TABLE OF CONTENTS Marco Falcone and Philippe Erhard
European Space Agency, ESA/ESTEC
Noordwijk, the Netherlands
Guenter W. Hein
Institute of Geodesy and Navigation
University FAF Munich, Germany
Satellite navigation, positioning, and timing have already found widespread applications in a large variety of fields. Recognizing the strategic importance of its applications, a European approach was developed in the early 1990s. It started with the European contribution to the first generation of Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS-1), the EGNOS program, and continues with the future generation of Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS-2), the GALILEO program.
GNSS-1 provides Europe with early benefits but does not offer a sufficient level of control over GNSS; nor does it offer signals with guaranteed availability and performance, as it depends upon the GPS or GLONASS. This has led to the definition of GALILEO, a satellite constellation providing worldwide coverage, which is proposed as the European contribution to GNSS-2.
The combined use of GALILEO, EGNOS, and GPS/GLONASS will increase the overall performance, robustness, and the inherent safety of the services achieved from GNSS, and it will allow for worldwide acceptability of the exploitation and use of satellite navigation for the benefit of all potential users.
The GALILEO system is being designed to meet a variety of user needs, out of which a number of representative services has been identified to form the basis of the design and to allow the definition of the main features of GALILEO. However, the capabilities of the...
