Main Engine Cut Off - T+101: Starlink Addendum

Starting point is 00:00:00 Hello, hello. Turns out we are back with a Starlink addendum very quick. This has been Engine Cutoff. I am Anthony Colangelo. Turns out yesterday, as I was recording, or right about then, SpaceX submitted an application to the FCC to change some of their original Starlink application. And I know I've been on a roll lately with a lot of these predictions, but again, I feel like I nailed it to a certain extent here. So I read through a bunch of this. Again, this is an FCC

Starting point is 00:00:41 application, so they still need to get approved. I read through this document that was posted alongside of it that contained a lot of details, and it sheds a little light on what we were talking about on yesterday's show, where these two demo satellites were still in this 500 and some kilometer orbit. There was rumors that the propulsion on them had failed when they were going to be raised up to what was supposed to be an 1100 kilometer orbit. And I don't want to rule that out, but we'll get into that in a little bit. So let me read you some excerpts from this document that SpaceX applied to the FCC with. Here's the first blurb as like a little intro. With this application, SpaceX seeks to modify its license to reflect constellation design

Starting point is 00:01:24 changes resulting from a rigorous, integrated, and iterative process that will accelerate the deployment of its satellite and services. Specifically, SpaceX proposes to relocate 1,584 satellites previously authorized to operate at an altitude of 1,150 kilometers to an altitude of 550 kilometers, and to make related changes to the operations of the satellites in this new lower shell of the constellation, this modest modification to the SpaceX authorization will slightly reduce the total number of spacecraft in the constellation, meet all required protection criteria for other systems operating in the same frequencies, and cause no overall increase in radio frequency interference. The modification will meet or exceed all space safety requirements and will reduce the potential for orbital debris through operation of part of the constellation at a lower altitude. So that was a pretty dense summary of the application here. So there's a couple of parts to this. Number one, my theory yesterday was that the SpaceX priority just needs to be get satellites on orbit, iterate from there, build on from there,

Starting point is 00:02:26 get cheaper satellites that might not last as long, might not have all the potential, get them on orbit quick because we got to get satellites up if we want to roll out a constellation this big. And in this, SpaceX specifically talks about this iterative design process from the initial concept, the initial constellation, to the full deployment. So let me read you another blurb here. In the initial phase, SpaceX will launch and operate first-generation satellites that it has designed specifically to support a faster pace of deployment with a simplified design to streamline the construction process and continuously add features to subsequent

Starting point is 00:03:00 generations of spacecraft. For example, SpaceX initially will use KU band spectrum for communications between satellites and both gateways and user terminals, then incorporate dual KU-KA band chipsets and other supporting technologies to phase in the use of KA band spectrum for gateway communications as it populates its constellation. Similarly, SpaceX initially will use parabolic antennas for its gateway earth stations and introduce phased array alternatives as the system evolves. So that's talking about the fact that they are going to do what my theory was, which was build an initial satellite constellation that will work, that will get them operating, that will get satellites on orbit, and expand from there. So they're going to start with the KU band, then

Starting point is 00:03:40 expand to dual band. They're going to start with parabolic antennas for gateway Earth stations, and then move to phased array. Phased array is much more expensive still. A lot of people are expand to dual band. They're going to start with parabolic antennas for gateway earth stations and then move to phased array. Phased array is much more expensive still. A lot of people are working on building phased array alternatives for both gateways and end users. So that kind of says they want to do a cheaper alternative up front, something that gets them built out, and then move to phased array, the more expensive, complicated thing as they move forward. A couple other aspects that are important to note. They spend a lot of time talking about the fact that lowering these satellites from 1,150 kilometers to 550 drastically decreases

Starting point is 00:04:17 the disposal timeline of these satellites. So they talk about if a satellite died at this altitude, of these satellites. So they talk about if a satellite died at this altitude, it would take a couple of years to come down. And five to seven years, I think, in the worst case, or three to five in the worst case, a little higher than them would be five to seven. So that is drastically lower than the 1,150 kilometer orbit, which would take hundreds of years to come down on natural decay. So this facilitates disposal very quickly to turn these satellites over. So the typical disposal process is going to be to drop from 550 kilometers to drop the perigee, the lowest point in the orbit, down to 300 kilometers, and then that would drop out very quickly out of orbit. So this would facilitate faster turnover of these satellites,

Starting point is 00:05:02 which I think in part helps the idea of launching an initial amount of satellites, an initial operational capability of satellites, letting them die out, letting them get disposed of, and replacing them very quickly. Sort of, it eludes some of those fears of like massive Kessler syndrome. And it's also much less congested at 550 kilometers. 1,100 kilometers, that range, there's a lot of constellations up at that altitude, a lot more chance for collisions with this many satellites. And down at 550, there's much less congestion. That's kind of a midpoint between the low Earth orbit satellites and the higher Earth orbit satellites. So that's a big advantage to going to 550. A couple of other notes here that are interesting. They talk about the fact that this lower orbit requires less fuel

Starting point is 00:05:52 to get into. These are going to be deployed at around 300 to 350 kilometers from the launch of, you know, the Falcon 9 launch that would launch a bunch of these satellites, would drop them off at 300 to 350 kilometers, and then they would climb to 550. That requires significantly less fuel than their old plan, which was drop off at 400, climb to 1100. So they tout this as an advantage. And they also are able to make the satellites lighter because of that. They need less fuel load. And apparently at the end here, it says, SpaceX has been able to decrease the overall work required by the Hall Effect thrusters, Hall Effect electric propulsion system by at least 50% with respect to the original design. Now that is to counteract the atmospheric drag that they experience at 550 kilometers. So they're going to be constantly getting a little bit of drag,

Starting point is 00:06:39 and they're going to use these Hall Effect thrusters to counteract that and stay up in orbit. And apparently that this is a, because of all the related changes to this change, they see a lot of fuel savings and a lot of reduced wear on their thrusters. So a lot of good changes here for Starlink, a lot of stuff that corroborates my theory from yesterday. I said at the front of the show, I don't want to rule out that the propulsion did fail on these first two demo satellites. That was some of the rumors going around that they were stuck in this lower orbit because propulsion failed. That could still be true. You know, they could have launched that, the propulsion could have failed, and they could have said, well, they're up there anyway, let's do some tests, realized that the altitude would

Starting point is 00:07:15 have worked better, started doing some thinking, realized all of these advantages, and went with it for that initial constellation. I don't want to rule that out. Likely, the case is they kind of had this in mind anyway. They deployed at that lower altitude to see if any of their theories were validated. They were, so they begun this process. So, you know, either case is likely. I would say it's more likely that this was an idea that somebody had up front. I don't know how happy certain regulators are going to be that SpaceX got authorized for an 1100 kilometer orbit for these two satellites, operated them at 500 and then, you know, changed their original application. I don't know what's going on behind the scenes there, but that seems a little scary to me, knowing how some of this paperwork tends to go. But I guess we'll see.

Starting point is 00:07:58 So overall, pretty good update here from SpaceX, confirms a lot of what we were talking about yesterday. And I thought it would be worth knowing on your end as a little addendum, a little mini episode addendum here to yesterday's show. Thank you all so much for your support, as always, at patreon.com slash Miko. This little mini episode was produced by 34 executive producers. Chris, Pat, Matt, George, Brad, Ryan, Jameson, Nadim, Peter, Donald, Lee, Jasper, Chris, Warren, Bob, Russell, John, Moritz, Joel, Jan, David, Grant, Mike, David, Mintz, Eunice, and eight anonymous executive producers. Thank you so much for making this episode possible. And thank you to everyone else over at patreon.com slash Miko. That is it for today. There'll be a headline show coming out later for you $3 and up on Patreon. And that is

Starting point is 00:08:41 it. I will talk to you pretty soon.

Main Engine Cut Off - T+101: Starlink Addendum

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