Usingen earth station
The Usingen earth station is a ground station for communication with satellites . It is located in Hesse , about 25 kilometers north of Frankfurt am Main , and is in the urban areas of Usingen and Neu-Anspach . The earth station is operated by Media Broadcast Satellite GmbH . With its more than 135 antennas, it serves, among other things, as a sending and receiving point for data traffic of all kinds.
history
The area of around 140 hectares of today's earth station was used as an ammunition depot and field airfield during World War II . After the war, the site was taken over by what was then the Deutsche Bundespost and a shortwave station (overseas radio station ) was built in 1955 .
With a transmission power of up to 100 kilowatts, information was sent around the globe. The prerequisite for this were large antennas ( rhombuses ), which shaped the character of the broadcasting station.
At the end of the 1960s, shortwave technology was gradually replaced by satellite technology. The first European test satellite OTS ( Orbital Test Satellite ) of the European Space Agency (ESA) was u. a. served from Usingen.
As a result of this change, a large number of large parabolic antennas were created , by means of which a large number of satellites are served.
In 1979 the first parabolic antenna was built. It has a diameter of 18.3 meters. Two more antennas, each 19.5 meters in diameter, followed in the early 1980s.
In mid-2015, Media Broadcast GmbH outsourced the operation of the earth station and the entire satellite business to its own subsidiary, Media Broadcast Satellite GmbH. In 2016, this subsidiary became independent as part of the sale of Media Broadcast GmbH to the Freenet Group and has continued to operate the earth station alone since then.
Satellite services
For more than 30 years, the Usingen earth station has been Germany's central data hub for teleport, VSAT and satellite services. In the connected NOC (Network Operation Center), SCPC connections and state -of-the- art VSAT network solutions for national and international companies and organizations are switched and monitored 24 hours a day, 7 days a week .
For the distribution of TV and radio programs, u. a. Using the satellite positions of Eutelsat and SES Astra , the earth station reaches over 230 million households in 60 countries in Europe, North Africa and the Arab world.
Antennas
More than 60 parabolic antennas with diameters of 4.2–19.5 m (Ku, Ka, K and C band) are in use for transmitting and receiving operations on an area of around 1,400,000 m² on the Usingen earth station . This means that orbital positions from 76 ° East to 60 ° West can be covered. Additional, mobile Ku and K band antennas are also available.
All antenna systems are redundant and equipped with de-icing systems. The earth station thus achieves an annual availability of greater than 99.99%.
Operation and plant
The earth station was built on behalf of the Deutsche Bundespost and has been in operation since 1977. In 2008 it was taken over by the French broadcaster TDF , which sold it on to three senior managers of the facility in 2019 (→ management buy-out ).
The facility works with around 70 employees on a 24-hour basis. The technicians in the NOC (Network Operation Center) can provide direct 1st-level and 2nd-level support on request and monitor the connections in real time.
The connection to the world's largest Internet hub DE-CIX in Frankfurt and terrestrial networks expand the transmission options of the earth station with redundant hybrid solutions. In addition, the earth station has a modern IPTV headend for more than 250 TV programs.
Environmental protection and solar park
Right from the start, when designing the Wert earth station, attention was paid to planting with local plants. Today the earth station is so integrated into the landscape that it can only be perceived from Merzhausen. The area itself is - due to the necessary distances between the antennas - a biotope of great ecological importance and biodiversity.
In order to save high costs for landscape maintenance, a large part of the lawn is kept short by sheep.
In 2013, the cities of Usingen and Neu-Anspach commissioned a solar specialist with the construction of three outdoor photovoltaic systems, which together generate 6.2 megawatts peak (peak power) and can thus supply over 1,700 households with green electricity. Before the construction, the ordnance disposal service had removed 24 tons of old war material such as machine guns, pistols, large quantities of ammunition, grenades, a complete anti-aircraft gun and much more. The solar power systems were officially put into operation in May 2013.
literature
- Hans A. Jack: The earth station Usingen im Taunus. In: Ingrid Berg (Ed.): Heimat Hochtaunus. Kramer, Frankfurt am Main 1988, ISBN 3-7829-0375-7 , pp. 320–323.
See also
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ From space about Usingen in television newspaper article of the FAZ about current and history of the earth station from January 29, 2010. Retrieved on May 27, 2017.
- ↑ Orbital Test Satellite (OTS) - artist's impression picture with descriptive text about the beginning and end of the mission. Retrieved May 27, 2017.
- ^ EQS Group AG, Munich, Germany: freenet AG acquires the Media Broadcast Group - dgap.de. In: www.dgap.de. Retrieved September 9, 2016 .
- ^ Television from the Hintertaunus, article in the Frankfurter Rundschau from February 1, 2010. Accessed on May 27, 2017.
- ↑ Bernhard Biener: From space about Usingen into television. In: Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung . January 29, 2010, accessed August 9, 2019 .
- ↑ State-of-the-art satellite technology made in Usingen - takeover of Media Broadcast Satellite GmbH funded with a total of 9.5 million euros. In: presseportal.de. Wirtschafts- und Infrastrukturbank Hessen , May 23, 2019, accessed on August 9, 2019 .
- ↑ Klaus Nissen: Usingen / Neu-Anspach: Ten hectares under power. In: fr-online.de . July 14, 2012, accessed December 18, 2014 .
- ↑ There will soon be electricity from the earth station. Article in the Taunus Zeitung from October 12, 2012 ( Memento from July 24, 2018 in the Internet Archive )
Coordinates: 50 ° 20 ′ 0.3 ″ N , 8 ° 28 ′ 45.9 ″ E