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WELLINGTON: New Zealand is planning a national space mission which could see a small fleet of state-owned satellites launched into the skies over the Pacific nation, a minister told AFP on Wednesday
“Actions to progress to a large-scale mission are being advanced,” Minister for Space Judith Collins said.
The mission would involve sending up “one or more government-owned satellites” for “regular coverage of areas of national interest, such as humanitarian and disaster response or monitoring for illegal fishing.”
“This would reduce the government’s reliance on external providers for this important information,” she added.
Documents obtained by AFP pitch the mission as a boon for the nation’s science sector and a commercial opportunity.
The mission would involve “all parts of the sector, from research and development of new sensors, to manufacturing satellite components, to launch, and then crucially to the downstream use of data.”
“A mission is an opportunity to support the development of innovative products for future commercialization and export,” the documents said.
They do not share a price estimate for the mission.
And the space minister said it would need a compelling business case for funding to go ahead.
“Space missions are complex endeavours which take years of work to develop and validate before they are ready to build, launch and operate,” Collins said.
New Zealand was, alongside Jeff Bezos and the US-based Environmental Defense Fund, a key backer of the MethaneSAT project, launched to monitor greenhouse gas emissions with “unprecedented resolution.”
The satellite was declared lost in space in July.
It is also home to launch company Rocket Lab, second only to Elon Musk’s SpaceX for the number of private launches it oversees.
Since 2017, it has sent dozens of its Electron rockets carrying small satellites into orbit from its Mahia Peninsula launch pad on New Zealand’s east coast.