SMALLSAT SAR: an Affordable, all-Weather Imaging Solution for Developing Countries
- Paper number
IAC-07-B4.4.09
- Author
Dr. Adam M. Baker, Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd., United Kingdom
- Coauthor
Mr. Phil Davies, Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd., United Kingdom
- Coauthor
Dr. Stuart Eves, Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd., United Kingdom
- Coauthor
Prof. Martin Sweeting, Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd., United Kingdom
- Year
2007
- Abstract
Small, affordable spacecraft have in the last several years begun to deliver regular, medium and high resolution Earth imagery in several wavebands on a commercial basis to a wide user community. Successes include the SSTL’s Disaster Monitoring Constellation delivering LandSat and SPOT compatible visible and near-IR data for a per mission cost of less than £20M, the European PROBA small satellite with its CHRIS hyperspectral camera, recently celebrating 5 years in orbit, and the French Myriade spacecraft such as Demeter and Parasol carrying electromagnetic monitoring and multispectral atmospheric chemistry cameras respectively.
However, all electro-optical missions to date are limited by the constraints of night, cloud cover and other obscuring atmospheric phenomena which can reduce the benefits of frequent repeats using constellations, increase continental coverage times and limit the temporal resolution of transient phenomena. Furthermore, compromises between optimum sun angles (Local Time at Ascending Node) and power available from solar arrays limit the rate at which data can be downlinked, and reduce the useful duty cycle of the spacecraft. An active microwave or radar system operates under an entirely different set of constraints and is ideally suited to complement existing optical sensor platforms such as the DMC. Targeted customers included those with the following applications: wetlands monitoring, rice mapping, pastoral farmlands monitoring and nomadic migration routes, ship detection, polar ice detection and tracking, maritime pollution control, land cover assessment, subsidence and deformation, and various defence applications.
This paper will outline how a synthetic aperture radar or SAR instrument can be engineered to suit the constraints of volume, power and mass available on a small spacecraft, targeting a cost of less than $50m (excluding launch and insurance). SSTL and a leading radar payload provider are working to develop a new, miniature SAR ideally suited to launch on small satellites, by low cost launchers and in constellations for commercial and defence users. The paper will describe the overall mission design, including spacecraft, payload, ground segment with mission and spacecraft control, and payload processing facility which are being developed. Example data applications and mission performance projections will be given . The mission concept which is targeting a first launch in 2009-2010 promises to further revolutionise the already growing field of low cost, small satellite missions.
- Abstract document
- Manuscript document
IAC-07-B4.4.09.pdf (🔒 authorized access only).
To get the manuscript, please contact IAF Secretariat.