MoU Steering Committee - Paris

The National Centre for Space Studies (CNES) in Paris hosted on 25 April the third meeting of the Steering Committee (SC), the body which manages filings for the European satellite radionavigation system (RNSS) - Galileo.
 
The meeting mainly served to discuss aspects regarding the licence agreement to be granted to the Galileo management entity on frequency usage rights, the possible inclusion or not of EGNOS (European Geostationary Navigation Overlay System) filings, the current status of the launch of Giove A and co-ordination with China?s Compass system.
 
Regarding the agreement on the licence to be issued to the Galileo management entity, the European Commission (EC) representative reported that the EC?s legal department was studying the model drawn up last year by the SC for the provisional transfer of Galileo filings to the European Space Agency (ESA), to evaluate whether that model is legally valid for the Commission. The result of that analysis will be released by the end of May. Work on producing a draft licence agreement can thus only begin in June or July, initially by correspondence. According to the EC, that licence should be ready by the end of 2006.
 
As for the inclusion of EGNOS filings in the MoU, the EC requested that the possibility of including it in the scope of the Galileo MoU should be discussed. EGNOS is an ESA, EU and Eurocontrol system meant to increase the capacity of the satellite radionavigation systems, GPS (American) and Glonass (Russian system), and is part of GNSS (Global Navigation Satellite System). However, EGNOS filings have been notified by the Inmarsat (United Kingdom) and Artemis (France) satellite systems and, besides RNSS, have other associated services such as MSS and Inter satellites for data relay with SPOT (satellite earth observation service). The question of including these filings in the MoU is therefore complex and the possibilities of resolving this matter will have to be thoroughly evaluated.
 
The ESA representative in turn reported on the current status of the launch of Giove A, the first Galileo test satellite. It was noted that after last December?s launch the test signals expected in this phase were received in the various frequency bands. In this regard, letters were sent to the ITU notifying that those frequencies were now being used, guaranteeing European priority for their filings in terms of international frequency co-ordination. Giove A signals are currently suspended in order to upload the new software to be used by the satellite. As for the second test satellite, Giove B, its launch as already been approved and is scheduled for October 2006.
 
Lastly, the question of co-ordinating with the Chinese Compass system was dealt with. A letter was sent to China indicating that the contact point for this issue is Paul Veroheven of the EC. According to its representative, the Commission?s intention is to ascertain the impact Compass may have on Galileo and China?s intention with respect to the European system. Per the EC representative?s request, opinions were exchanged on frequency co-ordination between the two systems in the scope of ITU regulatory procedures. The SC chairman is to draw up a set of questions on co-ordination at ITU level, to help the EC in the process of co-ordinating with China.
 
The next meeting has been (provisionally) scheduled for 11-12 October 2006 in London.