ABSL Powers 4th SAR-LUPE Satellite in Orbit
02nd April 2008
ABSL Space Products Establishes Itself as Leaders in Batteries for Long-Duration SAR Missions.
The fourth SAR-Lupe spacecraft was launched on the 28th March from Plesetsk onboard a Cosmos 3M launch vehicle. This marked the 34th ABSL Space Products Lithium-ion battery in space. The 10-year LEO mission is the fifth long-duration SAR mission to be powered by ABSL lithium-ion.
The SAR-Lupe system consists of five identical satellites built by OHB-System AG in Germany for the German Government. With its high-resolution radar, SAR-Lupe provides a repetitive worldwide reconnaissance capability with perfect picture quality independent of weather and lighting conditions. All satellites are launched on top of the Cosmos 3M rocket from Plesetsk, Russia.
ABSL have supplied batteries for all five satellites. The on-board batteries are designed to support the satellites throughout their nominal nearly sun-synchronous orbit ten-year missions. The batteries use the heritage ABSL18650HC cell. With unsurpassed heritage both in-orbit and on ground test the ABSL18560HC has become the cell of choice for long-duration SAR type missions, where understanding of long-term performance characteristics is of paramount importance.
With the recent successful launch of TerraSAR in June of 2007 and the award of the TandemX battery supply contract, ABSL are the clear leaders in the supply of Lithium-ion battery systems for long-duration SAR missions. All of these programmes have taken advantage of ABSL’s small-cell approach and unmatched heritage to provide power for their missions, all in excess of seven years in duration.
ABSL is recognised as the world leader in the supply of Lithium-ion batteries for space applications with over sixty-five Lithium-ion battery contracts for spacecraft and launch vehicles. ABSL supplied the first rechargeable Lithium-ion battery flown in space and a total of thirty-two spacecraft are now flying using ABSL Lithium-ion technology. More than 8,900 cell-years of space operation have been built up without a single failure.
-ENDS-
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