Tender for processing of Copernicus satellite data to be launched

Copernicus Flight Operations Segment Archive Dataspace

Buyer: European Space Agency

Deadline: not specified yet

Budget: not specified yet

Description: The Copernicus program, managed by the European Union in collaboration with ESA, represents the most ambitious Earth observation program to date. It is designed to provide a comprehensive system for monitoring our planet, supporting environmental management, enhancing public safety, and mitigating the effects of climate change. At the heart of the program are the Copernicus Sentinels, a constellation of satellites specifically developed to deliver a vast array of critical data. These satellites observe Earth’s land, ocean, and atmosphere, providing essential information on a wide range of environmental and security issues. The data gathered by the Sentinels support a variety of applications, including climate change monitoring, natural disaster response, and agricultural forecasting, making it an invaluable resource for policymakers, scientists, and businesses worldwide.

The Copernicus Ground Segment (CGS) is responsible for operating the constellation, including planning, acquiring, storing and disseminating the scientific data. Part of the CGS is the Flight Operations Segment (FOS), located at the ESA’s European Space Operations Centre (ESOC), in Darmstadt, Germany.The FOS is responsible for monitoring and controlling Sentinel-1, Sentinel-2, and Sentinel-5P, including the performance of orbit control operations and collision avoidance. Passes over S-Band and X-Band ground stations, as well as LEO to GEO intersatellite links, allow to retrieve the satellites telemetry, that is stored in the archives of the Mission Control System (MCS).

To ease the processing, visualisation and analysis of the telemetry, this is further transferred to a secondary archive accessible to the users. The archiving infrastructure has successfully managed the operational storage of all data related to flight operations—ensuring it isaccessible for health monitoring, investigating anomalies, and maintaining a historical log of spacecraft activities. The limitations of these solutions, together with new requirements emerging alongside advancements in technology, create an opportunity not merely for gradual change but for a transformative upgrade in the FOS operational data storage methods. The proposed idea envisions a public cloud archive offered as a service, placing importance on allowing the service provider to tailor the implementation. This enables adaptability that is intended for the service provider to utilize their unique expertise to maximize user satisfaction. The Invitation to Tender (ITT) will be published on esa­-star Publication. In order to access the ITT Package from esa-­star Publication, Tenderers must be registered in esa­star as potential ESA suppliers. Any Tenderer which is not yet registered with ESA as a potential supplier must complete the online questionnaire in esa­star Registration.