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Showing posts from August, 2022

FCC says New rules needed to fix growing space debris problem

  It's time to modernize the fight against space junk, U.S. regulators say. The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is pledging to update the rules it enacted just two years ago to address space debris, with a new focus on in-space servicing assembly and manufacturing (ISAM) risks and opportunities. "We believe the new space age needs new rules," FCC chair Jessica Rosenworcel said in an Aug. 5 statement. Existing regulations, she added, were generally "designed for a time when going to space was astronomically expensive and limited to the prowess of our political superpowers." Rosenworcel pointed out that megaconstellations and crowdfunded satellites were not possible in the 1950s when space exploration first began. That said, the new push piggybacks off a similar space debris effort that the FCC publicized much more recently, in 2020(opens in That 2020 update was said to be the most comprehensive revision to space debris rules in more than 15 years,...