#117 Space Stations: Worth The Trip?
In this edition of Technopolitik, Aditya Ramanathan explains what space stations really are for. Bharath Reddy follows with a piece that reflects on the recently announced AI governance guidelines. This newsletter is curated by Adya Madhavan.
We have news: the Curated section will soon be moving to a space of its own, and starting this week, we’ll be publishing a new segment on China’s tech developments!
Antarikshmatters: Space Stations… What Are They Good For?
— Aditya Ramanathan
On 21 January, two crew members from the Tiangong space station completed a remarkable 8.5 hour space walk during which they completed multiple tasks including installing devices that provide protection from orbital debris. The taikonats’ latest extravehicular activity was slightly shorter than the extended walk they conducted in December that lasted more than nine hours, and set a world record.
The Tiangong’s latest orbital feats stand in contrast to the conditions their counterparts encounter on the International Space Station (ISS) where faulty suits have hampered space walks. In June of 2024, NASA suspended all space walks after ISS astronauts discovered a coolant leak. EVAs are set to resume again sometime this year.
The ISS is scheduled to be decommissioned in 2030 and US plans for commercial space stations remain uncertain. The result of this is that China’s dominance of low Earth orbit (LEO) habitation is likely to increase, at least in the short term. These developments have implications for India’s own space station ambitions in the coming years.
They also prompt a more basic question: what are space stations for?
Castles in the Sky?
The ISS is fated to meet a fiery end. To decommission it, NASA plans to use a SpaceX capsule to drag the largest object in space into the upper atmosphere where it will burn up and disintegrate.
What comes next? NASA’s commercial low Earth orbit destinations (CLDs) programme provides some financing to private projects for space stations. The agency’s stated goal is:
“to be one of many customers in a robust commercial marketplace in low Earth orbit where in-orbit destinations as well as cargo and crew transportation, are available as services to the agency.”
The CLD programme supports three projects: Axiom’s space station, which is slated to grow as a multi-module segment of the ISS, that will eventually separate from the parent structure. Then there’s Starlab’s no-frills single-module station that can house about four people. The most ambitious of these is Blue Origin’s much-troubled Orbital Reef, which is meant to house at least 10 people. Each of these projects face formidable technological challenges ranging from launch vehicles to the actual construction and maintenance of a long-term orbital habitat that can safely sustain humans for years.
These commercial undertakings from the US will be joined by a more traditional counterpart from a national space agency: India’s own planned Bharatiya Antariksha Station (BAS), which ISRO is scheduled to make operational in 2035.
While ISRO remains characteristically tight-lipped about the details of the BAS, its thinking does seem to have evolved. In 2019, then ISRO chief K. Sivan envisaged a limited programme meant to sustain the Gaganyaan orbital space vehicle programme and enable a few microgravity experiments. The space station was to be a small module and there was little talk of international cooperation.
Plans for the BAS seem to have grown considerably in recent years. India’s ambitions now seem to involve a multi-module station - a goal that seems less distant after the success of ISRO’s recent SpaDex space docking mission. ISRO scientists are also emphasizing international cooperation. The BAS is to orbit at an altitude of 400-450 kilometres above median sea level, similar to the ISS. More significantly, its orbital inclination will be 51.6 degrees, very close to the 51.5 degree inclination of the ISS. ISRO has made it clear that a key motivation for this inclination is to make it much easier for capsules from other countries to dock with the BAS.
The Ideology of Continuous Presence
Space stations embody a vast range of both technological and business risks. Besides building and running the station, operators will need reliable and timely access to launch services as well as crew and cargo capsules. However, even after those challenges are overcome, the business risks remain considerable. The main customers for space stations remain governments. Most scientific research conducted in orbit is also, in some way, funded or underwritten by governments.
While Axiom and Starlab seem to be focused on taking on crews and research payloads previously hosted on the ISS, Blue Origin has called the Orbital Reef a “mixed-use business park” whose modules can also serve as hotels or perhaps even film studios.
The reality is that while NASA hopes to create a self-sustaining low Earth orbit economy, space stations are going to remain at the mercy of governments. Microgravity experiments conducted on space stations have thus far yielded modest results, and it seems unlikely private corporations will invest heavily in such experiments in the future. Only governments have the deep pockets and inter-generational patience needed to enable such experiments, in the hopes that they eventually generate scientific breakthroughs.
However, human spaceflight is not really about science. It is about economics and politics. Large projects like those for space stations generate expertise and jobs in high-technology sectors. They also serve as irrefutable evidence of a country’s technological prowess.
Partner governments in the ISS project have consciously maintained a continuous presence in the station since November of 2000. While this is a staggering achievement, it is ultimately driven by politics. The ideology of continuous human presence has its origins in remote terrestrial geographies like the Antarctic. It has since spread to low Earth orbit, where it appears to be a Chinese goal as well. NASA’s Artemis programme and the China-Russia led International Lunar Research Station (ILRS) project also envisage a continuous presence on the Moon, though is likely many years away.
The politics of Earth-orbit habitation has serious implications for the BAS. Should India seek to emulate other countries and eventually attempt to maintain continuous presence in LEO? India knows it will also have to offset costs from such expensive undertakings by offering transport on Gaganyaan capsules as well as hosting international crews and payloads on the BAS. Here, the success or failure of the CLD projects will shape India’s choices. If the limited LEO market of the 2030s is saturated by commercial American space stations, India may have few commercial opportunities. However, if only some of these projects enjoy success, the BAS and Gaganyaan capsules may be well positioned to become indispensable.
Technopolitik: Reflections on the Proposed AI Governance Guidelines
— Bharath Reddy
An Advisory Group, chaired by the Principal Scientific Advisor, has been formed to develop an ‘AI for India-Specific Regulatory Framework'. A subcommittee within this group has released a report on developing AI governance guidelines that is currently open for consultation.
The guidelines propose a light-touch interim AI governance mechanism along with the establishment of an Inter-Ministerial AI Coordination Committee and a Technical Secretariat in an advisory capacity. Here is a summary of the recommendations:
To implement a whole-of-government approach to AI Governance, MeitY and the Principal Scientific Adviser should establish an empowered mechanism to coordinate AI Governance.
To develop a systems-level understanding of India’s AI ecosystem, MeitY should establish, and administratively house, a Technical Secretariat to serve as a technical advisory body and coordination focal point for the Committee/ Group.
To build evidence on actual risks and to inform harm mitigation, the Technical Secretariat should establish, house, and operate an AI incident database as a repository of problems experienced in the real world that should guide responses to mitigate or avoid repeated bad outcomes.
To enhance transparency and governance across the AI ecosystem, the Technical Secretariat should engage the industry to drive voluntary commitments on transparency across the overall AI ecosystem and on baseline commitments for high capability/widely deployed systems.
The Technical Secretariat should examine the suitability of technological measures to address AI related risks.
Form a sub-group to work with MEITY to suggest specific measures that may be considered under the proposed legislation like Digital India Act (DIA) to strengthen and harmonise the legal framework, regulatory and technical capacity and the adjudicatory set-up for the digital industries to ensure effective grievance redressal and ease of doing business.
While the Takshashila Institution will be submitting detailed feedback on these guidelines, here is our initial analysis projecting the outcomes if these guidelines are implemented.
The AI governance outcomes will largely depend on the other government stakeholders' alignment with the inter-ministerial committees's findings. However, too many influential stakeholders might have differing interests, including relevant ministries, union government departments and sectoral regulators. Therefore, this needs to be an empowered nodal agency to resolve disputes among these stakeholders rather than a coordination committee. Without such an empowered nodal agency, the whole-of-government approach for a common roadmap could lead to adopting diluted and minimal AI governance standards and guidelines.
The incident database and voluntary commitments are welcome, light-touch interim measures that encourage transparency and disclosure while avoiding overly burdensome requirements that could hinder innovation. However, since both are voluntary, active engagement and participation with stakeholders are needed to ensure adoption.
One of the main recommendations in the guidelines is to provide input on the proposed Digital India Act. As this group is led by the PSA, the successful adoption of the recommendations will depend on MeitY's cooperation. MeitY’s overall roles will include advisory functions, policy-making, and policy implementation as part of the IndiaAI mission – something Osborne and Plastrik would disapprove of. Ideally, rowing and steering roles must be decoupled.
The deadline for submitting feedback on the recommendations is 27 February 2025. If you have any thoughts on the subject, do consider responding to the consultation.