{"id":10281,"date":"2023-10-19T23:21:45","date_gmt":"2023-10-19T15:21:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-productionenv-bjg9h2g2bgg5b8aa.southeastasia-01.azurewebsites.net\/news\/commercial-space-companies-say-cut-red-tape-or-u-s-will-lose-its-lead-in-spaceflight\/"},"modified":"2023-10-19T23:21:45","modified_gmt":"2023-10-19T15:21:45","slug":"commercial-space-companies-say-cut-red-tape-or-u-s-will-lose-its-lead-in-spaceflight","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/news\/commercial-space-companies-say-cut-red-tape-or-u-s-will-lose-its-lead-in-spaceflight\/","title":{"rendered":"Commercial space companies say cut red tape or U.S. will lose its lead in spaceflight"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Blue Origin\u2019s New Shepard rocket lifts off from West Texas on Thursday. Credit: Blue Origin<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The three companies who have flown people to space and back, Blue Origin, SpaceX and Virgin Galactic, joined two experts at a Congressional hearing to press for regulatory improvements, warning the U.S. risks losing its lead in spaceflight.<\/p>\n

The 1.5-hour-long hearing before the U.S. Senate Subcommittee on Space and Science was mainly focused on a regulatory framework called \u201cPart 450,\u201d which was designed to help streamline the process of issuing launch licenses under the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) Office of Commercial Space Transportation, which goes by the acronym AST.<\/p>\n

The five witnesses argued that not only is the current regulatory framework not achieving its ideal goals, but it is stifling growth and innovation in the commercial launch market.<\/p>\n

\u201cI want to state clearly that AST is an outstanding and important organization that needs more resources and immediate regulatory direction from Congress,\u201d said Bill Gerstenmaier, SpaceX\u2019s Vice President of Build and Flight Reliability in his opening remarks. \u201cAST\u2019s role is critical to enabling safe space transportation, but we\u2019re at a breaking point.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cLicensing, including environmental approval, often takes longer than rocket development. This should never happen and it\u2019s only getting worse,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

Currently, SpaceX is working through the regulatory review process in order to get a launch license modification for a second test flight of its Starship rocket. However, certain upgrades made since the first launch are still being reviewed by both the FAA and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS).<\/p>\n

In his written statement, Gerstenmaier said that Starship has been ready to fly since mid-September and SpaceX is prepared to conduct the second integrated test flight \u201cas soon as the end of this month,\u201d but they have to wait until the regulatory process is concluded.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn order to successfully execute on its commitments, SpaceX plans to conduct at least two more Starship flights this year, with a higher flight rate in 2024 and beyond, pus and estimated 30 more Falcon flights for various customers, including the U.S. Government, before the end of the year,\u201d he wrote. \u201cThe test and flight cadence across multiple vehicle families for SpaceX alone is most certainly not possible if Congress does not provide AST with additional resources, direction, and legislative guidance.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Artist\u2019s concept of a Starship on the moon. Credit: SpaceX<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Starship also has great importance to NASA, since it was selected as the Human Landing System (HLS) vehicle to bring humans to the surface of the Moon on the Artemis 3 and 4 missions.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese delays may seem small in the big scheme of things, but a continuous delay of each and every test flight just adds up and eventually, we\u2019ll lose our lead and we\u2019ll see China land on the Moon before we do,\u201d Gerstenmaier said.<\/p>\n

When asked by Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) about the timeline for the HLS version of Starship, Gerstenmaier said it was hard to pin that down.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe burden should be put on us as a private company, put on SpaceX. Let us develop at the fastest pace,\u201d Gerstenmaier said. \u201cWe should be the ones that are driving the development, not being driven by regulatory oversight.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Italian Air Force Col. Walter Villadei unfurls an Italian flag as he and the crew enjoy a few minutes of weightlessness. Image: Virgin Galactic.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The representatives from Blue Origin and Virgin Galactic, which both fly suborbital, crewed missions, agreed with SpaceX that regulation for human spaceflight should ensure safety for passengers and those who work on the program, adding that the so-called learning period before more regulations are added should not be allowed to expire on Jan. 1, 2024.<\/p>\n

That grace period was established through the Commercial Space Launch Amendments Act of 2004 has been extended a handful of times. According to the FAA, it prohibits the agency from \u201cregulating the safety of individuals on board\u201d commercial spacecraft.<\/p>\n

Caryn Schenewerk, the president of CS Consulting and a former employee of both SpaceX and Relativity Space, told the subcommittee that current FAA regulations do in fact protect crew members as part of the vehicle\u2019s flight safety team and passengers have protections via their \u201ctraining and acceptance of risk.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cGiven the limited number of private human spaceflights, three orbital and ten suborbital, the ongoing opportunities for thoughtful engagement between the FAA and industry, as the FAA\u2019s challenges with implementing its existing regulations, the original premise underpinning the learning period still appears solid,\u201d Schenewerk said.<\/p>\n

Despite it being the focus of much of Wednesday\u2019s hearing, the FAA wasn\u2019t invited to participate in the discussion.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe FAA did not receive an invitation to testify at the hearing,\u201d an FAA spokesperson said in a statement to Spaceflight Now.<\/p>\n

In his comments to the subcommittee, Phil Joyce, Blue Origin\u2019s senior vice president of the New Shepard Business Unit, offered three points of suggestion to modify the FAA\u2019s regulation over the commercial space sector:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Create a more streamlined process to keep pace with industry<\/li>\n
  2. Have Congress grant the FAA sufficient resources to keep up with licensing<\/li>\n
  3. Allow the FAA more time to make needed adjustments by extending the learning period<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    \u201cBeyond the FAA, Congress should think broadly about how to build a framework for mission authorization. This should be correctly scoped to draw clear boundaries between agencies,\u201d Joyce said. \u201cWe also recommend Congress designate a single agency as the hub for authorization of commercial space activity.\u201d<\/p>\n

    Sirisha Bandla, Virgin Galactic\u2019s vice president of Government Affairs and Research, said an extension of at least eight years would be their recommendation.<\/p>\n

    \u201cI completely agree that we should not be moving the goalposts just to move the goalposts, but now\u2019s the time because we have data, we have operators to discuss what that framework looks like. That\u2019s the important part,\u201d Bandla said. \u201cThe learning period should not lapse without having a blueprint for what a safety framework looks like for human spaceflight so that we can look at what areas need to be regulated, what are the consequences of that, making sure it\u2019s still light touch to allow innovation and also, importantly, that the FAA\u2019s resourced with the funds and expertise to carry out that framework.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Blue Origin\u2019s New Shepard rocket lifts off from West Texas on Thursday. Credit: Blue Origin The three companies who have flown people to space and back, Blue Origin, SpaceX and Virgin Galactic, joined two experts at a Congressional hearing to press for regulatory improvements, warning the U.S. risks losing its lead in spaceflight. The 1.5-hour-long […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[509,386,318,316,492],"class_list":["post-10281","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-blue-origin","tag-congress","tag-faa","tag-spacex","tag-virgin-galactic"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10281"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10281"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10281\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10281"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10281"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10281"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}