Smart and Resilient Energy Systems

The Opportunity

The Smart and Resilient Energy Systems Call for Proposals aims to develop operational solutions using space-enabled technologies to improve the anticipatory, operational, and strategic resilience of electricity grids. Solutions should have a strong focus on critical infrastructure protection, climate resilience, and emergency preparedness.

The Call has been developed in collaboration with ELES, Slovenia's combined transmission and distribution system operator, and is based on operational requirements and challenges identified by the organisation. These requirements reflect real-world needs associated with forecasting and grid operations, dynamic thermal rating enhancement, asset intelligence, infrastructure monitoring, digital twin integration and situational awareness across electricity networks, and form the foundation for the use cases within this call.

This Call for Proposals will accept proposals for Proof-of-Concept Studies and Pilot Projects.

Topics of relevance

This Call addresses operational challenges identified by ELES and is organised into three complementary solution clusters.

Cluster A: Forecasting & Grid Operations

Modern electricity networks require increasingly sophisticated forecasting, planning and operational decision-support capabilities to support network stability, renewable integration and resilient system operation. Areas of interest include:

• Renewable generation forecasting for solar and wind power
• Load-flow prediction and congestion analysis
• Contingency planning for unplanned outages
• Cross-border scheduling and balancing coordination
• Seasonal and long-term capacity planning
• Climate and weather risk assessment
• Strategic outage mitigation planning

Solutions should improve operational awareness, forecasting accuracy and decision-support capabilities across transmission and distribution networks while supporting efficient network utilisation and improved resilience.

Cluster B: Dynamic Thermal Rating Enhancement

ELES operates the SUMO Dynamic Thermal Rating (DTR) system and is seeking improved environmental monitoring and forecasting capabilities to enhance the utilisation of existing transmission infrastructure. Areas of interest include:

• Enhanced wind speed and wind direction monitoring
• Ambient temperature and solar irradiance monitoring
• High-resolution nowcasting and forecasting of environmental parameters at conductor-representative heights
• Historical environmental analysis and weather model calibration
• Integration of environmental data into the SUMO DTR system and operational workflows

Solutions should improve the spatial resolution, accuracy and timeliness of environmental inputs to Dynamic Thermal Rating calculations, particularly across Alpine and pre-Alpine transmission corridors.

Cluster C: Asset Intelligence, Digital Twin & Situational Awareness

Electricity network operators require improved visibility of infrastructure condition, environmental threats and operational risks to support effective asset management and resilient network operations. Areas of interest include:

• Predictive maintenance and anomaly detection
• Asset prioritisation and vulnerability assessment
• Digital twin enrichment and automated data integration
• Natural hazard monitoring
• Infrastructure condition monitoring
• Emergency situational awareness
• Obstacle and encroachment detection
• Vegetation and corridor monitoring
• Cross-domain resilience dashboards
• Smart-grid assessment and future operational planning

Solutions should integrate Earth Observation, Artificial Intelligence, advanced analytics and digital-twin capabilities to improve asset intelligence, infrastructure monitoring and operational awareness across the electricity network.

Value of Space

Space enabled services can significantly enhance electricity grid operations across multiple domains:

• Satellite Earth Observation (SatEO) enables large-scale, near-real-time or latency-dependent monitoring of hazards such as floods, storms, wildfires, landslides, snow and icing events, as well as vegetation encroachment, construction activities and asset surroundings. These capabilities complement local inspections, drone operations, and GIS-based monitoring, while improving crisis awareness, emergency response coordination and long-term climate resilience planning. When combined with advanced analytics and AI techniques, EO data can also support predictive maintenance, asset prioritisation and digital-twin enrichment, enabling a shift from reactive to risk-based operations.
• Satellite Communications (SatCom) enables ubiquitous connectivity to enhance communication links, connectivity of IoT devices and networks of sensors, in remote locations. SatCom also provides real-time, long-range communications with infrastructure monitoring systems (i.e. UAVs/robots), enabling remote operation while assisting enabling technologies such as digital twins.
• Satellite Navigation (SatNav) supports precise asset localisation, time synchronisation for digital operational systems and secure backup communications during emergency or degraded terrestrial network conditions. These services can enhance operational continuity and coordination during large-scale disruptions or crisis events.
• Satellite enhanced forecasting improves the spatial and temporal resolution of weather driven inputs (solar irradiance, wind fields, ambient temperature), directly supporting renewable generation forecasting, load flow prediction, and dynamic thermal rating.

What we are looking for 

We look for motivated teams with established business, financial and technical expertise who can address our focus areas with market-ready concepts. Submitted proposals must demonstrate: 

• Commercial Viability and Sustainable Business Models: Service concepts designed for long-term commercial profitability. Projects targeting public sector or law enforcement users (B2G) are strongly encouraged to incorporate commercial B2B customer streams to ensure post-project sustainability. 
• Operational Readiness over Research: A clear focus on deploying pre-operational commercial services rather than pure academic research or basic scientific data exploration. Concepts must be driven by practical market demand and active user support. 
• Technical Data Self-Sufficiency: Bidding teams must already possess the internal technical capability to acquire and process downstream space data. Teams must be self-sufficient from the outset, as ESA provides financial and strategic backing rather than direct software engineering support. 
• Distinct Space Added Value: Clear, measurable operational or commercial advantages derived directly from the integration of space assets over traditional terrestrial alternatives. 

What we offer 

• Zero-equity co-funding: up to 50–80% of your activity costs, depending on SME status and Member State approval. 
• Technical and commercial guidance 
• Access to our network, partners and Taskforce members 
• ESA brand credibility 

Who can apply?

To be eligible for funding, your team must be based in one of the following countries: Belgium, Canada, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and United Kingdom.  

Potential Tenderers are strongly advised to contact the National Delegation(s) of the countries where their industrial partners (Prime and Subcontractors) are located as soon as possible.  A Written Authorisation for ESA funding from the National Delegation(s) is required for the Full Proposal. 

How to apply 

Visit the How to Apply to Proof-of-concept studies and Pilot Projects page for the full application details. 

The call opens for submissions on 29 September 2026 and closes on 27 November 2026. This closing date refers strictly to the deadline for submitting the initial Activity Pitch Questionnaire (APQ) via the Open Space Innovation Platform (OSIP). It does not apply to the subsequent Outline Proposal or Full Proposal stages. 

Proposals are assessed individually on a rolling, non-competitive basis; companies are therefore strongly encouraged to submit their APQ as early as possible. 

Further information and important documentation can be found on the BASS documents page.