# Weather System Follow-on — Program Element 1206422SF

**Program element:** 1206422SF  
**Component:** U.S. Space Force  
**Appropriation:** 3620F — RDT&E, Space Force  
**Budget Activity:** 5 — System Development & Demonstration  
**Vintage:** President's Budget PB2027  
**Canonical URL:** https://hitchintel.com/programs/1206422SF

## Summary

U.S. Space Force requests $34.8M in FY2027, with nothing planned by FY2031. In the FY2027 defense authorization, the House funded it in full; the Senate funded it in full; House appropriators funded it in full. BAE Systems leads the industry work.

## Funding profile

| Fiscal Year | Estimate Type | Amount ($M) |
|---|---|---|
| FY2025 | Actual | 47.5 |
| FY2026 | Enacted | 37.9 |
| FY2027 | Request | 34.8 |
| FY2028 | Outyear | 25.1 |
| FY2029 | Outyear | 0.0 |
| FY2030 | Outyear | 0.0 |
| FY2031 | Outyear | 0.0 |

> Estimate types are not summed — the profile mixes actuals, enacted law, the request, and outyear projections.

## Congressional marks (FY2027)

| Stage | Marked ($M) | Change ($M) |
|---|---|---|
| Request | 34.8 | — |
| House NDAA (HASC) | 34.8 | +0.0 |
| Senate NDAA (SASC) | 34.8 | +0.0 |
| House Approps (HAC-D) | 34.8 | +0.0 |

> FY2027 NDAA authorization marks, as of 2026-07-27. Not appropriations or final law.

## Projects (2)

| Project | Title | FY2025 actual | FY2026 enacted | FY2027 request | Move |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 65A039 | WSF-M | 45.5 | 35.9 | 32.7 | −9% |
| 65A038 | SSA Environmental Monitoring | 2.0 | 2.0 | 2.1 | +5% |

> Projects are the summable leaves: the program element total is their sum, never added to it.

### Project 65A039 — WSF-M

The Weather System Follow-on - Microwave (WSF-M) Project 65A039 includes funds for the WSF-M system, the Compact Ocean Wind Vector Radiometer (COWVR) technology demonstration, and the Energetic Charged Particle (ECP) sensor development. Weather System Follow-on (WSF) is a Low-Earth Orbit (LEO) microwave imaging system developed and delivered by the United States Space Force's Space Systems Command (SSC). WSF is the next generation of space-based passive microwave sensing technology. It will provide U.S. and Allied warfighters with essential weather data, including the measurement of ocean surface wind speed and direction, ice thickness, snow depth, soil moisture, and local spacecraft energetic charged particle environment. The ocean surface wind speed measurement enables tropical cyclone intensity determination by the Joint Typhoon Warning Center. The data gathered by WSF will be provided to meteorologists in support of the generation of a wide variety of weather products necessary to conduct mission planning and operations globally. WSF is an Acquisition Category IB program comprised of two Space Vehicles (SV) and their associated command, control, and data dissemination network. Global environmental monitoring data is gathered, stored, and downlinked through the Satellite Control Network (SCN) and disseminated to Air Force and Navy weather centers. Additionally, data is broadcast real time by the satellite for utilization by heritage Direct Readout Terminals that use the data for local weather forecasting. WSF is a Major Defense Acquisition Program (MDAP) with the Space Force as the lead component. Founded on the Space-Based Environmental Monitoring (SBEM) Analysis of Alternatives (AoA) results, the WSF will be to enable: 1) Timely weather collection over broad oceans in support of maneuvering forces. 2) Space weather capabilities to characterize operational orbits, space situational awareness, and the ionosphere. Secondary investments may be supported to address weather gaps identified in the SBEM AoA and validated by the JROC. The Space Force will pursue prototyping of latest commercial industry capabilities for simplified designs to meet the SBEM Gap requirements. COWVR is an on-orbit demonstration project of the new COWVR technology to deliver Weather Gap #3, Ocean Surface Vector Winds (OSVW) and Gap #8, Tropical Cyclone Intensity (TCI).

**Named R-3 performers** (share of this project's FY2027 R-3 total, so they need not reach 100%)**:** BAE Systems (18.8, 57%), NRL (4.5, 14%), Booz Allen (3.3, 10%).

| Activity (R-2A) | FY2025 | FY2026 | FY2027 |
|---|---|---|---|
| WSF Microwave Satellite (SV1-2) | 44.0 | 35.6 | 32.7 |
| COWVR Tech Demo | 0.1 | 0.4 | 0.0 |
| ECP | 1.4 | 0.0 | 0.0 |

> R-2A activities carry the prior, current and budget year only — no five-year plan. Coverage is partial, so count them, never total them.

### Project 65A038 — SSA Environmental Monitoring

The Space Situational Awareness Environmental Monitoring (SSAEM) program is a non-ACAT, Class D technology demonstration project to support the international Constellation Observing System for Meteorology, Ionosphere and Climate 2 (COSMIC-2) mission. The SSAEM program provides the acquisition, development and launch/on-orbit support of 18 space/terrestrial weather sensors to COSMIC-2 partnership in coordination with National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and Taiwan Space Agency (TASA). COSMIC-2 launched six satellites in an equatorial, Low Earth Orbit (LEO) with 3 SSAEM sensors on each spacecraft in FY 2019. The sensors are the primary Tri-Global Navigation Satellite System (Tri-GNSS) Radio occultation System (TGRS), and the secondary Ion Velocity Meter (IVM) and Radio Frequency Beacon (RFB). The SSAEM sensors address three distinct Joint Requirement Oversight Committee (JROC)-approved Category A weather gaps, specifically Gap #4 (Ionospheric Density), Gap #7 (Equatorial Ionospheric Scintillation) and Gap #12 (Electric Field), to provide ionospheric space meteorological data to improve forecast capabilities and improve warfighter navigation/communication capabilities. TGRS also provides atmospheric refractivity profiles that are important inputs to DoW operational numerical weather prediction models. This program element may include necessary civilian pay expenses required to manage, execute, and deliver SSAEM for weapon system capability. The use of such program funds would be in addition to the civilian pay expenses budgeted in program elements 1206392SF and 1206398SF. The RFB ground station equipment was previously transferred to AFRL to continue development and potential fielding options for future ops capability. Incremental operational fixes and improvements to the TGRS sensor via a series of flight software/firmware uploads began in the months following launch, continue through the present and are expected to continue through FY 2026 at least. Design life has extended through FY 2033 due to system performance exceeding expectations.

**Named R-3 performers** (share of this project's FY2027 R-3 total, so they need not reach 100%)**:** UCAR (1.0, 46%).

| Activity (R-2A) | FY2025 | FY2026 | FY2027 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Space Situational Awareness Environment Monitoring (SSAEM) | 2.0 | 2.0 | 2.1 |

> R-2A activities carry the prior, current and budget year only — no five-year plan. Coverage is partial, so count them, never total them.

## Where the FY2027 request goes

| Category | Share | $M |
|---|---|---|
| Industry primes | 79% | 27.5 |
| Government labs & warfare centers | 14% | 4.7 |
| Other / unspecified | 7.3% | 2.5 |

**Top named industry performers:** BAE Systems ($18.8M, 54%), NRL ($4.5M, 13%), Booz Allen ($3.3M, 9.4%), UCAR ($1.0M, 2.8%).

> R-3 exhibit contract funding, not USAspending obligations.

## Mission & acquisition strategy

Weather System Follow-on program 1206422SF consists of Space Situational Awareness Environmental Monitoring (SSAEM) Project 65A038 and Weather System Follow-on - Microwave (WSF-M) Project 65A039. System Delta 810 is developing WSF-M (Project 65A039) and operating SSAEM (Project 65A038) for Guardians across the Weather Mission Area. As a result, the Service will deliver space domain awareness capabilities, continue to advance all near term effects, and provide resilient infrastructure, equipment, and personnel.

The acquisition strategy for WSF is based on validated SBEM AoA results from FY 2014 and subsequent acquisition strategy development activities that were conducted in FY 2015. The WSF acquisition strategy focuses on streamlined acquisition processes for providing materiel solutions to OSVW, TCI & LEO ECP, as validated by the JROC; deliver microwave sensing solution to address DoW needs for OSVW and TCI capabilities and deliver space environment sensing solution to address LEO ECP capabilities for on-orbit attributions and support of anomaly resolutions.

## Related program elements

- [1203710SF — EO/IR Weather System Dev](https://hitchintel.com/programs/1203710SF) (Space Force)
- [1206853SF — Next Generation Launch System Investment](https://hitchintel.com/programs/1206853SF) (Space Force)
- [0604035A — Low Earth Orbit (LEO) Satellite Capability](https://hitchintel.com/programs/0604035A) (Army)
- [0604032F — DE Prototyping](https://hitchintel.com/programs/0604032F) (Air Force)

## Source & machine access

- **Source:** FY2027 Department of the Air Force RDT&E Budget Justification, Exhibits R-2/R-3, PE 1206422SF (PB PB2027); FY2027 NDAA committee marks (as of 2026-07-27).
- **MCP:** `mcp.hitchintel.com` — `budget_get_program_element(pe="1206422SF")`.

*HitchAI is an independent intelligence service, not affiliated with the U.S. Department of Defense. Budget figures are requests/estimates, not obligations.*