2013
2013 – Chinese Spaceports
China’s new spaceport is the Wenchang Satellite Launch Center, located on the southern Chinese island of Hainan. Building the spaceport on the island offers two advantages over China’s current spaceports. As it is located on the coast, China can transport rocket stages to the site via ship and eliminate the size restrictions imposed by the need to pass through railway tunnels and bridges.
2013 – Russian Spaceports
Baikonur Cosmodrome was Russia’s first spaceport, beginning operations in 1957. It is also the largest spaceport in the world in terms of area, and it is the world’s busiest spaceport in terms of number of orbital launches. It is located in what is now the independent country of Kazakhstan, which until 1991 was a Soviet republic.
2013 – U.S. Spaceports
Kennedy Space Center (KSC) and Cape Canaveral Air Force Station (CCAFS) occupy neighboring sites in the state of Florida, and are responsible for the bulk of U.S. launch activity. KSC is the only U.S. spaceport that currently supports crewed orbital spaceflight and historically has been the launch site for almost every crewed U.S. spaceflight. With the end of the Space Shuttle program, KSC and CCAFS were left with an impressive assortment of NASA infrastructure that was now in search of a purpose.
2013 – Spaceports Overview
Spaceports are the facilities where launch vehicles and their payloads are prepared and subsequently launched. Spaceports vary widely in scale. They range from the relatively austere Kodiak Launch Complex in Alaska, which typically conducts only one launch every year or two from its one pad, to a sprawling facility such as Baikonur, which covers thousands of square kilometers and conducts about one-third of all global launches per year, lifting off from more operational launch pads than are found in any other spaceport.
2013 – Satellite Orbits
There were 1,165 active satellites in orbit at the end of 2013, all performing various missions depending on their configuration and orbit. Of all active satellites, 437 (approximately 38% of the total) were in geosynchronous equatorial orbit (GEO), an orbit 35,790 kilometers (22,240 miles) above the Equator, which allows satellites to circle the Earth exactly once per day, thus appearing to be fixed above a single point on the Earth’s surface, which is valuable in communications applications.
2013 – Satellite Overview
In 2013, 193 satellites were successfully launched on behalf of 29 different countries. Of these, 101 were “microsatellites,” with a mass of less than 91 kilograms (200 pounds). These satellites often carry scientific payloads or serve as demonstrations of new technologies. They usually operate in LEO, have a short life cycle, and are launched together with a larger primary payload. In most cases, three to six microsatellites piggyback on the primary payload, although one Minotaur launch in November 2013 carried 29 such spacecraft, and a Dnepr launch two days later deployed 32 more.
2013 – Perspective
The evolution of the space sector is reflected in changes within the industry in response to new challenges and opportunities. As certain elements of the space economy become established economic goods, the ways customers buy—and companies sell—those space products and services evolves.
2013 – Positioning, Navigation, and Timing Services
Geo-location and navigation equipment and services continue to be the space industry’s largest and fastest-growing sector. Total global revenues for this market, estimated based on data published by the European GNSS Agency (GSA), were $## billion in 2013, compared to $## in 2012.
2013 – Earth Observation
Earth observation (EO) and imaging services enabled by satellites remain a small but vital part of the global space economy. Earth observation revenues in 2013 are estimated to total $## billion, #% more than the $## billion generated in 2012. According to the space industry consultancy Northern Sky Research, growth in 2013 slowed, dropping below the compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of ##% achieved by the EO market from 2007 to 2012.
2013 – Satellite Communications
Estimated 2013 revenue for the satellite communications segment reached $## billion, #% higher than the $## billion identified in 2012. The market is composed of satellite operators, which own satellites and lease the transmission capacity of these satellites to private and government clients in need of transmission capability. Traditionally, these satellites were used to transmit voice and television signals. As technology has developed to allow…