Biomass’ 12-metre wire-mesh reflector

With liftoff scheduled for 2023, engineers are busy building and testing ESA’s Biomass satellite. The photo shows the satellite’s 12-metre reflector in the cleanroom at L3Harris Technologies in Florida, USA, where engineers tested its deployment procedure. The satellite will be launched with this huge antenna folded up, and once safely in orbit around Earth, a three-piece boom deploys the stowed reflector bundle into position. When the boom hinges lock into their final positions the reflector bundle is released and then opened to provide a highly accurate and stable 12-metre aperture wire-mesh reflector. This reflector will receive P-band data reflected from the world’s forests – data that will carry information about forest biomass and forest height, leading to a better understanding of the state of our forests, how they are changing over time, and advance our knowledge of the carbon cycle.