Space in Parliament | 21.4.23
G7 concern over satellite strikes | MPs debate Horizon funding | UK Space Agency partnerships | Space skills action plan | +more
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1. G7 concerns on space security
UK Foreign Minister James Cleverly was in Japan earlier this week for G7 meetings.
The G7 Non-Proliferation Directors Group statement and the foreign ministers’ communiqué both committed to “promoting the maintenance of a peaceful, safe, secure, and sustainable space environment”.
Both statements committed “not to conduct destructive direct-ascent anti-satellite missile testing” and encouraged others to “follow suit”, building on UN General Assembly resolution 77/41, adopted last December.
This comes amid growing tensions with Russia and China, both of which have tested anti-satellite missiles in the recent past.
It builds on the UK’s Integrated Review refresh in March, which “committed to making the UK a meaningful actor in space… supporting the growth of a sovereign UK space industry… and advancing norms of responsible state behaviour.”
Both statements backed the UK-led initiative for a UN Open Ended Working Group on “Reducing space threats through norms, rules and principles of responsible behaviours”.
The foreign ministers’ communiqué reiterated the “importance of addressing the issues of space debris, which is growing exponentially.”
Both statements condemned “Russia’s irresponsible nuclear rhetoric” and noted that the G7 Leaders meeting will be held in Hiroshima, where the first atomic bomb was detonated in 1945.
2. UKSA launches £20m fund for international space partnerships
On Monday, the UK Space Agency launched its £20 million International Bilateral Fund, to “strengthen the space sector’s partnerships with other space nations”, particularly the USA, Canada, Australia and Japan.
The fund was hinted at in the Government’s response to the Science and Technology Committee’s report “UK space strategy and UK satellite infrastructure”, which also spoke about partnering with Singapore as an “emerging space nation”.
The funding will come in two tranches and will be overseen by the UKSA in collaboration with the Science and Technology Facilities Council (part of UKRI).
Minister of State at the Department of Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT), George Freeman, said that working “with some of the world’s most dynamic space economies” will create “more jobs and… investment in the UK.”
Dr Paul Bate, Chief Executive of UKSA, said the fund will “unlock cross-border innovation… and strengthen the UK space sector’s relationships with strategic partners”.
The announcement came at the opening of the US Space Symposium in Colorado Springs, where Dr Bate spoke on Tuesday.
3. William Hague warns of espionage threat from space
Lord Hague, a former Tory leader, wrote in the Times on Tuesday about the recent US Pentagon leaks.
He argued that “new technology is changing espionage at great speed, and in some ways to the advantage of dictatorships”, and that useful modern intelligence exploits “open sources and secret methods that might come from space or the internet.”
The comment piece came as Lindy Cameron, head of the National Cyber Security Centre, gave the opening remarks at CYBERUK 2023 in Belfast.
Cameron spoke bluntly about the threat of “China becoming the predominant power in cyberspace”.
She also raised concerns about the “new risks” associated with satellite-based internet — a major part of the UK space industry.
4. Government co-developing skills action plan with the space sector
In response to a written question on Monday, DSIT Minister George Freeman said his Department was “working with industry to help them tackle skills shortages, for example co-developing a skills action plan with the space sector.”
The aforementioned Science and Technology Committee report called on the Government to address the skills shortage in the space sector.
In its response two weeks ago, the Government said that the UK Space Agency’s Inspiration Programme will commit over £4 million in the next two years to establish a National Space Skills Institute, and that the UKSA will commission a Space Skills Survey, due to report this summer.
That survey will be combined with “valuable insights” from the Space Skills Advisory Panel to produce a Space Skills Action Plan by the end of 2023, “which will hold all parties across government, industry, and academia accountable for actions needed to address the sector’s skills shortage.”
The Government response to the Committee report also said that UKSA is planning “an uplift and rebranding” of its youth outreach programme to be called “Space Inspirations”.
The Minister’s statement came as Prime Minister Rishi Sunak gave a speech about the importance of maths education: “We’re creating more sector specific content that can excite young people about the relevance of maths for the careers that they aspire to.” — Where better to look than the space sector?
5. MPs criticise Government plan B for Horizon science funding — but they don’t mention Copernicus
The UK Government are seeking re-entry into the EU Horizon programme —negotiations began last month following the resolution of the Windsor Framework.
The UK want a reduction in their contributions, as they have been locked-out for two years of the programme; the EU says this is acceptable for Horizon, but not for Copernicus, the EU’s earth observation programme.
The Financial Times reported last Friday that the UK’s re-entry into the Copernicus space programme is in doubt, noting that the UK space industry is split on whether Copernicus is the best option.
On Tuesday, Labour MP Paul Blomfield led a debate calling on the Government to prioritise Horizon and criticising the Pioneer prospectus, the UK’s plan B published earlier this month.
Labour MP Stephen Doughty also criticised the Government for “chronic uncertainty, making it impossible for people to invest or plan for the future”, calling for a new “target of 3% of GDP to be invested in R&D”.
On Wednesday, Dr Paul Nurse, Director of the Francis Crick Institute, told the Science and Technology Committee that not joining Horizon would “damage very important institutions” and dismissed Pioneer as an inadequate plan B
However, Professor Adam Tickell, Vice Chancellor of Birmingham University, said that the prospectus showed the UK was serious and was “politically the right thing to do”.
Sir Adrian Smith, President of the Royal Society, said he had spoken with the DSIT Secretary of State, Michelle Donelan, and he was convinced she was committed to getting a deal on Horizon.
Both the Tuesday debate and the Wednesday Committee hearing neglected Copernicus association.
6. UK contribution to JUICE mission
The UK Space Agency has invested approximately £9 million in JUICE, Europe’s first mission to Jupiter, which successfully launched last week.
Teams from the UK led the development of the magnetometer J-MAG — which will help to characterise Jupiter’s moons’ oceans and assess their potential for habitability — and contributed to the CMOS imaging sensors and the Particle Environment Package.
DSIT Secretary of State, Michelle Donelan, said, “UK tech on the spacecraft illustrates how our world class universities and research institutions are unlocking deep space exploration.”
7. Former UK Space Agency director and Artemis astronaut on space and sustainability
Ahead of the planned SpaceX launch on Monday, Dr Alice Bunn, former International Director of the UK Space Agency, spoke to the Today programme on BBC Radio 4.
Tempering enthusiasm for “high-risk, high-reward” endeavours to reach Mars, she pointed out how dependent we already are on space programmes in our every day life.
“Space has the greatest capacity to help us live sustainably on the planet right now, meeting the challenges of climate change, food shortage, global connectivity,” she said. “Companies like SpaceX have made a huge contribution to that [by] enabling reusable launch to orbits around the earth.”
On Tuesday, Today heard from Canadian astronaut Jeremy Hansen, who will be involved in the Artemis 2 moon mission, which is due to launch next year.
Hansen said: “This [mission] doesn’t solve [the world’s problems], but it is a very visual, very human reminder that we can do incredible things when we set really big goals… and we can accomplish the seemingly impossible”.
Objects in outer orbit: Space Forge, Lula, accelerators, AI, bricks, billionaires, balloons and Benjamin Franklin
UK-based company Space Forge, which develops in-space manufacturing, used the Space Symposium in Colorado this week to announce that it is launching operations in the United States, citing an appetite for manufacturing semiconductors in space and defence initiatives such as the AUKUS Alliance — on the same day NASA announced a new consortium focused on making in-space servicing, assembly, and manufacturing capabilities “a routine part of space architectures and mission lifecycles”.
President Lula of Brazil used his trip to Beijing to renew the two countries’ space co-operation and build the seventh satellite in the China-Brazil Earth Resources Satellite programme, which provides information on deforestation, drought and agriculture.
Amazon Web Services announced on Tuesday the 14 U.S. and European startups picked to join its third annual space accelerator program kicking off in May, to boost ventures with solutions for improving space sustainability — unfortunately, no UK-based companies are included.
China used an AI to control a small Earth observation satellite for 24 hours and revealed plans to 3D print bricks on the moon.
“Europe and the UK continue their decades-long struggle to manifest a space industry, in an economy that does not have the right billionaires”, Sinéad O’Sullivan of Harvard Business School’s Institute for Strategy and Competitiveness writes in the Financial Times.
On Thursday, a team from Durham University released the first images from the Superpressure Balloon-borne Imaging Telescope (SuperBIT), a telescope flown to the edge of space by a helium balloon the size of a football stadium to study dark matter.
Space balloon company Zephalto announced this week it is partnering with the French space agency to offer commercial trips to the stratosphere in a balloon in 2025 — tickets start at €120,000, with a Michelin-star chef.
On witnessing the first manned balloon flight in Paris in 1783, Benjamin Franklin commented:
It has even been fancied that in time people will keep such globes anchored in the air, to which by pullies they may draw up game to be preserved in the cool and water to be frozen when ice is wanted. And that to get money, it will be contrived to give people an extensive view of the country, by running them up in an elbow chair a mile high for a guinea, etc.
