New life for old satellites
Discussion
Interesting idea in this article https://futurism.com/we-could-have-in-orbit-satell...
Instead of refuelling old satellites to extend their life, a drone satellite attaches itself to it and takes over the task of controlling attitude. It can also be used to de-orbit failed satellites
Instead of refuelling old satellites to extend their life, a drone satellite attaches itself to it and takes over the task of controlling attitude. It can also be used to de-orbit failed satellites
That's an idea that's been floating around the space industry for years for big geostationary (GEO) satellites but no one seems to have gone for it until now.
One issue now is that the market is changing, for many years the telecoms market was direct to home telly (DTH) broadcast from big GEO satellites. Now with netflix etc coming over the internet there has been a plateauing of GEO DTH demand and a move towards Low Earth Orbit (LEO) constellations which can give acceptable lag time and error rates on the internet streaming. Have a look at OneWeb as a good example.
Another problem is as more satellites have come on line with on board signal processing you tend to find customers get used to it and like it so there is less need for the older style "bent pipe" repeater payloads that merely receive the signal, boost it's power then re transmit back down to earth. Though the need does still exist.
Also newer satellites have much greater traffic capacity than 15 years ago (the design life of a GEO) so the customer has to trade off the cost of the recovery of a satellite that can handle X amount of traffic or get a new one that can handle 4 times X amount of traffic and is more in line with their business plan.
So from a commercial POV I'm not sure of it's viability, however having said all that it might have a use for deorbiting dead satellites in LEO orbits or boosting science missions that have run out of fuel. As with all this you will need to find someone to pay for it.
I suppose if you are an international Bondesque master villain you could use one for hijacking a satellite and holding companies/countries to ransom.
One issue now is that the market is changing, for many years the telecoms market was direct to home telly (DTH) broadcast from big GEO satellites. Now with netflix etc coming over the internet there has been a plateauing of GEO DTH demand and a move towards Low Earth Orbit (LEO) constellations which can give acceptable lag time and error rates on the internet streaming. Have a look at OneWeb as a good example.
Another problem is as more satellites have come on line with on board signal processing you tend to find customers get used to it and like it so there is less need for the older style "bent pipe" repeater payloads that merely receive the signal, boost it's power then re transmit back down to earth. Though the need does still exist.
Also newer satellites have much greater traffic capacity than 15 years ago (the design life of a GEO) so the customer has to trade off the cost of the recovery of a satellite that can handle X amount of traffic or get a new one that can handle 4 times X amount of traffic and is more in line with their business plan.
So from a commercial POV I'm not sure of it's viability, however having said all that it might have a use for deorbiting dead satellites in LEO orbits or boosting science missions that have run out of fuel. As with all this you will need to find someone to pay for it.
I suppose if you are an international Bondesque master villain you could use one for hijacking a satellite and holding companies/countries to ransom.
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