On-Orbit Servicing: A New Value Proposition for Satellite Design and Operation

Abstract

The use of humans to service satellites designed for servicing has been adequately demonstrated on the Hubble Space Telescope and International Space Station. Currently, robotic on-orbit servicing technology is maturing with risk reduction programs such as Orbital Express. Robotic servicing appears to be technically feasible and provides a set of capabilities which range from satellite inspection to physical upgrade of components. However, given the current design and operation paradigms of satellite architectures, it appears that on-orbit servicing will not be heavily used, and, as a result, is not likely to be economically viable. To achieve the vision of on-orbit servicing, the development of a new value proposition for satellite architectures is necessary. This new value proposition is oriented around rapid response to technological or market change and design of satellites with less redundancy. Nomenclature a phase = semimajor axis of the phasing orbit for the servicer a target = semimajor axis of the target satellite orbit CP Ser = servicing cost penalty C op = cost of satellite operations C sat = cost of satellite development k servicer = no. of phasing revolutions of the servicer k target = no. of phasing revolutions of the target satellite N Trans = no. of transponders P markup = markup for serviceable satellite RIFR = interest free discount rate RINF = inflation rate RINS = insurance premium RIRR = internal rate of return t H = expected end-of-life year of the satellite t k= decision year t 0 = initial launch year X 0 = initial value of a GEO satellite communications market V phase = velocity change necessary for servicer to adjust its phase to match target satellite V proximity = velocity change necessary for servicer to adjust to proximity operations at target satellite # = initial angular separation between servicer and target satellite

Current trends in the development of intelligent unmanned autonomous systems

“…In the past 20 years, the leading powers in space have carried out a great deal of fruitful research into autonomous on-orbit service. A series of ground tests, including on-orbit tests and applications, have shown that autonomous on-orbit service is a feasible technique, and it has captured wide attention in research and development (Sullivan and Akin, 2001;Long et al, 2007;Flores-Abad et al, 2013).…”

Value-Driven Analysis of New Paradigms in Space Architectures: An Ilities-Based Approach

“…find that 130 servicing tickets of various urgency could be expected to be generated over a 5 year period by the set of 335 GEO satellites, but that the economic feasibility of on-orbit servicing remains questionable. 13 The current generation of spacecraft is too reliable to ensure market share for OOS, and a paradigm shift to GEO spacecraft with shorter lifetimes may be required. New value propositions must be incorporated into the design and operation of satellites, and OOS must be able to provide large performance gains over the long design lifetimes of satellites.…”

Metrics for Evaluating Survivability in Dynamic Multi-Attribute Tradespace Exploration

“…1 Given the growth of military and commercial dependency on space systems, 2,3 identified vulnerabilities in the current U.S. space architecture, 4 the proliferation of threats, 5,6 and the weakening of the sanctuary view in military space policy, 7,8 survivability is an increasingly important consideration during the design of space systems. 9 Counterintuitively, the risk-averse nature of the space industry, which manifested in the common satellite design elements of redundancy, proven technology, and long design lives, 10 exacerbates space architecture fragility 11 by increasing the magnitude of potential downside losses and by reducing the speed at which space capabilities might be reconstituted. Although survivability is an emergent system property that arises from interactions among components and between space systems and their environments, conventional approaches to survivability engineering are often reductionist in nature (i.e., focused only on selected properties of subsystems or modules in isolation).…”

“…In particular, integrated cost, performance, and survivability trades are performed for an orbital transfer "space tug" vehicle operating in LEO for ten years. Building on previous work, 13 the impact of bumper shielding, 14 collision avoidance, 15 and on-orbit servicing 10 strategies on space tug encounters with orbital debris is examined.…”