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• CENSAT technical information

On 18 June, the mayor of Barcelona, Xavier Trias, presided at the signing of an agreement between the University of Barcelona (UB), the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya · BarcelonaTech (UPC), the University of Florida (UF) and the Cartographic and Geological Institute of Catalonia (ICGC) to form a consortium for the creation of a Centre for Satellite Applications and Technologies (CenSAT) in Barcelona. CenSAT will operate within the framework of the Barcelona Knowledge Campus (BKC), a UPC-UB initiative backed by the Barcelona City Council. The new centre will consolidate Barcelona’s position at the forefront of the smart cities sector, harnessing the potential of space missions to generate scientific knowledge and technological solutions that will improve efficiency in the management of public services.

The CenSAT initiative is the product of an initial framework agreement reached in October 2011 between the State of Florida and Spain, under the former minister for Science and Innovation Cristina Garmendia, which promotes global leadership in the manufacturing and operation of microsatellites for scientific and commercial uses.

The research and technological development conducted at CenSAT will focus specifically on the field of micro and nanosatellites. Through partnerships with private enterprises, the Centre will oversee tasks ranging from mission design and analysis to the processing and use of data. The information that is generated will be put to scientific and commercial use, particularly in the fields of life sciences, Earth observation and astronomy.

CenSAT will also be a hub for new and rapidly growing research areas that have emerged around concepts such as big data, contributing to public service management through the development of smart city solutions in areas such as microelectronics, energy efficiency and environmental management.

The new centre will specialise particularly in the design of payload subsystems and platforms for small satellite missions and the associated control and communications systems, transferring its technology to wider society through a framework agreement for commercial exploitation. CenSAT will also leverage the operational experience and educational expertise of consortium members to provide training in microsatellite technology and its applications to the next generation of engineers and scientists.

CenSAT, which will be based in Barcelona and have a permanent management office at the University of Florida, is scheduled to be fully operational by December 2015 and will become part of the Barcelona network of Shared Innovation Centres. Funding will come from private sector contracts and competitive research calls in Europe and the United States, ensuring a high degree of financial, scientific and technological sustainability and establishing a solid base from which to drive the development of the space sector in Catalonia.

Micro and nanosatellites, which weigh between 2 and 100 kg, provide companies, local authorities and research centres with access to space technologies at significantly lower cost and in more manageable time frames than conventional satellites. The satellites can be used for scientific experimentation and the development of civil applications in various sectors and activities, including agriculture and livestock farming, environmental control and safety, and the monitoring of metropolitan and maritime areas, in a new research scenario with a more advantageous cost-risk ratio.

The potential of the CenSAT initiative and Barcelona’s ongoing commitment to the use of new technologies to improve urban management, allied to its status as Mobile World Capital and European Capital of Innovation, have made the Catalan capital a model of smart city development.

Barcelona has taken the strategic decision to integrate a range of emerging technologies into the management of its public services, including 3-D printing (in the Ateneus de Fabricació, a network of fabrication laboratories), the Internet of Things, and microsatellites. Satellite technology brings space within the reach of organisations, such as city authorities, for whom the costs would previously have been prohibitive. With the creation of CenSAT, Barcelona is leading the way for many other cities that will look into the potential of this emerging sector.

The initiative is a gateway to a fertile aerospace market, with 120-180 small satellites due to be launched each year between now and 2020 . Catalonia can thrive in this new market by merging the knowledge, capabilities and extensive experience of its companies, institutions and university research groups.

The UPC will contribute to the CenSAT initiative through the experience of the Castelldefels School of Telecommunications and Aerospace Engineering (EETAC), in teaching and research in the fields of air navigation systems, space systems and technologies, astrophysics, sensors, materials, and communications networks and systems, and the expertise of the Barcelona School of Agricultural Engineering (ESAB), in the application of remote sensing for the control of extensive farming systems, infestation detection, precision farming, and the design of biological experiments for microgravity environments. The Institute of Photonic Sciences (ICFO) brings expertise in the design of hydrophobic optical coatings for the lenses of on-board optical sensors, and the Barcelona Supercomputing Center (BSC) provides extensive experience in the field of big data, which will be crucial in processing the enormous volumes of data that a satellite generates every day.

The Barcelona School of Telecommunications Engineering (ETSETB), the Micro and Nanotechnologies Research Group and the Remote Sensing Research Group bring a wealth of experience in a range of fields related to air navigation, and will also make important contributions to CenSAT activities. The ETSETB, for example, houses the Payload and Small Satellite Laboratory, NanoSat Lab, which has developed the Cube-Cat-1 nanosatellite, scheduled to orbit the Earth over the coming months with six experiments on board.

Jordi Berenguer, a lecturer and research at the EETAC and one of the driving forces behind the initiative, explains that “it’s about bringing together all of the UPC’s research activity in the aerospace field”. Between now and the end of the year, he hopes to finalise a specific proposal for “working on nanosatellites from the design phase through to launch and data exploitation”.