Case Study: Foreign Commercial SAR Evaluation

Observera recently managed an independent evaluation for the US Government of the capabilities of three new foreign commercial synthetic aperture radar (SAR) satellites: COSMO-SkyMed (CSM), RADARSAT 2 (RS2) and TerraSAR-X (TSX). The SAR systems represent a significant improvement over existing commercial radar sensors.  When considered as a constellation, they provide significantly increased all-weather coverage and much higher resolution than previous systems. 

In addition, they have orbital repeat cycles that support collection of coherent series of images for elevation measurement and change detection applications.  Their utility to the broader imaging community in the areas of maritime monitoring, environmental and disaster-support applications is very high.  There is also significant value provided by the commercial nature of the data, so it can be easily shared with coalition partners, non-governmental organizations, and non-military users for disaster and domestic security needs.  The study included an evaluation of data accuracy, image quality, and data utility for various applications.  For this activity, Observera developed the study goals and plan, managed application of resources, provided management of the acquisition, storage and distribution of the data, consolidated results, developed briefings, and integrated the final report.