ESA Open Invitation To Tender AO8233
Open Date: 04/05/2015
Closing Date: 15/06/2015

Status: ISSUED
Reference Nr.: 15.112.04
Prog. Ref.: TRP
Budget Ref.: E/0901-01 – TRP
Special Prov.: A+B+CH+CZ+D+DK+E+F+FIN+GB+GR+I+IRL+LUX+N+NL+PL+POR+RO+S
Tender Type: C
Price Range: 200-500 KEURO
Establishment: ESOC
Directorate: Directorate Human Spaceflight & Operatio
Department: Ground Systems Engineering Department
Division: Navigation Support Office
Contract Officer: Suessner, Carol
Last Update Date: 04/05/2015
Update Reason: Tender issue

The use of high accurate clocks within Ground Sensor Stations and also on-board of Satellites (GNSS, LEO) provides the potential todevelop new concepts for the precise orbit determination. High accurate clocks allow a better characterisation and therefore an improved modelling of the clock parameters. This feature has an direct impact on the satellite precise orbit determination capability. Recent results from a TRP study indicated that clock modelling improves the quality of kinematic orbits significantly. The high accurate clocks allow a new approach for the processing of the GNSS data and the related precise orbit determination algorithms. Especially the option to constrain the clock parameters will allow the potential reduction of the number of ground sensor stations used forthe orbit determination. This could also have an impact not only for global networks, but also on the usability of regional sensor station networks (e.g. Galileo, EGNOS). Further, high accurate clocks would allow for a couple of interesting applications. I.e. it would significantly improve the reverse PPP approach thus leading to more accurate and reliable attitude evaluations. Also it does allow for generating GNSS orbits that are completely free of dynamical orbit models and thus provide a kind of “ground truth” for orbit determination. This is important when going into the direction of satellite models as this would allow to evaluate if the introduced models are causing any systematic errors. Key Words: High Accurate Clocks, POD (GNSS, LEO), Kinematic POD, Global , Regional Sparse Density Networks. Procurement Policy: C(1) = Activity restricted to non-prime contractors (incl. SMEs). For additional information please go to EMITS news “Industrial Policy measures for non-primes, SMEs and R&D entities in ESA programmes”.

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