PROBA-V: AN OPERATIONAL AND TECHNOLOGY DEMONSTRATION MISSION – RESULTS AFTER COMMISSIONING AND ONE YEAR OF IN-ORBIT EXPLOITATION

Proba-V, the third mission of ESA’s Programme for In-orbit Technology Demonstration (IOD), conceived and developed following the footsteps of its predecessors, Proba-1 and Proba-2, is an operational mission based on a small, high performance satellite platform and a compact payload, whose main aim is the continuation of the SPOT/Vegetation programme, now planned for decommissioning. Successfully launched by the ESA VEGA launcher in May 2013, it has completed its commissioning and the full calibration of platform, main instrument and additional payloads and is, since last October, fully operational. The development of the Vegetation Instrument, the main satellite’s instrument, required the use of a number of innovative technologies, in order for it to be compatible with a small platform’s resources, while at the same time being able to enhance Vegetation images’ resolution performances from 1km to 100m at Nadir. Besides its main instrument, Proba-V embarks a number of advanced technologies, some of which represent first-ever in-space applications, integrated into its baseline platform’s design, for the enhancement of the its capabilities, flexibility and robustness, in order to meet the mission’s stringent objectives. Additionally, Proba-V embarks five technological payloads providing early flight opportunities for novel instruments and space technologies: • ADS-B: first-ever in-space demonstration of this air traffic surveillance system, • An X-Band transmitter based on Gallium Nitride RF power amplifier, • EPT: a new technology application for advanced radiation monitoring, • HERMOD: a high density fibre optics connector’s demonstration device, • SATRAM: a miniaturised radiation monitoring sensor. This paper will present the ESA approach to the In-Orbit Demonstration programme, and will highlight the Proba-V mission, focusing on the new technologies flying on-board, their in-orbit initial results and achieved performances