Orbit Fab Wants to Create 'Gas Stations' in Space for Satellites (cnn.com) 53
Of the 15,000 satellites humans have sent into space, "just over half are still functioning," reports CNN. "The rest, after running out of fuel and ending their serviceable life, have either burned up in the atmosphere or are still orbiting the planet as useless hunks of metal" — scattering "an aura of space junk around the planet."
"One way to start tackling the problem would be to stop producing more junk — by refueling satellites rather than decommissioning them once they run out of power." "Right now you can't refuel a satellite on orbit," says Daniel Faber, CEO of Orbit Fab. But his Colorado-based company wants to change that... "The lack of fuel creates a whole paradigm where people design their spacecraft missions around moving as little as possible. That means that we can't have tow trucks in orbit to get rid of any debris that happens to be left. We can't have repairs and maintenance, we can't upgrade anything. We can't inspect anything if it breaks. There are so many things we can't do and we operate in a very constrained way. That's the solution we're trying to deliver...."
Orbit Fab has no plans to address the existing fleet of satellites. Instead, it wants to focus on those that have yet to launch, and equip them with a standardized port — called RAFTI, for Rapid Attachable Fluid Transfer Interface — which would dramatically simplify the refueling operation, keeping the price tag down. "What we're looking at doing is creating a low-cost architecture," says Faber. "There's no commercially available fuel port for refueling a satellite in orbit yet. For all the big aspirations we have about a bustling space economy, really, what we're working on is the gas cap — we are a gas cap company." Orbit Fab, which advertises itself with the tagline "gas stations in space," is working on a system that includes the fuel port, refueling shuttles — which would deliver the fuel to a satellite in need — and refueling tankers, or orbital gas stations, which the shuttles could pick up the fuel from. It has advertised a price of $20 million for on-orbit delivery of hydrazine, the most common satellite propellant.
In 2018, the company launched two testbeds to the International Space Station to test the interfaces, the pumps and the plumbing. In 2021 it launched Tanker-001 Tenzing, a fuel depot demonstrator that informed the design of the current hardware. The next launch is now scheduled for 2024. "We are delivering fuel in geostationary orbit for a mission that is being undertaken by the Air Force Research Lab," says Faber. "At the moment, they're treating it as a demonstration, but it's getting a lot of interest from across the US government, from people that realize the value of refueling." Orbit Fab's first private customer will be Astroscale, a Japanese satellite servicing company that has developed the first satellite designed for refueling. Called LEXI, it will mount RAFTI ports and is currently scheduled to launch in 2026.
According to Simone D'Amico, an associate professor of astronautics at Stanford University, who's not affiliated with Orbit Fab, on-orbit servicing is one of the keys to ensuring a safe and sustainable development of space... "The development of space infrastructure and the proliferation of space assets is reaching a critical volume that is not sustainable anymore without a change of paradigm."
"In 10 or 15 years, we'd like to be building refineries in orbit," CEO Faber tells CNN, "processing material that is launched from the ground into a range of chemicals that people want to buy: air and water for commercial space stations, 3D printer feedstock minerals to grow plants. We want to be the industrial chemical supplier to the emerging commercial space industry."
"One way to start tackling the problem would be to stop producing more junk — by refueling satellites rather than decommissioning them once they run out of power." "Right now you can't refuel a satellite on orbit," says Daniel Faber, CEO of Orbit Fab. But his Colorado-based company wants to change that... "The lack of fuel creates a whole paradigm where people design their spacecraft missions around moving as little as possible. That means that we can't have tow trucks in orbit to get rid of any debris that happens to be left. We can't have repairs and maintenance, we can't upgrade anything. We can't inspect anything if it breaks. There are so many things we can't do and we operate in a very constrained way. That's the solution we're trying to deliver...."
Orbit Fab has no plans to address the existing fleet of satellites. Instead, it wants to focus on those that have yet to launch, and equip them with a standardized port — called RAFTI, for Rapid Attachable Fluid Transfer Interface — which would dramatically simplify the refueling operation, keeping the price tag down. "What we're looking at doing is creating a low-cost architecture," says Faber. "There's no commercially available fuel port for refueling a satellite in orbit yet. For all the big aspirations we have about a bustling space economy, really, what we're working on is the gas cap — we are a gas cap company." Orbit Fab, which advertises itself with the tagline "gas stations in space," is working on a system that includes the fuel port, refueling shuttles — which would deliver the fuel to a satellite in need — and refueling tankers, or orbital gas stations, which the shuttles could pick up the fuel from. It has advertised a price of $20 million for on-orbit delivery of hydrazine, the most common satellite propellant.
In 2018, the company launched two testbeds to the International Space Station to test the interfaces, the pumps and the plumbing. In 2021 it launched Tanker-001 Tenzing, a fuel depot demonstrator that informed the design of the current hardware. The next launch is now scheduled for 2024. "We are delivering fuel in geostationary orbit for a mission that is being undertaken by the Air Force Research Lab," says Faber. "At the moment, they're treating it as a demonstration, but it's getting a lot of interest from across the US government, from people that realize the value of refueling." Orbit Fab's first private customer will be Astroscale, a Japanese satellite servicing company that has developed the first satellite designed for refueling. Called LEXI, it will mount RAFTI ports and is currently scheduled to launch in 2026.
According to Simone D'Amico, an associate professor of astronautics at Stanford University, who's not affiliated with Orbit Fab, on-orbit servicing is one of the keys to ensuring a safe and sustainable development of space... "The development of space infrastructure and the proliferation of space assets is reaching a critical volume that is not sustainable anymore without a change of paradigm."
"In 10 or 15 years, we'd like to be building refineries in orbit," CEO Faber tells CNN, "processing material that is launched from the ground into a range of chemicals that people want to buy: air and water for commercial space stations, 3D printer feedstock minerals to grow plants. We want to be the industrial chemical supplier to the emerging commercial space industry."
Great for fueling very specific satellites (Score:5, Funny)
This will be a great way to extend the life of satellites that just happen to have the exact same orbit and velocity of the gas station.
Which should be exactly none of them.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Great for fueling very specific satellites (Score:5, Interesting)
Never mind the fact launch prices keep coming down
Launch prices for the refueler will also come down.
there's probably already new generations of hardware that make it obsolete.
Many otherwise fully functional satellites deorbit because they run out of fuel.
Satellites are designed to be robust so they don't fail prematurely, and as a result, often far outlive their fuel supplies.
Xkcd: Spirit [xkcd.com]
Re: (Score:2)
Satellites are designed to be robust, but they still have hardware failures [sciencedirect.com] eventually. A slightly slightly older [nasa.gov] analysis (there have been another $800M [spacenews.com] in insurance claims in 2023 alone) pointed out that astronauts were able to save some satellites being deployed from the Space Shuttle, but that's not a feasible fix now. As satellites age, they suffer various failures [timesaerospace.aero] until they either are decommissioned or fail entirely [theverge.com].
Re: (Score:2)
If you send up 100 satellites, some will fail early, and some will fail late.
If you put enough fuel on all of them to last the longest possible lifetime, you will pay a very high launch cost.
So you put enough fuel on each to last the mean lifetime and then refuel only those still functioning.
Re: (Score:2)
Most [physicsworld.com] of a satellite's fuel is used to reach its intended orbit. The difference between what is needed for station-keeping over a design lifetime vs a number of years longer is quite small in terms of launch costs.
(The numbers may be different for low Earth orbit, but those satellites are largely intended as disposable anyway.)
Re: (Score:2)
Then why are half of existing satellites inoperable because they ran out of fuel?
Re: (Score:2)
Satellite operators will keep running their satellites until they cannot. Most satellites are designed with significant redundancy, so that they can keep providing services (meaning revenue) after various components fail. The operators will then choose to do that as long as possible -- operating costs are much, much less than capital costs.
That being the case, a satellite operator doesn't want either "I ran out of fuel" or "my satellite broke" to dominate the failure modes; either one indicates that they
Re: (Score:2)
Most [physicsworld.com] of a satellite's fuel is used to reach its intended orbit.
That is different fuel, in a different fuel tank, on different vehicle.
The difference between what is needed for station-keeping over a design lifetime vs a number of years longer is quite small in terms of launch costs.
No, it really isn't. An extra kg of fuel in the payload bay means 100 kg more fuel in the launch rocket.
Re: (Score:2)
People don't calculate cost to orbit based on how much fuel is needed in the launch vehicle. That's what the cost to orbit reflects.
Re: (Score:2)
I'm not convinced that it will be cost effective though. Every satellite needs a zero-g refuelling port, which is accessible to the refueller.
Re: (Score:1)
A Beowulf Cluster of Fuel Turtles all the down to Planet Recursion.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
A fuel depot has to be at a specific point in a specific orbit
No. The satellites don't go to the refueler. The refueler goes to the satellites.
the choice of fuel, is it hydrogen, methane, kerosene?
It is hydrazine: N2H4.
What oxidizer, LOX or peroxide?
Hydrazine doesn't need an oxidizer: N2H4 => N2 + 2H2, a very exothermic reaction.
Re: (Score:2)
And you missed the point. I wasn't asking "what does this one use", because it's in the fucking summary. It's about the general concept. There is no one fuel that rockets use, you have to match with what needs refueling. You don't just throw some fuel up into orbit and wait for something to come by and use it.
The refueler goes to the satellites.
Plane changes are expensive in terms of fuel consumption. Once you're done, then you have to do another plane change for the next refueling. And you have to somehow transfer the fuel, which depends on
Re: (Score:2)
I think that you're missing that any satellites to use this service would have to be built to accept refueling. In addition to this, while rockets do indeed use a bunch of different fuels, satellites as a class use a much smaller number of fuels. This is because any fuels they use need to be stable, easy to store(in space!), easy to ignite, etc...
Thus hydrazine.
The initial fuel he proposes creating a refueling infrastructure for is basically the gasoline of the satellite world.
So if you want to be able to
Re: (Score:2)
This will be a great way to extend the life of satellites that just happen to have the exact same orbit and velocity of the gas station.
It wouldn't have to be exactly the same. Just close enough that not too much fuel would be needed to synchronize.
If a refueler is launched to visit a few dozen satellites, deciding the sequence to visit them to minimize fuel consumption by the refueler is equivalent to solving the traveling salesman problem [wikipedia.org].
Re: (Score:2)
OMG! Quick! Let these people know that they haven't thought of this crucial piece of information.
(Do you really think they haven't thought of moving around in space?)
Re: Great for fueling very specific satellites (Score:2)
Maybe they do. Maybe they don't. I don't know.
But I do know their direct customers are mid-level government bureacrats whose understanding of space can range from "space is up there" to "I took physics 101 and passed!" and occasionally even "I used to do mission planning for a living so I know this is of limited utility but my boss thinks it's cool and I get paid regardless."
Which is how silly ideas with a lot of glitz and scifi street cred do bubble up occasionally, not just in government to be fair, but s
Re: (Score:2)
"Maybe they do. Maybe they don't. I don't know."
The rest of us know that Orbit Fab though of that, because Orbit Fab says they though of that: "a system that includes... refueling shuttles..."
Re: (Score:2)
Which should be exactly none of them.
There are many satellites in GEO. After refueling one, it would only take a couple of small maneuvers and a bit of patience to move to the next.
Re: (Score:2)
Cost? (Score:2)
"In 10 or 15 years, we'd like to be building refineries in orbit," CEO Faber tells CNN, "processing material that is launched from the ground into a range of chemicals that people want to buy: air and water for commercial space stations, 3D printer feedstock minerals to grow plants. We want to be the industrial chemical supplier to the emerging commercial space industry."
One can only imagine the cost for these materials. Launching out of a gravity well isn't cheap. I can hear the whining now: "You mean I
Re: (Score:2)
* Cost to ship [businessinsider.com]
Your "cost to ship" citation is from 2016.
Launch prices are way lower today and will soon drop even more.
Re: (Score:2)
Indeed. The Shuttle was not a cheap delivery vehicle. Roughly $25,000 per kilogram.
SpaceX's Falcon 9 is closer to $3500/kg.
Starship might turn that into $35/kg.
Re: Cost? (Score:2)
That low end for the falcon is in reusable mode. It's quite a bit higher (2 or 3x) in expendable mode, which is necessary if the minimum mass of the payload is too big.
Starship isn't going to cost so low. They've got to make up the r&d cost on the 10 or so units They've blown up already and maybe a couple more before they're ready to take paying customers.
Re: (Score:2)
One can only imagine the cost for these materials.
That is correct, one can only imagine the cost for these materials because nobody is refining them in space yet. But if they aren't cheaper to make there than to send there, something is wrong.
Re: (Score:2)
One can only imagine the cost for these materials.
That is correct, one can only imagine the cost for these materials because nobody is refining them in space yet. But if they aren't cheaper to make there than to send there, something is wrong.
Do you think the raw materials are found in orbit?
You have to send the raw materials to orbit - then process them in a hard vacuum, with entirely remotely operated equipment without any maintenance available. What is wrong, and it is very wrong, is to think that this is cheaper than simply processing them to final form in a plant here on Earth, then sending the finished material to orbit.
Re: (Score:2)
You have to send the raw materials to orbit - then process them in a hard vacuum, with entirely remotely operated equipment without any maintenance available
I would hope this is part of a longer term strategy involving asteroid mining. Otherwise you're correct.
Re: Cost? (Score:2)
The most expensive refined metals here cost on the order of a quarter million a kilo. The ore costs pennies per kilo because they're just that rare. In asteroids with "higher" abundance maybe you could fetch a few dollars or tens of dollars a kilo. The rocket equation being not your friend is important here because that ore will cost you tens of thousands per kilo to bring back cuz you have to launch all the fuel needed to get there and come back (nevermind the equiment).
Refining would be nice. Except most
One way gear means no refueling (Score:1)
> "Right now you can't refuel a satellite on orbit,"
Right, because it's called "in orbit". New Yorkers stand "on line" instead of "in line" (or "queue up" as per the brits) but it's still IN LINE, IN ORBIT, etc.
You may say "Why do you care what words they use?" It is because they don't speak the same language and they still don't get the idea that if it doesn't have a refueling port (think "that thing on the side of my car I open to insert the gasoline nozzle into") on the side of the vehicle there is
Re: (Score:2)
it doesn't have a refueling port ... the fuels used are not of a uniform type
RTFS. The system is not designed to refuel existing satellites. It will refuel future satellites that are designed to be refueled.
terminology [Re:One way gear means no refueling] (Score:3)
> "Right now you can't refuel a satellite on orbit,"
Right, because it's called "in orbit". New Yorkers stand "on line" instead of "in line" (or "queue up" as per the brits) but it's still IN LINE, IN ORBIT, etc.
In fact aerospace professionals use both the phrase "on orbit" and also "in orbit".
For the most part, the two terms are interchangable, although there's a slight difference in connotation between the two, So, yes, on-orbit refueling is done when you're in orbit.
Re: (Score:2)
No, it's not economics. If it were, you'd also be replacing tires with nails in the treads. The reason you can't (by law) patch a tire with a hole in the sidewall is because the sidewalls flex in motion, and gradually make the patch come loose.
Re: (Score:2)
What do you mean? Replacing a tire can easily be over $200 these days, a patch that can last the remaining life of the tire might be $40. The cheaper option is economical. Plus the patch keeps your tires matched up so you can just replace them all at equal wear.
A patch in the tread is economical, as it lasts. A patch in the side doesn't, so it is both uneconomical and unsafe because you don't know when it will let loose.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Well, it's still kind of both. There's a safety reason, and an economical reason. The safety reason is that you don't know when it will fail, and the econoimcal reason is that it's going to fail, generally early. So there's no real reason to even keep it as an option.
It IS rocket science (Score:3)
This would use more fuel matching orbit with the satellite to be refueled than it would deliver to the satellite.
The only way this would ever be practical would be to refuel things in geostationary orbit, where there is a lot of stuff in the same orbit, and no cross-traffic
Re: (Score:2)
This would use more fuel matching orbit with the satellite to be refueled than it would deliver to the satellite.
That isn't necessarily true. It depends on the differences in orbit and speed. To refuel a satellite, they would pick a refueler in a similar orbit and refuel multiple satellites in a sequence that would minimize fuel consumption.
They charge $20M per refueling. They can afford some inefficiencies.
The only way this would ever be practical would be to refuel things in geostationary orbit
You are defining "practical" as using less fuel than is delivered. There is no particular reason that criterion is important. They could burn many times as much fuel as they deliver and still be profitable.
Re: (Score:2)
You are defining "practical" as using less fuel than is delivered. There is no particular reason that criterion is important. They could burn many times as much fuel as they deliver and still be profitable.
Quite true. The ill-considered objection the poster was making is a manifestation of the "energy budget" obsession of lots of space fanbois that neglects that the cost of doing stuff in space is entirely driven by the cost of space hardware and operations support, not energy expenditure. The reason for this seems to be an attraction only to physics and not the essentials of engineering, which are fundamentally economic and involve complex systems.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: It IS rocket science (Score:2)
If you charge me 20m to extend my mission by (let's say) 10 years with fuel alone, it would have cost me less than 20m to have built my satellite with a bigger fuel tank and paid for the launch of the extra fuel. The economics almost never works as far as I can tell.
What we really need *now* (Score:5, Interesting)
What we need now is a "service" for deorbiting space junk, because none of the current satellites are designed to be serviced, just rot in space and take up valuable room. At best, they just push the satellite up into a junk collection zone where they can bump into one another and create more space debris to scatter around and destroy prime operational satellites.
We need a delivery system that can place something right in front of these dead satellites to slow them significantly as to deorbit them on a planned trajectory. Either a rocket nozzle with fuel that attaches to the center of mass that can make a controlled decent into the atmosphere or a larger umbrella that will cause resistance for what little gas and particles are out there that could slow it down to deorbit it.
Most of all we need a regulation saying that we don't put anything up there that does not have a contingency plan for end-of-life deorbiting. Stop creating space junk, because anything that does not plan for its own demise is just going to be a cost to others who have to maneuver to avoid their space junk. There should be some kind of dead-mans-switch that deorbits any satellite if it is unable to function properly
Re: (Score:2)
What we need now is a "service" for deorbiting space junk
"Space junk" is a bigger problem in pop-science journalism than in reality.
Most satellites are in LEO, 600 km or below, where there is enough air friction to deorbit them within a few years. If a collision occurs in LEO, the smaller particles will have much higher friction/mass ratios and deorbit within a few days.
Re: (Score:2)
"Space junk" is a bigger problem in pop-science journalism than in reality.
Most satellites are in LEO, 600 km or below, where there is enough air friction to deorbit them within a few years. If a collision occurs in LEO, the smaller particles will have much higher friction/mass ratios and deorbit within a few days.
A more informative way of looking at it is the the "space junk" problem is so severe that it restricts large scale exploitation of space to 600 km or below. The original plan for StarLink was to place all of their satellites at 1100 km - which would have been a disastrous decision. When outsiders started pointing this out Musk reduced the altitude to 550 km. This means that StarLink has to operate at a sub-optimal altitude to avoid this problem. Thus the claim that "most satellites are in LEO, 600 km or bel
Re: (Score:2)
It can actually be a lot easier. You don't need to be in front. Remember you have plenty of time, and force levels necessary are tiny.
Just get close and you can couple with a small magnet, clamp, or even sticky pad. You might even be able to couple with gravity.
Then, depending on orbit stuff, you could even use a sail or balloon to maximize surface area and thus drag to minimize propellant needed.
Leisure Suit Larry already applied for a job (Score:2)
If there is a chicken game.
Just give them all small solar sails (Score:2)
If they have small solar sails you can push them around with a particle beam, then you only need to refuel a couple satellites.
US wants to put particle beams in orbit any way as directed energy weapons, so two birds with one stone.
Re: (Score:2)
Are they going to be the liquid kind of "gas" station, or proper gas?
The fuel is hydrazine (N2H4) which is a liquid.
Alternatives (Score:2)
1. Put up several real space stations (i.e. the Wheel), and put the functiontality on them.
2. Require ALL satellites to deorbit before running out of fuel.