April 2020
Satellite mega-constellations pose threat to ground-based astronomy
... the impressive flashes caused by the older Iridium satellites. Typical smallsats in a mega constellation. The European Space Agency’s Space Debris Office estimates there are currently some 22,000 artificial objects of considerable size (several tens...
March 2021
Eyes on the prize
... China, Japan and elsewhere clean reliable energy sources will be in ever greater demand. Graphic produced by the European Space Agency to illustrate the concept of gathering solar energy in orbit and beaming the power to Earth. The opportunity for...
April 2025
Space sustainability and the role of space situational awareness
... the size of satellites has decreased over the decades, their number has significantly increased. According to the European Space Agency (ESA), over 2800 satellites were deployed into orbit in 2023, more than in any year before. ESA...
March 2018
Plumes on Europa - tasting an extra-terrestrial ocean
...mission that might be able to exploit this opportunity is the Jupiter Icy moon Explorer (JUICE), comissioned by the European Space Agency (ESA). Scheduled for launch in 2022, JUICE is expected to arrive in the Jovian system in 2029 and head to Europa...
May 2019
Active debris removal faces legal minefield
... examples is a collision with Europe’s Sentinel-1A radar satellite that occurred in August 2016. As the European Space Agency (ESA) reported, a tiny piece of space debris hit its solar panels, causing a slight decrease in power and a change in the...
January 2020
Commercialising space exploration and development
... Today, we are competing with ICE Cubes (a public-private partnership between the European Space Agency (ESA) and Belgium-based Space Applications Services) and Space Tango (a Kentucky, USA-based company that builds research and manufacturing systems...
