The European Space Agency (ESA) is Europe’s gateway to space. Its mission is to shape the development of Europe’s space capability and ensure that investment in space continues to deliver benefits to the citizens of Europe and the world.
Find out more about space activities in our 23 Member States, and understand how ESA works together with their national agencies, institutions and organisations.
Exploring our Solar System and unlocking the secrets of the Universe
Go to topicProtecting life and infrastructure on Earth and in orbit
Go to topicUsing space to benefit citizens and meet future challenges on Earth
Go to topicMaking space accessible and developing the technologies for the future
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Kourou, French Guiana, at Europe’s spaceport the EDRS-C satellite is being prepared for launch. Soon this second node of the European Data Relay system will join the EDRS-A node already in orbit, as the first dedicated EDRS satellite. EDRS has been designed to enable fast and reliable optical data transfer from low earth orbiting satellites to the ground. To achieve this the EDRS system uses state-of-the art laser link communication terminals and in combination with the longer data transmission offered EDRS, much more data can be transferred to the ground in Quasi Real Time, thus creating a real SpaceDataHighway