Will pLEO become a nation-state obsession?
In years past, small countries often financed geostationary satellites under the auspices of national sovereignty. Commercial satellite operators found themselves competing with new state players for whom a commercial business case seemed irrelevant, leading to the term “PrideSats,” as national pride seemed to be the biggest motivator (think Bangabandhu-1 for Bangladesh, or Tupak Katari 1 for Bolivia). In 2024, will Low Earth Orbit (LEO) constellations become the new PrideSats?
A bellwether for this behavior is Taiwan, which has longstanding trust issues with Elon Musk over his opinions on and connections to China, and has consequently rejected Starlink. The island of 23 million people is now actively contemplating a domestic LEO constellation. If Taiwan pushes forward with a constellation, it could encourage other countries to follow suit.
To date it’s been the typical suspects deploying or planning government LEO broadband constellations – The U.S., the EU, Russia and China. Can smaller nations follow suit? We find this will be challenging for the following reasons:
• Coverage physics. LEO constellations inherently require dozens to hundreds of satellites to ensure consistent coverage. Nations that build LEO networks need a global, or at the very least, a large regional use case as justification, otherwise they will spend large amounts for capacity that won’t get used.
• Limited orbital real estate. LEO stretches from 200-2,000km, but many of the ideal orbits are already claimed or populated by Starlink, Amazon, SDA, OneWeb and Telesat. What’s left is mainly either vLEO, where atmospheric ablation becomes an issue, orbits between Starlink and SDA, where large debris is a threat, or above OneWeb, where radiation levels climb. Put simply, there is not enough room in LEO for dozens of proliferated constellations (unless operators become extremely adept at avoiding collisions and/or trust each other enough to allow for orbits closer than what operators, and perhaps regulators, tolerate today).
• High cost barriers. While GEO PrideSats were expensive, $200-300M could get a satellite built, launched and operated. For LEO constellations, that funding is the starting point. Unless nations are prepared to spend billions, potentially on a recurring basis, the fiscal requirements will be too much.
These high barriers could benefit existing commercial LEO operators. Already Taiwan is using OneWeb for emergency communications, and South Korea, through Hanwha’s investment in OneWeb, has obtained a degree of sovereign LEO capability. Israel’s Ministry of Communications said May 7 it is buying Starlink services and testing OneWeb with domestic GEO operator Spacecom.
Quilty Space won’t be surprised to see a handful of nations attempt sovereign LEO constellations, but the more likely outcome is nations banding together (like the E.U.’s IRIS2), buying into existing LEOs (Hanwha/OneWeb), or accepting that sovereign connectivity can come from higher orbits like MEO or GEO.
SOURCE: https://edition.cnn.com/2024/05/04/asia/taiwan-starlink-intl-hnk/index.html