to send data at unprecedented speeds.

    ARTES also promotes the use of satellites in new and imaginative ways. Satellite communications can be applied in areas as diverse as healthcare, education, transport and security to deliver services and improve daily life.

  • Linking by laser for fast data delivery

    Linking by laser for fast data delivery

    Launched in April 2014, Sentinel-1A carries an advanced radar instrument to image Earth’s surface through cloud and rain, regardless of whether it is day or night. Among its many applications Sentinel-1 routinely monitors shipping zones, maps sea ice and provides information on winds and waves for marine traffic, tracks changes in the way land is being use and provides imagery for rapid response to disasters such as floods, and monitors uplift and subsidence. The satellite transmits data to Earth when passing over ground stations in Norway, Italy and Spain. For continual data delivery, the satellite is also equipped with a laser terminal to transmit data to satellites in geostationary orbit carrying the European Data Relay System (EDRS). These satellites then transmit the Sentinel-1 data to the ground. Complementing the Sentinel ground-station network, EDRS will ensure the timely availability of large volumes of data.

    Currently, a precursor optical communications terminal and downlink system is carried on the geostationary Alphasat, Europe’s largest telecommunications satellite. The first EDRS element will be carried on the Eutelsat-9B satellite, which will be launched in 2015. In the meantime, Sentinel-1A can use the precursor instrument on Alphasat to further improve the availability of its data. Sentinel-2A, scheduled to be launched in the spring of 2015, also carries the same optical communications payload.