Tiangong space station12/17/2023 ![]() ![]() Most countries either have reusable rockets or try to dispose of their rocket bodies by reserving some fuel to allow for a controlled descent through the atmosphere. And like other powers, China must now confront a problem: how to take out the garbage that goes along with maintaining a space station. The completion of Tiangong shows that China is no longer a rising player in space-it’s now one of a few powers. The head of Roscosmos, the Russian space agency, announced earlier this year that it would launch modules for its own new station as early as 2028-although that’s unlikely to happen. Russia is expected to play no major role with Tiangong. ![]() (In the interim, private company Axiom Space is developing a module for the ISS.) NASA and its partners also plan to assemble a lunar space station called Gateway later this decade as part of the Artemis moon program. To replace the ISS, NASA is investing in three possible plans for commercial space stations that would launch as soon as the late 2020s. That’s a significant departure from Cold War precedent, when NASA and its Soviet counterparts occasionally worked together despite political differences. It prevents US agencies from working with Chinese companies and agencies due to perceived national security concerns. The agency is prohibited from collaborating by what's commonly called the Wolf Amendment, which Congress passed in 2011. Their focus will likely be to show Chinese leadership and that they don’t need to depend on other nations’ space agencies and companies. ![]() But unlike the ISS, which continually depends on the cooperation and support of its partners, China has different priorities for Tiangong, says Marissa Herron, a space policy researcher at Rand and a colleague of Osburg’s. Chinese commercial partners may also get involved by launching cargo missions. It already has a Saudi Arabian experiment on board, and researchers from European institutions and other countries have proposed experiments on a wide range of topics, from gamma-ray bursts to space medicine and atomic clocks. (The ISS, which has a truss structure and huge solar arrays, underwent multiple expansions, though it also took many years and launches to put it all together.)Īs with the ISS, China’s station will offer some opportunities for partnerships, through which other countries can send experiments, and perhaps later also astronauts, to Tiangong. Tiangong’s T shape may limit expansion options, and so will other factors like the need to manage power usage and remove waste heat. The space program may also attach a robotic telescope to it in the future, although the station itself is not likely to grow much bigger, says Osburg. You may well end up with only one orbiting space station-the Chinese one,” says Fabio Tronchetti, a space law professor at Beihang University in Beijing and the University of Mississippi. The International Space Station won’t run for much longer. ![]() (China flew two Tiangong experimental prototypes between 20, but they are no longer orbiting.) “This is important for the Chinese space program. It’s also the first long-term neighbor the International Space Station has had since Russia’s Mir station was deorbited in 2001. It’s a significant accomplishment for China’s rapidly growing space program, which plans to build a base on the moon, deploy a lunar rover, and send new landers and orbiters to Mars. It currently hosts commander Chen Dong and two other astronauts. The 18-meter lab module, named Mengtian (meaning “dreaming of the heavens”), enables a range of scientific experiments and now allows the station to accommodate up to six people at a time. On October 31, China launched the final piece of its new Tiangong space station, completing its construction. The size of the neighborhood in low Earth orbit has now officially doubled. ![]()
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