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A cereal farmer in Salamanca, Spain, explains how satellite navigation systems help farmers to reduce CO2 emissions and save time and money, and demonstrates how EGNOS currently plays an important role in European agriculture, helping farms to improve crop yields while reducing their environmental footprint.

We met with Fernando Benito, a cereal farmer in Spain, who spoke to us about how EGNOS supports the entire wheat production cycle by facilitating various tasks such as ploughing, fertilizing, sowing and spraying.

EGNOS, the preferred entry technology for precision farming

EGNOS, with its sub-metre level accuracy (20-30 cm pass-to-pass), offers an affordable solution for some of the field work required by precision agriculture. EGNOS allows farmers to better monitor their harvest yields, perform effective in-field data collection and use guidance in cultivation. It also increases their efficiency, allowing them to work in poor visibility or bad weather conditions, while increasing productivity, lowering costs and minimising environmental impact - all with minimal investment. 

In the words of Fernando: “EGNOS allows me to save time and money across all my tasks. Thanks to its precision guidance it enables the correct dissemination of fertilizer and phytosanitary products, thus avoiding overlaps and errors. EGNOS is very easy to use and to configure, it saves me resources and time.” 

To benefit from the EGNOS service, all you need is an SBAS-enabled antenna and a receiver properly configured to receive the signal. For those interested in equipment configuration details, guidelines can be downloaded through this link. You can also download GEAR, an interactive (and free) virtual demonstrator that allows you to have fun experiencing various farming tasks under different weather conditions, while showcasing the benefits of EGNOS for machinery guidance. If you want to calculate how much money you can save by using EGNOS on your farm, try the EASE tool. This software provides a cost-benefit analysis by comparing the results achieved through EGNOS+GPS guidance versus GPS alone.

Fernando added: “I can say that EGNOS is a tool that meets the requirements of my crops at low cost. It provides me with the precision I need at all times throughout the season, so I would recommend it to other cereal farmers.”

The agriculture sector has been one of the fastest to adopt satellite navigation services. This is confirmed by the fact the vast majority of agricultural GNSS devices on board farming machinery today are EGNOS-enabled and EGNOS is fast becoming the preferred entry-level technology for sustainable precision agriculture in Europe.

Watch the video here.

A European cereal farmer in Salamanca, Spain, is explaining how satellite navigation systems help farmers to reduce CO2 emissions, as well as save time and money, demonstrating how EGNOS today plays an important role in European agriculture, helping farmers to increase their productivity while being more sustainable for the environment.

Meeting Fernando Benito, a cereal farmer in Spain, we have listened to him presenting how EGNOS supports him during a crop harvest by facilitating various tasks such as ploughing, fertilizing, sowing and spraying.

EGNOS, the preferred entry technology for precision farming

EGNOS, with its sub-metre level accuracy (20-30 cm pass-to-pass), offers an affordable solution for some of the field works required today by precision agriculture. EGNOS allows farmers to better monitor their harvest yields, perform effective in-field data collection, use guidance in cultivation, increase efficiency (allowing to work in poor visibility/weather conditions), increase productiveness, lower costs and minimise environmental impact - all with minimal investment. 

As Fernando Benito, the cereal producer and protagonist of our video stated: “EGNOS allows me to save time and money during all the tasks carried out as it is very precise in the guidance, therefore it allows a correct dissemination of fertilizer and phytosanitary products, thus avoiding overlaps and faults. It is very easy to use and to configure, therefore it helps me save time” 

To benefit from EGNOS service, all you need is an SBAS-enabled antenna and a receiver properly configured to receive the signal. For those interested in equipment configuration details, guidelines can be downloaded through this link. You can also download GEAR, an interactive (and free) virtual demonstrator which, in a friendly way, allows you to experience in an entertaining way some farming tasks under different weather conditions while showcasing the benefits of EGNOS for machinery guidance. If you want to calculate how much money you save thanks to using EGNOS in your farm, try the “EASE tool“. This software provides cost-benefit analysis by comparing the results achieved through an EGNOS+GPS guidance versus a “GPS alone” one.

That is why Fernando Benito, the cereal producer, also added: “I can say that EGNOS is the tool that meets the requirements of my crops at low cost. It provides me with the precision I need at all times throughout the season, so I would recommend it to other cereal farmers.”

The agriculture sector has been one of the fastest to use satellite navigation services in recent years. This is confirmed by the fact the vast majority of agricultural GNSS devices, on board farming machinery on the market today, are EGNOS enabled and it is becoming the preferred entry level technology for a sustainable precision agriculture in Europe.

Watch the video here.

Galileo Initial Services Open Service and SAR/Galileo Enhanced Services Performance Reports covering the first quarter of 2020 are available in the Electronic Library of the European GNSS Service Centre web portal.

The Galileo Open Service (OS) and SAR/Galileo Service Public Performance Reports for the first quarter of 2020 are available in the Performance Reports section of the Electronic Library, providing the status of the Galileo constellation and the achieved performance over the reported period (January, February and March 2020).

These quarterly reports provide the public with the latest information on the Galileo OS and SAR/Galileo Services measured performance statistics with respect to their Minimum Performance Levels (MPLs) (as declared in their respective Galileo Service Definition Documents: OS-SDD and SAR-SDD). Both SDDs can be found in the Programme Reference Documents section of the GSC web portal. It should be noted that this SAR/Galileo Service Performance Report is the first one following the declaration of the SAR/Galileo Enhanced Services and the publication of the updated SDD last January.

Quarterly reports provide information to users on parameters such as:

• For Galileo Initial Services Open Service (IS OS): Initial ranging performance, Galileo to GPS Time Offset (GGTO) determination performance, Galileo positioning performance, the timely publication of NAGUs, etc.;
• For SAR/Galileo Enhanced Services: Availability of FLS and RLS, performance of location probability and accuracy, RLS service latency etc.

Highlights from Q1-2020 Public Performance Reports

As in previous periods, Galileo measured OS and SAR Service performance figures comfortably exceed their MPL thresholds, specified in the OS-SDD and SAR-SDD (except for the SAR transponder availability for GSAT-214 and GSAT-103 during February and March respectively).

Some highlights from the Q1-2020 performance reports:

Initial Service OS:

• Galileo Initial Open Service Ranging Performance: This is measured based on the Availability of the Galileo SF/DF Ranging Service [between 96.29% (all signals, March) and 96.42% (SIS E5a and Dual Frequency combination E1-E5a, February)], Per-slot Availability of Healthy Signal in Space for each Galileo operational satellite [low values were observed for GSAT-209 (86.71% in February) and GSAT-103 (with F/NAV and I/NAV SIS availability of respectively 45.34% and 51.52% during March)] and the Galileo Signal in Space Ranging Accuracy [for individual space vehicles: worst case value of 0.41 [m] for DF in February and 0.68 [m] for SF in February and March; best case values of 0.15 [m] for DF in January and 0.22 [m] for SF in February and March].
• Galileo UTC and GGTO Dissemination and Determination Performance: The Galileo UTC Determination Service Availability reached a monthly value of 100% during the entire quarter, exceeding the MPL target of 87%. Moreover, the GGTO Determination Availability exceeds the MPL target of 80% over the reported months, reaching 100% in January and March.
• Galileo Positioning Performance: This is measured based on the Availability of the Galileo Position Dilution of Precision and the Positioning Service, and the Galileo measured Positioning Performance.
• Timely Publication of NAGUs (Notice Advisory to Galileo Users): The timeliness requirements for NAGU publication were met both for Planned and Unplanned events (NAGUs related to planned events need to be published at least 24 hours before the event starts, and those related to unplanned events with a delay of up to 72 hours from the detection of the unplanned event). A total number of 8 NAGUs have been published on the GSC web portal in the reported period.

Enhanced SAR/GALILEO Service:

• Availability of SAR/Galileo:
  • Forward Link Service: 99.9% for the reported period (above defined MPLs of 99%). 
  • MEOLUT facilities in “Nominal” and “Nominal + Degraded” modes: remain at excellent levels, always above the MPL targets of 95% in “Nominal” and 97.5% in “Nominal + Degraded” modes. 
  • Return Link Service: 100% all over the period (MPL set to 95%).
  • SAR Transponders: achieved excellent levels of performance reaching monthly satellite transponder availability of 100% for almost all space vehicles (except for GSAT-214 in February, and for GSAT-103 in March).
• Performance of: 
  • Detection Service: monthly values of a valid message detection probability after a single transmitted burst over 99.7%, where the MPL target is 99%. 
  • Location Probability: excellent values were achieved, with monthly values higher than 99.3% for a single burst, where the MPL target is 90%, and 99.7% after 12 transmitted bursts (multi-burst), where the MPL target is 98%. 
  • Location Accuracy: surpassed the targets with monthly values higher than 98.6% for a single burst and 99.1% for multi-burst transmissions with accuracy better than 5 km, while the MPLs are 90% and 95% respectively. 
• Return Link Service:
  • Delivery Latency within 15 min: 99.94% on average over the reported period for an MPL set to 99%. 
  • Reception Probability: 99.76% in average over the reported period for an MPL set to 99%. 

For the most up-to-date information on the Galileo system and constellation, visit the European GNSS Service Centre (GSC) website, in particular, the Galileo constellation status section. For an exhaustive description of the Minimum Performance Levels (MPLs), refer to the SDDs (Programme Reference documents).

For more details on Galileo performance and its Services, do not hesitate to contact the Galileo Help Desk. Moreover, if you wish to receive NAGUs automatically, please register to the GSC web portal.

Media note: This feature can be republished without charge provided the European GNSS Agency (GSA) is acknowledged as the source at the top or the bottom of the story. You must request permission before you use any of the photographs on the site. If you republish, we would be grateful if you could link back to the GSA website (http://www.gsa.europa.eu).