Res Communis

Fourth IAASS Conference: Making Safety Matter – Session 36 – Regulations and Standards for Safety – Part III

by P.J. Blount with the blog faculty

The final legal session at the Fourth IAASS Conference: Making Safety Matter, was held on May 21, 2010 and consisted of three presentations.

The first presentation was “Technical Regulation Associated to the French Space Operations Act in the Launcher Field,” by Francois Cahuzac, CNES.His presentation built on the earlier presentations given on the new French Technical Regulations at the conference. He reiterated that the Regulations were meant to protect People, Property, the public health, and the environment. He also stated that a crucial piece to the regulations are the safety regulations that will govern the Guiana Space Center.

The next presentation was given by T. Sgobba and was titled “An International Civil Aviation and Space Agency.” This presentation was a follow up on an earlier paper that suggested an ICAO for space in order to increase safety through international standards. He stated that the current state of space law was such that it was made of many principles but no rules. He said that these rules were needed in a time of widening access to space and an increased number of stakeholders in space activities. Sgobba emphasized that with advent of commercial human spaceflight and integrated form of Air and Space traffic control would be desirable.

The final paper was given by J.N. Pelton, International Space University. His paper was titled “Global Space Safety Regulations and Standards: The Merchants, the Guardians, and the Civil Space Advocate.” His presentation also focused on the widening array of stakeholders in space activities which includes civil space actors, military space actors, and commercial actors. His paper focused on how standardized safety regulations would be favorable to all three sectors..