Contents

• Brief historical overview
• The institutional landscape
• Southern Africa as an emerging hub of space science and technology
• Establishment of a South African space agency and supporting regulatory and policy processes
• Space industry in South Africa
• An IAC in 2011 is the next milestone for South Africa’s space development
• French South African Institute of Technology
• Space Commercial Services

 

Brief historical overview

South Africa has a rich heritage of involvement in space science and technology. The country has been an active participant in the exploration of space since the dawn of the Space Age. From the late 1950s to the 1970s satellites were tracked to determine the effects of the upper atmosphere on their orbits. Lunar and interplanetary missions were supported from a NASA tracking station at Hartebeesthoek (about 50 km northwest of Johannesburg). In July 1965 this station received the images of the planet Mars taken by the Mariner IV spacecraft – they were the first close-up images of Mars and also the first close-up images of another planet to be received on Earth.

 

NASA Deep Space Station 51, opened at Hartebeesthoek in 1961, supported a number of early interplanetary and lunar space missions. Today, this facility is the Hartebeesthoek Radio Astronomy Observatory, a facility of the National Research Foundation. It still provides ground support for scientific space missions and is the principal African facility for space geodesy.

 

South Africa initiated its first space programme in the 1980s. The objective of this programme was to develop an Earth observation satellite (named Greensat) and a launcher, and all the necessary facilities to support these activities. Satellite integration and testing facilities were constructed at Grabouw in the Western Cape, about 70 km east of Cape Town.  The launch facility was established at Arniston, on the Cape South coast, about 180 km east of Cape Town. This allowed for east to polar launches. Considerable capabilities were developed in South African industry to support this programme. This programme was discontinued in 1994, before any satellites were launched, and the facilities were redirected towards other uses. South Africa retains a residual space heritage from the Greensat programme in facilities and in latent industrial capability and know-how acquired during that programme.

Following the termination of the Greensat programme, the country developed a capability in microsatellite engineering at the University of Stellenbosch. The 64-kg Sunsat was built by staff and students at the University of Stellenbosch and launched in 1999. The satellite operated successfully for 2 years in low Earth orbit and took numerous multispectral images at 15-metre GSD. Sunsat achieved imaging performance previously considered unobtainable from a microsatellite platform.

Following the success of the Sunsat programme, Stellenbosch University started receiving requests and orders for microsatellite subsystems, e.g. the imager, star camera, magnetometer and other attitude determination and control systems components.  When an order for a complete remote sensing satellite was received, the university and founders of the Sunsat programme decided to form a spin-off private company.  SunSpace and Information Systems (Pty) Ltd was established in March 2000, and commenced with the development small satellites in two classes.  Their 60 kg microsatellites are based on the Sunsat concept and their larger satellites in the 200kg class are designed to carry approximately 5-m resolution multispectral imagers and/or hyperspectral imagers.  SunSpace has registered sales of satellites, subsystems and know-how transfer contracts with international clients in Germany, Italy,Australia, Brazil, Saudi Arabia and Malaysia. SunSpace’s efforts resulted in the South African government announcing the acquisition of a majority stake in the company which will assure the company’s capital base for a considerable period into the future.

 

The institutional landscape

South Africa has a variety of institutions that play a significant role in the scientific study, exploration and utilisation of space. These institutions, situated in academia, the science councils and industry, have broad competencies in satellite applications, satellite engineering and space science, and all their supporting technologies. The existing infrastructure and skilled workforce, both inside these facilities and in wider industry supporting them, allow South Africa to position itself as a regional hub of space science and technology. This can be used as a basis for strengthening ties with industry in established space-faring nations, and for developing links with other emerging national space initiatives, particularly in Africa.

The space-related institutions fall under several research facilities operated by the National Research Foundation (NRF). These national facilities have competencies in areas of basic space science, as well as their supporting technologies. They include the Hermanus Magnetic Observatory, the South African Astronomical Observatory, the Hartebeesthoek Radio Astronomy Observatory, the Karoo Array Telescope (MeerKAT) and the South African Environmental Observation Network. The Council for Scientific and Industrial Research operates the CSIR Satellite Applications Centre (CSIR SAC), which is the premier satellite reception facility in the region.

 

The CSIR Satellite Applications Centre, at Hartebeesthoek.

 

Satellite integration facilities exist from the previous space programme at the Institute of Satellite and Software Applications, near Cape Town. These facilities will form one of the cornerstones of the future South African space programme. Also existing are the launch facilities developed for the previous space programme, a few hundred kilometres from Cape Town. Although not currently in use for space activities, these facilities could be used to support future research and development projects.

 

Thermal vacuum test facility at the Institute for Satellite and Software Applications, near Cape Town.

 

The hub of space activities in South Africa is the Western Cape. This region hosts the facilities developed for the previous space programme, as well as a number of universities, government research laboratories and many high-tech companies. The universities in the region have competencies in satellite engineering, satellite operations, optical instrumentation design and testing, synthetic aperture radar systems and data processing, as well as space policy and space law.

 

Southern Africa as an emerging hub of space science and technology

The region is emerging as a hub of ground-based space science and now hosts some of the largest facilities for ground-based astronomy in the southern hemisphere. In 2005, the 10-metre diameter Southern African Large Telescope (SALT) was commissioned. This is currently the largest single optical telescope in the southern hemisphere. It was built by South Africa and partners in Germany, New Zealand, Poland, the UK, and USA. India has subsequently joined the consortium, too.

South Africa has been short-listed to host the Square Kilometre Array (SKA), an international 1.6 billion Euro project to build the world’s largest radio telescope. In support of its bid to host the SKA, South Africa has started construction of the Karoo Array Telescope (MeerKAT) near the towns of Carnarvon and Williston in the Northern Cape Province. MeerKAT achieved a major milestone in April 2010 when the first four telescopes in the MeerKAT Precursor Array were linked together as an integrated system to produce the MeerKAT's first interferometric image of an astronomical object, the galaxy Centaurus A.  The full array of 80 dishes is expected to be completed in 2013.

In 2005 the Department of Science and Technology initiated a satellite programme. The main goal of the programme was capacity building in all aspects of a typical space mission. The University of Stellenbosch was appointed to manage this programme and Sunspace was appointed as the prime contractor to provide the satellite.  This satellite, named Sumbandila (“Pathfinder” in the local Venda language), was launched on the 17th of September 2009 from Baikonur Cosmodrome and is currently operational.

 

South Africa’s Earth observation satellite Sumbandila, launched in September 2009.

 

 

Establishment of a South African space agency and supporting regulatory and policy processes

The primary South African legislative instrument governing the regulation of both governmental and non-governmental space-related activities is the Space Affairs Act, No. 84 of 1993. The South African Council for Space Affairs is established under the authority of the Minister of Trade and Industry to implement the regulatory, monitoring and registration functions of the Act. In 2009 the Minister of Trade and Industry launched South Africa’s national space policy, which sets out various objectives to develop the national space arena to support sustainable development, industrial development, human capital development and international cooperation in space activities.

The South African National Space Agency (SANSA) has been established under the Department of Science and Technology to implement the national space strategy. The strategy seeks to enable South Africa to make effective use of space science and technology to enhance economic growth and sustainable development. In accordance with this, the priority areas of the strategy are: Innovation and Economic Growth; Safety and Security; and Environmental and Resource Management.

 

Space industry in South Africa

There are some 74 companies in the aerospace and defence sector in South Africa, ranging from a large (R3-billion) state-owned enterprise (Denel), through R1-billion multinationals to about 60 Small Medium and Micro Enterprises and some 17 Broad-based Black Economic Empowerment businesses. A recent audit of the South African industry shows that the annual turnover for industry and public sector institutions involved in space activities is of order $20M. Some 180 – 200 people are currently involved in space-related activities of one sort or another.

SunSpace (Sumbandilasat design authority) is set to lead the satellite development and manufacturing operations in the Western Cape on the strength on a government investment and future satellite projects.

 

NIR image taken by Sumbandila satellite of a portion of London on 18 April 2010. This image proved that the area around Heathrow was unaffected by volcanic ash at the time.

 

 

An IAC in 2011 is the next milestone for South Africa’s space development

With the adoption of a new space policy and the establishment of the new South African National Space Agency, the country is now well on its way towards having a domestic civil space programme. The IAC 2011 will thus be an important opportunity for South Africa to showcase its institutional and industrial space capabilities to the world. As this will be the first International Astronautical Congress on the African Continent, IAC 2011 will be a historic milestone in the development of the African space arena.