CANCELLED: NASA OSAM-1 (Restore-L) LEO servicing

[Jim]

Shades of Psyche?

[Blackstar]

Shades of Psyche?

No. This was a technology sandbox at Goddard. I saw the early work on it at Goddard in August 2012. Attached is a photo I took during that visit. At the upper right you can see an antenna. That was a model of (I think) a NOAA weather satellite that they were supposedly going to service in GEO. It was an uncooperative target. In the lab they would maneuver a robotic arm to track the model to simulate that work in space. You can also see some test panels there near the robot arm. The arm would unscrew caps over fueling systems, pull and insert plugs, and so on. The thing that supposedly made this work unique was that the targets would not have been designed to be serviced, so the servicing spacecraft would have to do things like cut into fuel lines and so on. Seemed totally nutty. Just design the satellites to be serviced and ignore the ones that could not be serviced and that tough problem was solved, right?

I think this was called NASA's Robotic Servicing Facility. They had earmarked money, which I think was put in their budget by Senator Mikulski. This was the kind of project that just seemed to make no real sense, leading people to speculate that it was cover for an NRO research program. But we talked to some people about it and figured out that the person who ran the lab at Goddard had made a pitch to Mikulski and that's how it ended up in the budget. Classic case of somebody finding a powerful patron in Congress.

This kind of stuff happens at every NASA center--they do technology research work that they claim will have great promise, but which never gets any closer to actual deployment and seems primarily intended to keep people busy. Various NASA administrators have tried to deal with that over the years and they've never been successful at making it go away, or at integrating the work into a specific agenda.

My guess is that somehow the political support to keep this going finally ran out. Dunno why it happened now, dunno why it did not happen years ago. Mikulski has been gone a long time.

[Blackstar]

https://spacenews.com/nasa-cancels-osam-1-satellite-servicing-technology-mission/

"Bo Naasz, who leads satellite servicing capability development at NASA, acknowledged the difficulty in developing a spacecraft designed to refuel a spacecraft “not prepared” for servicing. “It’s really hard,” he said. He argued the value of OSAM-1 was to demonstrate robotic technologies that could be transferred for other applications while gaining experience in satellite servicing."

Yeah, we asked that question 12 years ago. If it's really hard, why not just not do it? Why not only service spacecraft that are designed for servicing? It just didn't make much sense. This was an earmarked project.

[jongoff]

Yeah, we asked that question 12 years ago. If it's really hard, why not just not do it? Why not only service spacecraft that are designed for servicing? It just didn't make much sense. This was an earmarked project.

At least part of the challenge is that there's a chicken and egg problem with design for serviceability -- nobody wants to design a satellite for serviceability unless there are existing servicing capabilities that they know they can count on at a reasonable price. But on the flip side, it's really challenging to get investors to put money into a satellite servicing capability when people aren't buying services and aren't designing their satellites for servicing. So, servicing unprepared clients means that you can sell services to existing customers, rather than trying to get people to buy interfaces then waiting for them to have a need.

But I think NG demonstrated that for propulsion, attaching a jetpack (ala their MEV or MEPs attached by their MRV) is way easier than trying to MacGyver your way through fill/drain valve closeouts that were never intended to be serviceable. That's the direction that most of the industry players going after providing life extension to legacy satellites have decided on (NG, Astroscale, Atomos, etc).

~Jon

[Blackstar]

But I think NG demonstrated that for propulsion, attaching a jetpack (ala their MEV or MEPs attached by their MRV) is way easier than trying to MacGyver your way through fill/drain valve closeouts that were never intended to be serviceable. That's the direction that most of the industry players going after providing life extension to legacy satellites have decided on (NG, Astroscale, Atomos, etc).

I have vague memory that we asked about refueling. We were told that satellites often have fill valves that are completely sealed after fueling and cannot be reopened. It's not like a screwcap on a car's gas tank. We asked why satellite designers couldn't simply design the fill valve with a screwcap or something similar that could be opened again. The answer was leaks, they want a system that won't leak. I could have some of that wrong, but like so many things, there are specific reasons why systems are designed the way they are, and it's not because the designers are dumb, it's because they are trying to address known problems.

But the Goddard effort in 2012 seemed like they were not serving a need, they were playing around with their technology. Maybe they reoriented the program and it made more sense. Dunno.

[DanClemmensen]

I do not understand the economics of satellite refuelling. Can someone check me on this?

A satellite in orbit can either be refuelled or replaced. If refuelled, its life is extended . If replaced, the newer satellite would presumably have a longer life than the extended life of a old satellite and would benefit from newer technology. Thus the cost of the refuelling mission needs to be considerable lower than the cost of a replacement mission.

But launch costs are now dramatically lower than they were in 2012 when OSAM-1 was being contemplated. Sure this lowers the cost of a refuelling mission, but it also lowers the cost of a replacement mission, including the cost of the replacement satellite. It seems like the potential customer base of refuelling candidates is vanishingly small.

[Blackstar]

I do not understand the economics of satellite refuelling. Can someone check me on this?

I'm sure that this has been discussed to death on another thread here somewhere. But your puzzlement is appropriate. The most common analogy I've heard is that nobody repairs a 10-year-old computer, they just replace it because the technology is so much better.

Now there are responses to that, such as extending the life of a satellite by maybe 25%-50% could be worthwhile if the servicing cost is low enough, but there are responses to that as well. In the years that companies have been looking at satellite servicing (since approximately 2010), we've now seen the development of LEO megaconstellations that have undermined the GEO comsat market that was considered the primary target for servicing, so the market case may be even weaker now than just five years ago.

The same technological advances that may make satellite servicing feasible may also make it unnecessary.

[gongora]

For a lot of satellite business, the "newer technology" argument doesn't necessarily win out.  For video broadcasting the existing technology might be just fine to continue for another decade.  Also a lot of the newer satellite designs haven't exactly proven their ability to be delivered on schedule with high reliability yet.  On the government side where new satellites can take decades and cost billions, life extension must also look pretty good for a lot of them.

[jongoff]

But I think NG demonstrated that for propulsion, attaching a jetpack (ala their MEV or MEPs attached by their MRV) is way easier than trying to MacGyver your way through fill/drain valve closeouts that were never intended to be serviceable. That's the direction that most of the industry players going after providing life extension to legacy satellites have decided on (NG, Astroscale, Atomos, etc).

I have vague memory that we asked about refueling. We were told that satellites often have fill valves that are completely sealed after fueling and cannot be reopened. It's not like a screwcap on a car's gas tank. We asked why satellite designers couldn't simply design the fill valve with a screwcap or something similar that could be opened again. The answer was leaks, they want a system that won't leak. I could have some of that wrong, but like so many things, there are specific reasons why systems are designed the way they are, and it's not because the designers are dumb, it's because they are trying to address known problems.

But the Goddard effort in 2012 seemed like they were not serving a need, they were playing around with their technology. Maybe they reoriented the program and it made more sense. Dunno.

Yeah, the traditional fill drain valve was safety wired closed, then a cap was screwed on top that was safety wired on, then another cap on top of that, also safety wired on. What Goddard created was a robot that could do that reliably. Which is pretty complicated, and impressive, but also not cheap. The MEV solution was just a lot simpler way of solving the problem. Theoretically there are some spacecraft that the jet pack would be hard to use with -- like spysats that do rapid slewing -- hard to do that with a big mass clamped to your back through a not-infinitely-stiff interface. They would've preferred unprepared refueling, but the NRO guys seemed pretty dismissive of satellite servicing. I'm not 100% convinced that they are actually right.

~Jon

[jongoff]

I do not understand the economics of satellite refuelling. Can someone check me on this?

A satellite in orbit can either be refuelled or replaced. If refuelled, its life is extended . If replaced, the newer satellite would presumably have a longer life than the extended life of a old satellite and would benefit from newer technology. Thus the cost of the refuelling mission needs to be considerable lower than the cost of a replacement mission.

But launch costs are now dramatically lower than they were in 2012 when OSAM-1 was being contemplated. Sure this lowers the cost of a refuelling mission, but it also lowers the cost of a replacement mission, including the cost of the replacement satellite. It seems like the potential customer base of refuelling candidates is vanishingly small.

And yet, several companies are finding customers who want life extension services, and the DoD is actively funding cooperative refueling missions...

You're missing a few things:

1- Especially in several popular orbits (at least some popular SSO planes and GEO, but quite possibly others), it's quite possible for a refueler to perform a large number of missions, with you only having to periodically launch refueling pods -- often to orbits you're going to anyway so they can be rideshares taking up what would otherwise be unused launch capacity.
2- The DoD is interested in refueling because right now with a non-refuelable spacecraft, any maneuvering you need (to deal with the fact that space is now a contested environment) directly reduces the life of the spacecraft, potentially dramatically. Refueling allows them to not have to throw out a still relatively new spacecraft just because hostile actions made them maneuver more often.

I could go on, but I think most people in satellite operations (other than maybe megaconstellation operators) see the value in refueling or jet pack services, either for life extension or maneuver without regret.

~Jon

[Blackstar]

https://arstechnica.com/space/2024/03/nasa-cancels-a-multibillion-dollar-satellite-servicing-demo-mission/


"A report by NASA's inspector general last year outlined the mission's delays and cost overruns. Since 2016, the space agency has requested $808 million from Congress for Restore-L and OSAM-1. Lawmakers responded by giving NASA nearly $1.5 billion to fund the development of the mission, nearly double what NASA said it wanted."


Note how that is consistent with what I posted above, that this project had earmarked money from Congress.

[jongoff]

https://arstechnica.com/space/2024/03/nasa-cancels-a-multibillion-dollar-satellite-servicing-demo-mission/


"A report by NASA's inspector general last year outlined the mission's delays and cost overruns. Since 2016, the space agency has requested $808 million from Congress for Restore-L and OSAM-1. Lawmakers responded by giving NASA nearly $1.5 billion to fund the development of the mission, nearly double what NASA said it wanted."


Note how that is consistent with what I posted above, that this project had earmarked money from Congress.

Absolutely. If Mikulski hadn't been the Senator from the same state as Goddard, there's zero chance it would've gotten the level of support it did. The thing that surprised me is how much it kept getting funding even after Mikulski retired.

~Jon

[Blackstar]

Absolutely. If Mikulski hadn't been the Senator from the same state as Goddard, there's zero chance it would've gotten the level of support it did. The thing that surprised me is how much it kept getting funding even after Mikulski retired.

Yes, I vaguely remember that when we discussed this back in 2012 (we were doing a review of NASA's strategic direction), somebody said that the person who ran that lab at Goddard was just really good at selling his work to Congress. And I vaguely remember that the center director at the time was unhappy about that, because he didn't have control over what work his center did and did not do.

It's something that you discover when you get involved with how NASA actually works, that there are always centers and even individual labs within centers that can make end runs around the leadership.

As to how they continued getting money after Mikulski left, I am as puzzled as you.

As a sidenote, DART at APL was something similar. If you look at the public record (Aviation Week, Space News, any other public sources) you will be hard-pressed to find out how and why that mission happened. But that too was an earmarked mission where somebody managed to get Congress on board even though NASA leadership didn't want it to happen. So these things are not uncommon.

[Comga]

Absolutely. If Mikulski hadn't been the Senator from the same state as Goddard, there's zero chance it would've gotten the level of support it did. The thing that surprised me is how much it kept getting funding even after Mikulski retired.

Yes, I vaguely remember that when we discussed this back in 2012 (we were doing a review of NASA's strategic direction), somebody said that the person who ran that lab at Goddard was just really good at selling his work to Congress. And I vaguely remember that the center director at the time was unhappy about that, because he didn't have control over what work his center did and did not do.

It's something that you discover when you get involved with how NASA actually works, that there are always centers and even individual labs within centers that can make end runs around the leadership.

As to how they continued getting money after Mikulski left, I am as puzzled as you.

As a sidenote, DART at APL was something similar. If you look at the public record (Aviation Week, Space News, any other public sources) you will be hard-pressed to find out how and why that mission happened. But that too was an earmarked mission where somebody managed to get Congress on board even though NASA leadership didn't want it to happen. So these things are not uncommon.

Frank Cepollina?

Great accomplishments, widely respected, repeatedly awarded, indefatigable.  Made his name on the Hubble servicing missions, which were technical triumphs for the Shuttle program.

OTOH a former colleague who worked with/for him for years had a bumper sticker tacked to a bulletin board that poked fun at “Cepi” (and which I will not quote because it really wasn’t nice)

But his arguments for satellite servicing were economic, and flawed. They only worked if the cost of the Shuttle was discounted.  Those arguments got even worse over time.  Plus much of the successful servicing technology, mostly Hubble, was done at contractors, Ball Aerospace predominantly.  Bringing the work in house to GSFC undid that dynamic.

[Emmettvonbrown]

Cepollina - yes. Heard about this name doing my research. This harcks back to Solar Max successfull repair back in the day: the so-called MMS bus: MultiMission Spacecraft. Custom designed for shuttle servicing, like Hubble except multiple medium-size satellites.

[jimvela]

Plus much of the successful servicing technology, mostly Hubble, was done at contractors, Ball Aerospace predominantly.  Bringing the work in house to GSFC undid that dynamic.

This is very true.  It was a real privilege to see the Hubble servicing work my colleagues did at Ball.
They also did a bunch of preliminary work for an autonomous servicing mission after the final STS servicing mission.

I can't resist a little anecdote. 

I happened to be present when a former Ball president was giving a tour to a group from NASA and NOAA in the Ball Fisher manufacturing facility.

They stopped at a picture of the Hubble, and this now former president of Ball (ex- GFSC ) fumbled a description of the work Ball did as well as the activities of the astronauts who flew the mission.  There was a bit of an awkward pause at one point, and one of the NOAA / Former NASA folks responded with (I'll paraphrase.)

"I know a lot about that mission.  I was an astronaut assigned to work on Hubble servicing while at NASA."

(My perception is that she was very much NOT impressed with the fellow's fumbling.)

I'm very proud to have charged a few hundreds of hours in very minor roles supporting the Hubble servicing work at Ball.

[Blackstar]

https://www.airuniversity.af.edu/CASI/Display/Article/3712146/pla-on-orbit-satellite-logistics/


PLA On-Orbit Satellite Logistics

    Published March 18, 2024
    China Aerospace Studies Institute

The People’s Liberation Army (PLA) is preparing its satellite operators to perform on-orbit satellite refueling, for peacetime and wartime space logistics.  They are also already integrating lessons learned into corresponding military doctrine and training tools.  To further ready a PLA in-space logistics force, a Chinese defense contractor has indicated, for the last six years, that it has a mission ready satellite refueler for geosynchronous Earth orbit (GEO).  With more clarity on the PLA’s requirements for satellite logistics, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has approved new commercial players to enter the field to provide, not only technology, but also frameworks to shape international norms.  These developments have largely gone unnoticed, perhaps because of an overemphasis on a low probability satellite grappling event.








pdf is attached.

[Blackstar]

https://spacenews.com/on-orbit-servicing-mission-planned-for-military-satellite-in-2025/

[Bean Kenobi]

https://spacenews.com/on-orbit-servicing-mission-planned-for-military-satellite-in-2025/

Wrong thread : it's MRV mission 1.

Here : https://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=55859.msg2343851#msg2343851

[StraumliBlight]

Senate spending bill pushes back on proposed NASA mission cuts

While the bill broadly supports the administration’s request, it does criticize some decisions by NASA to cancel or cut missions. That includes the On-Orbit Servicing, Assembly and Manufacturing (OSAM) 1 mission to demonstrate satellite servicing technologies that NASA announced in March its intent to cancel. NASA requested $11 million for OSAM-1 in 2025 to close out the project.

The Senate report, though, directs NASA to spend up to $174.5 million on OSAM-1 in 2025, pending a report requested by the 2024 appropriations bill on how the mission can meet a 2026 launch. The Senate language seeks a new report not later than 30 days after the final bill is enacted on those plans, as well as the potential for cost-sharing with the Defense Department and use of the spacecraft in an extended mission for national security or commercial applications.