ESA

Offering a foretaste of what’s to come once it is fully commissioned, ESA’s EarthCARE satellite has returned the first images from its broadband radiometer instrument. These initial images offer a tantalising glimpse into the intricacies of our planet’s energy balance – a delicate balance that governs our climate. Earth’s energy balance accounts the amount of ...

ESA’s new Φsat-2 mission, launching in the coming weeks, will push the boundaries of AI for Earth observation – demonstrating the transformative potential of AI for space technology. The integration of AI has significantly enhanced Earth observation. AI capabilities allow for more data to be processed quickly and accurately, helping to enable to transform vast ...

In the maritime sector, work is ongoing towards the identification and development of alternative PNT (positioning, navigation and timing) solutions, that is, solutions that are not wholly dependent on GNSS-based technologies. “The VHF data exchange system [VDES], is being considered as a source of alternative PNT [A-PNT] for maritime,” said Michael Turner of GMV NSL, ...

ESA’s EarthCARE satellite, poised to revolutionise our understanding of how clouds and aerosols affect our climate, has been launched. This extraordinary satellite embarked on its journey into space on 29 May at 00:20 CEST (28 May, 15:20 local time) aboard a Falcon 9 rocket from the Vandenberg Space Force Base in California, US. Just 10 ...

The advantage of incorporating 5G within a global positioning solution lies in its extensive coverage and accessibility, especially in urban areas, where GNSS signal quality can be significantly compromised. The NAVISP-funded HYPER-5G project was aimed at studying, designing and developing algorithms and software needed to drive a precise positioning engine that would use both multi-constellation ...

European Space Agency (ESA) allocated €76.6 million to develop the Genesis orbital observatory, which will be able to determine the position of objects on Earth with an accuracy of one millimeter. Another €156.8 million has been allocated for the launch of a low-orbit constellation of devices to test and improve the reliability of satellite navigation. ...

After a 16-year working life, the second European Remote Sensing Satellite (ERS-2) is making its final descent into Earth’s atmosphere. ERS-2 returned information that influenced the perception of climate change and the understanding of the planet. The European Space Agency (ESA) retired ERS-2 in 2011. It was originally launch in 1995. The Space Debris Office ...

Dedicated to delivering a wealth of new information on exactly how clouds and aerosols affect Earth’s climate, ESA’s EarthCARE satellite has had the chance to show off prior to engineers embarking upon the careful task of packing it up for its journey to the launch site in the US. Carrying four different instruments, this remarkable ...

ESA and the Commission’s Directorate-General for Climate Action (CLIMA) are, therefore, seizing the opportunity to harness their combined expertise and resources to bring about transformative change, not least in the context of the EU’s Copernicus space programme and ESA’s Space for a Green Future Accelerator. ESA and CLIMA are reinforcing their cooperation by working together ...

MANTIS was successfully integrated with its EXOpod Nova deployment system in Berlin, provided by Exolaunch as part of their mission management and integration service, prior to completing its integrations with SpaceX’s Falcon 9 before lift-off from Vandenberg Space Force Base. MANTIS, which stands for Mission Agile Nanosatellite for Terrestrial Imagery Services, will be the first ...

Methane is a powerful greenhouse gas and is the second-largest contributor to climate warming after carbon dioxide. A tonne of methane, despite its shorter lifespan of about 10 years in the atmosphere, can retain an astounding 30 times more heat than a tonne of carbon dioxide over the course of a century. This means that ...

ESA satnav receiver vans – driving between the busy heart of Rotterdam, quiet countryside, and the Agency’s ESTEC technical centre – have confirmed that Galileo signals now provide a first position fix more rapidly, while also offering improved robustness in challenging environments and streamlined access to time information. The improvement comes from a new so-called ...

Satellites will soon be used to keep an independent eye on airborne planes, under a deal agreed between ESA and Spire Global, a company that provides space-based data, analytics and space services. Spire will design an advanced civilian aviation surveillance system that uses a constellation of satellites to monitor flights globally in real time, as ...

SmartSat Cooperative Research Centre (SmartSat), Australia’s space research centre, has signed a new agreement with European Space Agencys (ESA) Philab to collaborate on Earth Observation (EO) research. The European Space Agency’s Philab is a leading research centre with a mission to accelerate the future of Earth Observation through transformational innovations and new technologies, including artificial ...

ESA along with European Organisation for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites (Eumetsat) today have released the first animations from the Lightning Imager onboard the first Meteosat Third Generation satellite, which launched on 13 December 2022. The Lightning Imager, built by Leonardo, can continuously detect rapid flashes of lighting in Earth’s atmosphere whether day or night ...

Seven CubeSat missions that demonstrate a variety of services including connectivity and secure communications are being developed by small and medium-sized companies and universities in Greece, following an open call and selection by ESA. The initiative underpins efforts – led by ESA on behalf of the Greek Ministry of Digital Governance – to expand the ...

ESA Director of Navigation, Javier Benedicto, invited Thales Alenia Space (Italy), Airbus Defence and Space (Germany) and Thales Six GTS (France) to sign respective contracts to initiate System Engineering Support for the next generation of Europe’s navigation satellite system. With 28 satellites in orbit, Galileo provides meter-level accuracy to more than four billion users around ...

The interactive online tool, a first on such a scale for all of Europe, allows users to visualise how the environment around them affects their health and well-being via set of detailed maps. It covers topics like air quality, noise and quietness, green and blue spaces and climate change throughout the member and collaborating countries ...

Officials from the Philippine Space Agency, the Department of Science and Technology (DOST) and the European Union (EU) launched on 24 April 2023 the Copernicus Capacity Support Action Programme for the Philippines (CopPhil) worth approximately Php 610 million or €10 million. The first space cooperation programme in the region, this new initiative will help Philippine ...

The international Surface Water and Ocean Topography (SWOT) mission—led by NASA and the Centre National d’Études Spatiales (CNES)—has sent back some of its first glimpses of water on the planet’s surface, showing ocean currents like the Gulf Stream in unprecedented detail. The spatial resolution of SWOT ocean measurements is 10 times greater than the composite ...

Con los contratos obtenidos de la ESA, Thales Alenia Space suministrará un primer lote de seis pequeños satélites con radar de apertura sintética (SAR) y un satélite basado en tecnología óptica para la constelación italiana de observación de la Tierra, IRIDE. Los satélites se construirán en Italia bajo la responsabilidad de Thales Alenia Space y ...

Tre giorni di tempo per sviluppare i propri progetti e sfidarsi nel realizzare applicazioni basate su dati e servizi satellitari dell’Unione Europea con l’obiettivo di creare soluzioni innovative per migliorare la sicurezza e la difesa in Europa. Tre le sfide sulle quali cimentarsi: mobilità sulla terraferma, sicurezza in mare, protezione delle infrastrutture critiche. Il CASSINI ...

Nun vermeldet die Europäische Raumfahrtbehörde (ESA), dass die Erdbeben offenbar das Terrain in der Katastrophenregion langfristig verändert haben. So habe sich die Küstenstadt İskenderun stellenweise abgesenkt, was zu Überschwemmungen geführt habe. Zudem drohen in der Region zahlreiche Hänge abzurutschen. Nach dem Beben stellten 17 Weltraumorganisationen insgesamt 350 Satellitenbilder aus der Krisenregion zusammen, damit die Schäden ...

The Galileo High Accuracy Service (HAS) is officially available, becoming the first GNSS to offer free precise point positioning (PPP) corrections worldwide via both the Galileo signal in space (E6-B) and the internet. The announcement was made Tuesday during the 2023 European Space Conference in Brussels, Belgium. The EU agency for the Space Programme (EUSPA), ...

MGISS, a UK geospatial company, aims to understand how satellite imagery can identify areas where developments could disrupt gas and water supply. The Interruption Prevention Alert Service project will use satellite data and services to automatically detect changes to the built environment in order to prevent outages in critical utilities. The company argued that a ...

La operación del “hub” (centro de conexiones) digital Copernicus en Panamá, mediante el cual la Unión Europea (UE) pone a disposición información de un conjunto de satélites para la observación de la Tierra, potenciará al país como un “hub” en diferentes campos, al aprovechar su estratégica posición geográfica en el istmo centroamericano. Representantes del gobierno ...

Prague is one of the European Union’s centers for space research, but what scientists do here remains a mystery to most people. This week, however, offers a unique chance to find out more about Czechia’s role in space exploration. The European Union Agency for the Space Programme (EUSPA) will have an open house at its ...

ESA has awarded an €800,000 NAVISP (Navigation, Innovation and Support Program) contract to Celestia UK for the development of an innovative PNT solution, based on LEO satellite constellations for 5G networks and applications. The project will use LEO satellite signals to provide a resilient position and time reference for 5G networks, boosting the reliability and ...

ESA’s Ariane 6 launch vehicle, on which the deployment of the EU’s Galileo GNSS satellite constellation now depends, has taken another step towards first flight. A fresh series of hot fire tests of the rocket’s upper stage and all-new Vinci engine is now underway at Germany’s DLR center for engine and stage testing in Lampoldshausen. ...

The European Space Agency’s Biomass satellite may be up to the job. The upcoming mission, which is planned to launch in early 2024, will monitor Earth’s forests in unprecedented detail. The satellite consists of a 40-foot-wide reflector suspended on a boom over its rectangular body — the whole thing looks like a ginormous umbrella shielding ...