States bid to host a revamped #NASA headquarters.

More states are lining up in a bid to host NASA’s headquarters, but the prize they seek may turn out to be smaller than they expect.

On April 16, members of the Texas congressional delegation sent a letter to President Trump requesting that he move NASA’s headquarters from its current location in Washington to the Johnson Space Center in Houston.

“For NASA to return to its core mission of excellence in exploration, its headquarters should be located at a place where NASA’s most critical missions are and where transformational leadership from the ground up can be provided,” the letter, signed by 27 members, stated. “We write to urge you to use this opportunity to reinvigorate our national space agency and move NASA’s headquarters from Washington, D.C. to the Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center (JSC) in Houston, Texas.”

#NRO reaches milestone with over 200 satellites deployed in two years

WASHINGTON — Following the launch of a classified mission April 20, the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO) has reached a new milestone, deploying more than 200 satellites into orbit in just over two years.

The NROL-145 mission lifted off Sunday on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California at 8:29 a.m. Eastern. This marked SpaceX’s 10th launch of satellites for the NRO’s proliferated architecture, which includes Starshield imaging satellites built by SpaceX and Northrop Grumman.

A proliferated architecture refers to the strategy of using numerous smaller satellites rather than fewer large ones, creating networks that are more resilient against potential threats and capable of providing more comprehensive coverage.

The National Reconnaissance Office designs and operates classified U.S. government surveillance and intelligence satellites. The agency is currently deploying an extensive network of satellites designed to track ground targets in near real-time.
New contract phase begins

Sunday’s launch was the first mission awarded by the U.S. Space Force under the National Security Space Launch (NSSL) Phase 3 Lane 1 program. The task order for NROL-145 was one of nine awarded to SpaceX in October 2024.

“This was our first Phase 3 launch, coming only months after establishing this new contract,” Col. Jim Horne, launch execution senior materiel leader at the Space Systems Command, said in a statement.

Horne also noted that 44 missions from the previous NSSL Phase 2 contract remain to be launched. The majority of those missions were awarded to United Launch Alliance. ULA’s new Vulcan rocket is expected to conduct its first NSSL mission this summer.
NRO’s multiple launch approaches

The NRO said in a news release that NSSL represents just one of multiple acquisition approaches the agency employs to deploy its satellites. For example, the agency has launched satellites with SpaceX and Rocket Lab under commercial contracts, and most recently utilized Northrop Grumman’s solid-fueled Minotaur IV for a mission under a separate contract vehicle used by the Space Force for small rockets.

“Over the past two years, NRO has launched more than 200 satellites, creating the largest and most capable government constellation on orbit in our nation’s history,” the agency said. Looking ahead, “2025 is set to be another dynamic year, with approximately one dozen NRO launches scheduled. Half of these launches will focus on advancing the NRO’s proliferated architecture with additional proliferated launches planned through 2029.”

#China sent six experimental Shiyan series satellites into orbit late Friday Eastern, using its Long March 6A rocket launched from Taiyuan.

The Long March 6A rocket lifted off at 6:51 p.m. Eastern (2251 UTC) April 18 from Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center, northern China. The state-owned Shanghai Academy of Spaceflight Technology (SAST) announced launch success, revealing the payloads to be Shiyan-27 (01-06).

SAST provided no images nor details of the satellites, instead stating that they are mainly used for space environment detection and related technical tests. This general description is typical of the Shiyan series, which is considered by some Western analysts to be used for piloting new technologies, playing a role in the earlier stages of developing space systems. This could be somewhat analogous to the U.S. military’s use of USA-designated satellites for classified technology demonstrations.

U.S. Space Force cataloged the satellites in 1,000 by 1,010-kilometer-altitude orbits inclined 99.7 degrees, while the upper stage was left in an 834 by 990 km orbit.

Many Shiyan satellites operate in low Earth or near-polar orbits, though a number have headed to geosynchronous orbits, including the possible inspector satellites Shiyan12-01 and 02. Shiyan-10 satellites, meanwhile, entered Molniya orbits.

The 50-meter-long, 530-metric-ton Long March 6A, developed by SAST, is the first and so far only Chinese launcher to bundle a liquid propellant core stage with solid propellant side boosters. It is capable of launching 4,500 kilograms of payload to a 700-kilometer sun-synchronous orbit. It has a dedicated pad at Taiyuan spaceport.

The rocket has now flown 11 times, having had its debut flight in March 2022. All launches have been successful, though some of the upper stages disintegrated in orbit, creating debris. The Long March 6A upper stage is one of the first Chinese kerosene-liquid oxygen upper stages.

SAST states that Friday’s launch was the first time the Long March 6A used “multi-satellite wall-mounted deployment.” indicating that satellites were mounted around a central load-bearing structure, rather than being stacked vertically. This approach brought increased challenges in terms of satellite-rocket integration, according to SAST.

The launch was China’s 20th orbital launch attempt of 2025. It follows the launch of the classified TJS-17 satellite via a Long March 3B from Xichang, April 10. Slingshot Aerospace has since detected a likely apogee kick motor near geostationary orbit, following a similar profile to the earlier TJS-15 launch.

Moon, Mars — #China leads to both .

In the Senate hearing considering the confirmation of Jared Isaacman as NASA Administrator, he and Senator Ted Cruz engaged in extensive dialogue about China. They strongly expressed the view that the United States must get our astronauts back to the moon before the Chinese get theirs there. Isaacman expanded that goal to assert that we should work on sending humans to Mars at the same time.

The six-decade old idea of a space race with astronauts putting footprints on the moon is still with us. It is good for politics, but not good for space development or for national strategy. Whether for commercial concepts like resource mining, or for military strategy like cis-lunar dominance, or scientific purposes like a lunar far side observatory or moon base, activity will be largely robotic, characterized by advanced technology of augmented reality, telerobotics, quantum communications and artificial intelligence. And with robotic missions and progress to a moon base, the Chinese are leading. In this decade they have conducted two lunar sample returns with rovers, including one to the lunar far side. The U.S. has never done a robotic lunar sample return. China has also begun emplacement of the lunar communication infrastructure and initiated first steps in development of the planned International lunar research station. In that same time, the U.S. has cancelled its only planned lunar rover and conducted several attempted smallsat missions with new companies — only one of which has succeeded with a two-week mission.

On Mars, the U.S. has delayed its Mars Sample Return plans, despite the wonderful collection already assembled by its Perseverance rover, while China has actually accelerated its timetable for a Mars Sample Return to launch in 2028.

In speeches, we lead. President Trump, Elon Musk, and now Administrator-designate Isaacman all assert the U.S. human Mars goal. But they do not mention (out of ignorance or convenience) the obvious engineering and scientific requirements for precursor knowledge and testing for a robotic Mars return mission. They do not mention the toxicity of the Martian surface, the terrible health effects of long-duration interplanetary flight, the incredibly thin Martian atmosphere that has to slow down a very-heavy landing vehicle with the humans on board, the closed-loop ecological life support necessary, or the sheer number of rendezvous and in-orbit docking and transfers that will be necessary to test and prove.

All that requires robotic Mars Sample Return — now, so unimportant to NASA as to not even be included in their moon-Mars architecture, and so unimportant to the policy planners as to not being mentioned in the Senate confirmation hearings. The Chinese will beat us with their Mars Sample Return, but we are making no plans for cooperation, either in science or mission development, to boost our program.

If the moon race was about development and utilization, instead of about footprints, we would keep our astronauts in orbit and teleoperate the instruments, vehicles and machines on the surface. We would accomplish more surface operations — faster and at much lower cost — that way. And science investigations, even an astronomical observatory, as well as technologies such as drilling and mining, are inherently robotic, and would be advanced more quickly if teleoperated than if having to be coupled with a human-support system in the hostile lunar or Martian environment.

With the astronauts in orbit, they would be doing what they do best — thinking and controlling, not hopping in space suits and worrying about life support. If the race to Mars were really to get humans there faster, we would not be detouring them to the lunar surface where the entry, descent, landing and environmental conditions are totally different. We would be preparing them for long-duration flights, first in lunar orbit, then with excursions beyond Earth orbit. The notion of a lunar base preparing us for Mars missions is as sensible as a trip to Omaha preparing us for a trek to Nepal.

The human spaceflight goals are symbolic — and the U.S. already won that race a half-century ago. The U.S. now should capitalize on its half century experience of scientific and technological leadership — not to repeat the past, but to create a new kind of space cooperation of humans and robots together on other worlds. Instead, it appears now just the opposite — the Trump administration rejecting science (despite Isaacman’s endorsement of the science program) and robotic missions of exploration including the Mars Sample Return. Not doing Mars Sample Return is a clear statement that we will never be ready to send humans there.

Louis Friedman is co-founder and Executive DirectorEmeritus of The Planetary Society

#NASA safety panel warns of increasing risks to #ISS operations .Members of a NASA safety panel said they were “deeply concerned” about the safety of the aging International Space Station, citing long-running issues and funding shortfalls.

During a public meeting of the Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel (ASAP) April 17, members expressed concerns about growing risks as the station nears its projected end in 2030.

“The ISS has entered the riskiest period of its existence,” said Rich Williams, a member of the panel, arguing there were “increasing risks” to the station.

Some of those risks are problems the station has been facing for years, such as leaks in a vestibule of the station’s Zvezda module called PrK. Russian and American experts have been investigating small cracks seen in PrK for several years, with no resolution on their cause or how to best address them.

Williams said officials from NASA and Roscosmos are scheduled to meet later this month in Moscow to update efforts to mitigate risks on the cracking. In the meantime, he said ISS managers have implemented procedures such as limiting repressurization of the vestibule, which links a docking port to the rest of the station. “The panel has considered this one of our highest concerns,” he said.

Another concern is developing deorbit plans for the ISS, particularly in an emergency before its scheduled retirement at the end of the decade before the arrival of the U.S. Deorbit Vehicle (USDV) that NASA has contracted SpaceX to build. “If there is a deorbit of the ISS before the USDV is delivered, the risk to the public from ISS breakup debris will increase by orders of magnitude,” Williams said.

The station is dealing with several other issues, such as keeping sufficient spare parts for life support systems and delays with cargo resupply vehicles. That latter concern involves both the delays in the first flight of Sierra Space’s Dream Chaser vehicle, now expected no earlier than late summer. and Northrop Grumman scrapping its NG-22 Cygnus mission to the ISS, which was scheduled to launch in June, because of damage to the spacecraft incurred during shipping.

White House proposal would slash #NASA science budget and cancel major missions

NOAA budget proposal would affect weather satellite, other space programs .

The White House’s budget proposal for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration would seek to make major changes in a weather satellite program as well as transfer space weather and space traffic management efforts.

NOAA received a draft of the fiscal year 2026 budget proposal from the White House’s Office of Management and Budget (OMB) April 10. The document, known as a passback, offers the agency a chance to seek any final changes in the proposal before the budget proposal is formally released by the administration.

Like the NASA budget passback, which proposed severe cuts in its science programs, the NOAA passback would make major changes to many of its space-related activities. Among them is the Geostationary Extended Observations, or GeoXO, program that will develop a new generation of weather satellites operating in geostationary orbit starting in the early 2030s

#NASA offers US$3 million in race to recycle poop in space.

Forget moon rocks – NASA’s looking for gold in astronaut poop and there’s US$3 million up for grabs if you can crack the code.

As part of its new Lunar Innovation Initiative, the LunaRecycle Challenge aims to solve one of the most overlooked challenges in long-duration space missions: waste management.

Announced in partnership with the University of Alabama as part of NASA’s Centennial Challenge, the space agency is calling on innovators around the globe to propose systems that recover resources from various types of garbage astronauts would generate on the moon. This includes food packaging, used clothing, broken tools, human waste and more.

NASA estimates that astronauts on the Artemis missions could generate nearly 96 bags of fecal waste during a four-person, 30-day mission.

The competition is split in two separate tracks: Track 1 is to design a digital model of a full resource-recovery system that can operate in harsh lunar environments. Track 2 is to build and demonstrate a working prototype of a key component or subsystem that could be used in such a system.

“We are very excited to see what solutions our global competitors generate, and we are eager for this challenge to serve as a positive catalyst for bringing the agency, and humanity, closer to exploring worlds beyond our own,” said LunaRecycle’s challenge manager Kim Krome in a news release.

Participants can either enter one or both tracks. Each track carries its own share of the prize money. The challenge encourages participants to consider lunar-specific constraints such as limited gravity, vacuum conditions and temperature extremes.

The challenge is open to teams and individuals worldwide, and participation is free.

Entrants do not need to have prior experience working with NASA or other space agencies.

Startups are preparing for the launch of space-based solar power .

Electrical engineer Ed Tate was skeptical of proposals for space-based solar power when he initially heard about the concept seven years ago.

“My first reaction was, ‘That really sounds like science fiction. I don’t think that will work,’” Tate said in March at the Satellite 2025 conference.

Now, Tate said, he’s “personally invested in making it happen” as chief technology officer for Virtus Solis Technologies, a Michigan startup planning to assemble a solar array in orbit in 2027.

Incremental progress

Tate is not alone in reconsidering the promise of space-based solar power (SBSP). Long deemed unaffordable because of the massive orbital infrastructure required, SBSP is gaining credibility as the SpaceX Starship and Blue Origin New Glenn seem poised to slash launch costs and offer room for modular SBSP antennas. Those antennas could be connected robotically in geostationary orbit to form kilometer-scale arrays.

In recent years, solar champions have focused on incremental progress, breaking down technical hurdles to make the concept more feasible instead of racing to establish space solar farms.

The Air Force Research Laboratory and Northrop Grumman, for example, proved the ability to beam radio-frequency energy toward various antennas in 2022 ground testing.

Florida startup Star Catcher demonstrated a similar feat March 21, sending concentrated sunlight more than 100 meters to power off-the-shelf solar arrays. China’s dominant satellite builder, China Academy of Space Technology, is preparing to demonstrate high-voltage transfer and wireless-power transmission from a spacecraft in low Earth orbit in 2028. And the United Kingdom plans to launch a space-based solar power prototype by 2030.

“Space solar has been a difficult challenge to solve, not just because of the engineering side, but also the finance side,” Tate said. “Interest in some of these incremental solutions is turning it into an investment class.”
Early revenue

Companies also are bringing in money from SBSP component and subsystem development.

With 1.2 million pounds ($1.6 million) in U.K. government funding, Space Solar Ltd. is working with the University of Cambridge to develop lightweight thin-film gallium arsenide photovoltaics for Constant Aperture, Solid-State, Integrated, Orbital Phased Array (Cassiopeia), a lightweight microwave antenna for SBSP.

Reducing the weight of antennas and making sure they can be packed tightly in a rocket fairing are critically important tasks because launch costs, while falling, remain a major capital expenditure.

“It’s not just about mass, it’s about volume as well,” said Martin Soltau, the co-CEO of Space Solar.

Space alliances hold strong despite broader geopolitical tensions. Officials insist that U.S. and allies are keeping space cooperation on track .

Despite ongoing trade disputes and disagreements between Washington and European capitals over Ukraine strategy, U.S. Space Force officials said international space cooperation remains largely unaffected by these broader tensions.

“It’s been business as usual in terms of the collaboration with the partners and allies this week,” said Air Marshal Paul Godfrey, former commander of the U.K. Space Command who currently serves at the Pentagon on the U.S. Space Force staff as assistant chief of space operations for future concepts and partnerships.

“The space domain is different to the other domains,” he told reporters April 9 at the Space Symposium, suggesting that rifts that affect other aspects of transatlantic cooperation don’t impact space issues as much.

This resilience of space partnerships mirrors previous instances where space collaboration has transcended geopolitical conflicts. A notable example is NASA and Russia’s continued joint operations at the International Space Station after the U.S. and Russia severed many other relationships following Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
Saltzman to meet with military chiefs

Gen. Chance Saltzman, chief of space operations of the U.S. Space Force, echoed this sentiment while speaking to reporters alongside Godfrey. He emphasized the importance of maintaining and strengthening international partnerships.

Saltzman this week is hosting an annual meeting with military air and space leaders from around the world. He used a keynote address at the Space Symposium to emphasize the Space Force’s push to deepen international partnerships, a move he said is essential to staying ahead of threats and maintaining technological interoperability.

“With regard to military-to-military relationships,” said Saltzman, “especially with my counterparts that I deal with on routine basis, just as as the air marshal said, ‘it’s business as usual.'”

“We’re still discussing the same challenges,” he said, including declassification concerns and initiatives for joint training and educational courses.

When addressing European cooperation specifically, Saltzman emphasized that the U.S. approach remains NATO-centric. “That’s really what we support,” he said.

The Space Force chief also noted the strategic advantages of these partnerships, pointing out that European allies are making significant investments in space technologies and have developed vibrant commercial space industries that the U.S. can leverage.