Space to Space Power Beaming From ISS

Power Up!

One of the most intriguing aspects of the International Space Station is that after a seemingly endless period of construction, now that the orbiting outpost is fully operational, various institutions are beginning to approach both NASA and CASIS, the Center for Advancement of Science in Space, with an ever broadening range of proposals for using the facility.

The most recent of those proposals is to test some aspects of space to space power beaming, a prospective technology with a long history but a very short resume.  Power beaming has long been touted as a means of enabling solar power satellites to collect and transfer free and ridiculously abundant solar power in orbit to receiving stations on the ground, generally by means of microwave transmission. Coming from the other direction, beamed power is one of the key enabling technologies in the deployment of space elevators,  and was the subject of a NASA Centennial Challenge in 2009.

When used in space to space applications,  it holds the potential of separating, or “unbundling”  one or more of the physical systems aboard a spacecraft, and thereby achieving a meaningful savings in mass or complexity by transferring it from the spacecraft itself to a space station, or other (relatively) fixed asset which need not be accelerated at great expense.  The benefits could range from the modest gains of allowing more efficient use of available mass for new and better instruments in a small satellite,  to permitting other spacecraft to travel farther and faster than otherwise possible, or enable new missions altogether.

For example, early advocates in the field envisioned large space based lasers fixed on a departing spacecraft, providing acceleration from a great distance by using the beams to heat a working medium to provide thrust. Today, with a profusion of working examples of electrical propulsion, and growing list of more exotic variations such as VASIMR, beamed energy holds the potential for solving some of the more vexing mass problems and unleashing the potential of higher thrust electrical propulsion. Other extrapolations suggest the possibility of something which closely resembles one of the staples of science fiction; a tractor or repulser beam effect.

Despite the history, and the possibilities, very little work has been done thus far in actually attempting to demonstrate even pathfinder technologies in the space environment, even as major contractors have demonstrated laser beamed power for keeping drones aloft well beyond their battery life.  That might be changing.

On Wednesday, Gary Barnhard, CEO of XISP-INC (Xtraordinary Innovative Space Partnerships Inc) outlined to NASA’s Future in Space Operations (FISO) working group, a series of proposals involving the International Space Station which are designed to change the common perception of what may be achievable through power beaming.   Barnhard’s company is currently pursuing an unfunded Space Act Agreement with NASA, as well as talking to CASIS, about devising an experiment to beam power to what could be a distributed group of cubesats ejected from Japan’s KIBO module, an external version of NASA’s onboard SPHERE’s experiment (also the subject of a FISO presentation) or even to a departing Visiting Vehicle. For early experiments,  beaming would be accomplished by a employing a microwave transmitter mounted on an external express logistics carrier.

Small steps to be sure, but perhaps another example in what might be an unfolding “Field of Dreams” effect for ISS.

Will the Success of “Gravity” Impact the Future of the ISS?

Slight Spoiler Warning:

Does the surprising success of the motion picture “Gravity” foretell an ominous future for the International Space Station?  Leaving aside the numerous logical gaps in the movie, which to some least, are even more disconcerting in an effort which otherwise succeeds in achieving a hyper realism than they would be in a run of the mill sci-fi movie, could the portrayal of the abandoned station have an effect on the future of the real thing?

Specifically, is it possible that the depiction of ISS being shredded in orbit, with the pieces left to follow the equally unfortunate Chinese station plummeting through the upper atmosphere, not in a Sy-Fy channel Saturday night gore fest,  but in a movie described as transformational, reviewed in almost uniformly glowing terms and finding a widespread audience, may influence public perception of when it should come down in real life?

Whether intentionally or not, and presumably the latter, Gravity hits right at the heart of the most significant space policy issue facing the United States over the next few years,  the future of the International Space Station.  Although funding for the Station program appears secure out to 2020, beyond that point, the case is not nearly so certain.   Absent an unlikely increase in NASA’s budget, it is difficult to envision how both the ISS and SLS programs can both be funded at necessary levels.

So a simple question; leaving other issues of merit aside, after having witnessed its destruction rendered gloriously and with striking realism on the big screen, would the public more readily accept a decision to terminate the program sooner rather than later. Alternatively, might the sweeping sense of size, complexity, and dare we say it,  gravitas,   which the move also portrays, draw out the opposite response, and lead to a verdict that is just too big to cast away so soon?

Some of course, will point out that after being prominently featured in the film, more than a few will be surprised to learn that ISS really exists. At the same time, they may be even more upset to learn that the Shuttle is retired.

But what about the perception of those who know perfectly well that the ISS is up there somewhere, but are not really that clear on why, or what function it serves?

Does the presentation of the facility in the movie, in all its gritty realism, including the real but exaggerated risk of impact from orbital debris, add to, or subtract from, the general regard for the sometimes unloved and under-appreciated ISS? Perhaps we will find out when the issue of its future comes up for real. More likely the effect will be negligible, but one can never say for sure. Movies sometimes have a way of weaving themselves into the national psyche,  and based on the initial response, this film  could be one that does just that.

A final, and admittedly whimsical  note. As depicted in Gravity, ISS shows at least one Progress resupply ship, and very prominently, a European ATV.  What it did not show, at least from a cursory perspective, was a commercial crew or resupply vessel.  In an era of alternate endings,  it might have been entertaining to see that after having tried and failed to escape via a Soyuz, the marooned Shuttle crew returned to ISS, making use of an attached cargo Dragon instead.  Clooney’s character, having made it that far, would still have had the chance to sacrifice himself by staying behind to detach the Dragon’s CBM, thereby still giving Bullock’s character the opportunity  for a metaphorical re-birth.  As it was, the ending on the big screen, complete with an unauthorized test drive of China’s Shenzhou,  (which succeeded no less!) must have  given Congressman Frank Wolf worse indigestion than a bad egg roll at the Virginia State fair.

Nah, come to think of it, the ending was perfect.

Alternate Ride?
Credit : SMoney

With HTV Attached, ISS Has a New Room (for the moment)

Gotcha!
Credit : NASA

Japan’s Kounotori-4  HTV cargo craft was berthed with the International Space Station today at 11:38 AM EDT.   Using the same Prox radio system which will also be used to communicate with Orbital Sciences Cygnus spacecraft next month,  astronaut Karen Nyberg, with support from Chris Cassidy, captured the supply vessel with the Canadarm 2 remote manipulator arm, after which a robotics team at Mission Control in Houston issued the commands for the arm to bring the ship in for berthing and hard attachment to the Harmony module’s Earth facing port.   The crew will open the hatch and begin the unloading process on Saturday tomorrow morning. With both the European ATV and the Japanese HTV attached at the same time, the station’s pressurized volume will temporarily increase by roughly 30 cubic meters,  or more than 1,000 cubic feet.  It is worth considering for a moment, what the net effect on usable space in orbit might be if NASA, JAXA, ESA and Russia all found a new way to take out the trash, and developed a rationale and methodology for keeping in space, what it costs so very much to get there in the first place.

After a Perfect Liftoff, HTV-4 Heads for Station

On the Way
Credit : JAXA

After a flawless liftoff yesterday, Japan’s Kounotori-4 cargo vessel is en route to a Friday arrival and berthing with the International Space Station.  The liftoff  of the H-IIB launch vehicle, which occurred precisely on time at 4:48:46 AM local, was accompanied by the rocket’s distinctive screaming sound, which pierced the pre-dawn hours of the Tanegashima Launch Center located on an island south of the Japanese mainland.

 With Russia having resumed progress resupply missions after a momentary concern caused by the dramatic destruction of a Proton booster at Baikonur on July 1st, eyes will now turn to back to the Wallops Flight Facility and the first planned flight of the Orbital Sciences Cygnus supply vessel and the final milestone under NASA’s COTS program, which is scheduled to take place during a launch window beginning September 14th.

HTV-4 Ready for Launch to ISS Today

Ready for Liftoff
Credit : JAXA

The Japanese Space Agency, JAXA, is  poised to launch its fourth automated supply vessel to the International Space Station. Liftoff aboard the H-IIB carrier rocket is scheduled for 4:48:46 AM Japan Standard Time  (Sunday in Japan) 3:48 pm Saturday US Eastern.  The  launch will be broadcast on NASA television, as well here. The HTV, which is called Kounotori, or  “white stork” is comprised of both  pressurized and unpressurized segments, the former is loaded with 3.9 tons  food, supplies and experiments. The external segment is loaded with ISS replacement hardware including a Main Bus Switching Unit, which routes electrical power through the station, as well as a NASA payload Space Test Program. The  launch vehicle for today’s  mission, the H-IIB is a two  stage hydrogen / oxygen booster aided on liftoff by four solid strap-on boosters is built by Mitsubishi Heavy Industries.  JAXA’s newest launch vehicle, the Epsilon, is a small three stage solid core booster which utilizes a derivative of the H-II series strap on as the first stage.  The Epsilon is scheduled to make its maiden flight on August 22.

NASA OIG Report Generally Praises ISS Research Outreach

Getting Better All the Time
Credit: NASA

Earlier this week, the NASA Office of Inspector General released a report,  found here,  titled NASA’s Efforts to Maximize Research on the International Space Station.  The report itself , like most NASA OIG reports is very well written and provides excellent background information on the subject. For anyone interested in the approach to science being performed aboard ISS it is worth a read.

The overall takeaway is that  “NASA has made progress towards maximizing the research capabilities of the ISS, but opportunities exist for greater utilization to more fully realize the Station’s research potential and maximize the value of the United States’ investment in building and maintaining the structure.”

NASA uses several metrics to measure the station’s research performance, and one of the simplest, average crew time spent on science per week is encouraging,  with the astronauts regularly exceeding the goal of 35 hours.  Also positive, the utilization rate for allocated space is set to increase from 70-75% for internal experiments, and 27-40% for external sites during the current year.  With 100% utilization being both impractical and likely unachievable, the internal rate in particular is pretty good.

One item which is extremely frustrating however is the limitation on total research performed by  having a crew of 6, rather than 7, a direct consequence of the U.S. lack of crew transportation capabilities. 

From the report, “According to the ISS Program Office, a seventh crew member could potentially add about 33 hours per week to the current amount of crew time devoted to research – a 94 percent increase.”

Given the fact that after $60 billion in construction costs, another $40 billion in Shuttle expense which NASA counts separately, and an ongoing budget of roughly $3 billion per year on the station program, ostensibly for the purpose of conducting scientific research, it is rather unfortunate that for lack of a crew capacity which now looks as if it won’t be available until 2017, the taxpayer has been shorted such a high percentage of the potential payoff.

And yet, judging by reports from the FY 2014  House Commerce, Justice and Science subcommittee  appropriations meeting yesterday, the only thing Congress care about, besides congratulating themselves, is either praising the amounts allocated to SLS/Orion, or if you happen to represent Alabama, complaining that it still isn’t enough.

About the only taxpayers who shouldn’t complain are those in Russia, who as the OIG report indicates, have been getting a pretty good deal since the U.S. started buying Soyuz seats in volume. 

Again, from the report:  “Between 2006 and 2008, NASA purchased one seat per year. Beginning in 2009, NASA started purchasing six seats per year. The price per seat has increased over the years from $22 million in 2006, to $25 million in 2010, to $28 million in the first half of 2011. During the second half of 2011, the price per seat jumped to $43 million.

The price has continued to increase. For example, the price of purchased seats for launches in 2014 and 2015 are $55.6 million and $60 million, respectively. In April 2013, NASA signed another deal with Russia valued at $424 million for six additional seats to carry NASA astronauts to the Station during 2016 through June 2017, and the price per seat has increased to $71 million.”

Perfect Liftoff for Ariane V

The latest resupply mission to the International Space Station got off to a perfect start yesterday evening with the launch of an Ariane V rocket carrying the Automated Transfer Vehicle ATV-4, “Albert Einstein.”

There is one more ATV planned for ISS, after which the European Space Agency will supply a modified version of the propulsion segment to NASA as service module for the first planned flight of the Orion capsule aboard SLS in 2017.

Yesterday’s launch marked another in a long string of successful flights for the Ariane V, which flew in its ES version configured with a storable propellant upper stage specifically designed for boosting heavily laden ATV’s to the space station’s orbit. The flight was the 69th overall for Ariane V and 54th successful launch in a row for the world’s premier heavy lift booster, a streak which began 10 years ago.

By contrast the sole American heavy lift vehicle currently in service, the EELV program’s Delta IV Heavy,  has flown just six times over a nine-year time frame, with one partial failure on its maiden flight and no commercial payloads.

ATV “Albert Einstein” Poised for Liftoff

Ready
Credit : Arianespace

The countdown is underway at Kourou, French Guiana for this evening’s launch of the European ATV supply ship  “Albert Einstein” to the International Space Station.  Launch is scheduled aboard the Ariane V booster at precisely 6:52:11 p.m. local (5:52:11 p.m. US EDT.)  Today’s launch will mark the fourth flight of the Automated Transfer Vehicle, and the heaviest payload ever carried by the Ariane V, with a liftoff mass of 20,235 kg, coming on the vehicle’s 69th flight. 

Unlike recent Soyuz ascents, the ATV will not be arriving at the station in a hurry, with docking scheduled for June 15th.  Today’s launch will be broadcast on-line here with coverage beginning a hour before liftoff.

“Planet Earth is Blue and There’s Nothing Left to Do” : ISS Sensation Hadfield Coming Back Home

Canadian astronaut and Commander of Expedition 35 Chris Hadfield, is preparing to return to Earth this evening, along with fellow travelers American Tom Marshburn and Russian cosmonaut Roman Romanenko.  Undocking is scheduled at 7:08 p.m. EDT, with de-orbit burn occurring at 9:37 and landing in Kazakhstan at 10:31 p.m. (8:31 a.m. local)

This “expedition” may be one for the record books.  Chris Hadfield has arguably done more to humanize the International Space Station program, at least to a  western audience than anyone else to visit the outpost, and if there was any doubt, this superb rendition of David Bowie’s  “A  Space Oddity” may seal the legacy for some time to come. 

Given that NASA has a hard time getting Americans to pay any attention to ISS except when there is a problem, such as the cooling leak addressed in Saturday’s spacewalk,  it might be worth some consideration as to why Hadfield has broken through in a way that some many others have not.   During the Shuttle era, which was already coming to a close as social media was making its meteoric rise in our culture, the relatively short duration and tightly controlled nature of the Shuttle flights would have presented a very limited window of opportunity for  the kind of connection Hadfield has made. 

The ISS program on the other hand, allows for much longer stays in orbit, creating ready-made opportunities for astronauts aboard it to connect with the somewhat larger crew of spaceship Earth, and engage, educate and sometimes even entertain the public which foots the bills.  Contrary to imagery presented in the Axe Apollo campaign, perhaps it is not the heroic yet faceless astronaut behind the visor, but instead an individual human being which can  spread the message that we really are explorers.

7 Hours 52 Minutes

Coming in Hot!
Credt : NASA TV

Seven hours and fifty minutes after a flawless liftoff from Baikonur at 2:42 AM Friday morning (local),  the three person crew aboard Expedition 35’s Soyuz TMA-08M spacecraft opened the spacecraft’s hatch and entered the International Space Stations’s Poisk module.  The new record breaking fast ascent, which was accomplished in four orbits,  had been employed on three previous Progress resupply missions but this flight marked the first time it has been performed by a spacecraft with crew.

With a full complement of 6 once again aboard ISS, astronauts of the unified Expedition 35 will begin a steady program of research, working with experiments brought up by the recently departed SpaceX CRS-2 Dragon resupply craft.  With both the SpaceX and Soyuz launches out of the way,  attention will now shift to an upcoming launch which is not going to the station at all, but is critical to the program nonetheless.  The oft delayed but highly anticipated test flight of the Orbital Sciences Corporation Antares launch vehicle is  scheduled for the third week of April. If the test flight, which will carry an instrumented mass simulator is successful, the next flight, complete with a loaded Cygnus resupply vessel could take place several months later.

The fast ascent profile used for the first time in this launch marks a small, but perhaps meaningful change not just in how spaceflight to low Earth orbit occurs, but in how it is perceived.  In all previous launches to the Station, and to Mir before that, particularly in the era of the Shuttle, television coverage tended to be of the launch only.  Two days later,  by the time the Shuttle arrived at the Station, life had gone, the news had changed,  and except for the final flights, docking rarely received any broad coverage.  While that aspect is certainly not going to change,  it seems possible that with launch and arrival now taking place within the same 16 or so hour waking span that most of us measure our lives, the awareness of space stations as a destination, rather than an abstraction might creep in just little.  Then again, maybe not.