Nanosatellite SAR Preliminary System Design for New Zealand Maritime and Terrestrial Remote Sensing

The potential of nanosatellite radar sensors for illegal fishing vessel detection in the coastal waters and imaging on the land of New Zealand is investigated. It was found that for a sensor in Low Earth Orbit at an altitude of 500 km, with an antenna compatible in width with the longest side of a 3-U CubeSat, i.e., 0.3 m and a length of 2 m and a peak transmitted power of 200 W; adequate detection performance can be obtained over a swath of up to 60 km at an incidence angle of 36° using an ambiguous acquisition mode. Alternative solutions for different looking angles, but smaller swaths are also found to be viable. A design method and the resulting imaging performance for a land non-ambiguous imaging mode are also presented.