Cnes activites on polynomial chaos expansion for uncertainty propagation

Dealing with initial uncertainties, or models uncertainties, and their evolution over time has become a point of greater interest over the last years. In particular, the increasing number of space debris strengthens the need for more efficient technics for risk assessment, both on orbit (collision risk) and on ground (casualty risk). One of the most common non-intrusive methods for uncertainty propagation is called Polynomial chaos expansion (PCE). The paper will briefly review some fundamentals of the PCE and the framework that have been adopted during an ongoing R&T study. Test cases will be presented, covering concrete day-to-day work of a spaceflight engineer. Current results will be presented and discussed.