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European Union Radio Navigation Plan (ERNP) study

The ERNP study web pages maintained by Helios have now been closed down.

For any enquiries regarding this study, please contact This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it at the following address:

Helios
29 Hercules Way
AeroPark
Farnborough
GU14 6UU
United Kingdom
Tel: +44 1252 451 651

Project Summary

The European Commission Directorate General for Energy and Transport (DG TREN) awarded a contract at the beginning of 2004 to a team led by Helios to contribute to the development of a European Union Radio Navigation Plan (ERNP) and to support European Union Radio Navigation policy. The team comprised Telematica of Germany, General Lighthouse Authorities of the United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland, INECO of Spain and the University of Leiden from The Netherlands.

The recommendations produced by this study are the culmination of a nine-month exercise that has included regular consultation with the EC’s ERNP Expert Group, attended by technical experts from EU Member States and other organisations such as Eurocontrol.

This study has for the first time produced a comprehensive inventory of all the existing radionavigation services available in Europe today, including the recent GNSS services provided by EGNOS and GALILEO. The study has clearly shown the potential benefits of creating an ERNP for Europe. These benefits include:

  • Improved harmonisation of European radionavigation services
  • Rationalisation of radionavigation infrastructure
  • Determination of a system mix that increases safety and security and reduces the dependency on GPS
  • Promotion of multimodal systems to enable cost efficient solutions
  • Increased stability to allow industry to plan future investment

The study started in January 2004 and concluded in October 2004. There were three phases: System and Policy Inventory, System Qualification, and Implementation. There was a consultation process at the end of each phase to review progress with users, industry experts, and Member State representatives.

The main outputs at the end of Phase 3 were a document containing recommendations to the European Commission "Recommendations towards the development of a European Union Radio-Navigation Plan (ERNP)" and a second accompanying document with details of radionavigation systems and applications entitled "European Union Radio-Navigation Services (ERNS)".