ESA's SAR Technology and Future Mission Concept Developments beyond Sentinel-1

This paper presents an overview of ESA's on-going technology and mission concept developments for future SAR missions beyond Sentinel-1. On the mission concept development side, six candidate Earth Explorer Core Mission ideas are studied at phase 0 level. Two of the candidates - BIOMASS and CoRe-H
₂
O - are SAR mission ideas using observations at respectively P- and dual frequency X/Ku-bands, addressing fundamental Earth system science issues. The sounding of terrestrial and planetary ice-sheets is an area where some concerted effort is focussed for enabling future Earth observation and planetary missions. An airborne P-band ice sounding demonstrator has been developed for assessing the feasibility of various clutter cancellation techniques. On the technology development front, specific risk-retirement actions are described in the areas of antennas and highpower amplifiers.