European Meteorological Satellite Systems

The ESA MetOp Second Generation (MetOp-SG) Programme was approved at the ESA Council Meeting at Ministerial level in Naples in November 2012. Phase B2 was kicked-off in May 2014 with Airbus Defence and Space SAS, France as Prime contractor for the Satellite A series, and with Airbus Space and Defence GmbH, Germany as Prime contractor for the Satellite B series. The EUMETSAT Polar System – Second Generation (EPS-SG) Programme has been fully approved in June 2015, allowing the start of Phase C/D.

MetOp-SG is the follow-on to the current, first generation series of MetOp satellites, which is now established as a cornerstone of the global network of meteorological satellites. MetOp-SG is required to ensure the continuity of these essential meteorological observations, improve the accuracy / resolution of the measurements, and also to add new measurements / missions.

The MetOp-SG Programme is being implemented in collaboration with EUMETSAT. ESA will develop the prototype MetOp-SG satellites (including associated instruments) and procure, on behalf of EUMETSAT, the recurrent satellites (and associated instruments).

The MetOp-SG satellites accommodate a total of ten instruments. Six of these are procured with the satellites, namely MicroWave Sounder (MWS), SCAtterometer (SCA), Radio Occultation (RO) sounder, MicroWave Imager (MWI), Ice Cloud Imager (ICI), and Multi-viewing, Multi-channel, Multi-polarisation Imager (3MI). Four other instruments complete the payload: METImage from DLR, the Infrared Atmospheric Sounder Instrument New Generation (IASI-NG) from CNES, Sentinel-5 from ESA under the Copernicus Programme and Argos-4 from CNES.

This paper will present the first six instruments for which the Preliminary Design Review is planned to be completed in November 2015.

The Meteosat Third Generation (MTG) Programme is being realised through the well established and successful Cooperation between  EUMETSAT and ESA. It will ensure the future continuity of MSG with the capabilities to enhance nowcasting, global and regional numerical weather prediction, climate and atmospheric chemistry monitoring data from Geostationary Orbit.

The industrial Prime Contractor for the Space segment is Thales Alenia Space (France) with a core team consortium including OHB-Bremen (Germany) and OHB-Munich (Germany). This contract includes the provision of six satellites, four Imaging satellites (MTG-I) and two sounding satellites (MTG-S), which will ensure a total operational life of the MTG system in excess of 20 years.

The MTG-I and MTG-S satellites will bring to the meteorological community a state of the art capability for continuous high spatial, spectral and temporal resolution observations and geophysical parameters of the Earth based on sensors from the geo-stationary orbit.

In particular, the MTG-I will bring significant enhancement to the imaging mission currently provided by the  MSG satellites, with the new Flexible Combined Imager (FCI) providing a  broad spectral range(from UV to LWIR), covering extensive areas (global and regional), with improved timeliness. Furthermore, MTG-I will also offer  an lightning detection capability, through the Lightning Imaging instrument.

The MTG-S satellite, meanwhile, will bring unprecedented features to the end users with a high spectral resolution (0.625 cm^-1) and a high spatial resolution (4 km SSD) provided by the  Infra-red Sounding  instrument (IRS). The IRS mission will provide the capability for vertical profiling of the atmosphere with respect to composition and temperature (water vapour tracking & profiling, and temperature profiling), thus allowing vertical wind vectors to be established. In particular IRS will ensure early detection, and warnings, of convective instability and the associated  location and intensity of convective storms as they develop.

Further, the detection bands of IRS will provide accurate measurements of many other atmospheric constituents including H2O, O3, NO, N2O, CO and CO2. This capability combines well with the second MTG-S payload, the  Sentinel-4 (S4) developed in the frame of the Copernicus Programme. The combination of the IRS and the UVN missions will  support air quality and chemistry missions for the atmospheric science from geostationary orbit.

This paper will provide an overview of the MTG satellites, the current status of development and expected performances. Moreover it will bring examples of how the MTG satellites will enhance and build on the world class performance of the well established, and well loved, MSG family currently in operation..

The EUMETSAT Polar System Second Generation (EPS-SG) will provide operational meteorological measurements from polar orbiting satellites in the mid-morning orbit from 2021 onwards and contribute to the Joint Polar System being set up with NOAA. The Metop Second Generation (Metop-SG) satellites with their instruments, constituting the space segment of EPS-SG, are being developed by ESA with three instruments to be provided by CNES and DLR. The Metop-SG satellites will be arranged as a two satellite constellation (satellites A and B) on the same Sun synchronous, low earth orbit at about 820 km altitude and 09:30 descending equatorial crossing time, providing observations with global coverage. Both satellites will carry instruments providing measurements in support of operational meteorology, climate monitoring, and environmental services, covering oceans, atmosphere, land, and biosphere supporting a variety of application areas. The payload complement of the first satellite consists of atmospheric sounding and optical imaging instruments, while the second one is dedicated to surface scatterometry and micro-wave imaging.

The EPS-SG encompasses observation missions supported by the following instruments:

Satellite A:

The Infra-red Atmospheric Sounding Interferometer – New Generation (IASI-NG), covering a wide swath of hyper-spectral infra-red soundings in four spectral bands, over the spectral domain from 3.62 to 15.5 µm at a spatial sampling of about 25 km, being developed under the responsibility of CNES;

The METimage, providing cross-purpose, moderate-resolution optical imaging in 20 spectral channels ranging from 0.443 to 13.345 µm with a spatial sampling of 500 m, being developed under the responsibility of DLR;

The Micro-Wave Sounder (MWS) allowing for all-weather soundings over a wide swath in the spectral region between 23 and 229 GHz, at a spatial sampling of about 30 km, being developed under the responsibility of ESA;

The Radio Occultation (RO) receiver, providing high vertical resolution, all-weather soundings by tracking GPS (Global Positioning System) and Galileo satellites, being developed under the responsibility of ESA;

The Sentinel-5 (S-5) for nadir-viewing ultraviolet, visible, near-infra-red, short-wave-infra-red sounding, providing hyper-spectral sounding with a spectral resolution from 0.05 to 1 nm within the spectral range from 0.27 to 2.4 µm at a spatial sampling of 7 km, being developed for Copernicus under the responsibility of ESA.

The Multi-viewing Multi-channel Multi-polarisation Imaging mission (3MI), providing moderate resolution aerosol imaging in the spectral region ranging from ultra-violet (0.342 µm) to short-wave infra-red (2.13 µm), at a spatial sampling of 4 km, being developed under the responsibility of ESA

Satellite B:

The Scatterometer (SCA), providing back-scattered signals in the 5.355 GHz band at a spatial resolution of 25 km, being developed under the responsibility of ESA;

The Micro-Wave Imager (MWI), providing precipitation and cloud imaging in the spectral range from 18.7 to 183 GHz at a footprint size of about 10 km (highest frequency) to 30 km (lowest frequency), being developed under the responsibility of ESA ;

The Ice Cloud Imager (ICI), providing ice-cloud and water-vapour imaging in the spectral range from 183 to 664 GHz at a footprint size of 16 km,  being developed under the responsibility of ESA;

The Radio Occultation (RO) receiver, providing high vertical resolution, all-weather soundings by tracking GPS (Global Positioning System) and Galileo satellites, being developed under the responsibility of ESA.

In addition, Satellite B embarks an Advanced Data Collection System (ARGOS-4), being developed by CNES. 

The ground segment of EPS-SG will provide data with high timeliness through polar receiving stations in Arctic and Antarctic areas for the global data service and a network of distributed receiving stations for the regional data service covering the European and North-Atlantic regions. The targeted timeliness, which is the time span from the measurement to the delivery of calibrated and navigated measurements to the users, is 70 minutes for the global and 30 minutes for the regional service.

The SAF Network is an integral part of the EUMETSAT Ground Segment. Currently, the eight SAFs are generating operationally hundreds of satellite products for specific areas of applications and services. As such, they are responsible for the largest part of the EUMETSAT product portfolio.

The SAFs are also ensuring the evolution of its data serices through the development of new products. These new products take into accunt new satellite data avialble, developing needs and requiremetns of the user communities as well as the progress in science and technology.

The current development activities of the SAFs are focussed on providing new products of increased coverage and quality as well as on the preparation for the next generation of EUMETSAT’s satellites, namely the Meteosat Third Generation (MTG) and the EPS Second Generation.

This presentation is intended to provide an introduction to the SAF Network in the context of the overall EUMETSAT data and activities. The programmatic evolution of the SAF Network for the next 15 years will be addressed as well as the interaction with the users.

EUMETSAT currently operates the Meteosat First and Second Generation Geostationary (MFG and MSG) and the EUMETSAT Polar System (EPS)  satellites. The last of the MFG satellites, Meteosat-7 is still providing an operational service and is located over the Indian Ocean. This satellite will be phased out in 2017, however, the potential of using the first MSG satellite, Meteosat-8, to continue the Indian Ocean Data Coverage Service is consdered. The last of the MSG satellites, MSG-4 (to be renamed Meteosat-11 after successful commissioning) has recebtly been launched and it is anticipated that the commissioning activities will be concluded in 2015. After that the primary service over 0-degrees will still be contibued by Meteosat-9 and the rapid scan service supproted by Meteosat-10, whereas Meteosat-11 will be kept in in-orbit storage.

On the EPS side, The first two satelliets, Metop-A and -B are fully operational and Meto-C is scheduled for launch towards the end of 2018.

This paper will give an overview of these programmes, satellites and products and application areas. This will include innovative products, like the Polar Multi-sensor Aerosol properties product, and services that go beyound the initial programme requierements building on the capabilities of these excellent satellite systems.