WASHINGTON — The nation’s leading space agencies added a new
member to their alliance recently by signing a memorandum of
agreement with the director of defense research and
engineering, a Department of Defense agency focusing on
technology.
The agreement formally establishes cooperative relationships
for space technological research and development, said
Undersecretary of the Air Force Peter B. Teets during a
Space Transportation Association meeting here. He said the
partnership is vital to both national security interests and
future commercial applications.
“The partnership that comes from these kinds of interchanges
(is) important to all of our national security space
activities,” Teets said. “Our national security activities
can pay dividends to the NASA civil space program as well.”
The partnership’s other members, all of whom had
representatives attending the meeting, include NASA, U.S.
Strategic Command, the National Reconnaissance Office and
Air Force Space Command.
“I think it’s natural to develop common technologies
together,” said Dr. Ron Sega, director of defense research
and engineering. “At the end of the day, we may have
different requirements and different systems, but there’s
a lot of … common work that can we can do in research
and development.”
Teets said an example of space technology with both military
and civil application is the global positioning system.
“I think the recent military conflict has shown us, without
a doubt, how important the use of space is to national
security and military operations,” Teets said. “GPS
accuracy and capability … has been vitally important to
our efforts in the war in Afghanistan.”
NASA Administrator Sean O’Keefe said assured space
accessibility is an area the space technology partnership
could immediately address.
“Propulsion power generation advances that are so critical
to the purposes of (achieving) our exploration and discovery
objectives are the same technologies that national security
seeks to utilize,” he said.
“Though applications may differ in the end,” O’Keefe said,
“(they) nonetheless can begin with similar technologies.”
A push is already under way to develop a reusable launch
system to both assure access to space, and to lower the
cost of boosting cargo into orbit.
“I’ve been concentrating quite heavily on our new evolved
expendable launch vehicle program,” Teets said. “(But) the
EELV isn’t the end-all for assured access. We need to look
forward to the (next) generation of launch systems.
“We’ll be working closely with NASA, as NASA continues to
be involved with reusable launch vehicle technology. It’s
in a technology development phase now, but there’s not a
doubt in my mind that we will have a reusable launch
system,” Teets said.
Other research projects include telecommunications
initiatives and space-based radar.
“It’s important that we leverage our capabilities together,
as a nation, to make sure we have the best space program
possible, in both (our) military and civilian space programs,”
Teets said.
