WASHINGTON — As expected, Ball Aerospace and Technologies Corp. received a sole source contract modification from NASA to build the Ozone Mapping and Profiling Suite (OMPS) for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Joint Polar Satellite System (JPSS)-2 weather satellite slated to launch in late 2021.
The cost-plus-award-fee modification is worth $113 million, NASA said in a Sept. 5 press release. The modification extends the performance period of Ball’s existing OMPS contract from November 2013 through May 2021, NASA said. Ball built the OMPS that launched aboard the Suomi-NPP weather satellite in 2011 and the OMPS that will launch aboard JPSS-1 in 2017.
OMPS, a suite of instruments that observe in the visible and ultraviolet spectra, will be used in part to fulfill a U.S. treaty obligation to monitor global ozone concentrations and to help produce enhanced ultraviolet index forecasts.