essay on space and sustainability

The role of space in driving sustainability, security, and development on Earth

The world is in a space renaissance. Expanding activity in space is beginning to outpace governance, technological progress is increasing accessibility, commercial funding is at an all-time high, and more nations and companies are clamoring to be part of the activity. Already space plays a role in advancing global sustainability and security priorities, but the potential is even greater. The future is in the balance, and all stakeholders have the capability to contribute to a more successful sector.

Advancements in space technology over the past decade have opened access to more players, unlocked new use cases, and positioned space to help address significant global priorities. Throughout, international and cross-sector collaboration has occurred in several areas.

However, the accelerating growth of the space sector and complex global dynamics pose a risk to continued international collaboration, the longevity of governance frameworks, and, thus, industrial progress in the ecosystem. To fully realize the benefits of space, the international community will likely need to quickly consider how to intentionally maintain space as an arena of collaboration.

Learn more about our work in the space sector

This report ( download below )—a collaborative effort with the World Economic Forum, and informed by the views of approximately 100 industry leaders—describes potential scenarios for the future of space. It identifies five actions that could put the industry on the path to more positive outcomes, in which the full benefits of the space economy are realized.

We invite you to read the report to learn more on what industry leaders believe it will take to put each of these actions into practice—and why these are keys to unlocking the potential of the future space economy.

The future of space is in humankind’s hands. By taking the right actions today, there may be lasting benefits from a peaceful and vibrant space sector that creates economic value, and also enhances the sustainability, security, and accountability of actors on Earth.

Download the full report: The role of space in driving sustainability, security, and development on Earth (PDF-3.42MB).

Ryan Brukardt is a senior partner in McKinsey’s Miami office, Jesse Klempner is a partner in the Chicago office, Daniel Pacthod is a senior partner in the New York office, and Brooke Stokes is an associate partner in the Southern California office.

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A new chapter for space sustainability

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Each day, new and innovative space technologies are being developed in countries around the world, and with that, a steady stream of satellites, rockets, cargo ships, and crew vehicles are being launched into the Earth's orbit and beyond.

So what happens to these systems when they come to the end of their functional life, or malfunction and break?

Some are programmed to re-enter the Earth's atmosphere where, if all goes well, they incinerate safely upon entry. Some are programmed to use their last bit of fuel to launch further into outer space, into so-called graveyard or disposal orbits. Other chunks of space debris are left to float in Earth's orbit, and as a result, estimates indicate that millions of pieces of space junk circulate our planet, traveling at tens of thousands of miles per hour. It's not hard to imagine how, at that speed and velocity, any kind of collision with a working satellite or spacecraft could mean instantaneous destruction.

To help address this real and ever-growing concern, in 2019 the World Economic Forum launched the Space Sustainability Rating (SSR), and held a competition to select teams to design the tool. The organizations selected were the European Space Agency along with a U.S. team led by Assistant Professor Danielle Wood, director of the the Media Lab’s Space Enabled group, in collaboration with Minoo Rathnasabapathy of Space Enabled, Professor Moriba Jah at the University of Texas at Austin, and Simon Potter of the space analytics and engineering company BryceTech .

The rating system under development by this team over the past two years has been designed to score the sustainability of manufacturers and operators, and is based on factors such as plans to de-orbit systems upon completion of missions; choice of orbital altitude; ability of systems to be detected and identified from the ground; collision-avoidance measures; size and number of objects left in space from the launch vehicle; and sharing of data. By voluntarily participating in the SSR system, missions will earn a certification and rating that verifies their level of sustainability.

“The development and deployment of the SSR comes at a crucial time in the ongoing efforts to encourage responsible behavior among a growing and increasingly diverse group of space actors,” says Potter. “Satellites are being launched in dramatically greater numbers, increasing the threat to the long-term sustainability of the space environment. The SSR aims to incentivize space actors to consider sustainability as a critical component of mission design and operations, in the same way that ESG [Environmental, Social & Governance] considerations are becoming increasingly embedded in activities on Earth.”

Now, with the progress made by this foundational team, the SSR is poised to move from the design stage to prepare for operations, and the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (Swiss Institute of Technology of Lausanne) Space Center — known as eSpace — has been tapped to lead the SSR rollout following a competitive selection process.

For this next chapter in space debris mitigation, the original SSR design team, including Wood, Rathnasabapathy, Jah, Potter, Stijn Lemmens and Francesca Letizia of ESA, and Nikolai Khystov of the World Economic Forum, will serve on the SSR's Advisory Council. This role includes serving on the team that makes recommendations and approves changes to the SSR definition, helps to communicate the value and benefits of the rating, and advises countries on how they can incorporate SSR guidelines into their national policies.

"The transition of the SSR from design to operations is an exciting milestone, and just the start of a new era of space sustainability research at MIT and with our collaborator Moriba Jah at the University of Texas at Austin," notes Wood.

Wood and her research team are building new alliances to expand research impact in space sustainability. Both Jah and Kevin O’Connell are newly announced affiliated researchers with Space Enabled. O’Connell served as the director of space commerce in the U.S. Department of Commerce and is a recognized expert on the global space economy. In addition, a research collaborative has been formed together with Jah and Richard Linares at MIT’s Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics to design next-generation methods that support space traffic management.

Wood explains, "At Space Enabled, future research will continue our work to create models to estimate how challenging it is to detect, identify, and track an object in space; build tools that invite new countries and firms to help shape sustainable space operations; study economic, social, and legal trends that influence the accessibility of space; and develop new methods to ensure that human activity — in our own orbit, on the moon, Mars, and beyond — is environmentally, socially, and economically sustainable.”

To celebrate this new season of research on space sustainability, Wood hosted Jah to discuss his views on space environmentalism in a public, virtual event on June 24 as part of the MIT Media Lab Perspective series.

The collaboration between Space Enabled and Jah leverages the capabilities of the Advanced Research Collaboration and Application Development Environment (ARCADE), a digital commons that Jah developed with the Texas Advanced Computing Center and IBM. ARCADE provides a platform to perform analysis related to SSR while leveraging ASTRIAGraph, a free tool that enables and encourages scientific and policy inquiries regarding space safety, security, and sustainability.

“The SSR is one of several pillars required to solve the wicked problem of uncoordinated space traffic activities,” says Jah. “Space operations knowledge is uneven across space actors, and thus the practice is also uneven as a consequence. The SSR aims, in part, to harmonize the currently existing gap between knowledge and practice in the space operations community. The University of Texas tool ASTRIAGraph contributes to this endeavor by creating a public platform to visualize and analyze estimates of the locations of human-generated space objects.”

Wood notes that with the leadership role that Space Enabled has played in designing the SSR, the group has established a collaborative research portfolio in space sustainability, and collaborations with key experts in the field. “We can build upon this in exciting ways,” she concludes, “and MIT will continue to innovate new ways of thinking and designing to preserve the environment in space and on Earth for generations to come.”

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A sustainability rating for space debris

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Danielle Wood spoke at the Media Lab’s space event, Beyond the Cradle, in March. She will join the faculty full-time in January 2018.

Danielle Wood joins Media Lab faculty

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Emerging Issues

Sustainability in space: the next frontier.

A surge in the number of satellites in orbit has created new opportunities to monitor environmental and human rights issues, but it also poses serious sustainability challenges.
Emissions from launches, orbital debris, and outdated laws are fueling concerns about the sustainability of current outer space activities.
Greater collaboration is needed across the space industry to tackle these issues and ensure equitable access to limited orbital slots, resources mined in space, and jobs within the sector.

The commercial space industry has grown rapidly in recent years, with a surge in the number of launches and satellites in orbit. This growth creates new business opportunities and ways to monitor the environment and human activities. However, it also leads to sustainability challenges both on Earth and in space, such as increases in greenhouse gas emissions from launches and orbital debris.

The space industry is enjoying a surge of activity unlike anything since the launch of Sputnik nearly 65 years ago, which signaled the start of the Space Age. Billions of dollars of private investment have fueled a new wave of startups across various aspects of the space business, including rocket development and satellite systems.

A major factor in this growth is the reduced cost of launching satellites into low Earth orbit. Companies once had to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars for this service, but SpaceX’s ability to reuse and rapidly re-fly rocket stages has reduced costs to around US$1,200 per pound of payload . Other companies are following their lead, opening space exploration to a wide range of entrepreneurs and innovators.

Cheaper access to space has also increased the number and size of “constellations” made up of hundreds or thousands of satellites. OneWeb, for example, is deploying a constellation of nearly 650 satellites to provide broadband services. Meanwhile, SpaceX has launched more than 2,000 of its Starlink satellites and is proposing a second-generation system of about 30,000 satellites. Amazon also plans to spend US$10 billion on Project Kuiper , a broadband satellite constellation that will be made up of more than 3,200 satellites.

The increase in constellations is adding to worries about the growing population of objects in low Earth orbit, both satellites, and debris. The latter includes defunct satellites and rocket stages, as well as fragments created by accidental collisions and, in some cases, deliberate tests of antisatellite weapons— including one by Russia in November 2021. This debris could set off a chain reaction of collisions. This scenario, called the Kessler Syndrome , could eventually make it difficult or impossible for satellites to operate in some orbits—particularly the low Earth orbits used by Earth science and communications satellites.

Launches pose other sustainability issues too. Many rockets use fuels like kerosene that generate greenhouse gases and soot. And while the emissions from launches are tiny compared to those from aircraft, launches can deposit pollutants in the upper atmosphere, magnifying their effect, as an Aerospace Corporation study noted. The effects of rocket emissions on the atmosphere are still largely unknown, however, as are the effects of reentries of rockets and satellites that could deposit materials like aluminum in the upper atmosphere.

Although these issues are concerning, the increase in satellites is also making it easier and cheaper to monitor environmental issues like air quality; human rights violations, such as the ethnic cleansing of Rohingya populations in Burma; and supply chains (an issue covered last year by The Fast Forward ). Commercial satellite imagery has also revealed war crimes in Ukraine and provided Kyiv authorities with intelligence on Russian troop movements .

However, the gathering of satellite intelligence on armed conflicts raises concerns about the power now wielded by satellite internet companies as well as the risk of them being dragged into conflicts.

One recent report published by Secure World Foundation, a space-oriented NGO, warned of a surge of interest in weapons that can disrupt space-based services. Another report issued by the Pentagon’s intelligence agency also claimed that Russia and China are developing weapons designed to take out US satellites. In the wake of the war in Ukraine, Russia has also severed commercial ties with US and European space projects—another sign that we may be reaching the end of an era in international space cooperation.

Tensions between the US and China were further inflamed by recent near misses between Starlink satellites and the Tianhe space station module. China complained to the UN and reminded the US of its obligation to avoid such dangers (although Starlink spacecraft are privately owned, the US government is internationally responsible for their space activities under the 1967 Outer Space Treaty). However, the US implied that the risk of a collision had been exaggerated.

The incident highlights the urgent need for better communication mechanisms between spacefaring nations—particularly as outer space resource extraction starts to become a reality. The US-drafted Artemis Accords , a set of principles to govern human-led exploration of the Moon, allow for mining in support of scientific missions. The Accords, which will also set the agenda for a human-led mission to Mars, are not binding under international law but will act as a blueprint of conduct for countries that sign up to them (19 so far). However, the fact that China and Russia are planning a rival International Lunar Research Station programm could complicate efforts to regulate mining in space.

Mining on the moon, and potentially Mars and asteroids too, also has implications for planetary protection —e.g., the practice of protecting solar system bodies from contamination and protecting Earth from possible life forms that may be returned from other solar system bodies. In October 2021, a report commissioned by NASA suggested that landing robotic missions in regions of Mars that are unlikely to allow terrestrial contamination to propagate could make the planet more accessible for both government and commercial endeavors. However, while the recommendations may be taken up by the Committee on Space Research, which oversees international planetary protection standards, there is currently no regulatory agency that could enforce such guidelines for commercial missions.

Despite the many issues that need to be solved to make space-based activities more sustainable, there are now long-overdue signs of progress on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI). NASA’s Artemis program aims to land the first woman and first person of color on the moon , for example. Executives in the commercial space sector have also pledged to significantly increase the number of women and employees from underrepresented groups. And the European Space Agency’s first call for new astronauts in more than a decade was open to candidates with physical disabilities .

Signals of Change

Executives from the space industry have signed a pledge to advance diversity across their workforces. The “Space Workforce 2030” pledge commits companies to annual reporting of data on diversity in their collective technical workforce, as well as working with universities to increase the number of diverse and underrepresented students in the technical fields needed in the space industry.

In March, the United Nations banned the use of mercury as a satellite propellant by 2025, citing the human health risks that mercury poses as it reenters the atmosphere. A space industry whistleblower informed Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, a US environmental organization, that a mercury-based thruster was in development in 2018. The ban came about before any thrusters made it into orbit.

Astroscale has secured European Space Agency funding for a 2024 demo mission to remove what will likely be a OneWeb satellite from orbit. The tech firm is one of the early movers in the space debris disposal industry and plans to launch a commercial de-orbit service for satellite operators in due course.

Fast Forward to 2025

The one I’m referring to created thousands of pieces of debris—none of which, I’m relieved to say, hit any of our satellites, which we managed to maneuver out the way in time. But one of our competitors wasn’t so lucky...

CEO of a satellite imaging firm

Memo from the Future

Our company helps numerous businesses to monitor and demonstrate the sustainability of their supply chains. We combine imaging from our satellites with artificial intelligence to provide our customers with near real-time data on everything from their efforts to end deforestation to how certain crops and plantations are changing. But without all the work there’s been to clean up space junk, I doubt we’d still be here today.

Back when we were starting out, several of our satellites were almost wiped out by debris from an anti-satellite missile test. At the time, these dangerous and reckless missile tests posed an increasing threat in our industry. The one I’m referring to created thousands of pieces of debris—none of which, I’m relieved to say, hit any of our satellites, which we managed to maneuver out the way in time. But one of our competitors wasn’t so lucky.

Low Earth orbit was incredibly crowded at this point, and this firm was unable to safely move all their satellites before the cloud of debris from the missile test collided with them (creating yet more debris in the process). They lost almost 50 satellites in one go, and while the cost of launches and satellite technologies has come down a lot, it must have taken a huge toll on their finances. They went bust shortly afterward.

One good thing did come out of the destruction caused by the test: it finally encouraged both governments and commercial companies to take real action on space debris.

Several governments and many other private companies also lost vital and expensive equipment. The scale of the destruction, and fear that the world was on the cusp of a Kessler syndrome event, led to a new multilateral treaty on anti-satellite missile testing. Start-ups focused on the removal of space debris also received a big boost in both public and private financing, allowing them to dramatically scale up their efforts.

More advanced government collision warning systems, as well as new commercial ones that pulled in additional data from their own tracking radars and proprietary AI algorithms, also helped to reduce the amount of space junk in orbit. New internationally enforced rules for collision avoidance, similar to those in the maritime and aeronautical sector, are also in the pipeline.

All of this has helped to steer the space away from a “tragedy of the commons” scenario. It’s also made it easier for companies such as ours to thrive, and provide businesses with rich, real-time data on their supply chains.

CEO Satellite Imaging Firm

The Fast Forward

BSR Sustainable Futures Lab

Implications for Sustainable Business

In recent years, the term “space sustainability” has gained traction in the space industry. While there is no universally accepted definition, it’s generally used as an umbrella term for measures designed to ensure that space activities don’t have adverse effects on either space or the Earth. However, there is very little international regulation that specifically addresses space sustainability. In 2019, the United Nations Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space published a set of 21 guidelines for the long-term sustainability of space activities, including ways to coordinate satellite activities and avoid collisions. But those guidelines are not binding; it is up to individual countries to decide whether and how to implement them. Space debris—or “space junk”—is one of the most pressing concerns. The issue has been around since the dawn of spaceflight, but recent anti-satellite missile tests and a huge increase in the number of satellites in orbit have exacerbated the problem. There are now over 20,000 known and tracked pieces of space debris orbiting Earth, which pose a huge risk to future space missions. An estimated 100 tons of space junk also makes it to Earth's surface every year.

There are many dimensions of sustainability that we’re just beginning to understand, but the really exciting part of this is that we’re witnessing the emergence of a brand new industry and the ability to integrate sustainability at its core from the beginning. It’s an incredible opportunity.

Paul Holdredge , Director of Industrials and Transport at BSR

Despite the scale of the space junk problem, both governments and the private sector have been slow to act. Today, most efforts focus on avoiding adding to the problem rather than cleaning up the debris that’s already in orbit. However, the WEF’s new Space Sustainability Rating should increase transparency around space operators’ contributions to protecting the space environment and encourage more responsible behavior. There are other issues beyond debris that urgently need to be addressed. Satellite constellations like Starlink can interfere with astronomy, as the satellites can be bright compared to distant stars and galaxies and dazzle the sensitive instruments that astronomers use on telescopes. Organizations like the International Astronomical Union have taken up this issue and are working with companies to reduce the brightness of their satellites. But the problem highlights how commercial activity coupled with a lack of industry-led binding collaborations could lead to a “tragedy of the commons” in space.

Orbital slots are another concern. Satellites in geostationary orbit are used for telecommunications, broadcasting, and weather monitoring, but slots are limited. As of February 2022, 541 of the 1,800 available were occupied by active satellites. These slots are allocated by the International Telecommunication Union on a first-come, first-served basis, which effectively means they go to the countries and companies with the most technological and financial muscle. This issue will need to be addressed to create more equitable access.

Satellites can play an essential role in advancing environmental sustainability. While those operated by governments have provided environmental information for decades, companies are now developing their own spacecraft to provide more specialized capabilities. One example is GHGSat, a Canadian company that is developing satellites to track methane and other greenhouse gas emissions. It can track leaks of such gases to specific oil and gas facilities, helping companies and government agencies monitor emissions with greater precision.

The Environmental Defense Fund is also pursuing its satellite to track methane emissions, MethaneSAT, whose data will be freely available. Carbon Mapper , another nonprofit, is pursuing its own constellation in partnership with Planet, a company that operates more than 150 imaging satellites. Meanwhile, a British company, Satellite Vu , is working on satellites to detect thermal emissions from buildings to enable more efficient energy use.

Can you imagine life without GPS? Well, the sensors that we're launching into space today for customers like NASA, and the satellites we are planning on launching, could someday have as transformative of an impact on every single person on Earth as GPS does today.

Chris Kemp , Founder, Chairman and CEO of Astra, a launch and space technology company

Looking beyond emissions, HawkEye 360 operates satellites that can track ships based on their radio and other transmissions , allowing governments and organizations to identify illegal fishing. Satellite imagery from companies such as Maxar has also been used to monitor human trafficking and slave labor around the world.

The growth of satellite-based internet services could offer a solution to internet shutdowns and censorship too. Starlink has already helped to keep parts of Ukraine connected after attacks on physical communications infrastructure. However, the limited number of players in the satellite internet space to date, and the amount of resources needed to compete in this market, has sparked monopolization concerns.

Space is a source of vast mineral riches that might also be monopolized by a small number of countries and firms. The US, Japan, the UAE, and Luxembourg have already passed dedicated laws granting companies rights to any minerals and other natural resources that they extract in outer space. But while space mining could boost the economies of countries that can carry it out, it could disrupt those of countries that are heavily geared toward exporting minerals and metals—an area that will require more attention as space mining shifts from "sci-fi" to emerging industry.

No matter whether they’re providing satellite broadband or imaging, or supporting crews aboard the International Space Station, firms in the space sector will need to scale up their DEI efforts. The next generation of explorers, engineers, technicians, and company leaders will come from a rich mix of backgrounds. Ensuring that all groups are represented, treated fairly, and have their rights protected is an important first step today in reaching a giant leap in fairness tomorrow.

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Covering the business and politics of space

Can space governance keep up with space sustainability?

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It is not uncommon to be faced with a problem but struggle to find a solution. In the case of space sustainability, as low Earth orbit fills with both active satellites and debris, the challenge is as much coming up with a solution to deal with that congestion as it is determining who should do it.

The rapid growth in the number of space objects, caused by the rise of satellite constellations as well as debris-generating events like anti-satellite tests and collisions, is testing the international governance model for space activities developed in the early years of the Space Age that many in the industry believe can no longer keep up.

“More objects have been launched in the last 10 years than in the previous 50 combined,” noted Guy Ryder, undersecretary-general for policy at the United Nations, during a speech at the Summit for Space Sustainability by the Secure World Foundation (SWF) in New York June 13. That creates, he said, “boundless development opportunities and governance needs.”

Space governance has been handled at the international level by the U.N.’s Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space (COPUOS), which now has 102 nations as members. In the 1960s, COPUOS helped guide the development of the Outer Space Treaty, the foundation of international space law, followed by several related agreements.

However, the large size of COPUOS and its use of a consensus-based model — all nations must agree — can make progress slow or nonexistent. Attendees of the most recent COPUOS meeting in Vienna, which concluded in early June, noted that one agenda item known as “dark and quiet skies” to study the effects of satellite constellations on astronomy had widespread support but was dropped because of objections from one nation, Iran, which is opposed to constellations in general on sovereignty grounds.

“It’s slow, it’s frustrating,” said Valda Vikmanis Keller, director of the U.S. State Department’s Office of Space Affairs, of COPUOS, during one panel at the Summit for Sustainability. But, she said, the discussions there were essential. “It’s the only way forward.”

However, some are looking for alternative mechanisms to address those growing space sustainability concerns. That includes efforts both within the United Nations itself and among other governments and organizations, seeking binding agreements or simply widely adopted norms and guidelines as the population of satellites and debris continues to grow.

Window of opportunity

One such effort is at the United Nations. It is beginning preparations for its Summit of the Future, a two-day meeting in New York in September 2024 where member nations will discuss key global issues. The U.N. calls it a “once-in-a-generation opportunity to enhance cooperation on critical challenges and address gaps in global governance.”

The agenda of that meeting will include space. “We have a window of opportunity over the next 15 months,” Ryder said, “where we can accelerate space diplomacy and advance the governance issue.”

The U.N. started planning for the Summit of the Future with the release of a policy paper in May on outer space governance. It highlighted as key topics space traffic coordination as well as space resource utilization and concerns about conflict in outer space.

The report doesn’t offer specific solutions, but Ryder said the ultimate goal is to develop “one single united regime to facilitate data sharing, cooperation and continuity” in space traffic management and related issues. Those issues could be addressed individually, though, “if that path looks likelier to achieve results.”

COPUOS will play a role in developing concepts to be considered at the Summit of the Future through its meetings next year, but it will not be the only mechanism. Portugal will host a conference in the spring of 2024 to develop proposals for consideration at the fall summit.

Hugo André Costa, a member of the executive board of the Portuguese Space Agency, said at the SWF summit that the spring meeting will be preceded by two virtual workshops, one this October on technology issues and a second in March 2024 on policy issues. Those meetings will be open to representatives from industry, academia and governments. “This is the only way that we can prepare for the future,” he argued.

Developing a global space government framework in just 15 months is an ambitious task. If it is successful, though, Ryder suggested that the framework that emerges might look different from existing approaches. One model, he said, might be existing treaties like the U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea. “All of this provides us with the confidence that the kinds of agreements concluded in the past are possible in the future, even in today’s admittedly challenging geopolitical climate.”

“The notion is that we live in a rapidly changing world,” he said, looking for new approaches while maintaining existing mechanisms. “Let’s be honest: what worked yesterday will not necessarily work tomorrow. That is not a recipe or a reason to jettison everything that has worked up until this point.”

“But,” he added, “it can be a very strong reason to adapt, modify, improve what we have.”

Phone a friend

The international community has demonstrated it can move quickly on space sustainability issues. After Russia conducted an ASAT demonstration in November 2021, destroying a defunct Russian satellite and creating thousands of pieces of debris, the United States and others started pushing for mechanisms to halt any future such tests.

U.S. officials said they didn’t expect Russia to perform a destructive direct-ascent (DA) ASAT test. “We were shocked. I’ll be honest with you, I was shocked,” said Audrey Schaffer, director of space policy at the National Security Council, during a talk at the Summit for Space Sustainability. “How could they do something so brazen, so reckless, and so clearly contrary to the safety, sustainability and security of an environment that so many of us depend upon?”

Later at the summit, Lt. Gen. John Shaw, deputy commander of U.S. Space Command, said that the U.S. military suspected Russia was planning some sort of test. “They consider themselves the senior spacefaring nation,” he said, and thus expected Russia would do an “offset test” that fired a missile to deliberately miss the target. “They want to continue that tradition of being that senior, responsible spacefaring nation. I was wrong.”

The Defense Department, he said, became “one of the earliest and biggest proponents” of what Vice President Kamala Harris announced the following April, that the U.S. would refrain from conducting similar ASAT tests and request other countries to do the same.

That effort resulted in a U.N. General Assembly vote last December, just over a year after the Russian ASAT test, on a resolution regarding such a test ban. A total of 155 nations voted in favor of the resolution, while nine, including China and Russia, voted against it. Nine other nations, including India, abstained.

“That kind of vote count indicates a very strong base of support,” Schaffer said but argued it was not enough. The resolution, she noted, was non-binding, simply encouraging countries to make such commitments. As of June 2023, 13 countries have done so.

“To truly establish an internationally recognized norm banning destructive DAASAT missile testing, we need a critical mass of nations to actually make the commitment,” she said.

That has been a slow process. Only three countries — Austria, Italy and the Netherlands — have formally committed not to conduct destructive ASAT tests since the U.N. vote. That slow progress, some suggested, may be due to domestic politics.

“We understand that other states that voted for the resolution but have not yet joined the commitment need some time to thoroughly review the domestic effects,” said Hyerin Kim, second secretary in the disarmament and non-proliferation division of South Korea’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs. South Korea announced its commitment to refrain from such tests last October. “Korea is also making efforts to raise awareness of the danger posed by ASAT testing.”

“We had a great start out of the gate, but there’s more road ahead of us,” Schaffer said, urging conference attendees representing nations that had not made a commitment to consider doing so. And for those who have, “phone a friend and ask them to make the commitment too.”

Alternative approaches

Other efforts to address space sustainability are proliferating. At the Summit for Space Sustainability, the World Economic Forum (WEF) announced a new set of guidelines for mitigating the growth of orbital debris. The document is the latest foray into space sustainability for the WEF, which previously led the development of a Space Sustainability Rating.

Among the recommendations published by the WEF is to establish a success rate for “post-mission disposal,” or removal of satellites from orbit after the end of their missions, of 95% to 99%. That disposal, it added, should be done no later than five years after the end of a satellite’s life, versus earlier guidelines of 25 years.

“We wanted to push the envelope a little bit on some of these concrete, specific targets,” said Nikolai Khlystov, lead for the WEF’s Future of Space initiative, at the conference. The document also calls for satellites to be maneuverable, preferably through onboard propulsion, when operating at altitudes above 375 kilometers, and for operators to agree to share orbital data.

The WEF convinced 27 companies to endorse the guidelines, including several major satellite operators. Notably absent, though, were some planning or deploying large constellations, such as Amazon and SpaceX.

Khlystov said the WEF worked with more than the 27 companies who signed the new guidelines. “If some actors didn’t sign on, I don’t think it’s a sign that they are against these standards,” he said. (An Amazon spokesperson later said that while the company helped craft those guidelines, it was not ready yet to endorse them as it assesses various other proposals.)

Just over a week later, the European Space Agency and three European satellite manufacturers — Airbus Defence and Space, OHB and Thales Alenia Space — announced their intent to develop a “Zero Debris Charter” to mitigate the growth of orbital debris. The charter, announced during the Paris Air Show, doesn’t exist yet beyond the most general outlines.

“The principle is a very simple one,” ESA Director General Josef Aschbacher said at the announcement. “The Zero Debris Charter is a principle where we would like to ensure that there is zero debris left behind in space.” He compared it a national park, where visitors are expected not to leave behind any garbage.

The goal is that, under the charter, satellite operators would be expected by 2030 to either deorbit their satellites on their own at the end of their lives or hire a company that offers active debris removal services to do so. ESA and the companies plan to refine the details and complete the text of the charter by the end of the year.

What benefit the charter will have was not exactly clear at the announcement. All three companies participating have already endorsed the WEF’s guidelines, with some executives at the event praising that document for its specific requirements.

Aschbacher suggested the charter could be incorporated into regulations so that governments agree to work only with those companies that agree to follow it. “We need to achieve a status where we demand that only data or information is bought from those satellite providers who are adhering to certain standards,” Aschbacher said. “The charter may be one vehicle for doing so.”

Executives, though, were cautious about a solution to a worldwide problem that applied only to European companies. “It’s important that those regulations are worldwide,” said Hervé Derrey, chief executive of Thales Alenia Space. “If this is not applied to the rest of the world it will have no effect at the end. It will collectively fail. And, on top of that, European industry will not be on a level playing field with its competitors. That would be the worst situation.”

“Only with a real international regulation will we get it under control,” said Lutz Bertling, an OHB board member.

That, then, returns to the United Nations and its often slow efforts. Ryder, at the Summit for Space Sustainability, was careful to praise COPUOS for its work even while suggesting changes are in order. “We have a very solid record of achievement,” he said. “It’s a very solid platform from which to start.”

“It’s very difficult to have 102 different ways of seeing the same thing,” Portugal’s Costa said, describing the long discussions at COPUOS meetings over things like wording of a single sentence in a statement all will accept. “You just need to have nerves of steel to wait until the very last moment when all the agreements are reached.”

As low Earth orbit fills with satellites and debris, that very last moment for space sustainability may be rapidly approaching.

This article originally appeared in the July 2023 issue of SpaceNews magazine.

Jeff Foust writes about space policy, commercial space, and related topics for SpaceNews. He earned a Ph.D. in planetary sciences from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a bachelor’s degree with honors in geophysics and planetary science... More by Jeff Foust

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Handbook of Space Security pp 319–340 Cite as

Space Sustainability

Peter Martinez 7
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Space sustainability is a concept that has emerged within the past 15 years to refer to a set of concerns relating to outer space as an environment for carrying out space activities safely and without interference, as well as to concerns about ensuring continuity of the benefits derived on Earth from the conduct of such space activities. As such, it encompasses the concerns of both space actors and those who are not space actors but who nevertheless benefit from space activities. This chapter reviews the role of the various relevant United Nations entities in ensuring space sustainability and provides a detailed review of the process and discussions held in the Working Group on the Long-Term Sustainability of Outer Space Activities within the Scientific and Technical Subcommittee of the United Nations (UN) Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space (COPUOS). Finally, the chapter discusses the relationship of the work in UN COPUOS with related work done in the Conference on Disarmament, the UN Group of Governmental Experts (GGE) on Transparency and Confidence-Building Measures in Outer Space Activities, and the initiative by the European Union to propose a Draft International Code of Conduct for outer space activities.

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United Nations Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space Scientific and Technical Subcommittee and International Atomic Energy Agency (2009) Safety framework for nuclear power source applications in outer space. International Atomic Energy Agency, Vienna. www.unoosa.org/pdf/publications/iaea-nps-sfrmwrkE.pdf . Accessed 3 Feb 2020

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Peter L. Hays

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Space Policy Institute, George Washington University, Washington, DC, USA

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OECD’s approach to space sustainability and the economics of space debris in perspective [May/2021]

In the context of increasing space activities, addressing space debris is becoming more important. In April 2020, the OECD Space Forum provided an economic analysis of the issue of space debris by reviewing the most relevant socio-economic impacts and identifying and discussing key sustainability challenges for current and future space activities.

The use of Earth’s orbits has increased significantly in the last decade (e.g. the deployment of mega-constellations among others), and with it, the terrestrial reliance on space-based infrastructure. As a result, vulnerability to space hazards is growing at a fast pace.

At the same time, an orbital environmental crisis is looming, as the space debris population in Earth’s orbits continues to grow. The risk is that collisions between debris ultimately spin out of control, become self-generating and render orbits unusable (i.e. the Kessler Syndrome). This would have severe economic and societal impacts.

Therefore, debris mitigation measures are crucial to ensure orbital environmental stability. National and international measures already exist, however various factors affect levels of compliance with current frameworks and hence their effectiveness (e.g. lack of monitoring capacity and enforcement authority, multiple legal and technological challenges).

To address this issue, OECD is looking into practices in other policy domains for options to increase compliance and suggests possible ways forward for decision-makers.

To learn more about this topic and access more detailed information, please click here .

Sustainability: The launch of Spaceship Earth

Adam Rome 1

Nature volume 527 , pages 443–445 ( 2015 ) Cite this article

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Adam Rome revisits five prescient classics that first made sustainability a public issue in the 1960s and 1970s.

The Meaning of the Twentieth Century: The Great Transition

Kenneth E. Boulding

Operating Manual For Spaceship Earth

R. Buckminster Fuller

The Closing Circle: Nature, Man, and Technology

Barry Commoner

The Limits to Growth: A Report for the Club of Rome's Project on the Predicament of Mankind

Donella H. Meadows, Dennis L. Meadows, Jørgen Randers, and William W. Behrens III. Universe: 1972.

9780876632222

Only One Earth: The Care and Maintenance of a Small Planet

Barbara Ward and René DuBos. W. W. Norton: 1972.

In 1969, in a book-length essay entitled Operating Manual for Spaceship Earth , the inventor and polymath Buckminster Fuller offered a striking metaphor for a new ideal of planetary management. Although Earth did not come with instructions, our spaceship had built-in safety features that had kept us going. Still, our pilot errors were catching up with us: we had been so “misusing, abusing, and polluting” the planet, Fuller argued, that it might need to be renamed “Poluto”. That way lay humanity's oblivion. But if we discovered how our spaceship worked — if we learned to make the best use of our incredible ingenuity — we might become “comprehensively and sustainably successful”.

Like everything Fuller wrote, Operating Manual for Spaceship Earth was idiosyncratic, at once arresting and fanciful. But many of the book's basic ideas were in the air at the time. Between roughly 1965 and 1975, the challenge of sustaining civilization inspired a shelf-full of influential books. They had a freshness, urgency and breadth that are hard to credit today, and they are still remarkably relevant. Now that sustainability as a concept has become dulled by overuse, they return our eyes to the prize.

These seminal studies built on earlier fears. Fairfield Osborn's Our Plundered Planet (Little, Brown) and William Vogt's Road to Survival (W. Sloane Associates), both published in 1948, warned that uncontrolled population growth and resource depletion would lead to calamity. But the situation seemed even more precarious by 1970, when the first Earth Day was celebrated across the United States. The human impact on the planet had exploded after the Second World War, and scientific advances had led to greater understanding of the threat from those impacts. For the first time, many realized, we had the potential to disrupt or even destroy the planet's life-support systems. The sense of environmental crisis was exacerbated by the social and political turmoil of the period.

What would be required for humanity to continue to thrive? To tackle so huge a question required intellectual audacity, and the authors of the pioneering books on sustainability were all big-picture, interdisciplinary thinkers par excellence. Economist Kenneth Boulding — author of The Meaning of the Twentieth Century (1964) — thought historically and philosophically. Biologist Barry Commoner felt compelled to study political economy, as his 1971 The Closing Circle shows. Fuller considered himself a futurist. The authors of the 1972 The Limits to Growth — Donella Meadows, Dennis Meadows, Jørgen Randers and William Behrens — meshed environmental science with systems analysis. Barbara Ward was a journalist, economist and adviser to world leaders who collaborated with Pulitzer-prizewinning microbiologist René Dubos on Only One Earth (1972).

The Meaning of the Twentieth Century is no longer well known, yet Boulding was key in framing the issue of sustainability. He made clear that the world that he hoped to sustain did not yet exist: humanity was in the middle of a “great transition” from an agricultural species to a thoroughly industrial one. In Boulding's view, this transition was fraught with peril and sure to be wrenching. It might be derailed by nuclear war or uncontrolled population growth, and might fail if we misused natural resources, especially fossil fuels. To succeed, we needed to create “a stable, closed-cycle, high-level technology” that would not pollute or require exhaustible materials. (He expanded on that in an often-reprinted 1966 essay, 'The economics of the coming spaceship Earth'.) But developing new technology was not the heart of Boulding's prescription. He argued that a sustainable future would require countless “social inventions”, from new aesthetics to better methods of resolving disputes. “The unfinished tasks of the great transition are so enormous,” he concluded, “that there is hardly anyone who cannot find a role to play in the process.” That is still ever true now: dealing with climate change requires a host of skills.

Fuller broke new ground by defining sustainability as a design challenge. Already famous for inventions such as the strong, lightweight, geodesic dome, he wrote exuberantly about the need for an “industrial retooling revolution”: to achieve lasting affluence, we must learn to do more with less. Like Boulding, Fuller argued that we needed to treat fossil fuels as a short-term expedient while we worked out how to fashion a sustainable future. For a reader today, the insights of Fuller's work are not enough to make up for the idiosyncrasies of his language and argument. William McDonough and Michael Braungart's Cradle to Cradle (North Point, 2002) would be a much better introduction to sustainable design. But in 1969, Fuller's work seemed thrilling, and his Operating Manual became a bible for people keen to invent eco-efficient ways of providing energy, building things and managing wastes.

Commoner's The Closing Circle laid the foundation for industrial ecology. Particularly in the postwar decades, Commoner argued, the industrialized world had come to rely on a host of “ecologically faulty” technologies, from nuclear power to chemical pesticides. The technologies of the future needed instead to accord with four basic principles, which he defined as laws of ecology: “Everything is connected to everything else”, “Everything must go somewhere”, “Nature knows best” and “There is no such thing as a free lunch”.

For Commoner, however, the ultimate problem was economic and political, not technological. Discussing the economic meaning of ecology, he argued that the private-enterprise system had serious flaws. Businesses had powerful incentives to produce new products that did more environmental harm than the products they replaced. They did not need to account for “biological capital”, and they did not pay the full costs of production, which included pollution. In the decades since The Closing Circle appeared, making capitalism greener has become a major concern of economists, business-school professors, entrepreneurs, corporate executives and activists, yet much of Commoner's critique still holds.

The Limits to Growth asked — heretically — whether humans could continue indefinitely to make ever greater demands on Earth. The authors used computer modelling to explore the interactions between population growth, resource demand, industrialization, food production and pollution. They did not forecast the future, although commentators ever since have debated whether their 'predictions' were right; instead, they extrapolated. If present trends continued, the authors wrote, humanity would hit the wall “sometime within the next hundred years”. They hoped that people would avert a breakdown, but stated repeatedly that they could not model the social, political and cultural factors that might alter trends. They did consider whether technology could be a magic bullet, and the results were shocking. Even when they allowed for the technological progress that greatly increased the availability of resources and reduced the amount of pollution, the result was still collapse — just farther down the road. Innovation alone could not lead to a sustainable economy. We needed a fundamental shift in values.

The Limits to Growth was an international sensation, selling over 12 million copies in more than 30 languages. Meadows, Meadows and Randers updated the analysis in 1993 and again in 2004, and the question of limits still prompts vigorous debate. Johan Rockström and Mattias Klum's Big World, Small Planet (Yale University Press, 2015) and Donald Worster's Shrinking the Earth (Oxford University Press, 2016) are just two of the many books now probing the problem of growth.

Ward and Dubos's Only One Earth , written to accompany the 1972 United Nations Conference on the Human Environment, added an international perspective to the sustainability discussion. Ward had travelled the globe as an expert on economic development. A preliminary draft of the book was circulated for comment to scientific, business and intellectual leaders from 58 countries, and the result is worth reading just for the summary of their responses, which made clear that people around the world held very different views about environmental issues. A European respondent argued for a retreat from industrialization, for example, whereas an Asian statesman wrote that developing nations could not afford “dreams of landscapes innocent of chimney stacks”.

For Ward and Dubos, any effort to ensure the survival of humanity had to bridge the tremendous gap between developed and developing nations. Although they didn't use the phrase 'sustainable development', they offered a path-breaking analysis of the challenge of raising living standards for the poor without degrading the environment. At the same time, they called for the affluent to take off their blinkers. Well-to-do nations needed to acknowledge the damage that they were doing to the biosphere — and to accept that their fate was inseparable from the prospects of the rest of the world. Because many environmental threats were global, Ward and Dubos concluded, “planetary interdependence” had to become a moral and political reality, not just “a hard and inescapable scientific fact”. The UN Paris Climate Change Conference starting this month will be a test of how close we are to meeting that aim.

Read together, the books of this charged decade demonstrate that building a sustainable civilization is multidimensional. It sweeps everything in: science and technology, politics, economics, social relationships, ethics. We cannot advance in a straight line. We need to approach the goal from many directions, with flexibility and tenacity.

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Rome, A. Sustainability: The launch of Spaceship Earth. Nature 527 , 443–445 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1038/527443a

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Title: sustainable skies and the earth-space environment.

Abstract: The rapid launch of hundreds of thousands of satellites into Low Earth Orbit will significantly alter our view of the sky and raise concerns about the sustainability of Earth's orbital space. A new framework for sustainable space development must balance technological advancement, protection of space environments, and our capacity to explore the Universe.

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2nd Summit for Space Sustainability Student Essay Competition

The Secure World Foundation is excited to announce a student essay competition in conjunction with our 2nd Summit for Space Sustainability.

Space sustainability is recognized as a priority issue among many policymakers and space practitioners. Building on the success of the inaugural Summit in 2019, this year’s Summit for Space Sustainability will focus on the progress being made in improving space sustainability and the gaps and challenges that remain. Participants will engage with a diverse group of international stakeholders to examine a range of issues across civil, commercial, and national security sectors and ideas for action. Due to the ongoing COVID-19 health crisis, this event will be held virtually from September 9-11, 2020.

SWF is dedicated to encouraging the next generation of space professionals to address the challenges of space sustainability and is hosting this competition as a way of promoting ideas and participation from students. The top five essays will be published on the Summit for Space Sustainability website, and these authors will be acknowledged during the Summit and will each receive a $500 prize.

Essay Topic Options

How should stakeholders (including governments, industry, and the scientific community) mitigate the potential impact of large satellite constellations on astronomy?
How can private sector perspectives be better represented in space-related multilateral fora such as the United Nations Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space or the Group on Earth Observations?
How should the United States approach future space engagement with China? What are the possible benefits and risks in doing so?
Should governments create a “license to drive” for satellite operators?
What can be done to incentivize governments to clean up existing orbital debris?

Contest Rules

Sponsor: This contest is sponsored by Secure World Foundation, located at 525 Zang St Suite D, Broomfield, CO 80021.
Length: Essays should be at least 1,000 words but should not exceed 1,250 words. All entries must be in English.
Topics: Entrants should select one of the five essay topic options above as a prompt.
Deadline: 11:59 PM EST (UTC -4) Sunday, August 2, 2020.
Eligibility: Must be enrolled in an undergraduate or graduate program at an accredited or internationally recognized university. Students who have already completed a master’s degree, or PhD students who have advanced to candidacy, are not eligible.
Number of Entries: Limit one entry per person.
Notification: Winners will be notified by email prior to September 9, 2020.
Judging: A panel of judges from the Secure World Foundation will score each paper on the following criteria:
Topical relevance (Does the essay address one of the five essay prompts and demonstrate an understanding of the topic?): 25%
Quality of analysis (Is the essay well-reasoned with good supporting examples or evidence?): 25%
Originality (Does the essay provide a novel or fresh perspective on the topic?): 25%
Form, style, and mechanics (Does the essay conform to rules of the written language and communicate clearly and effectively?): 25%
Submission: All entries must be received via the submission form provided here .

For further information or questions, please contact Project Manager Josh Wolny at [email protected] .

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The need for space sustainability.

Published 13th Jul, 2022

Focusing on U.K.National Space Strategy , the fourth summit for Space Sustainability in London was hosted in collaboration with the Secure World Foundation.

Space sustainability comes into play to address the pressing current state of near-Earth orbits and its high amounts of orbital debris.
Spacecraft collisions with orbital debris, space weather, overcrowding in low earth orbit (LEO) makes spacecraft susceptible to higher rates of failure.
The current end-of-life protocol for spacecraft exacerbates the space sustainability crisis; many spacecraft are not properly disposed, which increasing the likelihood of further collisions.

Key highlights of the Summit

A new plan has been announced as ‘ Plan for Space Sustainability .’
This plan aims to set a global commercial framework for the insurability, the licensing and the regulation of commercial satellites.
It also aims to reduce the cost for those who comply with the best sustainability standards and thus encourages a thriving ecosystem for the industry.

What does space sustainability means?

Long-term sustainability looks toward space research and development of technology to ensure the reuse and recycling of satellites at every stage is known as Space sustainability.

How does the plan propose to achieve space sustainability?

The U.K. calls for an “ Astro Carta” for space sustainability, based on the Artemis Accords model for sustainable space exploration.
Active debris removal and in-orbit servicing,
Encouraging space research and the development of technology to ensure the reuse and;
Recycling of satellites at every stage.

Need for considering Space sustainability

Increasing number of satellites : With the emergence of large constellations and complex satellites, there is a risk of collisions and interference with radio frequencies.
Security challenges: As more countries integrate space into their national military capabilities and rely on space-based information for national security, there is an increased chance that any interference with satellites.
Expansion of private sector: The expansion of private sector space activities poses new challenges to maintaining a safe operational environment in space, while offering opportunities to expand access to the benefits of space applications on Earth.

What are the challenges in achieving space sustainability?

Orbital crowding poses a big threat to space sustainability. This poses a direct threat to the operations and safety of a mission and is likely to cause legal and insurance-related conflicts.
Space debris : After the completion of a mission, an ‘end-of-life protocol’ requires space objects to be moved to the graveyard orbit or to a low altitude. Neither of the options is sustainable in the long run.
Solar and magnetic storms : These storms can potentially damage communication systems. Such space weather threats need to be addressed along with the efforts to identify the terrestrial carbon footprint of outer space missions .

Where does India stand on space sustainability?

India has always emphasised cost-effective and efficient missions with problem-solving applications. For example, India’s debris footprint is minuscule; India has 114 debris among the 25,182 pieces of sizes larger than 10 cm in the lower earth orbits. Apart from that, the recent activities of India on space sustainability are;

Project NETRA : The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) has initiated ‘Project NETRA’ to monitor space debris,
Earlier this year, India and the U.S. signed a new pact for monitoring space objects at the 2+2 dialogue,
Increased private participation : With Indian National Space Promotion and Authorisation Centre (In-SPACe) , India expects an increased role of the private sector in India’s space activities, and
SPADEX : ISRO is developing a docking experiment to provide in-orbit servicing named SPADEX. It looks at docking a satellite on an existing satellite, offering support in re-fuelling and other in-orbit services while enhancing the capability of a satellite.
Hence, the SPADEX can increase the longevity of a mission and also provide a futuristic option to combine missions/experiments.

Required measures

Global Cooperation : A collective effort by all space players , with the active role of the UN COPUOS or the United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs (UNOOSA), is needed to set equitable standards for the ease of activities,
Conservation of resources : Many of the measures for sustainability are resource-consuming and expensive for medium-and-small space programs. Hence, there is a need for addressing the principles and rules that guide the activities in outer space with better clarity, and
Proper Guidelines: Encourage the private sector with a set of sustainability guidelines to ensure optimum utilisation of resources and increase the safety and productivity of missions.

Our duty is to endure that all humanity can continue to use outer space for peaceful purposes and socioeconomic benefit now and in the long term. This will require international cooperation, discussion, and agreements designed to ensure that outer space is safe, secure, and peaceful.

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'Playing Place — Board Games, Popular Culture, Space' released

By molly sheridan.

"I have to admit that the only board game I really played as a kid was Monopoly. I was always the banker, and I always cheated," confesses Architecture Professor Medina Lasansky with a conspiratorial laugh while sharing the inspiration behind Playing Place — Board Games, Popular Culture, Space , a new book out from MIT Press which she edited in partnership with Chad Randl (Ph.D. HAUD '14). The volume, printed in full color and rich with imagery, collects 38 essays by contributors spanning a wide range of experience and expertise that illuminate, as the editors' introduction explains, "what board games, past and present, tell us about larger place-based cultural attitudes, assumptions, and anxieties."

The impetus for the book came out of Lasansky's Archi.Pop class, which draws connections between architecture and design and popular culture. One unit asks students to play a board game and think about how that relates to their understanding of space.

"Students should know about pop culture when they go out in the world, and I encourage them to think about board games like everyday life," Lasansky says. "A lot of people play with games and toys, and it helps them think about ideas about space and place without them knowing it. I used to teach the Italian Renaissance, and it took me so long to get students up to speed and to be able to ask interesting questions, whereas in Archi.Pop, they know all this stuff, so they can begin right away being creative and thinking critically."

The Strong National Museum of Play in Rochester also proved to be an invaluable resource in developing the project. Housing an archive of some 29,000 games and employing a very helpful archivist, trips there introduced Lasansky and Randl to the amazing range of options available — from the weird to the scandalous to the inspiring, and even the original blueprint to Scrabble, which as it turns out was designed by an unemployed architect.

In the midst of planning the book, COVID hit, which Lasansky suspects led them to a better, more accessible project in the end. Renewed interest in board games paired well with their decision to take a more relaxed approach to what was originally envisioned as a collection of long articles rather than the shorter essays covering a wider range of games that they eventually commissioned. They tapped contributors who they knew would have fun with the project while also bringing scholarly insights to the table. Some covered the usual suspects such as Life, Risk, and Monopoly, while others dove into more obscure childhood favorites such as Barbie Queen of the Prom and Uranium Rush.

Continue reading on the Architecture, Art, and Planning website.

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01 April 2024

Eutelsat 36d airbus-built satellite successfully launched.

22 nd Airbus-built communications satellite for EUTELSAT

The Airbus-built EUTELSAT 36D telecommunications satellite was successfully launched on Saturday 30 March at 17:52 EST aboard a Falcon 9 rocket from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. EUTELSAT, one of the world’s leading satellite operators, selected Airbus in March 2021 to build EUTELSAT 36D, a new generation multi-mission geostationary telecommunications satellite.

EUTELSAT 36D is based on the latest generation Eurostar Neo geostationary telecommunications satellite and will provide TV broadcasting (DTH) and government services over Africa, Europe and eastern countries and has a planned lifetime of more than 15 years.

Alain Fauré, Head of Space Systems at Airbus, said: “EUTELSAT 36D is the fourth Eurostar Neo satellite in orbit demonstrating our commitment to continually pioneering new technologies which better serve our customers’ needs. Our relationship with Eutelsat spans more than 30 years, working hand in hand with them to provide broadcast and data connectivity across the world, including to remote regions where it’s needed most.”

The all-electric EUTELSAT 36D, with its new enhancements in coverage and performance equipped with 78 physical Ku-band transponders, will ensure a seamless service continuation with EUTELSAT 36B.

Eurostar Neo satellites combine increased payload capacity and more efficient power and thermal control systems with reduced production time and optimised costs as part of a fully digitalised production process. EUTELSAT 36D combines 18 kW of electric power with a reduced launch mass of approximately five metric tonnes, enabled by Airbus’ electric orbit raising capability, reinforcing Airbus’ position as the world leader in electric propulsion.

The Eurostar Neo family of Airbus telecommunications satellites is based on a next-generation platform and technologies, developed with the support of the European Space Agency (ESA), and others, including the Centre National d’Etudes Spatiales (CNES) and the UK Space Agency (UKSA).

The EUTELSAT 36D geostationary telecommunications satellite was shipped from Toulouse, France to Sanford, Florida, USA, on board an Airbus BelugaST (A300-600ST) on 11 March, a true example of pan-Airbus synergies.

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The role of space in driving sustainability, security, and development
Already space plays a role in advancing global sustainability and security priorities, but the potential is even greater. The future is in the balance, and all stakeholders have the capability to contribute to a more successful sector. Advancements in space technology over the past decade have opened access to more players, unlocked new use ...
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The SSR aims to incentivize space actors to consider sustainability as a critical component of mission design and operations, in the same way that ESG [Environmental, Social & Governance] considerations are becoming increasingly embedded in activities on Earth.". Now, with the progress made by this foundational team, the SSR is poised to move ...
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The commercial space industry has grown rapidly in recent years, with a surge in the number of launches and satellites in orbit. This growth creates new business opportunities, but it also leads to sustainability challenges both on Earth and in space, such as increases in greenhouse gas emissions from launches and orbital debris.
Space sustainability
Space sustainability aims to maintain the safety and health of the space environment. [1] Similar to sustainability initiatives on Earth, space sustainability seeks to use the environment of space to meet the current needs of society without compromising the needs of future generations. [2] [3] [4] It usually focuses on space closest to Earth ...
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The terms space security and space sustainability are sometimes used interchangeably to encompass a set of largely overlapping concerns as seen from two somewhat different perspectives. Underlying both of these perspectives is the acknowledgment that space systems underpin the modern information society and now form part of the critical infrastructure of most nations, whether they are ...
OECD's approach to space sustainability and the economics of space
In April 2020, the OECD Space Forum provided an economic analysis of the issue of space debris by reviewing the most relevant socio-economic impacts and identifying and discussing key sustainability challenges for current and future space activities. The use of Earth's orbits has increased significantly in the last decade (e.g. the deployment ...
PDF Global Future Council on Space Space Sustainability Monitor
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For All Humanity
The present policy brief contains an examination of the extraordinary changes under way in outer space and an assessment of the sustainability, safety and security impacts of these changes on present and future governance. The brief also contains an outline of major trends that are impacting space sustainability and the positive impact that these trends could have on achieving the Sustainable ...
Space sustainability: The economics of space debris in perspective
Data, research, outlooks and country reviews on environment including biodiversity, water, resource and waste management, climate change, global warming and consumption., This paper explores selected long-term sustainability issues related to increasing activities in outer space, with a particular focus on the economics of space debris. It reviews trends of selected space sustainability issues ...
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The purpose of this essay is to locate the making of social spaces as a particularly salient approach for understanding sustainability. Castells' spaces of places and spaces of flows. are interpreted generically and a new social theory, Jacobs' moral syndromes, is. introduced to underpin the production of these two spatial forms: commercial ...
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9780876632222. Only One Earth: The Care and Maintenance of a Small Planet. Barbara Ward and René DuBos. W. W. Norton: 1972. In 1969, in a book-length essay entitled Operating Manual for Spaceship ...
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This paper explores selected long-term sustainability issues related to increasing activities in outer space, with a particular focus on the economics of space debris. It reviews trends of selected space sustainability issues and discusses a range of possible policy actions. A notable policy response would be to strengthen space situational awareness systems and data reporting structures ...
Space sustainability : The economics of space debris in perspective
It reviews trends of selected space sustainability issues and discusses a range of possible policy actions. A notable policy response would be to strengthen space situational awareness systems and data reporting structures, while addressing operator compliance behaviour at both the national and international levels.
[2403.15081] Sustainable Skies and the Earth-Space Environment
Download PDF Abstract: The rapid launch of hundreds of thousands of satellites into Low Earth Orbit will significantly alter our view of the sky and raise concerns about the sustainability of Earth's orbital space. A new framework for sustainable space development must balance technological advancement, protection of space environments, and our capacity to explore the Universe.
Essay Competitions
This essay competition is a unique opportunity to contribute to the global conversation on sustainable development and to promote collaboration between private and public sectors in advancing SDGs related to space. For any query, feel free to reach out to us by sending us an email at [email protected].
The Geographical Journal
The purpose of this essay is to locate the making of social spaces as a particularly salient approach for understanding sustainability. Castells' spaces of places and spaces of flows are interpreted generically and a new social theory, Jacobs' moral syndromes, is introduced to underpin the production of these two spatial forms: commercial agents through their network practices make spaces ...
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Board Games, Popular Culture, Space' released
"I have to admit that the only board game I really played as a kid was Monopoly. I was always the banker, and I always cheated," confesses Architecture Professor Medina Lasansky with a conspiratorial laugh while sharing the inspiration behind Playing Place — Board Games, Popular Culture, Space, a new book out from MIT Press which she edited in partnership with Chad Randl (Ph.D. HAUD '14).
Exclusive: Musk's SpaceX is building spy satellite network for US
The $1.8 billion contract with the National Reconnaissance Office shows the extent of SpaceX's involvement in US intelligence and military projects and illustrates a deeper Pentagon investment ...
Sustainable design
Sustainable design is an integrated, holistic approach that positively impacts all phases of a building's life-cycle and encourages compromise and tradeoffs. GSA and sustainable design Per the 2005 Energy Policy Act, federal agencies must design buildings to achieve energy efficiency at least 30 percent better than ASHRAE 90.1 standards.
Space and sustainability: an exploratory essay on the production of
The purpose of this essay is to locate the making of social spaces as a particularly salient approach for understanding sustainability. Castells' spaces of places and spaces of flows are interpreted generically and a new social theory, Jacobs' moral syndromes, is introduced to underpin the production of these two spatial forms: commercial agents through their network practices make spaces ...
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EUTELSAT 36D Airbus-built satellite successfully launched
The Airbus-built EUTELSAT 36D telecommunications satellite was successfully launched on Saturday 30 March at 17:52 EST aboard a Falcon 9 rocket from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. EUTELSAT, one of the world's leading satellite operators, selected Airbus in March 2021 to build EUTELSAT 36D, a new generation multi-mission geostationary ...
ACS Fall 2024
Join us in Denver, Colorado from August 18-22 to get the latest research in chemistry, network, and attend career events. The theme of this meeting is Elevating Chemistry and will explore a variety of topics such as: Elevating chemistry performance Elevating chemistry for the public good Elevating safety for graduate students Elevating chemical education Chemistry in space Elevating the ...

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