KSAT plans ground network for lunar communications
If you fly to Longyearbyen, you will see a large network of 100 antennas above the town. This installation belongs to Kongsberg Satellite Services, or KSAT, a Norwegian company that provides satellite communications technology to various partners. Among them is NASA, which wants to get back on the moon with its Artemis program. KSAT has now unveiled a project to improve communications for these missions. But this is just the beginning of an even bigger idea.
After discovering frozen water in a crater at the moon’s south pole, construction of a future lunar base appears to be taking giant steps forward. And KSAT wants to be actively involved in this. A ground network of 20m-class antennas that will provide communications with future lunar missions and even a planned lunar base (or bases) is KSAT CEO Rolf Skatteboe’s vision. To this end, an entire network of such new antennas is to be built on Earth over the next two to three years. These will then be in communication with several satellites orbiting the moon, allowing a base on the lunar south pole to communicate with Earth. The CEO unveiled these plans as part of Silicon Valley Space Week.
Since January 2022, KSAT has been part of a project to ensure connectivity with lunar missions and bases. More than 100 lunar missions are expected to be launched in the coming years, according to expert reports, a lucrative market for a communications company like KSAT. “We see the emerging lunar and cislunar markets as areas where KSAT´s experience can be used to establish an integrated and cost-effective ground station service offering beyond LEO and through near-space orbits,” says Arnulf Kjeldsen, Executive Vice President Strategies and Technologies at KSAT. “Lunar communications is a natural next step for us.” But this will require building new satellite antennas at a wide variety of locations on Earth that can meet the difficult demands of maintaining a continuous link with the moon and spacecraft during lunar missions. “The requirements from future missions demanding 24/7 coverage of the Moon with the highest reliability and support of big data transfers with use of specific frequencies, motivated KSAT to undertake the challenge in leading the way in the commercial lunar network ground stations development by building dedicated 20m-class antennas,” explains Rolf Skatteboe. Therefore, his company will make large investments so that the project can be realized in the next two to three years.
The existing 25 sites with the 260 antennas, 100 of which are located above Svalbard alone, will continue to provide the existing services. This is because the Svalbard site in particular offers a unique advantage, namely complete coverage of satellite communications in the uppermost part of the northern hemisphere with satellites in low orbits. So from here, most satellites can be targeted to communicate with them and send and receive data. The individual antennas connect to individual satellites or to entire missions. KSAT’s customers on Svalbard include space agencies NASA and ESA, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration NOAA, the Japanese and German aerospace authorities, and private companies such as Iridium. The data that is sent and received runs from the station via fiber optic cable to the mainland and to the end customers. KSAT also operates an antenna site in Antarctica at the Norwegian station, which together with Punta Arenas offers the same in the Southern Hemisphere. By covering the two polar regions, the step to the next level, namely to the south pole of the moon, therefore seems almost logical.
Dr Michael Wenger, PolarJournal
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