Optimized SAR satellite concepts for the future space infrastructure of GMES

Within the EU-ESA Global Monitoring for Environment and Security (GMES) programme several studies are focusing on the security dimension of the programme including a preliminary investigation on its future space infrastructure. This paper describes the SAR payload and SAR satellite concepts ident ified by OHB System AG as promising candidates to become part of the future space architecture of GMES. It provides also a short overview of the gap analysis conducted during the study and the derived user requirements as the basis for the SAR sensor design. The presented work was funded by ESA under contract number AO/1-6206/09/I-LG.