The United Kingdom has announced plans to join the Atlantic Constellation partnership, committing more than £3 million to build a pathfinder satellite.
In September, Spain signed an agreement with the European Space Agency for the contracting and technical management of the Constelación Atlántica (Atlantic Constellation). The aim of the constellation is to provide data that will support the early detection of climate change indicators and the mitigation of natural disasters. The data will also be utilized to increase agricultural productivity and manage energy use.
Spain and Portugal have each committed to providing €40 million to support the project. The pair will each build and operate eight small Earth observation satellites.
The UK Space Agency announced its intention to contribute to the Atlantic Constellation on 21 November during the opening day of the UK Space Conference in Belfast. The agency has committed £3 million to the project, with additional co-funding being supplied by Open Cosmos. The funding will be utilized to build one satellite that will be launched in the same orbital plane as three others from Portugal. The four satellites will constitute the first batch of the constellation. According to the UK Space Agency, the addition of its satellite will increase the revisit time for the first orbital plane by 33%.
In addition to providing co-funding for the project, Open Cosmos has been tasked with building the pathfinder satellite, which it will do so at its headquarters in Oxfordshire. The company will utilize the same design as the three satellites being provided by Portugal.
Data access and provision policies for the Atlantic Constellation are expected to be agreed upon shortly. During the first year, UK users are expected to be able to task the country’s contributed satellite over areas of interest.
