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Operating cost (to the airport) of VOR DME NDB or ILS, and LPV?

Do airports with LPV really pay money for EGNOS, as suggested above?

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

It appears that Egnos LPV service is free for the user.

https://egnos-user-support.essp-sas.eu/new_egnos_ops/services/about-sol

But in the UK, airspace access is now charged (for uavs) so everything is possible

LFOU, France

I wonder if EGNOS is charged to non EU countries? The above link doesn’t say so:

The SoL service is based on integrity data provided through the EGNOS satellite signals, it is provided openly and is freely accessible without any direct charge.

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

Peter wrote:

Do airports with LPV really pay money for EGNOS, as suggested above?

If nothing else, someone must register the “channels” used to define the approaches and that may cost money.

ESKC (Uppsala/Sundbro), Sweden

Are they registered with EGNOS? The signal is the same for all and there is no 2-way comms involved.

Somebody has to develop the hex block which defines the approach. That ends up published in the AIP. I would think that is a part of the IAP design fee.

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

Jujupilote wrote:

It appears that Egnos LPV service is free for the user.

https://egnos-user-support.essp-sas.eu/new_egnos_ops/services/about-sol

This is the “safety of life” service, not the “augment GPS precision” service, which I think is https://egnos-user-support.essp-sas.eu/new_egnos_ops/services/about-os, and which is also described as “without any direct charge or specific authorisation requirements”. Not sure what “direct charge” aims at. Maybe they mean that the airplane operator is not charged anything, but the airport is, and thus the airplane operator is charged “indirectly” through the terminal / approach / landing fee?

Even if the GSA (running EGNOS) doesn’t charge aerodromes, possibly the UK state does, just like it charges aerodromes for use of the radiowaves.

Airborne_Again wrote:

If nothing else, someone must register the “channels” used to define the approaches and that may cost money.

What are these “channels” actually? I naively thought that WAAS/EGNOS/GAGAN/QZSS/MSAS/… improves GPS accuracy everywhere (within their coverage zone), by broadcasting correction signals. Is that not the case? Is the “best” improvement reserved for a narrow area along the extended centerline of the runway, and that area is defined by the “channel”?

Last Edited by lionel at 08 Nov 08:14
ELLX

lionel wrote:

What are these “channels” actually? I naively thought that WAAS/EGNOS/GAGAN/QZSS/MSAS/… improves GPS accuracy everywhere (within their coverage zone), by broadcasting correction signals. Is that not the case? Is the “best” improvement reserved for a narrow area along the extended centerline of the runway, and that area is defined by the “channel”?

As far as I understand the “channels” are simply identifications of the particular approaches and have nothing to do with the GPS or EGNOS signals. But nonetheless someone must handle the registration of these channels identifiers and there may be a charge for that registration.

ESKC (Uppsala/Sundbro), Sweden

Peter wrote:

Does anybody know any operating costs, as per the thread title?

I think the answer is; “too high for private GA airfields (non commercial OPS), except GNSS/RNAV”. There is one new private, non commercial OPS only (yet public) airfield in Norway that has GNSS. It’s Gullknapp, ENGK. Take off fee is NOK 200 (€20), or a per yer fee of NOK 2000 (€200). This includes both IFR and VFR, and within or outside opening hours (only VFR outside opening hours). It’s an ordinary AFIS unit inside opening hours. To me this suggests that the cost of RNAV/GNSS is close to nothing, and VOR DME etc is so costly it is prohibiting. But, who is actually financing ENGK, and how? and how much traffic do they have? I don’t know. An AFIS unit is still one man in the tower.

But then again, ENNM close to me, even smaller than ENGK has GLS (a special GPS approach system used by Widerøe only), NDB and RNAV. ENRM close by, same size as ENNM has GLS, RNAV and VOR. My own homefield has RNAV, ILS/LOC and TACAN (for those with special interests and equipment ) All commercial fields in Norway (about 50) have non GPS procedures in addition to RNAV, and there are no plans of removing these AFAIK. All commercial fields are also GA fields here, so what this stuff cost isn’t relevant for the private GA community who can do well with GPS only.

The elephant is the circulation
ENVA ENOP ENMO, Norway

I have just checked with someone in the system and there are no ongoing charges to airports for the use of GPS or EGNOS.

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

LeSving wrote:

GLS (a special GPS approach system used by Widerøe only)

GLS is actually an ICAO standard and installed at several major airports like Frankfurt (EDDF) — but I don’t think it is very widely used as you need special equipment in the aircraft.

GLS works like a LPV, but instead of getting wide-area GPS correction signals from satellites (SBAS), it gets local correction signals from a ground station at the airport (GBAS). This allows even better GPS accuracy – CAT II/III minima are possible.

But it’s a bit surprising that Namsos has an GLS installation as (at that airport) it only provides marginally lower minima than the regular LPV does. (35 ft for RWY 07 and 45 ft for RWY 25.) Maybe the GLS installation was in place before SBAS was available?

Last Edited by Airborne_Again at 09 Nov 10:58
ESKC (Uppsala/Sundbro), Sweden
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