ESA Optical Ground Station

The ESA Optical Ground Station (OGS Telescope or ESA Space Debris Telescope) is the European Space Agency's ground based observatory at the Teide Observatory on Tenerife, Spain, built for the observation of space debris.

The observatory is a 1-meter Coudé telescope with a field of view of 0.7 degrees, supported by an English cross-axial mount inside a dome 12.5-meters in diameter.

Its main purposes are: It is equipped with a cryogenically cooled mosaic CCD-Camera of 4k×4k pixels.

As a large part of the observation time is dedicated to space debris surveys, in particular the observation of space debris in the geostationary ring and in geostationary transfer orbits, the term ESA Space Debris Telescope became used very frequently.

Space debris surveys are carried out every month, centered on New Moon.

The telescope
Dome operations of the OGS