RADHAKRISHNA RAO / BANGALORE
Delhi's commercial space ambitions lifted as Nanyang becomes fifth overseas client
Antrix, the commercial arm of India's space programme, has been selected by Singapore's Nanyang Technological University (NTU) to launch its 100kg (220lb)-class X-sat satellite aboard India's Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV).
The deal is a shot in the arm for Antrix, which is promoting the four-stage PSLV as a cost-effective booster for placing small satellites into low- and mid-Earth orbits.
The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO)says Antrix's agreement with Singapore calls for the microsatellite to be launched by 2006. The satellite will carry an Earth observation payload for land and coastal monitoring using multi-spectral imaging. Antrix will also provide support and equipment for pre-launch testing of the satellite.
The Singapore satellite will be the fifth foreign spacecraft to be launched by the PSLV, which is also being considered for the launch of the European Pleiades remote-sensing satellite.
The PSLV, which has logged six successful missions, was originally developed to place into polar orbit 1t-class Indian-built IRS series Earth observation spacecraft. In May 1999 the 44m (144ft)-tall PSLV, using alternate liquid and solid fuel stages, launched three satellites simultaneously: India's 1,050kg IRS-P4 ocean watch satellite; South Korea's 105kg Kitsat; and Germany's Tubsat spacecraft weighing 45kg. In October 2001 the booster placed Belgian, German and Indian satellites into their specified orbits.
On its first mission to geostationary transfer orbit in September 2002, the PSLV successfully delivered the 1,060kg Indian-built weather satellite Metsat.
India's lunar programme, which has yet to receive a formal go-ahead from New Delhi, will use a modified PSLV upper stage as a trans-lunar stage, carrying 2.2t of propellant and capable of sending a 530kg spacecraft on a fly-by of the moon or placing a 350kg payload into lunar orbit.
Meanwhile, the second flight of India's three-stage Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV) from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre on the east coast is due to take place in March, says ISRO chairman K Kasturirangan. It will carry the 1,800kg G-Sat-2 experimental communications satellite into geostationary transfer orbit.
Once the GSLV is declared operational it will be used to launch India's multipurpose domestic Insat-series satellites, currently launched by Europe's Arianespace.
For heavier communications satellites, ISRO is planning to develop an augmented, Mk3 version of the GSLV capable of launching a 4t satellite into geostationary transfer orbit.
Source: Flight International
