China Unveiled Plans To Build A New Satellite Constellation At The Very Low Earth Orbit (VLEO) That Would Comprise 300 Satellites Orbiting The Globe By 2030 And Provide Ultra-fast Remote Sensing And Communication Services, With The First Satellite To Be Launched December This Year , The Global Times Learned From Developers On Wednesday. The Second Academy Of The China Aerospace Science And Industry Corp (CASIC), A State-owned Space Contractor, Announced Its Ambitious Plan At The Opening Day Of The Ninth China (International) Commercial Aerospace Forum (9th CCAF) In Wuhan, Central China’s Hubei Province On Wednesday.
The VLEO refers to orbits that are below 300 kilometers, compared with traditional satellite orbits, the dynamic environment of the VLEO is more complex so that it requires to offset the impact of the rapid decay of satellite orbital heights due to higher atmospheric resistance. Although the long-term operation of ultra-low orbit will face many technical challenges, it also offers unique value, including lower costs and higher observation resolution achieved by changing from “remote sensing” to “near observation” due to the decrease of orbital, shorter transmission delay, among other benefits, according to Zhang Nan, the chief designer of the CAISC program. VLEO technology could help reduce the weight and cost of optical payloads by 50 percent while providing the same resolution and reducing the weight and cost of Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) payloads by 40 percent. The resolution of VLEO sensing services could reach up to half of a meter, Zhang told the Global Times.
