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As I noted in July, the support of my readers through the years has given me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Only now does it appear that Washington might finally recognize this reality.

 

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Japan awards $32.5 million contract for lunar GPS-type satellite constellation to startup

Capitalism in space: As part of the multi-billion dollar fund the Japanese government has allocated to encourage private enterprise by new Japanese startups, its space agency JAXA has now awarded a $32.5 million development contract to the startup ArkEdge Space to design and fly a GPS-type satellite in orbit around the Moon, thus demonstrating the technology.

Under the agreement, ArkEdge Space will plan and design the mass production and operation of micro-satellite constellations to lead the development of a next-generation Lunar Navigation Satellite System (LNSS), a vital component to the International “LunaNet” initiative driven by National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), European Space Agency (ESA) and JAXA. LunaNet seeks to establish essential infrastructure to support sustainable lunar exploration and foster the growth of the lunar economy.

The real significance of this contract award is that it signals JAXA’s growing shift from designing, building, and owning everything to simply becoming the customer who gets what it needs from the private sector. The Japanese government had established that fund for this express purpose, but JAXA has shown a reluctance to proceed, as it directly threatens its turf. This award indicates that reluctance is finally being pushed aside.

Genesis cover

On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.

 

The print edition can be purchased at Amazon. from any other book seller, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.


The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
 

"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News

3 comments

  • Jerry Greenwood

    It will be interesting to see their approach to this.

    Am I correct that maintaining a stable orbit around the moon is difficult because the influence of the earth?

  • Jerry Greenwood: Lunar orbits ARE unstable, difficult to maintain, and eventually decay. However, it is not the Earth that is the cause. The cause comes from what scientists label “mass concentrations” or mascons within the Moon’s interior.

  • wayne

    ah, down the rabbit hole a little…

    “Orbits Around the Moon are Very Unstable”
    NASA (2022)
    https://youtu.be/0ayDBidFbDI?t=39
    (1:52)

    Old clip, but good graphics, and they mention a cube-sat called CAPSTONE, designed to test a “near-rectilinear-halo-orbit.,” which is supposed to be more-stable.

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