Year: 2018

Japan creates $1 billion fund for private space start-ups

7:59 am

The new colonial movement: Japan’s government has created a $940 million fund that will be used to help new space companies get started.

The funds will be made available through investments and loans over the next five years, as part of a government-led initiative to double Japan’s more than $11 billion space industry. With less than 20 Japanese space start-ups currently operating, many see this as critical to helping new companies cover costs such as research or applying for patents. “We believe this will be remembered as a turning point for our burgeoning industry,” Takeshi Hakamada, CEO and founder of lunar exploration start-up ispace, said in a statement.

Ispace has received government backing in the past, including during a recent $90.2 million round of funding that included Suzuki Motor and Japan Airlines. Founded seven years ago, ispace is stepping beyond the Google-backed Lunar XPRIZE competition to fund two exploration missions to the moon, with the first by the end of 2019 and the second by the end of 2020.

The Japanese government is setting up an agency to manage the funds and connect start-ups with local talent from organizations such as the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency or the rocket-building arm of Mitsubishi Heavy Industries. Initially, start-ups will be eligible to each receive about $100,000 in aid to help present concepts to investors. Promising ventures and more mature companies will be able to tap into the rest of the $940 million fund to further development.

More details here.

The most interesting aspect however of this new effort is the decision by Japan to also review its space law in order to encourage private ownership in space.

Japan also announced it is considering new laws and policies that would allow businesses to own plots of land developed on the moon, in a similar manner to the laws passed by the United States and Luxembourg. So far, the U.S. and Luxembourg are the only two countries in the world to have passed laws giving corporations ownership of materials mined in space, but only after they’ve been extracted. That legal framework has seen the tiny European country attract dozens of space companies, with another 70 space companies looking to establish in Luxembourg, according to Deputy Prime Minister Etienne Schneider.

They will find, as have the U.S. and Luxembourg as well as UAE, the United Kingdom, and a number of other countries that have reviewed the Outer Space Treaty, that this legal framework under this treaty will not work well, and still leaves the ownership rights of private companies very vulnerable. To protect property rights in space, either the Outer Space Treaty has to be changed to allow the establishment of national borders and laws, or dumped entirely.

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March 19, 2018 Zimmerman Space Show podcast

11:19 am

My two hour appearance with David Livingston on the Space Show last night is now available and can be downloaded as a podcast here.

This show was particularly interesting because of the high quality of questions from the callers. In fact, in many ways I think it might have been one of my most interesting Space Show appearances in a long time. Definitely worth a listen.

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Star’s close approach 70,000 years ago pinned to cometary orbits

10:03 am

Astronomers now think they have pinned the orbits of about 340 comets to another star’s close approach to our solar system 70,000 years ago.

About 70,000 years ago, when the human species was already on Earth, a small reddish star approached our solar system and gravitationally disturbed comets and asteroids. Astronomers from the Complutense University of Madrid and the University of Cambridge have verified that the movement of some of these objects is still marked by that stellar encounter. At a time when modern humans were beginning to leave Africa and the Neanderthals were living on our planet, Scholz’s star – named after the German astronomer who discovered it – approached less than a light-year from the Sun. Nowadays it is almost 20 light-years away, but 70,000 years ago it entered the Oort cloud, a reservoir of trans-Neptunian objects located at the confines of the solar system.

This discovery was made public in 2015 by a team of astronomers led by Professor Eric Mamajek of the University of Rochester (USA). The details of that stellar flyby, the closest documented so far, were presented in The Astrophysical Journal Letters.

Now two astronomers from the Complutense University of Madrid, the brothers Carlos and Raúl de la Fuente Marcos, together with the researcher Sverre J. Aarseth of the University of Cambridge (United Kingdom), have analyzed for the first time the nearly 340 objects of the solar system with hyperbolic orbits (very open V-shaped, not the typical elliptical), and in doing so they have detected that the trajectory of some of them is influenced by the passage of Scholz´s star.

It is likely that the close approach influenced a lot more objects, many of which might not have yet arrived in the inner solar system. Moreover, their computer models suggest that the star might have come closer to the Sun than 0.6 light years.

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School shooter in Maryland stopped by armed officer

9:08 am

A school shooter today in Maryland was stopped by armed officer before the shooter had killed anyone.

St. Mary Co. Sheriff Tim Cameron on shooting at Great Mills HS: shooting happened in hallway; shooter, a student, fired at a female student, another was student hit. Armed school resource ofc, a deputy, exchanged shots w/ shooter; shooter & female student in critical condition

The shooter has since died.

It is unclear if the shooter here was aiming to kill as many as possible, or was involved in personal conflict. Either way, the incident illustrates the wisdom of having armed protection available, either by teachers or police officers.

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Chinese competition in smallsat rocket industry forcing prices down

8:54 am

Capitalism in space: The price to launch smallsats is plummeting, partly because of competitive pressure coming from China.

During a panel discussion at the Satellite 2018 conference here March 12, executives of several launch providers said they expected small launchers under development or entering service in China, either by state-owned enterprises or private ventures, to sharply reduce launch prices in the coming years. “I think the Chinese are going to drive an order of magnitude reduction in launch costs, building satellites and operating satellites. That will happen in the next five years,” said Rich Pournelle, vice president of business development for NanoRacks, a company that offers rideshare launch services for smallsats, primarily from the International Space Station.

Pournelle said that there are already signs of price pressure on launches. “Cubesats that used to cost $350,000–400,000 to launch are now $250,000 and going down,” he said. “You’re seeing a tremendous pressure from Asia, especially, on the launch side.”

Others on the panel agreed. “I think prices will settle and start to go lower as the Chinese put more launchers on,” said Curt Blake, president of Spaceflight, which also provides rideshare launch services on a variety of vehicles. “That will put pressure on U.S. launch vehicles.”

The industry concern here is that the Chinese companies are not really private, and can be heavily subsidized by China so that they can offer lower prices than anyone else. They are therefore suggesting that the government should step in and act to protect them from this competition.

I say, the government should stay out. For one thing, U.S. law today prevents American companies from using Chinese launchers, and a vast majority of the launch business is going to come from the U.S. The U.S. smallsat launch industry will have plenty of work, and can very effectively deal with the Chinese competition without government help. Moreover, this Chinese competition will only serve to enliven the market, and bring about more innovation and lower prices. The last thing we need is the government stepping in to interfere with that healthy and free competition.

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Alaskan spaceport schedules first commercial launch

8:45 am

The spaceport in Kodiak, Alaska, has announced that its first commercial launch is now scheduled for mid-April.

The Coast Guard has notified mariners of the launch, which is scheduled for some time between April 6-13, the Kodiak Daily Mirror reported Monday.

Alaska Aerospace has launched 19 rockets in collaboration with government agencies including NASA, the U.S. Air Force and the Missile Defense Agency since the spaceport opened in 1998. But in recent years, the publicly owned corporation has partnered with commercial launch companies amid the growth of the private spaceflight industry. In preparation for the launch, berms are in place to protect the launch pad and surrounding facilities. A glass structure has been placed on top of a shipping container, which will serve as a mission control center.

Sources with knowledge of the industry have refused to name the company that will launch in April due to a non-disclosure agreement, the Daily Mirror reported. But the launch will not be from Vector Space Systems or Rocket Lab — two companies that have known contracts with Alaska Aerospace.

If not Rocket Lab or Vector, this suggests another smallsat company, such as Interorbital, Firefly, or Arca, or even a company I have not spotted up to now. If so, this will certainly heat up the competition in the smallsat rocket industry.

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Port of Los Angeles approves SpaceX portside construction site

10:22 pm

The Port of Los Angeles has granted SpaceX approval to begin construction of a booster construction and refurbishment facility on a large abandoned lot with direct ocean berthing access.

A request summary completed on March 6 details SpaceX’s proposal, laying out a bright future of rocket manufacturing for the abandoned 18-acre lot at Berth 240, one that might soon support “composite curing, cleaning, painting, and assembly [of commercial transportation vessels]” that “would need to be transported by water due to their size.

The article then speculates that this facility will be used to build SpaceX’s BFR. Maybe so, but my guess is that the facility is needed now for bringing reused Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy boosters back after launch and prepping them for reuse.

While it is likely to take a fair amount of time to prepare the lot for the construction of a facility capable of manufacturing advanced composite rocket components, the wording in the Port documentation also suggests that SpaceX means to transfer its Falcon 9 recovery work to the new berth as soon as it’s available. Indeed, the comparatively massive space would give SpaceX far more room for recovery operations with the drone ship Just Read The Instructions (JRTI), and could potentially become a one-stop-shop for booster recovery and refurbishment. As of now, boosters recovered on the West Coast are transported to the Hawthorne factory for all refurbishment work, operations that themselves already require brief road stoppages to accommodate the sheer size of Falcon 9.

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On The Space Show Monday March 19 7 pm PDT

5:50 pm

Several recent stories regarding Trump’s space policy has prompted David Livingston to quickly schedule a Bob Zimmerman appearance on The Space Show for Monday, March 19, 7 pm (Pacific). The show will last at least ninety minutes. David especially wanted my analysis of Trump’s comments about the Falcon Heavy and SpaceX and how those comments have the big space contractors Boeing and Lockheed Martin quaking in their boots. Their fear and terror is further compounded by the present lack of a NASA administrator, which is made even worse by the announcement that the acting interim administrator is retiring at the end of March.

You can listen to the show live at the Space Show link. We are hoping that a number of my readers will call in with questions as well as their thoughts. The Space Show toll free number is 1 (866) 687-7223. David does not screen calls, though he expects those who call to have good questions or thoughts that will further the conversation in an entertaining way. And I don’t bite!

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New theory suggests Mars’ oceans formed earlier and intermittently

11:19 am

Scientists have proposed a new model for the existence of oceans on Mars’ northern plains that proposes they formed earlier, were shallower, were variable in size, and formed in conjunction with the eruptions that formed the planet’s giant volcanoes.

The proposal by UC Berkeley geophysicists links the existence of oceans early in Mars history to the rise of the solar system’s largest volcanic system, Tharsis, and highlights the key role played by global warming in allowing liquid water to exist on Mars. “Volcanoes may be important in creating the conditions for Mars to be wet,” said Michael Manga, a UC Berkeley professor of earth and planetary science and senior author of a paper appearing in Nature this week and posted online March 19.

…The new model proposes that the oceans formed before or at the same time as Mars’ largest volcanic feature, Tharsis, instead of after Tharsis formed 3.7 billion years ago. Because Tharsis was smaller at that time, it did not distort the planet as much as it did later, in particular the plains that cover most of the northern hemisphere and are the presumed ancient seabed. The absence of crustal deformation from Tharsis means the seas would have been shallower, holding about half the water of earlier estimates. “The assumption was that Tharsis formed quickly and early, rather than gradually, and that the oceans came later,” Manga said. “We’re saying that the oceans predate and accompany the lava outpourings that made Tharsis.”

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