Space insurers make record-breaking loss as orbit gets cramped
- Reference: 1714564810
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2024/05/01/space_insurer_record_loss/
- Source link:
Space insurers paid out a record $995 million in claims during 2023, according to a [1]report from Slingshot Aerospace. This surge in orbital launches and satellite deployments was driven largely by SpaceX's Starlink.
According to the report, 12,597 spacecraft were in orbit as of December 31, 2023, including 3,356 inactive satellites. 2,877 satellites were deployed in 2023, a 14.6 percent increase from the previous year, and there were 223 orbital launches.
[2]
Unsurprisingly, communication satellites dominated, accounting for 2,285 satellites deployed in 2023 and 79 percent of all deployed spacecraft.
[3]
[4]
It's getting crowded up there, and that's without considering all the debris whizzing around as well.
Worryingly, it appears that Geosynchronous (GEO) satellites are starting to encounter the overcrowding issues seen in Low Earth Orbit (LEO). The report noted an approximate 33 percent decrease in average separation between satellites.
[5]
"The data shows that a congestion problem is brewing in GEO," said Melissa Quinn, General Manager of Slingshot Aerospace.
"Among the increased number of objects in GEO are satellites that maneuver more regularly than is traditionally seen in this more stable regime. This anomalous behavior clearly demonstrates an increasing need for precise space domain awareness in GEO to ensure operators have insights to both their satellites and neighboring satellites."
Quinn also noted problems in LEO. "There are still thousands of inactive satellites hanging out in LEO. With LEO becoming more crowded than ever, there is a real risk to satellites that provide valuable services including internet, weather forecasting, and land-use tracking."
[6]Satellite of love: SES and Intelsat finally tie the knot in $3.1B acquisition
[7]Japan's space junk cleaner prototype closes in on its target
[8]FAA now requires reentry vehicles to get licensed before launch
[9]SpaceX, Northrop Grumman reportedly working on US spy sat program
SpaceX's Starlink, for example, accounts for 5,896 satellites in orbit, [10]according to astronomer Jonathan McDowell. Of those, 5,822 were assessed as working, although 135 in that number were in the process of lowering their orbits prior to retirement.
Some LEO satellites have sustainable end-of-life plans, although many others do not, and it can take years or decades for their orbits to decay naturally. The report noted that satellites with propulsion capability had reached an all-time high, "potentially reflecting greater adoption of practices that contribute to space sustainability."
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Chiara Manfletti, CEO of Neuraspace, [12]told The Register earlier this year: "There's still a lack of awareness of the urgency for us to do something.
"There aren't collisions taking place every day, which is good, but if we don't do anything, it's not going to get any better. It's going to get worse."
Overall, the situation appears to be worsening, particularly for insurers, who took in $557 million in premiums but paid out $995 million in insurance claims, resulting in a record-breaking loss.
Quinn said: "The losses in the space insurance market are unsustainable. Some insurers are exiting the space industry, while the ones who remain are substantially increasing premiums to hedge against the record losses in the industry." ®
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[1] https://www.slingshot.space/news/state-of-satellite-deployments-and-orbital-operations-2023
[2] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_offbeat/science&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2ZjJnHhNmhsjJFw53lGmyTQAAAAE&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[3] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_offbeat/science&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44ZjJnHhNmhsjJFw53lGmyTQAAAAE&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[4] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_offbeat/science&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33ZjJnHhNmhsjJFw53lGmyTQAAAAE&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[5] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_offbeat/science&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44ZjJnHhNmhsjJFw53lGmyTQAAAAE&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[6] https://www.theregister.com/2024/04/30/ses_intelsat_acquisition/
[7] https://www.theregister.com/2024/04/29/asia_tech_news_roundup/
[8] https://www.theregister.com/2024/04/22/faa_now_requires_reentry_vehicles/
[9] https://www.theregister.com/2024/04/19/spacex_paired_with_northrop_grumman/
[10] https://twitter.com/planet4589/status/1784737788153270349
[11] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_offbeat/science&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33ZjJnHhNmhsjJFw53lGmyTQAAAAE&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[12] https://www.theregister.com/2024/02/07/neuraspace/
[13] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
Re: An incentive perhaps
Very impractical from geostationary orbit - I did do a conceptual design for a GEO-to-disposal tug for my MSc thesis, but it would have been the biggest set of ion engines ever operated, with about half the solar power of the Space Station and very optimistic assumptions about how much iROSA arrays could be made to weigh, and it required an entire Falcon-9 load of replacement argon, hydrazine and N2O4 per satellite deorbited. The problem is that the disposal burn has to be impulsive and so needs to be chemical, and then you have to do a similar burn the same size so you don't dispose of the tug too. The design was really fragilely dependent on the exact tankage fractions for the argon.
Insure this
[1]Russia developing space nuke to knock out swaths of satellites with EMP wave
I'd hope that satellites are already resilient to solar flares and intense radiation, so i wonder how many would be destroyed by such a blast and what would it do to the space junk situation..
[1] https://edition.cnn.com/2024/02/16/politics/russia-nuclear-space-weapon-intelligence/index.html
Re: Insure this
Their use would likely render LEO unusable for a long, long time.
Just the sort of thing a madman like Putin would consider "a reasonable outcome" if he doesn't get his way.
Re: An incentive perhaps
Getting redundant satellites from GEO back to the Earth for disposal would need a huge amount of fuel. Up there a easier option is to push them further out to a parking orbit where they will not be a problem for anybody.
What type of claims are being paid out?
The article talks about crowding in LEO and GEO and then about record insurance claims, without making a clear link between the two (or saying what is the source of those extra claims).
I doubt very much it's a dozens of new satellite-on-satellite crashing action? that's the kind of thing where every single case makes the news.
Re: What type of claims are being paid out?
Launch and deployment failures account for the lion's share.
I would guess that our faultless dot-coms have realised they can take greater development risks at the insurer's expense and are slipping their development prototypes through under the guise of the real thing. Government agencies are seldom guilty of playing the insurance markets like this (one of the few faults they are not noted for).
Expect massive increases in premiums for unproven tech....
...then, next cycle, the collisions and near-miss orbit destabilisations will kick in too.
Re: What type of claims are being paid out?
No, insurers are generally not stupid and will not insure prototypes at a price that any prototype provider is wiling to pay.
There were two huge claims in 2023: Viasat 3, where the operator was willing to pay for a fully-expended Falcon Heavy to get it up to GEO as fast as possible and then found that the giant unfolding antenna didn't unfold, and Inmarsat 6 F-2 whose power supply failed to provide power.
Also, one provider of the extremely fiddly Power Processing Units required for operating large ion drives has a reliability issue which means that four big GEO satellites built by Northrup Grumman are running on one PPU and will die if that one does.
Re: insurers are generally not stupid
True. But they do not always respond to market changes in timely manner. For example flood insurance took a big hit in the first season or two of climate change. And you can hoodwink them if you are smart enough - remember how the collapse of the US mortgage market, through the bursting of a bogus-statistics reinsurance bubble, triggered the collapse of Lloyds Insurance?
Re: What type of claims are being paid out?
There is also the likelihood that someone like StarLink who is essentially treating their stuff as disposable does not insure them.
Do you have to have "Third Party Insurance" for a satellite?
StarLink has already proved beyond doubt that they don't give a stuff for other people s assets because they are essentially more valuable than a cube sat.
Re: What type of claims are being paid out?
Just so. The two big claims that made up $793m of the total $995m had nothing to do with crowding, let alone collisions. In fact if it wasn't for the $445m claim for Viasat-3 Americas failing to deploy its reflector, the insurers would have been slightly in profit overall.
Re: What type of claims are being paid out?
Their business is all statistics and assessment of risk. If the insurers get it right they drink champagne, if they get it wrong they bleat, increase premiums accordingly and drink more champagne. As long as there's enough capital stuffed under their mattresses, and customers want someone else to take the financial risk, insurers will ride the odd storm and make money ...
Reduce your insurance premium by launching one of those long-mooted hoover satellites to catch and de-orbit junk. With launch costs at an all time low it seems somewhat no-brained, does it not?
Reduce your insurance premium by launching one of those long-mooted hoover satellites to catch and de-orbit junk .... and when it fails to work you claim on the insurance .... hmmm
How much of this was space-X blowing up test rockets?
As the smoke clears, Oh iit was supposed to do that!
>>How much of this was space-X blowing up test rockets?
Err none? why would they insure a test article against loss? Yeh, insure it in case it damages someone/thing other than SpaceX but not surely not against RUD.
Not even a single one in their entire existence?
If you're referring to the rather spectacular kabooms of their starship test launches over the last year, they obviously were all sub-orbital trajectories to make 100% sure they would not leave any debris in orbit since they expected those explosions. They're rocker engineers, ya know?
To summarise...
Stratospheric profits go up in smoke?
Slightly confusing or misleading here: from the tenor of the article I thought the losses were already due to collisions because of crowding.
Going to the actual report, it's clear that it's technical issues of launch and similar - with half of total losses coming from one major sat that suffered total battery failure.
Should have been made more clear, ElReg.
Yes. The report came from the self-declared "leader in AI-powered solutions for satellite tracking, space traffic coordination, and space modeling and simulation" and by some coincidence trumpets orbit crowding, even though the insurance payouts and losses it highlights wouldn't have been saved by their "AI-powered solutions".
Article needs teaking
As everyone else here as observed, the insurers' big losses are due to satellite failure unrelated to collisions or with more crowded orbits. That's insurers' losses.
These mechanical failure-type incidents are the main reason for insurers upping their premiums.
A much smaller contribution to the higher premiums is the larger number of satellites in orbit, according to the source report.
An incentive perhaps
To design all orbital vehicles for *controlled* re-entry after their useful life, with parachutes and suchlike to get them down in the right place at the right time?
(Curiously, my grandfather's reference book 'Riley on Consequential Loss' eighth edition, included chapters on satellite insurance risks... thirty years ago.)