In the next five to 10 years, the domestic commercial satellite launch demand will reach thousands of orders, and the explosive growth of satellite application demand will bring about a geometric surge in space launch business. ? NPC deputy, vice chairman and deputy general manager of China Aerospace Science, Technology and Space Construction said. She believes that China urgently needs to build a launch site mainly for commercial launch.
After years of development, China has formed a launch pattern with relatively reasonable layout, basically perfect facilities and relatively complete functions. However, Dou Xiaoyu said that in the face of the future commercial space launch market, there is a certain gap in the current space launch site construction, which is mainly reflected in five aspects:
First, the layout of the space launch site needs to be constantly improved and optimized. In the past, considering the needs of military strategic deployment, the launch site construction needed strategic depth, so the layout often lived inland. Jiuquan, Taiyuan and xichang satellite launch center in China are far from the sea and live in the hinterland. With the rise of commercial space flight, space launch pays more attention to key factors such as low cost, low latitude, wide range, high flexibility and good landing site safety. The shooting range of the existing launch site is relatively narrow, and there are many safety hazards in the rocket navigation area and debris landing area. At the same time, due to the limitation of railway transportation, the cost of rocket transportation is high. Although Wenchang launch site is near the sea, the task volume has become saturated.
Second, there is a certain gap between the existing space launch sites in terms of commercial launch adaptability. Commercial launch is a market behavior with the characteristics of temporality, flexibility and variability. The existing launch site is influenced by the policy and controlled by the military, so it is difficult to meet the future demand for high-density, high-frequency and flexible commercial launch.
Third, domestic policies and regulations related to commercial launch need to be improved, the degree of marketization is not high, and the involvement of civil and commercial forces and social capital is low.
Fourth, the supporting industries around the existing space launch site are lagging behind, which can't meet the needs of local R&D and manufacturing industry, making the manufacturing, launching, measurement and control and recycling links separate.
In addition, the contradiction between the increasing number of new rockets in China and the small number of existing launch positions and stations is becoming increasingly prominent. The average number of launching stations in China's existing launch sites is two, both of which are liquid launching stations, which is difficult to meet the demand of high density and low inclination launching in the future. At present, there are only simple outfield conditions for launching small solid launch vehicles, which will inevitably limit the development space of large and medium-sized solid launch vehicles.