Res Communis

by Joanne Irene Gabrynowicz with the blog faculty

Source: Space News

Space News Staff Writer

WASHINGTON — U.S. President Barack Obama has given his administration until Oct. 1 to scrutinize existing national space policy as part of a sweeping review that could culminate in a new strategy governing American civil and military space activities.  

Sources familiar with the Obama review say it will address a range of topics that fall into several categories, including space protection, international cooperation, acquisition reform and national space strategy.

Led by Peter Marquez, director of space policy for the White House National Security Council, the review will involve a slew of U.S. offices and agencies, including the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, the U.S. Commerce, Defense, Homeland Security, Interior, State, Treasury and Transportation departments, and U.S. intelligence agencies.

In May, Obama issued Presidential Study Directive-3 (PSD-3), calling for a broad review of the U.S. national space policy of former President George W. Bush. Sources familiar with the review note that PSD-3 is the second presidential directive issued during Obama’s first few months in office to address space. PSD-2 will address classified space activities, these sources said. 

Multiple sources familiar with the Obama policy review say it could lay the foundation for further debates within the executive branch this fall, potentially leading to a revised U.S. national space policy by mid-2010.

Preliminary reviews of the Bush space policy are currently under way, with teams led by White House, intelligence, Defense and State department officials charged with identifying specific areas for further study. Although NASA is not leading any of the teams, sources familiar with the space policy review said agency officials are engaged in the effort. In addition, the review is expected to incorporate results from a blue-ribbon panel charged with assessing the future of NASA’s manned spaceflight programs. The panel, led by retired Lockheed Martin Chief Executive Norman Augustine, will present its findings to the Obama administration in late August. 

Bush’s October 2006 space policy emphasized security issues, sought to foster commercial enterprise and rejected new arms control agreements that would limit U.S. activities in space. It capped a series of space policy edicts released earlier in his administration that addressed remote sensing, space transportation, navigation and the 2004 Vision for Space Exploration, which called for replacing the space shuttle with a system capable of taking humans to the Moon.  

Bush was criticized in the media for taking a unilateral tone in his October 2006 policy document. In contrast, the Obama administration is expected to emphasize international cooperation, adopting a more inclusive approach with allies in addressing space access and other strategic concerns. 

“There’s enough of a sense in the Obama people that the tone of the Bush policy is not what they want to communicate,” said John Logsdon, a space policy expert at the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum here. “It’s very clear that Obama in general, and with respect to space, intends to take a much more multilateral approach.”  

Sources familiar with the review say U.S. outreach and cooperation with international partners on space activities is an area ripe for study, as is reform of the U.S. export control regime with regard to commercial communications satellites. In June, the U.S. House of Representatives approved legislation that would give the administration authority to remove commercial satellites and components from rigorous State Department export licensing requirements. 

Other topics on the table include commercial remote sensing, technology industrial base and acquisition reform, the need to maintain two expendable launch vehicles and a review of the Bush administration’s stance on weapons in space.

During his 2008 presidential campaign, Obama called for a ban on space weapons, a controversial statement that found its way onto the White House Web site shortly after his Jan. 20 inauguration. The statement has since been removed.

International discussions of space weapons have typically foundered on disagreements over what constitutes a space weapon and verification concerns about any proposed ban. Scott Pace, director of the Space Policy Institute at George Washington University here, said a more achievable goal might be a ban on the creation of long-lived orbital debris that could threaten satellites and other spacecraft, including the international space station.  

“An international agreement on preventing orbital debris could contribute to the sustainability of the overall space environment,” Pace said.

Earth’s orbit is populated by approximately 17,000 objects larger than 10 centimeters and some 200,000 objects between 1 and 10 centimeters in diameter, according to the NASA Orbital Debris Program Office at Johnson Space Center in Houston. In early 2007 China shot down an aging Chinese weather satellite with a ballistic missile. The breakup of the Fengyun-1C satellite resulted in a debris cloud comprising a large number of fragments that pose a collision risk to operating satellites and spacecraft.

Since U.S. policy on space debris was first articulated by U.S. President Ronald Reagan’s administration in 1988, the United States has sought to minimize the creation of new orbital debris. According to the 2006 Bush national space policy, “Orbital debris poses a risk to continued reliable use of space-based services and operations and to the safety of persons and property in space and on Earth. The United States shall seek to minimize the creation of orbital debris by government and non-government operations in space in order to preserve the space environment for future generations.” 

by Joanne Irene Gabrynowicz with the blog faculty

Source: Space News

By AMY KLAMPER
Space News Staff Writer

WASHINGTON — As it launches a sweeping review of U.S. space policy, the administration of President Barack Obama has given indications that it is open to removing commercial telecommunications satellites from the U.S. Munitions List (USML), a shift that could make American satellite companies more competitive in the global market.

 

Ellen Tauscher, who was confirmed June 25 as U.S. undersecretary of state for arms control and international security, said in June that reform of the U.S. export control regime, known as the International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR), is on the administration’s agenda.

“We are going to review our export control policies,” the former Democratic congresswoman from California said during her June 9 confirmation hearing before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Later, in a written response to questions asked by committee ranking member Sen. Richard Lugar (R-Ind.), Tauscher said she “supports export control reform in general and would consider supporting the transfer of commercial communications satellites to the Department of Commerce provided that the transfer is consistent with our foreign policy and national security objectives.”

Commercial communications satellites were placed on the USML, a registry of sensitive technologies regulated by the U.S. State Department, by a U.S. law that went into effect in 1999. Since then, U.S. space hardware makers have complained about lost market opportunities, and even many in the U.S. military establishment have said the move has harmed national security by undermining the American defense industrial base.

In June the House passed legislation in the Foreign Relations Authorization Act for 2010 and 2011 that would give the Obama administration authority to remove commercial satellites from the USML. The bill now awaits consideration by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

“The administration supports efforts to determine the appropriate jurisdiction of satellites and their parts and components, and looks forward to working with Congress on this issue,” David McKeeby, spokesman for the State Department Bureau of Political-Military Affairs, said in a July 1 e-mailed statement to Space News.

During her confirmation hearing, Tauscher spoke broadly of balancing U.S. national security interests with helping American companies compete in a global marketplace marked by rapid technological innovation.

“I believe we have to understand that the life cycle of technology these days can be as short as 18 months,” she said. “You could actually have an item that is, you know, release 1.0, and right following it in a few months, is release 2.0.”

However, Tauscher cautioned that the process of determining which technologies should be removed from the USML would be a complicated one.

“What is the review process, once something is no longer a necessity to protect, to get it off the list, so that we can put the thing on that needs to be protected?” she said. “I think in the beginning, we realized that we had to protect x number of things. And then it became x-plus, and then x-plus, and then xx-plus. And you cannot protect everything for its life cycle. You can only protect it while it is important for national security.” 

During the hearing, Sen. Benjamin Cardin (D-Md.) warned that U.S. national security ultimately could be compromised if U.S. regulations prevent American aerospace companies from competing in the international market.

“A lot of this technology growth is international in some respects,” he said. “And if companies are prohibited from being engaged internationally, their viability is affected.” 

Tauscher agreed that while it is important to favor national security interests, “we also need to create good-paying American jobs and have America be at the forefront of technology. And it’s that sweet spot that we have to find, to make sure that we are absolutely protecting the national security items, but at the same time, we’re cognizant that there’s a world market for things that can be taken off the list, and that we have to then protect the new things that need to be protected.”

In her written response to Lugar, Tauscher noted the State Department’s export licensing process is less cumbersome today than in recent years.

“In the past, U.S. industry had some valid concerns regarding their competitiveness in a global market,” Tauscher wrote. “In 2006, the average space-related export authorization took 76 days from submission to the Department of State to issuance of the authorization approval. In 2008, such approvals were averaging 23 days.”

In his written questions, Lugar asked Tauscher if China’s space program poses a threat to U.S. national security. Tauscher noted that China’s January 2007 successful test of a ground-launched anti-satellite missile demonstrated the country’s ability to attack satellites in low Earth orbit.

“This system is one component of a multidimensional program to limit and prevent the use of space-based assets by political adversaries during time of crisis or conflict,” Tauscher said. “We believe that China should respond to international calls for a full explanation of China’s intentions, including how China’s development of anti-satellite weapons squares with its claims to be opposed to the militarization of space.”

by Joanne Irene Gabrynowicz with the blog faculty
Source: Wall Street Journal

By ANDY PASZTOR

A clutch of former Pentagon brass is helping to start a company that offers a new service: satellites intended solely for military communications that would be built, launched and owned by private investors.

The new company, called U.S. Space LLC, attempts to meet a need that the U.S. military has struggled to fill. As U.S. forces deploy to out-of-the-way regions, the Pentagon frequently needs more satellite capacity for communications and distribution of video surveillance than it can get its hands on.

The military’s own satellites are expensive, and often take too long to deploy to satisfy fast-changing battlefield needs. Meanwhile, the military hasn’t always been able to lease sufficient bandwith on traditional commercial satellites, particularly in remote areas such as Afghanistan.

The new company intends to build and launch relatively small and inexpensive commercial satellites that would be optimized for military use and leased only to military customers, according to Mark Albrecht, the company’s chairman and co-founder.

Backers said the price of the satellites would be held down by keeping them small, modular and relatively basic, without tailoring them for special needs and piling on bells and whistles.

“This is absolutely responsive” to the Pentagon’s needs for quickly supplementing current capacity wherever it’s needed, said Mr. Albrecht, a former head of Lockheed Martin Corp.’s international rocket business.

The company’s board members count three former Air Force generals, including retired Lt. Gen. Michael Hamel, who until recently served as the military’s top uniformed space-acquisition official; retired Major General James Armor, a former space policy maker; retired Major General Craig Weston, who is also the president and chief executive of U.S. Space. The company’s backers include firms headed by former Attorney General John Ashcroft and former Defense Secretary William Cohen.

Each proposed high-altitude satellite is envisioned to cost less than half of the roughly $350 million price tag for building and launching a large, top-of-the-line commercial satellite. The Pentagon and various national-security customers already lease significant commercial capacity, often at expensive spot rates that by some estimates amount to more than $800 million annually.

In addition to being less costly, the venture aims to be more flexible because the in-orbit locations and transmission frequencies specifically will be intended for military uses.

The U.S. Space models are intended to be ready for service in roughly three years, versus a decade or more in development for most Pentagon satellites.

The project is risky, partly because no firm financing or contracts to supply capacity have been signed. The Pentagon is notorious for balking at long-term satellite leasing arrangements.

But military brass “have really endorsed” the commercial approach and “encouraged us to continue the discussions,” said Edward Horowitz, a U.S. Space co-founder and former president of the U.S. unit of global satellite-services giant SES Global.

Industrial firms backing the venture include a group of second-tier aerospace contractors led by Orbital Sciences Corp., which is in line to build the satellites and launch them with a beefed-up version of its Minotaur rockets.

The venture doesn’t see itself competing directly with current providers of military satellite, Boeing Co. and Lockheed Corp., as the U.S. Space satellites would be so stripped down.

by Joanne Irene Gabrynowicz with the blog faculty
Source: Committee on Armed Services of the U.S. House of Representatives through the Federation of American Scientists

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by P.J. Blount with the blog faculty

Women in Aerospace will host a panel on Commercial Satellite Imagery and Its Impact on National Security on Thursday, June 25, 2009, 8:00am – 9:00am at Charlie Palmer Steakhouse, 101 Constitution Ave NW, Washington, DC:

WIA Programs Presents:

Panel on Commercial Satellite Imagery and Its Impact on National Security

President Obama’s intelligence plan, announced on April 8 as a replacement for the Future Imagery Architecture satellite program, calls for buying more commercial space imagery in the short-term from U.S. companies. The complete intelligence plan, which also includes the planned purchase of new intelligence satellites, has met with some controversy on the Hill. Satellite imagery long has been a core component of U.S. national security. During Operation Iraqi Freedom, commercial imagery aided in defining deployment locations for missile and air defense batteries and assisted in mission planning. At the same time, the ready availability of satellite images has increased transparency for everyone should the U.S. be concerned about the world’s access to similar technology. Can commercial satellite imagery bring us closer to universal situation awareness?

Join us for this thought-provoking panel discussion with some of our industry’s leading experts.

Featured Panelists:

Dawn Sienicki, Vice President, Government Relations DigitalGlobe

Bob Minehart, Professional Staff, House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence

Gil Klinger, Assistant Deputy Director of National Intelligence for Architecture, Engineering, and Integration, ODNI

Carol Staubach, Vice President, Booz Allen Hamilton

Moderated by:
Warren Ferster, Space News

Thursday, June 25, 2009
8:00am – 9:00am
Charlie Palmer Steakhouse
101 Constitution Ave NW
Washington DC 20001

$30.00 member
$45.00 nonmember
Breakfast served

To register for this event go to https://secure.womeninaerospace.org/eventreg/30.html
Please join WIA at our first panel event of the year! This event is a great opportunity to network with colleagues and meet industry leaders. For more information on WIA programs, please visit our web site at www.womeninaerospace.org.

by Joanne Irene Gabrynowicz with the blog faculty
Source: NY Times

Satellite-launch services provider Sea Launch and five affiliates filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, citing liquidity concerns and recurring losses from operations, Reuters reported.

In a filing on Monday with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the District of Delaware, Sea Launch listed assets of up to $500 million and liabilities of more than $1 billion.

The Long Beach, California-based company said in the filing it intends to explore the sale of one or more of its divisions, the news service reported.

Go to Article from Reuters »

by Joanne Irene Gabrynowicz with the blog faculty
Source: BBC News

By Jonathan Amos
Science reporter, BBC News, Le Bourget
The IOVs are currently under construction in Portsmouth, UK
Europe’s satellite-navigation system has taken a big step forward with the signing of new industrial contracts.
Satellite firms EADS Astrium and OHB have been asked to provide spacecraft components that will be needed for the forthcoming constellation.
And rocket company Arianespace has signed the deal which will loft the system’s first operational platforms.
The agreements, announced at the Paris air show, are a much needed fillip for the delayed programme.
Galileo came close to collapse in 2007 when a public-private partnership (PPP) set up to construct and run the project fell apart.
The European Commission, which is leading the endeavour, has set aside more than two billion euros to build 26 satellites (plus two spares), buy launch rockets and set up the ground control centres.
Its partner on the venture, the European Space Agency (Esa), is running a procurement contest with the aim of having Galileo up and running by 2013.
Delay protection
Monday’s deals are the first formal contracts to come out of the post-PPP process.
Astrium, a pan-European outfit, and OHB, based in Bremen, Germany, have been given 6m and 10m euros respectively to start to source so-called “long-lead items”.
These are components – management computers, software, attitude control systems, atomic clock systems, etc – that take a long time to acquire and which, if not pursued soon, will further delay the project.
This will give the EC and Esa additional time to sort who they finally want to build the satellites proper – Astrium or OHB, or a combination of the two.
The companies, with partners, are currently in competition to build 26 (plus the two spares) of the 30 required operational platforms. The other four are already in production and nearing completion.
Known as the “in orbit validation” (IOVs) models, these spacecraft will be the first “stars” in the Galileo constellation, and will prove the system.
Business opportunities
Monday’s second contract signing saw Arianespace agree to launch the IOVs on Soyuz rockets from Europe’s spaceport in French Guiana in 2010.
The satellites will go up in pairs. They will be boosted into a circular orbit at 23,000km.
Galileo is expected to improve substantially the availability and accuracy of timing signals delivered from space.
Users should get quicker, more reliable fixes and be able to locate their positions with an error of one metre compared with the current US GPS (Global Positioning System) error of several metres.
It is anticipated that the extra performance will give entrepreneurs the confidence to bring forward many more sat-nav applications, especially with this functionality being built into more and more mobile phones and other handheld devices.
‘Dual procurement’
The question remains as to who will win the final contract for the 26+2 spacecraft, to be awarded before the end of the year.
Monday’s Astrium and OHB agreements are not supposed to be an indicator of the eventual outcome, although many commentators have speculated that the EC-Esa process could result in a dual procurement, with both companies being asked to provide a proportion of the satellites.
But Evert Dudok, the head of Astrium satellites, warned against such a conclusion. He told journalists that a dual track approach would lead to a 35% increase in the total cost of the Galileo space segment.
“I want to be extremely clear: ‘there is one winner and one loser, and the winner takes it all’ has to be the principle for best value for money – otherwise we will be in a mess. I promise you, we will be in a mess,” he said.
Mr Dudok claimed the increased cost would result from the loss of economies of scale – the inability to bulk purchase various items.
But Paul Verhoef, who leads the Galileo project at the EC, said competition was imperative not just for price but also for the timeline to an operational system. He told the BBC that the commission and Esa reserved the right to split the final contract if deemed necessary.
“Sure, there is an issue of price in absolute time and in absolute terms, but there is also an issue of what happens if there are delays – if there are production problems,” Mr Verhoef explained.
“Dual sourcing always costs more initially, but the purpose is to avoid risky situations that can end up costing you even more in the long term.
“From a market perspective, we are on a critical path. The Americans are modernising, the Russians are modernising and the Chinese are coming. Schedule is very important to us.”
Jonathan.Amos-INTERNET@bbc.co.uk

by Joanne Irene Gabrynowicz with the blog faculty
Source: Space News

By Peter B. de Selding

LE BOURGET, France – European government and industry officials continue to dispute the best way to contract and deploy the 30-satellite Galileo navigation and timing constellation even as final bids are prepared for the satellites and launch services.

In what may be a sign that the European Commission, as Galileo’s paymaster, is succeeding in its goal of using a competitive Galileo procurement to shake up Europe’s space sector, government and industry representatives openly disagreed about Galileo’s direction here June 15-19 during the Paris Air Show.

The European Space Agency (ESA) said its current thinking is that all 28 of the Galileo satellites to be contracted late this year would be launched, two at a time, by Russian Soyuz rockets operated from Europe’s Guiana Space Center in French Guiana.

“It’s simple economics,” said Rene Oosterlinck, ESA’s director of navigation. In a June 16 interview, Oosterlinck said Europe’s heavy-lift Ariane 5 rocket would be reserved as a backup in the event of a Soyuz problem.

The current Ariane 5 ES version that would be used for Galileo can carry just three 750-kilogram Galileo satellites, with a four-satellite capability possible only after a modification of its upper stage that would cost up to 50 million euros ($70 million).

But Alain Charmeau, chief executive officer of Astrium Space Transportation – Ariane 5’s prime contractor – said it is all but certain that several Ariane 5 vehicles will be used for Galileo to reduce European dependence on Russian hardware for a program meant to showcase European strategic autonomy.

In a June 17 press briefing, Charmeau said the Ariane 5 ES version’s upgrade has little to do with changing hardware and mainly concerns designing a Galileo payload dispenser and studies on mission optimization to place the four satellites into Galileo’s medium Earth orbit.

Similarly, Jean-Yves Le Gall, chief executive of the Arianespace launch consortium that markets Ariane 5 and will market Soyuz, said he has a written request from the European Commission asking that Arianespace – the sole company bidding for the work – make a proposal featuring both Soyuz and Ariane 5 rockets.

ESA and the European Commission appear to favor dividing the satellite construction contract into two stages to permit a later modification of the design, as needed. In addition, the two government agencies have given indications that they may divide the first satellite contract between the two bidders – consortia led by Astrium Satellites and by OHB System.

On June 15, ESA awarded contracts to begin development of long-lead satellite components – those whose development takes longest — to both consortia. Astrium Satellites received a contract valued at 7 million euros, with OHB receiving 10 million euros.

Oosterlinck said awarding two contracts should not be seen as an indication that ESA will be dividing the Galileo contract between the two bidders; rather, it is meant as an insurance policy to reduce the possibility of further development delays. The hardware produced by the contracts will belong to ESA and likely will find some use elsewhere if one of the two contractors is not selected for final construction, he said.

Evert Dudok, chief executive of Astrium Satellites, urged ESA and the European Commission not to divide the satellite construction contract, whose budget is 840 million euros

“Don’t change the rules in the middle of the game,” Dudok said during a June 16 press briefing. “If it’s a competition, let’s have one winner and one loser. It has to be winner-take-all or we will be in a real mess.”

ESA and the European Commission are considering three scenarios: Ordering all 28 satellites from one of the two bidders; ordering 16 satellites from one bidder, with 12 to be competed later to stretch out the budget and permit rapid modifications to the satellites if need be; and a third option in which each bidder gets an order for eight satellites, with the final 12 to be competed at a later date.

“It is not a budget issue, it is a question of design flexibility,” Oosterlinck said.

Dudok said the most financially efficient solution is to order all 28 satellites from a single contractor. Giving Astrium and OHB eight satellites each would raise the total cost of the satellite procurement by as much as 35 percent because neither contractor could generate scale economies. If one consortium is selected to build 16 satellites, with 12 to be competed later, the satellite price tag would go up by 15 percent, he said.

Dudok sharply criticized what he said was a political desire in some government circles to “create a third satellite prime contractor” in Europe alongside Astrium Satellites and Thales Alenia Space, which is on Astrium’s Galileo team and may be on OHB’s team as well.

Dudok did not mention the German government by name, but it is Germany that has been most active in promoting OHB as a prime contractor, saying OHB is fully German, whereas Astrium is at least as French as it is German, in addition to Astrium’s substantial operations in Britain and Spain.

Marco Fuchs, chief executive of OHB Technology, which owns OHB System, dismissed Dudok’s remarks. “No one can know what price penalties you pay by contracting with two bidders until they have seen the actual bids,” Fuchs said June 18. “Astrium doesn’t know our bid price, and we don’t know theirs. And even if you suppose that non-recurring engineering costs will be relatively higher if you use two contractors, you get the advantage of maintaining a competitive environment for future orders.”