ESA GNC Conference Papers Repository

Meteosat Third Generation (MTG), the next-generation European meteorological system and a collaborative EUMETSAT/ESA program, is a fleet of six Geostationary satellites equipped with high resolution payloads. The MTG mission is based on a common 3-axis highly accurate and stable platform serving 4 Imaging (MTG-I) and 2 Sounder (MTG-S) satellites. OHB, MTG-S and platform prime, is responsible for the design, implementation and verification of the AOCS, together with the procurement of AOCS units, development of simulators and test benches. The program is now at the end of the phase C and at the beginning of the tests with hardware in the loop. This paper provides an update of the status of the design. The focus is on some of the technical challenges that are specifics of this mission and that had an impact on the design: 1) stringent delta-V accuracy and estimation performance: plume impingement compensation factor and accurate thruster models 2) autonomous star tracker relativistic aberration compensation: implementation of an on board inertial orbital propagator 3) iteration between thruster commanding and solar array flexible modes: constraint on the commanding scheme 4) accurate reaction wheel speed estimation for friction jumps compensation 5) sensors and actuators developments: Star tracker, Fine gyro and Reaction wheels 6) MTG-I/MTG-S commonality