NASA has awarded the Total and Spectral Solar Irradiance Sensor-2 (TSIS-2) Spacecraft contract to the US-based www.ga.com/ems General Atomics Electromagnetic Systems Group.

The TSIS-2 is a directed mission to address the 2017 Decadal Survey recommendation for sustained multi-decadal global measurements of solar irradiance and will continue the collection of high-quality data for the long-term climate record.

These measurements are regarded as indispensable by the scientific community for understanding solar influences on Earth’s climate.

The contract is based on a hybrid firm-fixed price, time and materials contract worth about $32.9 million; it will run until May 2026 and will take place primarily at the contractor’s facility in San Diego.

General Atomics will develop and test the core spacecraft for the TSIS-2 project, integrate the primary instrument into the observatory and provide the functional, performance and environmental testing of the ‘observatory’.

The company will also ship the spacecraft to the launch site and support launch operations, in-orbit performance verification and operations of the mission operations centre for three years, through to the decommissioning of the TSIS-2 spacecraft.