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SpaceX Wants Permission To Test Satellite Internet
An anonymous reader writes: SpaceX has filed documents with the FCC asking for permission to begin testing a project to serve internet access from space. "The plan calls for launching a constellation of 4,000 small and cheap satellites that would beam high-speed Internet signals to all parts of the globe, including its most remote regions." This follows news that Facebook and Google had stepped back their efforts in that arena. SpaceX could prove to be a better fit for the project, given that they need only rely on themselves for launching satellites into orbit. "The satellites would be deployed from one of SpaceX's rockets, the Falcon 9. Once in orbit, the satellites would connect to ground stations at three West Coast facilities. The purpose of the tests is to see whether the antenna technology used on the satellites will be able to deliver high-speed Internet to the ground without hiccups."
4k more thing sto collide with!
How many more companies need to try this and fail miserably? It's been tried time after time, and each time the company either goes bankrupt of give up. The magical touch of Musk isn't going to change reality - internet access is fucking expensive, no matter who builds it or how.
Just what we need. More junk in space.
Looks like you may have a new competitor soon.
SJW's don't eliminate discrimination. They just expropriate it for themselves.
Exede and Hughesnet already serve internet from satellites, so we need more? Maybe this one will be better?
> FCC claim of authority mumble mumble so called "Net Neutrality"
Ah, a Big Telco lobbyist in sheep's clothing, I assume?
Sounds like illumination for a bistatic radar, or a way to perform mass interception of traffic.
Probably both given the source of funding...
I don't think FCC has jurisdiction over "all parts of the globe"
Lots of Sat's are up that serve the Internet. FCC claim of authority was nullified when they tried to claim authority over the internet with their so called "Net Neutrality". IGNORE the FCC.
The FCC still regulates the radio spectrum though, of course only in the USA.
Here's the fcc application
https://apps.fcc.gov/oetcf/els/reports/442_Print.cfm?mode=current&application_seq=66082&license_seq=66693
Two test satellites at 625km.
Tx power 4 watts versus ERP 1.1Kw
From those numbers, could one figure out the antenna footprint size on the surface?
That might say if it really takes 4k birds to cover the earth.
Since these are low orbit, it means that each satellite crosses and provides internet for multiple countries. One EMP would degrade the whole global network instead of affecting one region.
Google and facebook have realized that some problems are not (economically) surmountable.
The problems are the following: The closer you fly your satelite to the earth, the more resistance it has from the atmosphere. The density of the atmosphere reduces by a factor of 100 each 46 km of height. So at "100km", you have about 10000 times less air than at the surface. Some people call that space. At 200km the air pressure is about 100 million times less than what it is over here. That is enough to have a reasonable decay rate of weeks/months/years. "skylab" came down after a few decades, right?
The further away you fly your satellites, the longer the travel times will be for the signals. This equates to ping-times. Hmm. 200km is 0.6 ms, quite acceptable. Both ways. 1.3ms. Still fine. Double the distance to 400km for slower decay times, and you're still about 10 times faster than a normal ADSL line. Acceptable. Not a problem. (the problem here is the same for everybody. The satellites will then play "pass the hot potato" to one that's flying above the ground station and beam your packet down to earth. Assuming your halfway around the globe, that will be about 10000 km. That's with 66ms (round trip) already more than what you get with a residential ADSL line. Still not too shabby.)
The problem with putting satellites high is that the distance to the user becomes large. You want them as close as possible.
The closer you put them, the more you need. -> 4000 of them. This however is not just a one-time investment: because they are low, their orbits decay and they fall back to earth on relatively short notice. If you need 4000 of them, they are not going to be large. So they are small. If you have a cubesate (10cm cubed) weighing 1kg, its orbit will decay just like a 100kg satellite of 10x100x100cm (flying the wrong side towards the front). But a bigger satellite is likely to be 100x100x100cm and weigh not 100, but 1000kg. The extra weight helps keep it in orbit, the extra size in the flying direction does not make a big difference. So the small satellites decay fast as well!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
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After N years, once the 4000 satellites have lived their useful life, how do you clean them up? Maybe put them on a slowly decaying orbit?
The song goes 'Fuck the EEC', not the FCC.
~ See kids? You tried your best at something, and you failed miserably. The lesson learned? Never try. C'mon, let's go watch TV.
~ Mmmmokay. What's on?
~ (heh heh) Son, it just doesn't matter...
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Musk has one major problem in the future: flight rate.
If he successfully lands a booster this year, and begins reflight of a used booster next year, there won't be enough payloads in the time beyond 2017. There are around 50-100 payloads/year worldwide. With rapid reusability SpaceX could serve the whole satelite business with just one booster!!
So someone has to create a new market besides defense and GEO-comsats.
This LEO-comsat business will provide enough payloads in the mid-term.
Yes, due to latency reasons they are probably going to put your satelites in < 1000km altitude.
But if you can do point to point communication via same satelite network without needing to go via base station, or if you have several base stations across the globe, then this will have LOWER latency than going via cables especially for long distance stuff say USA <=> Europe.
I assume they plan to launch small satelites, maybe bigger than cubesats, but definitely smaller than 100cm^3 and 1000kg. I think one rocket should be able to launch a significant percentagle of constellation, otherwise this whole thing becomes unfeasible.
On top of that, you have to weigh the cost of launching a constellation against the cost of laying enough cable to cover the whole world. Satelites are cheaper if you have reusable rockets. And regarding decaying orbit- I think the satelites, no matter what they are now, will be obsolete and replaced in ~10 years anyway, so they just need to last that long.
I wonder how will they deal with scalability with the number of clients, and what kind of antennas will this need on the ground. I imagine they'll have to be somewhat directional, otherwise power usage will be too high? Will they have to be outdoors? How will an individual satelite deal with the load when it passes over a huge city with lots of clients, say NY?
--Coder
Only if he calls it the Alan Parsons Project.
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
And it is through the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) that most countries coordinate the usage of global spectrum usage. This includes the USA, particularly with regards to almost anything having to do with spaceflight where you have spectrum usage that crosses international boundaries... like will most definitely happen in the case of this satellite constellation.
In the USA, you work through the FCC to make those ITU filings though.
Sure, try there first. But don't rely on their approval.
The feds are so f'ed up at this point that I don't think you can trust them to be rational on the issue. If they don't respond in a timely manner with a "yes"... ask someone else and launch through them. The feds don't own space. You can launch from a lot of places. Talk to the French, talk to the russians, talk to the chinese, talk to the indians.
Make that part of your ask from the FCC... unofficially make it clear you're going to do it. And the only question is whether the US has a role or not.
Then count to ten and pull the trigger.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
Not to sound too negative on the concept, more internet is always better but it sounds like a lot of extra space junk in the already crowded atmosphere of Earth. Also, it reminds me of the failed Iridium project, which only involved 65 satellites.
There is only one way to drastically reduce latency (compared to websites competing with you) : Rend a server _ON_ the satellite.
I wonder how much SpaceX will rent that for! (and the kWh price...)
I suppose they know what they're doing, but if the FCC says "no", I think they should consider responding with the finger and a launch.