Abstract

HE stakes for economic impact of satellites are ever increasing, not just economically, but in their ability to affect our daily life in services of distribution of data and voice communications globallyi (Figure 1). Methods to reduce the cost of implementation of satellite systems, most notably on orbit, are valid to consider to continue to grow this market and service enterprise. Today serious investigation and commercial planning is underway to enable “servicing” of spacecraft on orbit;“servicing” in this context is repair after failure or break, rather than pre-planned upgrades or replacements. An area that has not previously been explored is the notion of insitu re-use of components from retired or un-used satellites as a means to increase economic and life efficiency.

Date

2012

Authors

David Barnhart, Brook Sullivan

Book

AIAA SPACE 2012 conference & exposition

Pages

5304