Hispasat 36W-1 (Hispasat AG1)

Hispasat 36W-1 [ESA / Pierre Carril]

In May 2008 ESA and Hispasat S.A. (Spain) signed a preliminary authorisation to proceed for the Small GEO Mission Hispasat AG1 (HAG1, Hispasat Advanced Generation 1). It was renamed Hispasat 36W-1 in March 2016. This will launch the initial activities of an industrial consortium led by Hispasat.

The signing took place in the presence of representatives from the German Space Agency (DLR), the Spanish Delegation to ESA (CDTI) and OHB-System AG.

The Small GEO Programme is aimed at the development of a small, general-purpose geostationary satellite platform, which will enable European industry to compete effectively in the commercial telecom market for small platforms.

To achieve this objective, ESA has established an element in its ARTES (Advanced Research in Telecommunications Systems) Programme. This element, known as ARTES 11, is divided into two parts. The first part covers the development of a platform supporting a payload mass of up to 300 kg, a payload power demand of up to 3 kW, and an operational lifetime of up to 15 years. The second part, the subject of the preliminary authorization to proceed that has just been signed, involves the development and launch of a Small GEO satellite and associated mission to provide flight qualification and in-orbit demonstration for the platform.

The resulting satellite, Hispasat AG1, will serve as an important and distinctive asset in Hispasat's satellite fleet with:

• a communication capacity of up to 24 transponders in Ku-band and three transponders in Ka-band
• a highly innovative payload, REDSAT, led by Spanish industry.

The REDSAT payload includes an active Direct Radiating Array (DRA) antenna providing four reconfigurable uplink beams in Ku-band and an advanced on-board processor providing four regenerative channels of 36 MHz.

Hispasat, a leading operator for the Spanish and Portuguese speaking markets, will be in position to push European innovative technologies to the telecommunications satellite commercial arena leading to the exploitation of enhanced services.

To develop the mission, Hispasat has built the necessary industrial team to implement all the programme elements. OHB-System AG will act as the Satellite Prime Contractor. TESAT GmbH (Germany) will be the Payload Prime and will be responsible for the integration of the Transparent Repeater (produced by TESAT) and the REDSAT payload. The development of the REDSAT payload will be led by Thales Alenia Space-España, who will coordinate a group of mainly Spanish companies. Thales Alenia Space-España is responsible for the on-board processor and EADS CASA (Spain) is responsible for the reflector and DRA antennas.

The satellite was booked for an Arianespace launch. Originally it was to fly as a co-passenger on an Ariane-5ECA, but in late 2016 it was moved to a dedicated Soyuz-ST-B Fregat-MT rocket. After severals delays from 2012, launch is planned for January 2017.