GEO6
Science with GNSS
Background & Objectives
While the consortium recognises that there are a number of areas in which the Galileo SIS is of particular value to the scientific research community, it suggests that the benefits to the community do not lend themselves to simple commercial criteria. Accordingly, the approach for selecting priority applications will be based on the development of knowledge, leaving the exploitation of the results to others.
The project has the overall objective of encouraging the innovative use of GNSS, in particular of EGNOS and Galileo, in appropriate areas of the scientific research community.
Description
- To facilitate the introduction of GNSS and in particular of EGNOS and Galileo in the addressed user community sector.
- To provide a platform for the representation of the interests of this user community in the overall discussion of EGNOS and Galileo optimisation in term of different aspects (e.g. commercial, PPP scheme and risk allocation between public and private sides, social benefits and public interests, industrial and research development and innovation, operational and system evolution).
- To provide a platform to link satellite navigation experts with user community experts in order to optimise the use of this technology in the target environments.
- To provide an instrument for the dissemination and promotion of the EGNOS/Galileo benefits and added-value with respect to the current GPS solution inside this user community, targeting expertise in satellite navigation.
- To evaluate and assess all the EGNOS/Galileo social and commercial benefits against current exiting scenarios (e.g. investments, standards, regulations, applications, services and infrastructures).
- To identify all the necessary steps to maximise the beneficial use of EGNOS/Galileo in Europe and in the world for this user community, in particular by using EGNOS SIS, Galileo GSTB-V2 SIS and Galileo IOV opportunities.
- To assess the major EGNOS/Galileo applications in this user community against all the different technical and non-technical aspects.
- To identify and promote new and innovative EGNOS/Galileo applications in this user community in order to explore all the potentials of this technology in the medium and long term time frames.
- To support the validation, qualification and certification of the different applications/services (for different aspects and with different involvement depending on the nature of the addressed application/service) in the overall frame of EGNOS and Galileo user segment validation, qualification and certification.
- To define and execute activities aimed at increasing and optimising the use of the EGNOS services, as provided by the fully deployed and operational system, in this user community.
- To define and execute activities aimed to maximise the benefits for the addressed user community coming from the opportunities offered by the GSTB-V2 and Galileo IOV phase.
Objectives
This project wants to foster possible novel applications of GNSS signals, and particularly of GALILEO, within the scientific community . On the basis of potential number of users, a set of priority applications (PA) will be selected by the consortium and they will be developed within the time frame of the project. The potential revenues of a Galileo Operating Company or concessionaire (GOC), international relevance, and level of innovation will also be researched. These applications will help to increase and optimise the use of EGNOS services as well as the opportunities offered by the Galileo Signal Test-Bed (GSTB-V2) and the Galileo (IOV) phase.
The proposal explored two application areas on which to focus the critical analysis: signal science (SS) and navigation/positioning science (NPS). Within these two areas a number of specific research topics were identified: SS (Oceanography, troposphere, weather forecasting, ionosphere and space weather, hydrography), and NPS (Solid earth geodesy, volcanism & seismology, cryosphere, robotics precise orbit determination, altitude determination and formation flying, UAVs and space navigation, archaeology, botany, biology etc., where precision positioning is important).
Work performed & results
Once finalised the plan's conclusions shall be as critical as possible, identifying problem areas, open points and future work. The identified open points and barriers will be mapped against the applications' enablers according to technology, market, regulation, standards and certification, and awareness and training. The priority applications of the GEO6 Project, according to the value chain, will be developed by the partners during the second phase of the project. The selected topics will be classified as: - Signal science applications, which are oceanography, troposphere, weather forecasting, ionosphere and space weather, hydrology and climatology. - Navigation and positioning science applications, which includes solid earth (geodesy, volcanism, seismology), cryosphere, robotics precise orbit determination (attitude determination and formation flying), archaeology, UAVs and space navigation.