The strategic significance of very low Earth orbit (VLEO) is growing – especially for national security missions. While low-Earth and geosynchronous orbits are becoming increasingly congested and contested, spacecraft in VLEO operate in a relatively unimpaired environment.
Redwire is a worldwide leader in developing and providing VLEO capabilities. With SabreSat, Redwire’s American-built VLEO platform, and Phantom, our European VLEO platform, Redwire is leading the way to full-scale operations for global security, scientific discovery, and environmental stewardship. Learn more about the growing interest in VLEO, along with its advantages and challenges, from Spence Wise, Redwire’s Vice President of Missions and Platforms, and Juan Pablo Ramos, Redwire Space Europe’s Business Development Manager for Platforms and Missions, in the Q&A below.
Why is there a growing interest in VLEO?
Spence: VLEO has actually been an orbit of interest since the 1960’s when the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO) began operating the CORONA program, which provided overhead imaging of earth from VLEO. Admittedly, higher orbits have seen the lion’s share of funding since then. The resurgence of VLEO is being driven by new propulsion technologies that can overcome drag for long durations. Being twice as close to Earth greatly improves the quality of photographs, even with non-exquisite cameras, similar to how iPhone pictures are better when you are closer to the object and don’t need to zoom in.
Juan Pablo: VLEO offers great advantages for both remote sensing and telecommunication applications. Smaller systems can be flown to achieve the same performance as satellites flying at higher altitudes. The presence of drag is both a challenge and a key opportunity. Specifically, drag helps satellites in VLEO to de-orbit faster and therefore remain naturally compliant with recent and future space debris mitigation guidelines. This allows VLEO satellites actively contributors to the long-term sustainability of space without compromising in other areas like satellite size, mass or performance.
What role do you see VLEO playing in national security?
Spence: Overhead imagery is an obvious focus area, particularly with the NRO doing more with commercial imagery providers through their commercial space office.
Juan Pablo: High-speed, low-latency communications and remote sensing present the lion’s share of the interest in VLEO. Likewise, VLEO presents an ideal “vantage point” for applications like space-based situational awareness. By flying “under” most active satellites, a satellite can emulate the approach taken by ground-based systems while also actively tracking debris and unidentified objects for longer periods of time and more often from orbit.
What are some of the challenges faced by operating in VLEO?
Spence: Drag from sparse gas present at these lower altitudes, power generation, and thermal management are all challenges that Redwire addresses leveraging our broad space component heritage.
Juan Pablo: Drag is a primary challenge, not just in terms of its effects on orbit decay rate but also around aspects such as aerostability and control. The atmospheric composition of VLEO also presents important considerations in terms of material ablation and integrity of elements directly exposed to the VLEO environment. Our team continues to advance our ability to simulate and optimize our platform design to circumvent these and other key challenges presented by this relatively unexplored frontier.
How do Redwire’s SabreSat and Phantom platforms fit into the emerging VLEO landscape?
Spence: SabreSat is leading the way advancing innovative capabilities that necessary to make VLEO a persistent regime. In parallel, we are building out the cutting-edge simulation capabilities that allow us to optimize full constellations of VLEO spacecraft for our customers.
Juan Pablo: Phantom leads the way in terms of enabling truly operational capability through a modular platform design optimized for sustained operations in VLEO.
Where do you see VLEO going in the next 5 years?
Spence: I expect we’ll see strong progress across enabling technology areas and that we’ll be transitioning to deploying the first satellites in operational constellations for the U.S. Government and select commercial markets.
Juan Pablo: I expect to see an increasing adoption of VLEO as an operational domain motivated by its key performance, operations, and sustainability benefits. Despite its many challenges, this environment presents a great deal of opportunities which are increasingly difficult to ignore as enabling technologies continue to become more accessible and the problem of space debris proliferation continues to unravel.
Spence Wise is Senior Vice President, Missions and Platforms at Redwire. Spence has spent more than 15 years developing, commercializing, and advocating for innovative space technologies and architectures to support critical national security missions.
Juan Pablo has more than 10 years of experience in the aerospace sector, with a particular focus on the design and development of new satellite systems and missions from Very Low Earth Orbit to Deep space exploration.
Learn more about the impact of VLEO in the video below:
