The Space Hour: Recent Episodes
Federal News Network | Hubbard Radio
A deep look at the commercial space industry from both the public and private sector. We discuss topics pertaining to the aerospace community with current and former members of the federal government, academics with in-depth knowledge, along with industry leaders, all of whom are paving the way to advance the U.S. space field.
Starting May of this year, NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory will have a new permanent director. President of Worcester Polytechnic Institute Laurie Leshin was selected earlier this year to lead JPL. Before she takes the reins however, I wanted to pick her brain about some of the projects she'll be most excited about once she's in the big seat.
NASA recently announced its latest selections to receive grants from its Innovative Advanced Concepts program. This is one avenue researchers are able to get money for ideas that are sometimes requested, and sometimes not. To learn more, I had a chance to speak with Michael LaPointe who is the acting NIAC program executive.
It is getting crowded up in space these days, and not just from operational equipment. Tens of thousands of objects are circling Earth, threatening launch vehicles, space assets, and even human lives. Now a coalition of experts is pressing lawmakers to do something about it before it's too late. I recently spoke to one of the members of the AIAA Space Traffic Management Coalition, Dan Dumbacher, who himself is executive director of the AIAA.
For this week, we'll be airing a panel that I hosted recently for AFCEA NOVA's Space Force IT Day earlier this month. My panel was on the topic of the State of the Space Industrial Base. My guests included Brigadier General Steven Butow - the Space Portfolio Director of the Defense Innovation Unit, Major Adam Burnetta, Program Manager of the Space Enterprise Consortium for the U.S. Space Force, and Hoyt Davidson, founder and managing partner of Near Earth LLC. We'll start with my opening comments.
Virgin Orbit, a sister company of Virgin Airlines and Virgin Galactic just recently launched multiple satellites into orbit for three of clients, the most well known one being the Pentagon, more specifically, the Defense Department's Space Test Program. Experts will tell you defense space research programs like these are important for ensuring America maintains a healthy footprint in space. One of them is Former Brig. General Mark Baird who was front and center for this launch as he is now president of Virgin Orbital subsidiary VOX Space. I had the chance to speak with Mr. Baird after the launch.
NASA's Flight Opportunities Program is one that helps commercial space companies work with the agency to test out their new technologies, with the hopes of being able to use them for future missions. The program just recently made nine new selections for new tech under NASA's 2021 TechFlights solicitation. To learn more about those picks and the program overall, I got the chance to speak with John Kelly, who is program manager for the Flight Opportunities Program, and Stephan Ord who is the program's chief technologist.
Skull and Bones, Porcellian, Tri Delta. The exclusivity of these clubs have nothing on NASA's Astronaut Corps. With the agency looking to send Earth's best and brightest into space, you can imagine just what it takes to maintain that group. Well NASA's Inspector General wanted to stop imagining and actually have a look itself. One of those in charge of that was Jamie Smith, who is a project manager with the IG's office. I spoke with Jamie about what they found.
With the retirement of the Space Shuttle program, the most popular one that NASA is best known for now is it's role in the International Space Station. Astronauts have lived and worked onboard the ISS orbiting roughly 250 miles above the Earth’s surface for more than 20 years. It has a planned retirement of 2024 but it's likely to go a few years longer than that. However to get ready for that day, NASA has committed to replacing the ISS with one or more commercially owned and operated space destinations. The agency's inspector general wanted to take a look at how much both options would cost, and what NASA would need to do in the meantime to get ready. For a look at what the IG found, I spoke with Rachel Pierre, who is a management analyst for the OIG.
Recently, astronauts on the ISS had to take shelter after a Russian anti-satellite weapon test created a dangerous cloud of space debris. Naturally, the US government is deeply concerned about the risk posed by space debris, this year's NDAA even includes a directive to identify efforts to advance alternatives to Hall thrusters. So what’s wrong with Hall thrusters? Well to find out, I spoke to Dr. Natalya Bailey, founder and chief strategy officer for Accion Systems.
Could NASA be doing more to protect us from asteroids? Should it bring the Space Shuttle back? Questions like these are being asked by the folks at the Concerned American Aerospace Engineers. While certainly budget concerns and changing political dynamics do play a role in these policy measures, there are some who think NASA needs a plan B. To find out what that could look like, I spoke to Don Nelson, who himself is a retired NASA engineer, and currently the coordinator for the Concerned American Aerospace Engineers.
We'll start the year off talking about NASA's latest accomplishment, getting one of the biggest telescopes into space ever. Though the James Webb telescope still has a long way to go, the amount technical work that went into the project is one of the most astounding. Prior to it's Christmas Day launch, I had the chance to speak to Michael McElwain, who is the James Webb Space Telescope observatory scientist.
From GPS, to weathertech, to national security, satellite imagery is used for all sorts of important aspects of life here on Earth. Now, one company is looking to vastly improve the quality of those images, which means improvements in all those sectors I mentioned. HySpecIQ claims it is now positioned to become the world’s leading provider of space-based hyperspectral imagery. To find out more, I spoke with the company's senior vice president of product and sales Tim Abbott.
The role of NASA administrator is one of the more unique positions in the federal government. Many agencies have a tough time just planning for next year, well imagine having to plan for projects that could take 10 or 20 years. Over the past few decades, there have been differing management and planning styles by whoever is in the big seat, and now there's comprehensive research to show the results of them. Syracuse University Professor Henry Lambright recently penned a report, which draws on insights from recent and past NASA Administrators to chart how leaders have passed the torch toward enabling machine and human space exploration of Mars, and its long term impact on strategic priorities for the space program. I recently had the chance to speak with him about what he found.
NASA is launching a new mission that will revolutionize how we “talk” with future missions in space, including at the Moon, Mars, and beyond. The Laser Communications Relay Demonstration is tasked with using lasers to communicate in space. It was supposed to actually launch earlier this month from Kennedy Space Center in Florida Sunday morning, however it has been scrubbed for repairs. It will be getting up there soon though. To learn more about it, I talked with Miriam Wennersten, NASA LCRD Ground Segment Manager.
It has been a pretty busy month for NASA, two major projects just got off the ground, literally. The first you may have heard of since it will help us learn how to change the course of any dangerous asteroids heading our way. The Double Asteroid Redirection Test or DART launched in late November, but has quite a ways to go to reach the one it's looking to make contact with. To learn more about the program, I spoke with Harrison Agrusa, who is a member of the DART Investigation Team and Dynamics Working Group.
We've talked a lot about emerging aerospace companies on this show, so we thought it was time to speak with one of them. York Space builds satellites to their customers likings and are in the process of expanding their headquarters in Denver, Colorado. To learn more about the company and get a little background on their work, I spoke to the companies executive chairman Charles Beames.
With more and more critical infrastructure relying on space technology, security of that tech becomes a major concern. For that to work, government agencies and major industry partners will need to work together. Enter the Space Information Sharing and Analysis Center, or Space ISAC. These kinds of offices help maintain a health relationship between the public and private sector. To learn more, I spoke with Erin Miller, who is executive director of Space ISAC.
The growth in the space industry hasn't been limited to the big companies everyone's heard of. Small businesses have also seen a growth in their bottom lines. A lot of the credit for that goes to people like Glenn Delgado. He's the head of NASA's Office of Small Business Programs. Delgado was recently recognized by the US Women's Chamber of Commerce for his commitment to supporting women owned small businesses. Since he will be retiring soon, I wanted to make sure we had the chance to speak with him about his career and what he's seen in the industry.
The amount of wildfires and major weather disasters is only increasing stretching first responders and those trying to help very thin. A new program involving space technology though looks to help disaster response team get a better sense of just how much of an area has been effected. Andre Coleman is senior data scientist the pacific northwest national laboratory. I spoke with him recently to learn more about the Rapid Analytics for Disaster Response, or RADR system.
The Air Force Research Laboratory is calling on universities to propose space missions with defense and educational purposes attached to it. It's AFRL's 11th year doing this from it's university nanosatellite program. To find out more about the challenge and program itself, I got the chance to speak to Jesse Olsen who is the manager of the university nanosatellite program and the Air Force Research Lab's Space vehicle directorate.
We began today with a bit of more nuanced conversation about the commercial space industry. The main question, have we reached a point where the government needs to play a bigger role in regulating who space companies work with? On the one hand everyone of course wants these businesses to have plenty of room to fix some of the most complex problems, but what if that comes at a cost to U.S. space superiority. My next guest tried to tackle that debate. Brent Ziarnick is Assistant Professor of Space Power and the Air Force's command and staff college.
We began today with a bit of more nuanced conversation about the commercial space industry. The main question, have we reached a point where the government needs to play a bigger role in regulating who space companies work with? On the one hand everyone of course wants these businesses to have plenty of room to fix some of the most complex problems, but what if that comes at a cost to U.S. space superiority. My next guest tried to tackle that debate. Brent Ziarnick is Assistant Professor of Space Power and the Air Force's command and staff college.
If you remember one of our first episodes which focused on a new partnership between NASA and the Federal Aviation Administration in an effort to streamline commercial space launches. Well the FAA now has another partnership aimed at making it easier on companies trying to conduct launches. It has entered a memorandum of understanding with the Space Force to recognize areas where both agencies have similar public safety standards, saving commercial space companies a ton of time. To learn more, I spoke with Brig. General Douglas Schiess, who is the director of space and cyber operations at Space Force Operations Command. We also welcomed back Wayne Montieith who is the Associate Administrator for Commercial Space Transportation at FAA.
After all the time and money is spent building and launching satellites, you hate to see it when these expensive machines break down while in orbit. New technology though could soon make it easier to repair them without having to decommission, or sometimes even sending a human repairman. To get more info, I spoke to Tom McCarthy, VP of Business Development at Motiv Space Systems.
In it's latest rendition of it's Hyperspace Challenge, this year the Air Force Research Laboratory is looking for technology that can provide the government and participating military agencies with secure, trustworthy autonomous and automated solutions for space. To find out some of the details of what exactly that means, I talked with Matthew Fetrow who is Technology Outreach Lead at AFRL and heads up the project.
You saw the big news over the summer with billionaires Richard Branson and Jeff Bezos conducting their own space race. Ultimately completing the first civilian space launches. To get a sense on what this means for the future of space tourism as well as other areas, I got a chance to talk to Dan Dumbacher, who is executive director of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics. He's also a former administrator for NASA on space exploration.
The expansion of commercial space activities is driving the need for advanced software and digital platforms that require vast amounts of data processing and computing power, and that demand can come at a cost to the environment. All that data needs to be processed which can carry a heavy footprint. To learn how perhaps things could be a little more sustainable, I was able to speak with Steven Carlini, he's vice president of innovation and data centers at Schneider electric.
To say the space industry is on the up and up is no longer a bold statement, but it helps when you have the data and research to back it up. One of those able to do so is Mehak Sarang, she's a research associate with the Harvard Business school where she's been helping investigate trends and practices of new space companies. I had the chance to pick her brain about what they've been finding.
We start today with workforce initiatives, specifically, where are space agencies, companies, and military branches going to find enough people to fill these critical jobs? Also, with all three of those groups so intermingled, how do you make sure there's enough to go around? Two organizations are hoping they may have a solution. The Space Force Association along with management services vendor LMI have teamed up to create the Space Center of Excellence. To tell us more about it I spoke with Bill Woolf, President and Founder of the Space Force Association, and Patrick Mahoney, director of the space and air force markets at LMI.
When you think of space, you don't think of it as the frontline of cyber war, but that's not the case. Many important aspects of U.S. critical infrastructure are controlled from space, and could be vulnerable to cyber attacks from malicious hackers. To help prevent that, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency has formed a Space Systems Critical Infrastructure Working Group. I twill be a mix of government and industry members that will develop strategies to minimize risks to space systems. To learn more, I spoke with Jim Platt, the chief of Strategic Defense Initiatives at the Department of Homeland Security.
The National Geospatial Intelligence Agency relies heavily on new space technologies to accomplish its mission. It can't do it all on its own though, as usual that's where the commercial side of things comes in. To help connect the two sides is David Gauthier, he's the director of Commercial and Business Operations at NGA. He's also the chair of the new Commercial Space Council, which has been set up to help recently to help assess the best way to utilize unclassified commercial satellite data. I spoke with David to learn more.
One of the biggest arenas for growth in the commercial space field is within the intelligence community. A main driver of that has been JP Parker, who is Space Executive with the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. The relatively new position is to help bridge the gap between the IC and its industry partners. We begin by discussing how space policy is now playing a bigger role when its comes to decision making for policymakers.
The Federal Aviation Administration and NASA recently entered into a memorandum of understanding with the aim of growing American commercial space transportation capabilities, including commercial crew and cargo activities. The agencies hope this will help create a framework that companies can operate in a safe and cost-effective manner, as well as streamline spaceflight standards and requirements.
To get more details, The Space Hour spoke to Wayne Monteith, FAA's Associate Administrator for commercial space transportation, and Mike Gold, who at the time was NASA's Associate Administrator for space policy and partnerships.
NASA has released its latest batch of commercial partnerships it has created to help fund new technologies. The companies involved are highly specialized in different facets of the space industry, whether it’s a 3D printing system for NASA’s Artemis lunar exploration program, testing a simple method for removing dust from planetary solar arrays, or maturing a first-stage rocket recovery system for a small satellite launch provider.
To learn more about this program, The Space Hour spoke with Jim Reuter. He’s NASA’s Associate Administrator for the Space Technology Mission Directorate at NASA Headquarters.
Mandy Vaughn has deep ties in the commercial space industry. Up until recently, Vaughn was the President and CEO for VOX Space, sister company to Virgin Orbit. She’s now an advisor for VOX, while taking time to start her own business, GXO, Inc.
Recently however, she has been appointed to serve as chair for workforce development at the National Security Space Association. She spoke to The Space Hour about how excited she is especially for this role, since creating the workers for tomorrow’s space industry is the only way to keep building on its continued momentum.