Will the Chinese version of "Starlink" lead a new era of commercial space travel?

In early August, the Qianfan polar orbit 01 satellite group was successfully launched by the Long March 6 modified rocket. According to public information, these 18 satellites are the first batch of networking satellites of my country's Qianfan constellation. They are launched in a stacking manner similar to the US Starlink satellites. They are also used for low-orbit satellite Internet services and are even called the "Chinese version of Starlink". This launch has once again sparked heated discussions about my country's commercial spaceflight.

Image source: Xinhua News Agency (Photo by Zheng Bin)

Many heroes are competing for space

In recent years, under the influence of multiple factors, the low-orbit satellite Internet industry has entered a period of rapid development. Among them, the rapid development of the US Space Exploration Company is particularly eye-catching. Since May 23, 2019, the first batch of 60 Starlink satellites were launched into space. As of August 6, 2024, Starlink has launched 184 batches, with a total of 6,851 satellites. Among them, 538 satellites failed or deorbited, 6,313 satellites were in orbit, 6,239 satellites were in operation, and 5,823 satellites were in orbit. Starlink has achieved global coverage of its business, has been approved to operate in 99 countries, has more than 3 million users, and has achieved profitability. The British OneWeb company followed closely behind. Since the launch of the first test satellite on February 27, 2019, the number of satellites in orbit has reached more than 600, and the constellation is close to deployment. Other countries including Canada, Russia, Germany, South Korea and others have also proposed their own Internet constellation plans, and nearly 30 companies in various countries plan to deploy satellite Internet constellations.

my country's low-orbit satellite internet constellation planning was launched not too late. As early as the 13th Five-Year Plan, central enterprises led by China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation and China Aerospace Science and Industry Corporation proposed their own satellite internet constellation plans. China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation plans to build a Hongyan constellation consisting of 324 low-orbit satellites. China Aerospace Science and Industry Corporation plans to carry out the Hongyun project, a global network of 156 satellites. Both companies launched their first test satellites in December 2018.

my country's early planning scale was relatively small and the construction progress was relatively slow. With the rapid changes in the situation, in view of the strategic importance of low-orbit satellite constellations, my country included satellite Internet in the category of "new infrastructure" for the first time in April 2020, and established China Satellite Network Group Co., Ltd. on April 26, 2021, responsible for the overall planning of the development of my country's satellite Internet field. Its establishment is a milestone in China's satellite communications and satellite application industries. To date, the total number of low-orbit satellites applied to the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) by my country has reached 51,300. Among them, there are three constellation plans with more than 10,000 satellites.

China Star Network's GW constellation plans to launch a total of 12,992 satellites, including 6,080 satellites in the GW-A59 sub-constellation, distributed in an extremely low orbit of 500-600 kilometers; 6,912 satellites in the GW-A2 sub-constellation, distributed in a low-Earth orbit of 1,145 kilometers. On July 9, 2023, the Long March 2C carrier rocket successfully sent the first satellite Internet technology test satellite into the predetermined orbit. Subsequently, on November 23 and December 6, my country completed two more launches of satellite Internet technology test satellites. It is expected that the GW constellation will begin mass launches this year, and 10% of the satellites will be launched before 2030. After 2030, the average annual launch will reach 1,800 satellites.

Image source: CCTV News

The "Qianfan Constellation", also known as the "G60 Constellation", was led by Shanghai Yuanxin, which was established in 2018. As early as November 2019, the first two test satellites were launched. Currently, the launch of five test satellites has been completed. The 18 satellites launched this time are the first batch of networking satellites. As a project strongly supported by the Shanghai Municipal Government, the Qianfan Constellation is expected to complete the launch of 108 satellites this year; 648 satellites will be launched by the end of 2025 to provide regional network coverage; the first phase of construction of a total of 1,296 satellites will be completed by the end of 2027 to provide global network coverage; by the end of 2030, the Internet networking of more than 15,000 low-orbit satellites will be completed.

The Honghu constellation is led by HongQing Technology, a subsidiary of Blue Arrow Aerospace, which was established in 2017. On May 24, 2024, HongQing Technology submitted a frequency and orbit application to the International Telecommunication Union, and will launch a total of 10,000 satellites on 160 orbital planes.

In addition to the above, my country also has companies including Galaxy Aerospace and Guodian Hi-Tech that are planning their own Internet satellite constellation projects. Although the current construction progress of my country's low-orbit satellite Internet is still somewhat behind the world's advanced level, it presents a trend of fierce competition and prosperity.

Connecting the world

The reason why Internet satellites have attracted so much global attention is that the practice of the Starlink project has proved the economic feasibility of giant constellations. Low-orbit satellite constellations are expected to become a new generation of global information infrastructure, and their owners will gain a monopoly advantage.

Low-orbit satellites refer to satellites that orbit between about 300 km and 2,000 km from the earth's surface. These satellites have the characteristics of low transmission delay and low link loss due to their low orbital altitude, making them very suitable for the development of satellite Internet services. According to rough calculations, if the minimum safe distance between satellites in the same layer and across layers is 50 kilometers, there are only 35 orbital shells at most, which can accommodate a total of 175,000 satellites. According to some other algorithms that take spectrum allocation into consideration, a maximum of 60,000 satellites can be accommodated.

Before the Starlink program, such a number meant that resources were unlimited. However, since the implementation of the Starlink program, more than 6,000 satellites have been launched in just 5 years, and its ultimate goal is 42,000. This has made countries feel the danger of monopolizing low-Earth orbit space resources.

Back in the days when the geosynchronous orbit dominated the satellite communications market, the world had already experienced a crisis of space resource shortage. At that time, in accordance with the principle of avoiding collisions and mutual interference, the drift range of each geosynchronous orbit satellite was limited to ±0.1°, and a maximum of 1,800 satellites could be deployed in the geosynchronous orbit. This made global satellite communications almost monopolized by oligarchs from a few developed countries.

The low-Earth orbit cannot even reserve basic rights for latecomer countries like the geosynchronous orbit. It can only be based on the principle of "first come, first served". Whoever applies first will enjoy priority use of space orbit and frequency, and the pioneers will always maintain monopoly advantages and benefits.

The 6G communication that will be coming in 2030 needs to achieve the transformation from traditional ground access to all-round and multi-dimensional access in the air, land, and sea. The network architecture needs to support multiple access methods such as space-based, air-based, and ground-based. This must also be supported by low-orbit satellite Internet to provide a wider coverage and higher communication reliability. By then, people will be able to access the Internet on airplanes, ships, and in the wilderness, and be always online. Large low-orbit constellations will become a beneficial supplement and enhancement to ground mobile communication networks. The former mainly serves dispersed customers with a large distribution area but low demand, and partially supplements the latter's services, while the latter is still the absolute backbone of the communication system.

Not to mention that Internet satellites can also open up markets in areas of the world where fixed network infrastructure is underdeveloped or even missing. At present, there are still 2.7 billion people and 70% of the geographical space in the world that have not been covered by Internet infrastructure. Moreover, even in developed countries like the United States, there are only more than 400,000 mobile communication base stations in the country, which is seriously insufficient compared with my country's 10.83 million communication base stations. Tests in Australia, New Zealand, Brazil, Mexico, France, Portugal, Germany, and the United Kingdom have shown that Starlink's network speed performance is far ahead of local wired broadband.

The application of low-orbit Internet satellite systems in the military field has great potential in battlefield reconnaissance, electronic countermeasures, anti-missile interception, and communication guarantee, thanks to its long-term presence in space. Its global high-bandwidth beam coverage can greatly enhance the informationization capabilities of the military. If equipped with relevant payloads, it can also achieve all-weather and all-day space-based reconnaissance and surveillance capabilities to accurately understand the battlefield situation. As early as 2019, the US military has continuously strengthened cooperation with SpaceX on the Starlink project. In the Russia-Ukraine conflict, the network support of Starlink satellites has greatly helped the Ukrainian army in communications and reconnaissance.

For the sake of our country's independence in the field of communications and the development of related industries, we must forge ahead, develop our own Internet constellation, and seize low-orbit satellite spectrum resources. From the perspective of national long-term development and security, given its resource scarcity and military importance, we cannot allow our satellite Internet to lag behind others.

Author: Yu Yuanhang, Senior Engineer, Beijing Institute of Aerospace Systems Engineering

Produced by: Science Popularization China

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