SLE-Services, a step to standardization in cross support?

Abstract

Overall costs of a spacecraft mission have to take into account not only satellite costs but also costs of the ground segment. Within the ground segment costs can be driven by the ground segment infrastructure or the operations using this infrastructure. From a ground system view satellite operations that use only one ground station, in the most simple case the user’s ground station, will be a cost effective solution. But today more or less all small space agencies need cross support for their satellites, at least in the LEOP phases of their missions.

One way of reducing cost in using cross support is to standardize those interfaces. Therefore the space agencies asked their standardization organization (CCSDS) to define services that give the owner of a spacecraft the ability to operate his spacecraft through different ground stations in a standardized way. This paper summarizes the status of these definitions and the future steps. It shows how the users can benefit from these definitions and demonstrates the cost savings of such an implementation.