Space Sustainability

ESA selected satellite servicing and long-term orbital sustainability company Astroscale, to lead a collision avoidance study, part of the Collision Risk Estimation and Automated Mitigation (CREAM) activities in ESA’s Space Safety Programme, Astroscale announced. The CREAM 2 study, valued at €800,000, will recommend late commanding paths to save time and resources from unnecessary manoeuvres.

Space Cafe WebTalk “33 minutes with Simonetta Di Pippo” on the topic of “International Women's Day 2022 - A Conversation on Women in Space,” took place on 8th March interviewing UNOOSA Director, Simonetta Di Pippo. Ms Di Pippo maintains responsibility for the Office's management and administration,

House and Senate appropriators published the omnibus spending bill for fiscal year 2022, offering US $24 billion to NASA. The amount is US $760 million less than what the agency requested. The largest cut is in the space technology directorate, US $1.1 billion instead of the sought US $1.425 billion.

The United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs (UNOOSA) signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the European Union Agency for the Space Programme (EUSPA) to support United Nations Member States, UNOOSA said. The cooperation will help to make the benefits of space technologies available to everyone on a global scale.

The Institute of Air and Space Law at McGill University is invigorating its work on the McGill Encyclopedia of International Space Law (MESIL), the university said. The McGill Encyclopedia was first announced in November 2020. Its aim is to be the go-to authoritative, peer-reviewed and reliable online resource on international space law. 

Space4Impact, EPFL’s Space Center eSpace, E2MC Ventures, and Space Innovation joined forces to launch an online course on the New Space Economy, hosted on edX, Space4Impact announced. The program is already available as a free EPFLx course.  There are over 30 video lectures accessible for those who want to learn.

Bahrain became the second Arab country to sign the Artemis Accords, an international agreement outlining the peaceful and responsible exploration of the Moon and space in general. The announcement was made during Crown Prince Salman bin Hamad's visit to the US last week.

A rogue 3-ton rocket stage crashed into the far side of the Moon after spending seven years in space. The collision was out of view for ground-based telescopes and NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter was not in position to record the event either. Scientific American suggests that the impact crater will be near the naturally formed 570 km wide Hertzsprung Crater. 

During this week’s Space Café, SpaceWatch.Global Publisher Torsten Kriening caught up with Emmanuelle David, the Executive Manager of EPFL Space Center (eSpace) and Dr Minoo Rathnasabapathy, a Research Engineer within the Space Enabled Research Group at the MIT Media Lab.

The first-ever Space Café Austria took place on Thursday, 24th of February. Guest Andrea Kleinsasser, Deputy Head of the Department of Space Affairs at the Federal Ministry of Climate Action, Environment, Energy, Mobility, Innovation and Technology, shared her personal experience and insight outside of her work for the government into Austria’s role and engagement at UN COPUOS.