Friday 29 Nov 2013 @ 07:10
EU News
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EGNOS safer landings scheme extended to Ukraine

Ukraine will be able to benefit from the European EGNOS scheme, which will make air transport safer, will open up business opportunities and will improve the GPS signal for private users.

In this context, European Commission Vice-President Antonio Tajani and Ukrainian Vice-Prime Minister Oleksandr Vylkul signed a Joint Statement in Brussels today declaring both sides' intention to include the Ukrainian territory in the coverage of EGNOS (the European Geostationary Overlay Service).

The EU-Ukraine Cooperation Agreement in the field of Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS), concluded in November 2013, will be a win-win arrangement for both sides. It will increase the robustness of the EGNOS performances in the Eastern part of the EU and will allow the provision of the services over Ukraine.

The utilisation of EGNOS services in Ukraine is also contributing to the creation of a Single European Transport Area covering 1 billion people in the EU and the neighbouring countries.

As member of Eurocontrol, Ukraine is in the process of adopting the Single European Sky legislation. EGNOS is a catalyst for the Single European Sky and the arrival of Ukraine will contribute to the defragmentation of aviation navigation services across the continent.

European Commission Vice President Antonio Tajani, responsible for industry and entrepreneurship said: “I welcome Ukraine on board of this European flagship initiative. This co-operation will provide better results of the EGNOS/Galileo navigation services and will also open up a series of business opportunities for SMEs both from Ukraine and the EU. The full benefits of what we are offering in this key strategic sector will however only be available through the signature of the Association Agreement including its Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Area, as it is precisely this that would further enhance industrial cooperation and offer to Ukraine’s space industry full access to the EU markets."

 


Background

EGNOS, the European Geostationary Navigation Overlay Service, is a Satellite-Based Augmentation System (SBAS) that improves the accuracy and provides integrity to the GPS signal over most of Europe. It is Europe's first venture into satellite navigation and a major stepping-stone towards Galileo, Europe's own future global satellite navigation system.

EGNOS delivers more accurate positioning data, for improving existing services or developing a wide range of new services for different market segment such as aviation, mapping, precise agriculture, road, and location-based services (LBS).
EGNOS is made up of transponders on board three geostationary satellites, and an interconnected ground network of forty positioning stations and four control centres which cover most of the territory of the EU.

EGNOS offers three high-performance navigation and positioning services:
  • EGNOS Open Service increases the accuracy of the current GNSS and enables the use of applications requiring higher precision by correcting errors caused by atmospheric disturbance factors. Citizens can profit from better personal GNSS navigation provided that they use an EGNOS-enabled receiver (as most recent models do). This Open Service is also already widely used in agriculture for high precision applications such as the spraying of fertilisers and in mapping (for an accurate measurement of areas).
  • The Safety-of-Life Service enables precision landing approaches and renders air navigation safer as well reducing delays, diversions and cancellations of flights. EGNOS also enables the planning of shorter, more fuel-efficient routes which reduce the CO2 emissions of the aviation industry. EGNOS is currently available over more than 80 airports (details on http://www.essp-sas.eu), while other European airports should also soon be equipped.
  • The Commercial Service or EDAS provides a terrestrial commercial data service which offers professional users ground-based access to EGNOS data.
Background info
EGNOS is owned by the European Commission and was launched in 2009 to be part of the Galileo global satellite navigation system. The European Space Agency designed EGNOS under a delegation agreement with the Commission.

EGNOS is the first pan-European satellite navigation system. Similar services are provided in North America by the Wide Area Augmentation System (WAAS), in Japan by the Multifunctional Satellite Augmentation System (MSAS) and in India by the GAGAN System. Other similar Satellite Based Augmentation Systems (SBAS) are under study or development in other regions of the world.

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