Galileo (system of positioning)

Presentation

This system of positioning per satellite is intended to remove the dependancy of Europe with respect to the American system , GPS ( Global Positioning System ). This independence is important, because the GPS suffers from many restrictions on the precision of positioning (about 20 meters for the free signal), on reliability or its continuity (positioning can be impossible in certain zones of the sphere and/or at certain times, for political technical reasons ou/et).

The system will be under strictly civil control, contrary to the other existing systems which are them, under military control. The two persons in charge of the project are the European Union (represented by the Member States and the European commission) and the European space agency. For this occasion, a Joint undertaking , Satellite European Navigation Industries (ESNIS), in the past Galileo Industries (GAIN), was created in July 2003. Its seat is with Brussels in Belgium.

Galileo will diffuse ten signals:

six for the free services
two for the business service
two for the public service regulated

Five services are envisaged:

the open service (or OS for Open Service ): It is the service which corresponds to the civil use of the current GPS. The open service functions on two wavebands: 1164-1214 MHz and 1563-1591 MHz. A receiver which uses the 2 wavebands can obtain a horizontal precision of <4m and a vertical precision of <8m. If the receiver uses only one of the two frequencies, it will have a horizontal precision of <5m and a vertical precision of <35m. What is comparable with the performances of the current GPS. For this service, no information of integrity is assured. It is this service which will be mainly used by the private individuals;
the business service (or CS for Commercial Service ): in exchange of a royalty paid with the Galileo operator, it will offer many services to added-value (guaranteed service, integrity and continuity of the signal, better precision of the dating and data of positioning or the diffusion of encrypted information using 2 additional signals). This service uses the 2 wavebands of the opened service, as well as a band frequency of additional of 1260 to 1300 MHz. What allows a precision lower than 1m. The signals of the business service can also be supplemented by signals coming from ground stations to reach a precision lower than 10cm. In fact mainly the subscriptions with this service will ensure the financing of Galileo;
the service of safety of the life (or GROUND for Safety Off Life service ): it will deliver a service made safe, just and certifiable, for the critical applications in the field of the safety of the life such as air transport, maritime and terrestrial;
public service regulated (or PRS for Public Regulated Service ): will address itself in priority to the users fulfilling a public service mission, very dependant on the precision, quality of the signal and reliability of its transmission (emergency services, transport of dangerous matters, etc). As this service must be available in any time, it uses two signals with share and has several systems preventing a jamming or a deception of the signal. It will be also quantified and available only on specific receivers;
the research service and help (or SAR for Search And Rescue service ): it will make it possible to locate the whole of the park of the beacons Cospas-Sarsat 406 MHz and to return a message of payment towards the beacons in distress. The regulation and the definition of the functions are under the load of the international maritime Organization (OMI) and of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO).

According to the estimates, the program should create approximately 140.000 jobs.

Technical part

The program is composed of four parts (also called “segments”):

The space segment

It consists of a deployment of thirty satellite placed on three Orbite S circulars, at an altitude of 23 616 Kilomètre S. Each orbit comprises a satellite of help.

Each satellite weighs 700 Kilogram S and contains in particular:

several atomic clocks,
of the solar panels providing a maximum power of 1500 Watt S,
a transmitter and a receiver radio operator.

The segment ground of control

The segment ground of control is in charge of the control of the satellites. It consists of:

two (or three, to see the agreements of concession of November 2005) control centers located in Europe
five stations of including all taxes in responsibility of maintain the connections of remote controls and telemetries with the satellites

The segment ground of mission

The segment ground of mission is charged to create the message of navigation diffused by the satellite (parking performances of the services), to detect the possible anomalies and to warn the users of them (in the message diffused by the satellites), like measuring the performances of the system.

It consists of:

two (or three) centers of mission colocalized with the centers of the segment ground of control where the functions of calculation of orbitography are fulfilled, of integrity (allowing to develop off the applications Safety Life ), of creation of the message of navigation and Galileo time, of the monitoring of the system and measurement of performances of the services
ten to twelve ground stations of transmission of the message of navigation towards the satellites
forty stations of reception of the satellite signals left again on all the Earth and in permanent connection with the centers of mission to provide them the necessary informations for their functions.

The segment of test of the users

This segment is intended to validate in real environment the performances of the receivers commercial (or more exactly their prototypes).

Sectors of applications

The sectors of applications are numerous. They touch the civil sector as well (marine commercial, aviation, vehicle of private individual, etc) that soldier (positioning of the troops and the mechanized units, the missiles or the planes). This last sector is however prone to discussions. On several occasions it was known as that Galileo is “ a civil program under civil control ”. However as from the moment when signal PRS is used by the firemen or the police force, nothing would prevent the Armée from making some in the same way.

In addition to positioning, like the satellites lay out each one of a ultra-precise atomic clock, Galileo can be used as a basis temporal. The business service also makes it possible to send messages of information to large scales.

Governorship and development

In 2001, after long tergiversations, the European Union made the decision of principle of building its own system of positioning GPS. In fact, the built organization is complex mixing public finances and private, and multiplying the bureaucratic structures.

Concession

June 27th, 2005, Galileo Joint Undertaking (GJU) decided to grant the concession to both Consortium S which had presented their joint offer:

INavSat : composed of EADS (Europe), Thalès (France) and Inmarsat (the United Kingdom)
Eurely: composed of Alcatel (France), Finmeccanica (Italy), AENA (Spain) and Hispasat (Spain)

The decision of the GJU rests initially on the hope that the mutualisation of the efforts and the means will more quickly allow the installation of Galileo and in a surer way. The commercial receipts should also be 20% more important than if there had been one selected consortium ( Voir the article on wikinews ).

The seat will be installed with Toulouse.

The concession will be valid until in 2026.

Financing and encountered difficulties

The estimated investment of the program is of 3,4 billion Euro S.

The annual operating costs are estimated at 220 million euros.

The financing of the program was envisaged initially with public funds and deprived:

left public (1/3 of the total) ensured equality by the European Union and the European space agency (ESA).
left private (2/3) having to come from the Eurely consortia and iNavSat.

But of very many difficulties were met at the beginning of the project: competition between States and in particular between Italy and Germany, difficulty of choosing a consortium, will to associate the two competitor consortia, then great difficulty (comprehensible) about the leadership, etc

These difficulties perdurent, and caused already “a delay of 5 years compared to the initial calendar”. The European commission pled with force on May 17th, 2007 “for a complete public finance of the 30 satellites of its future navigation system by satellite Galileo (the European GPS), exploited by private the once operational ones”. This scenario, considered to be “most advantageous” by the Police chief with Jacques Barrot transport, will be presented to the European Ministers for Transport June 7th and 8th 2007. It would imply a complete deployment of the satellites “at the end of 2012”, with first concrete uses one year earlier, according to the European commission.

The total costs quoted in this article (10 billion euros, of 2007 to 2030, period including a contract of one twenty years duration private exploitation) much higher are on the whole quoted higher: 3,4 billion investments + 4,4 billion for the exploitation (20 times 220 million euros). In this scenario, the public cost over the period 2007-2013 would remain however to 3,4 billion euros. According to Jacques Barrot, it could partly be financed by “appropriations not consumed” coming from various accounts of the community budget (agricultural assistances for cereal stocks, research appropriations, funds European against the natural disasters). However certain European Commissioners expressed their hostility with his transfers between budgetary headings and according to Mariann Fischer Boel: the financing of Galileo cannot depend on the course of the cereals , whereas Günter Verheugen questions the interest of the projects of Galileo and the “stupid” judge.

Co-operation

The United States has at the beginning of the project tempted to make it cancel. And that for various more or less acknowledged reasons:

to prevent that countries or organizations enemies can use Galileo (indeed, the systems of positioning per satellite make it possible to precisely guide the missiles to their target)
to prevent the independence of Europe in a strategic sector
possible problem of interference with their system GPS

The United States finally accepted Galileo and even will take part in it. Thus in margin of the Etats top - Linked - European Union, which proceeded in Ireland, was signed on June 26th, 2004 a final agreement allowing the technical interworking of Galileo with the GPS. That will make it possible to be able to use the Galileo system and GPS with the same receiver. Moreover, if one of the systems had suddenly had failures, the second will take over completely transparent way. The joint use of the 2 systems and the system EGNOS (system diffusing by geostationary satellites of the data of correction of the American GPS starting from an inspection network on the ground) makes it possible to improve the precision of positioning on the whole of planet.

This agreement of June 26th, 2004 is mainly confidential but essentially, it can be known as that the concluded agreement envisages the possibility of discriminating, in the event of crisis, the American military signals " M code" civil signals of the American GPS. Reciprocally, the agreement also allows to maintain in operation signals PRS (dedicated to the public services) European when it is necessary to prohibit, for safety reasons, the access to the open signals.

Many other countries are interested to take part in Galileo, on more or less important levels of co-operation. Currently (September 2005), four countries signed agreements of participation in Galileo:

China, which was committed financing Galileo for 200 million euros
India, signed on September 7th, 2005 with New Delhi
, which will take part technically and financially via a profit-sharing in the joint undertaking GJU
Morocco, which joined the program the November 8th 2005
Ukraine

Other discussions are in hand with the following countries: Russia, which has its own system of positioning, Glonass (I do not know where is currently Russia in term of co-operation. If somebody with news…) -->

European agreement on a public finance

November 23rd, 2007 in astronautics, the Member States of the European Union agree on the public finance of the program and the 2,7 billion euros necessary.

Another agreement, concluded on November 29th, 2007 in the majority qualified, without Spain, makes it possible to solve disagreements between participating countries on the attribution of the invitations to tender. The project is thus divided into six segments, each segment being equipped with a company “leader” and subcontractors.

The following day, November 30th, the Spain joint with the program, announces the Portuguese Minister for Transport, Mario Lino, who chaired the meeting of the European Ministers for Transport Brussels. Spain must shelter a center on the ground, charged with the signal dedicated specifically to civil protection (" Safety off Life"), used in the event of problem in the field of the maritime security, air and railway.

Installation

Realized

December 28th, 2005, ESA and GJU placed on the orbit envisaged, to 23.000 km of altitude, the first of two experimental satellites named GIOVE-A (GSTB-2A), since a launched Russian rocket Soyuz Cosmodrome de Baïkonour with the Kazakhstan.

This satellite is appeared as a cube of 602 kg and is manufactured by the British company SSTL. During two years, it will be used to validate a certain number of technologies, of which certain news, like the the most exact Atomic clock ever sent in space. It moreover will make it possible to hold the frequencies allotted by the International union of telecommunications (because in the event of non-utilization of these frequencies, they would have been found again free).

Envisaged

The launching of the second experimental satellite called Giove-B, initially scheduled for September 2006, was deferred and should finally be launched fine 2007 or beginning 2008.

Another satellite called Giove-A2 is programmed to be launched to the second half-year 2008 for the case or GIOVE-B would not be launched (engineering problems). This satellite will help to maintain the reservation of the frequencies allotted by the International union of telecommunications for 27 months additional.

After 2010 as soon as possible, four satellites being used to validate the performances in flight (phase IOV for In Orbit Validation ), should be operational. The launching and the deployment of the 26 remaining satellites (phase JIB for Full Operational Capability ) are designed to be spread out 2008 with 2010 or later.

References

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