Thales Alenia Space, a joint-venture between Thales (67%) and Leonardo(33%), has signed an amendment to its CO2M contract, worth 88 million euros, with the space segment prime contractor OHB System. This amendment provides for the development of the payload for the third satellite in the CO2M Copernicus mission, in addition to the first two satellites payloads that are currently under integration. 

Copernicus is the Earth observation component of the European Union’s Space Programme. It provides accurate, timely and easily accessible information to improve the management of the environment,understand and mitigate the effects of climate change and ensure civil security for the benefit of all European citizens. The CO2M mission as part of the Copernicus Programme is developed by the European Space Agency with a co-funding made by the European Union and the European Space Agency.

The signature of this amendment marks a significant milestone in the pursuit of the CO2M mission to develop a European anthropogenic greenhouse gas monitoring capability. Following the awarding of the CO2Mcontract in 2020 for the development of the first two satellites of this mission, ESA has renewed its confidence in OHB System and Thales Alenia Space to provide a third satellite and payload. With this additional satellite,the CO2M constellation will further consolidate its operations, while enhancing the accuracy of CO2measurements thanks to greater repeatability of acquisitions (more than 3 times a week at European latitudes).

The goal of the CO2M mission is to measure human-induced atmospheric carbon dioxide (and methane).These measurements will reduce current uncertainties in estimates of emissions of carbon dioxide from the combustion of fossil fuels at sub-continental scales. This will provide the European Union with a unique and independent source of information to assess the effectiveness of public policies, and to track their impact on decarbonizing Europe and meeting national emissions reduction targets.

Each CO2M satellite’s payload includes three instruments:

A combined CO2/NO2 (carbon dioxide/nitrogen dioxide) instrument based on a near-infrared and shortwave-infrared spectrometer provided by Thales Alenia Space in France;

A Multi-Angle Polarimeter (MAP) based on four identical cameras, contained in a dedicated optical unit, provided by Thales Alenia Space in France;

A Cloud Imager (CLIM), derived from the flight-proven Proba-V instrument, provided by OIP Sensor Systems in Belgium.

The CO2M payload will simultaneously deliver highly accurate measurements of CO2 and NO2 concentrations(with the CO2/NO2 instrument), together with measurements of aerosol density (with the MAP instrument) and cloud detection and mapping (using the CLIM instrument), thereby ensuring maximum accuracy and error corrections in CO2 concentration measurements.

CO2M will measure images of atmospheric columns of CO2 with the resolution, accuracy, time sampling and spatial coverage required to provide the key space component inputs of the Operational Anthropogenic CO2Emissions Monitoring & Verification Support (MVS) Capacity.

The atmospheric measurements made by the combination of satellites and in-situ networks, especiallyCO2M, will provide Europe with a unique operational capability that will contribute to the global monitoring of fossil CO2 emissions, meaning CO2 emissions arising from anthropogenic activities, add carbon in the climate system with a huge impact on climate change.