CO3D, A WORLDWIDE ONE ONE-METER ACCURACY DEM FOR 2025

Abstract. The goal of the CO3D (Constellation Optique 3D) mission is the full-automatic production of a worldwide accurate DEM. CO3D is also a constellation of a new generation of low-cost optical satellites. The DEM accuracy is expected to be one meter in relative height and two meters in absolute height with a one-meter grid space. Each of the four satellites of the constellation will provide images with 0.50 m resolution in red, green, blue bands. A NIR (Near-InfraRed) band will also be available with a resolution close to 1 m. The satellites resource will be shared by, on one hand, the French institutions (government, scientists concerned by global Earth monitoring) who will have dedicated access and preferred price conditions, and on the other hand commercial customers interested in 2D and 3D products. The launch of the constellation is expected mid-2023 and 90 % of the DEM worldwide production should be reached by the end of 2025.

Starting from an overview of the system characteristics and its main innovations, this paper presents the expected performance, the 2D and 3D products that should be available for the end-users and finally how they should be qualified.