On-orbit servicing (OOS) presents new opportunities for refueling, inspection, repair, maintenance, and upgrade of spacecraft (s/c). OOS is a significant area of need for future space growth, enabled by the maturation of technology and the economic prospects. This congestion is leading s/c operators to explore how they can leverage OOS. OOS missions for s/c in geostationary orbit (GEO) are currently underway. This is being driven by the closure of the business case for refueling long lived monolithic chemically propelled GEO assets. However, there are currently no plans for OOS of low-earth orbit (LEO) s/c, aside from technology demonstrations, because of their shorter design life and lower cost. It will become particularly important to enable the servicing of LEO s/c as the industry shifts its focus towards LEO. Designing OOS systems for LEO constellations differs from that of GEO based systems, this difference is attributed to LEO's proliferation of satellites, environmental effects (J2 nodal precession, drag), and different constellation patterns. Satellite constellations in LEO are becoming more distributed due to increased access, distributed risk, flexibility, and cost. OOS of s/c may enable the reduction of requirements on subsystems such as safety and the need for redundancy. These requirement reductions will enable lower risks, lower costs, and increased system resilience. This paper analyzes the benefits of OOS in proliferated LEO constellations. Several OOS system architectures are modeled; in each system architecture the model will vary qualities such as number of servicers, altitudes, and orbital maneuvers. The objective of the model will be to optimize for cost, time, and utility to generate a tradespace for an OOS system architecture.
On-orbit servicing (OOS) presents new opportunities for refueling, inspection, repair, maintenance, and upgrade of spacecraft (s/c). OOS is a significant area of need for future space growth, enabled by the maturation of technology and the economic prospects. This congestion is leading s/c operators to explore how they can leverage OOS. OOS missions for s/c in geostationary orbit (GEO) are currently underway. This is being driven by the closure of the business case for refueling long lived monolithic chemically propelled GEO assets. However, there are currently no plans for OOS of low-earth orbit (LEO) s/c, aside from technology demonstrations, because of their shorter design life and lower cost. It will become particularly important to enable the servicing of LEO s/c as the industry shifts its focus towards LEO. Designing OOS systems for LEO constellations differs from that of GEO based systems, this difference is attributed to LEO's proliferation of satellites, environmental effects (J2 nodal precession, drag), and different constellation patterns. Satellite constellations in LEO are becoming more distributed due to increased access, distributed risk, flexibility, and cost. OOS of s/c may enable the reduction of requirements on subsystems such as safety and the need for redundancy. These requirement reductions will enable lower risks, lower costs, and increased system resilience. This paper analyzes the benefits of OOS in proliferated LEO constellations. Several OOS system architectures are modeled in various scenarios; in each system architecture the model will vary qualities such as mass, altitudes, time, propulsion system, maneuver, and type of service. The objective of the model will be to optimize for cost, time, and utility to generate a tradespace for an OOS system architecture. OOS provides higher utility over the comparative alternative of using spare satellites in some scenarios. The utility of OOS provides even more utility when considering failure rates of satellites and allowing for an increase in failure rates when adopting an OOS system.
The field of on-orbit servicing (OOS) has matured to a viable industry through the progression of many technological milestones over the last several decades. Starting from the first orbital rendezvous of Gemini 6 in 1965 to Northrop Grumman's Mission Extension Vehicle successful reposition of Intelsat 901 in 2020, the scientific and engineering achievements have enabled a promising new capability in space. This OOS capability enables higher flexibility, risk reduction, and new expanded system architectures. More recently, the space industry is rapidly deploying a high number of satellites in proliferated low-earth orbit (LEO) constellations at orders of magnitude not seen before. This paper will review enabling technologies, upcoming OOS programs, emerging proliferated constellations, and orbital environmental conditions that enable OOS for potential future clients in LEO. These environmental conditions consist of LEO orbit sensitivities, orbital maneuvers, J2 earth oblateness, and propulsion considerations.
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