Optical feeder links (OFLs) to geostationary orbit (GEO) satellites present a promising solution to significantly enhance the throughput of satellite systems, especially those with high data rate demands, such as satellite constellations. However, cloud coverage substantially increases the likelihood of link outages, thereby reducing the availability of optical ground stations (OGSs) and limiting the number of possible connections between the GEO and OGS networks. This paper introduces a maxflow-based OFL planning concept aimed at maximizing the number of ground-to-GEO OFL connections under the influence of dynamic cloud coverage. Various network scenarios are considered—featuring different numbers of satellites, OGSs, and varying degrees of visibility correlation—to optimize the network design. The average system capacity is estimated through Monte Carlo simulations, while system availability is stochastically evaluated. Simulation results show that network capacity depends mainly on the number of GEO satellites, while visibility correlation has a strong impact on availability. Furthermore, the simulations reveal that even under a high correlation of visibility and a high probability of link outages, only a small number of additional OGSs are sufficient to achieve the theoretical upper bound of capacity. These insights can contribute to costefficient network design by identifying the optimal number of GEO satellites and OGSs required to meet operational demands.      «

Optical feeder links (OFLs) to geostationary orbit (GEO) satellites present a promising solution to significantly enhance the throughput of satellite systems, especially those with high data rate demands, such as satellite constellations. However, cloud coverage substantially increases the likelihood of link outages, thereby reducing the availability of optical ground stations (OGSs) and limiting the number of possible connections between the GEO and OGS networks. This paper introduces a maxflow...     »