The Space Resource Newsletter - June 2021
Artist rendering of the Lunar Lantern, a 3D printable lunar habitat that would be printed using lunar regolith. Credit: ICON.
Welcome to The Space Resource monthly newsletter for June 2021. Bruno is on-board with in-situ propellant production, Artemis Accords gets two new members, China's new space station gets visitors, and Starship aiming for orbital launch in July. And another ISRU job posting at Blue Origin.
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Asteroids
ULA’s CEO, Tory Bruno, mused that in-situ propellant production is key to asteroid mining feasibility. We couldn’t agree more! Such an architecture may look like TransAstra’s Honeybee system, where some of the ice collected is used to directly propel the spacecraft back to Earth orbit.
A dwarf planet will pass within 11 AU of the Sun over the next 10 years. The recently discovered object, 2014 UN271, is a 130km to 370km wide dwarf planet from the Oort cloud. It is also the largest Oort cloud object discovered to date. In about ten years it will make an approach just beyond the orbit of Saturn, with an orbit almost perpendicular to the solar system’s ecliptic at a period of nearly 400,000 years. This discovery came out of a recent search of data from the Dark Energy Survey collaboration. Speculation abound on whether a mission could be arranged in time to get a closer look, but it is certain that extensive remote observations will be conducted to take advantage of this rare close encounter.
CISLUNAR
Takinauts launched to China’s new space station for three month mission. This is the first time that crew have entered the space station, called Tianhe-1, while in orbit. Two additional modules will be flown up over the next two years, which will expand the laboratory space for experiments. Link.
China pitches a multi-stage plan for space solar power, starting with 2022 tests. Space solar power systems would launch a solar panel based system into Earth orbit and transmit that power back to Earth via microwave. The benefit of such systems is that they can collect solar power constantly, regardless of the day-night cycle on Earth’s surface. China presented small scale testing starting in 2022, with megawatt sized generation happening in the 2030s and gigawatt levels happening by 2050. While they pitch the use of Earth launched components via their next generation heavy launch rocket, a more sustainable and scalable approach would be to use space resources to build out such a system, likely using lunar or asteroid materials. Link.
Moon
New Zealand and Brazil became the 11th and 12th countries to join the Artemis Accords. The Accords are a framework for peaceful cooperation and civil exploration of the Moon, Mars, and asteroids. Originally started by the U.S., other countries who have signed it include Australia, Britain, Canada, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, South Korea, the United Arab Emirates, and Ukraine. Notable emissions from the list include Russia and China. Whether the accords actually impact international law and state actions is yet to be seen, but at least brings a modern approach for the first time in decades.
ICON showcased 3D printable lunar outpost as part of their SBIR funded research. The Austin, Texas based construction company has been developing large scale concrete 3D printers that are able to build houses from a concrete slurry. ICON received funding from NASA in a Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) contract, which is allowing them to study, design, and prototype a printer concept able to build a habitat on the Moon. ICON partnered with two architectural firms to help design these structures: the Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG) and Space Exploration Architecture (SEArch+). Building habitats with in-situ resources is a perfect example of how humanity can develop a sustainable presence in space. Link.
Lunar IceCube passed environmental testing, and is on schedule for the Artemis I launch. The NASA Lunar IceCube CubeSat will map the dynamics and distribution of water on the Moon’s surface. This information will aid future landing site selections for prospecting missions, which will target high concentrations of ice.
NASA selects three payloads for lunar surface studies. As part of the Payloads and Research Investigations on the Surface of the Moon (PRISM), the three scientific payloads will be carried on commercial services as part of the Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) initiative. One payload will study the surface and magnetic features on Reiner Gamma, the location of the lunar swirl. Another payload will study seismic features in Schrodinger basin, and the final payload will study heat flow and electrical conductivity of the subsurface in Schrodinger basin. In addition to performing fundamental planetary science, the commercial delivery aspect warrants mention because it shows one business case for commercial delivery services. Link.
Starship
Gwynne Shotwell, SpaceX President, mentioned the goal of an orbital launch of Starship in July. All progress in Starbase Texas is aimed around this goal.
Starship progress focused on orbital features and the interface with the booster. The first Vacuum Raptor engine, which has an Isp of 378 seconds, was delivered to Starbase (Boca Chica) on June 27th. Meanwhile, the first public stacking test of the interface between the Starship lower skirt and Super Heavy upper section was performed using partial sections of each system. While the hot gas reaction control thrusters for Starship were spotted for the first time on June 22, it was later stated that they won’t be utilized on the initial orbital flight due to their integration being unnecessary complication.
The Super Heavy Booster manufacturing line is building up speed. Super Heavy Booster 3, now nearly complete, will be used only for ground tests and won’t have grid fins. Booster 4 will have significant design changes to improve ease of manufacturing, and is expected to be tested in an orbital flight. These rapid iterations allow the design to evolve quickly to ensure quick success. The current plan is to have a full orbital stack by July, meaning Starship SN20 and Super Heavy Booster 4 will need to be complete within the next few weeks. Super Heavy boosters aren’t expected to have an entry burn when they return to the launch site.
While there was some media backlash and political attention over news that SpaceX launched Starship SN8 without FAA authorization, the leader of the FAA’s space office defended the company by saying that they had confidence in SpaceX after they effectively modified their procedures and addressed the safety culture issues they had identified. Coordination with the FAA and launch providers can be tricky at times, but they are professionals and do work together to achieve launches without undue burden.
terrestrial
Blue Origin continues to post ISRU related job opportunities. Despite a lack of any significantly detailed information on the ongoing space resource utilization work at the company, Blue Origin continued to post job opportunities relevant to such work this month, including one for a mining and material processing engineer that would be specifically tasked with work related to Moon regolith. Apply for the job here!
Multiple Space Resource startups selected for Amazon Web Service’s space accelerator. In total, ten U.S. and European space based startups were able to join a month-long accelerator program. This is helpful for the startups as it provides them access to leaders within AWS’s Aerospace Solutions group and general AWS credits. While the ultimate goal of these companies is to operate in space, all data centers are still terrestrially bound (until AWS launches a datacenter in space…). Link.
Launcher announces a new Orbital Transfer Vehicle (OTV), Launcher Orbiter. This custom small-satellite will deliver up to 90U worth of CubeSats across multiple orbits. The first flight is scheduled for October 2022 aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9. The Launcher Orbiter has planned compatibility with both the SpaceX Falcon 9 rideshare program and Launcher’s Light rocket. Multiple companies have announced OTVs, capitalizing on the affordable launches SpaceX enables from their rideshare missions. The trick now will be making these OTVs reusable and ensuring there is enough demand to support multiple OTV operators (as Momentus has already struggled with). Link.
Phase Four accelerating production of iodine propellant electric thruster. Having announced a successful Series B funding round of $26 million in early June, Phase Four will now have the funds to accelerate production to meet demand for it’s Maxwell plasma thruster. This small satellite thruster uses iodine instead of the more expensive xenon as propellant in the attempt to decrease cost and increase safety. So far Phase Four has delivered three Maxwell thrusters to orbit, but it plans to have eight in orbit by the end of year. Link.
Momentus successfully signs a National Security Agreement. After what was reported to be a four month effort with the U.S. government, Momentus announced on June 9th that they finalized and signed a National Security Agreement with the Department of Defense and the Department of the Treasury, which is meant to create a path toward Momentus being able to provide in-orbit satellite transportation. The agreement requires increased security measures, improves oversight, and a board member who will oversee compliance with these stipulations. After successful implementation of the steps outlined in the agreement, the company plans to again request permission to fly their first demo mission, which was previously denied because of various national security concerns. Link.
Launch
Relativity Space announces plans to build a fully reusable and entirely 3-D printed rocket, called the Terran R. Along with announcing the close of a $650 million dollar investment round, Relativity Space announced a methane oxygen fueled rocket that they plan to launch from Cape Canaveral in 2024. The vehicle is expected to have full reusability, potentially like a smaller version of the SpaceX Starship. It is planned to deliver up to 20,000kg to LEO. This payload capacity is substantial, as the current payload capacity to LEO for the SpaceX Falcon 9 is around 17,000kg when recovering the first stage. For additional context, the upcoming ULA Vulcan Centaur is aiming to have a 10,600kg LEO capacity and a 27,200kg capacity when using 6 solid-rocket boosters (i.e. the heavy configuration). With all these considerations, the Terran R looks like a highly competitive follow on to Relativity Space’s initial small-sat launch vehicle, Terran 1, due to its planned capability, reusability, and innovative construction methods. Link.
Relativity Space announces new factory headquarters. On the last day of the month, Relativity Space announced the purchase of a 93-acre site previously used to manufacture the Boeing C-17 on which they will build a manufacturing facility for the Terran R that will exceed a million square feet. The new facility will employ over 2000 employees, which is over four times the total number of current company employees; 200 of which will be hired by the end of 2021. Link.
Small launch company Astra acquires electric propulsion firm Apollo Fusion. After going public earlier this year, Astra announced the purchase of Apollo Fusion for $50M with $95M in possible milestone-based incentives. Ultimately, this will allow Astra to both incorporate and sell the Apollo Fusion thrusters directly. Astra currently has 50 launches under contract, with plans to scale the payload capacity of its launch vehicle from 50kg to 500kg. The acquisition of Apollo Fusion allows Astra to provide customers with an integrated satellite bus and electric propulsion system for housing their payloads. Link.
New plan for the Long March 9 booster revealed during a presentation by the China National Space Administration (CNSA). Intended to support a human Moon landing before 2030, the vehicle was shown to have both a low-Earth orbit (LEO) and lunar-transfer orbit (LTO) configuration, capable of delivering 150 tons to LEO and 53 tons to LTO. Link.
Engine oscillation seen on May 18 Atlas V flight confirmed to be off-nominal. In a June 4 statement, Tory Bruno confirmed that the heavy oscillation of the new RL10C-1-1 engine nozzle seen on the SBIRS GEO-5 launch was not nominal and that work would be done to fully understand the behavior before flying the SBIRS5 configuration of the RL10 again. This shows that even workhouse rockets still have challenges and continually require close oversight. Link.
