
NASA wants to purchase data from small satellites bound to take a new look at Earth.
NASA is bound to develop new small satellites which will be sent in cosmos to take a new look at Earth. NASA’s scientists wish to acquire a better analysis of the data about Earth, double-checking information through a new perspective.
- NASA has new plans for 2017.
- The space agency will purchase information from small satellites owned by private sector companies.
On November 7, during a press conference, Michael Freilich, who is the director of NASA’s Earth science division, has stated that the space agency was waiting for the budget allocated for 2017 to determine their plans. They intend to purchase information from companies which own small satellites.
He claimed that the research would be funded by Congress. Thus, NASA will spend a considerable amount of money to buy and analyze the studies utility of information products which were produced from the private sector. They will also examine the satellite constellations which are meant to take a new look at Earth.
The budget request supposed to help the development of NASA’s plan in February 2017 was estimated at $30 million. The new project is called the Small Satellite Constellation Initiative. This new scheme will include a variety of ideas. NASA will validate the smallsats’ use of technology as well as initiate the nurturing of the commercial launch services for small satellites.
Back in July, NASA has launched a request in which they declared they wanted to purchase data from smallsats to use it for the development of NASA scientists’ researchers. The demand for information (RFI) has asserted that NASA is considering the idea of buying information from the private sector probably to enrich or even replace the data previously collected by their satellites.
Freilich has argued that their request for information has received a lot of encouraging responses from the companies which are part of the private sector. Unfortunately, he did not share more details about which company answered to the request.
Nevertheless, the RFI has claimed that NASA is mainly interested in data provided through global atmospheric profiling, undergone through GPS radio which determines occultation measurements. Companies like, PlanetiQ, Spire, and GeoOptics are currently developing small satellites meant to take a new look at Earth using GPS radio.
Freilich has argued that all the information which will be purchased through this program is bound to prove how useful they could be.
Image courtesy of: wikipedia
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