Elena Labrador Vares
GMV (Spain)
Safety and Security in Space Traffic Management: Concept of Operations for Space Sustainability
The recent growth and change in the space industry due to the explosion of commercial activities with the aim of developing a faster and cheaper access to space, is leading to a large growth of space traffic and the number of objects in orbit.
This trend, together with the problem of space debris, evidence the limitations of the current on-orbit operational procedures and the lack of regulation. In this context appears the concept of Space Traffic Management, to enable the evolution of the current capabilities on Space Situational Awareness and Collision Avoidance to a harmonized system with the corresponding operational and regulatory aspects.
In this work, the safety and security of the concept of operations for space sustainability has been assessed. The analysis addresses on-orbit satellite operations, centered in the assurance of the sustainability of the space environment.
The main objective was to identify safety hazards and security threats, and to determine which functions are needed to ensure that the system can be operationally safe and secure. Mitigation strategies obtained as the output of the assessment have been compared with the current operational capabilities, enabling the identification of required aspects to assure the safety of a harmonized STM system.
During my master degree in Aeronautical Engineering at the Polytechnic University of Madrid, I started an internship at GMV, where I developed my master thesis in Space Safety. Afterwards, working as a RAMS engineer for GMV, I have participated in several projects in different aerospace domains including launchers, ground segment, and on-board critical SW and HW of space systems.
In addition, I have worked in several GNSS projects focused on navigation and integrity algorithms applied to the rail and maritime domains. Along these projects, I have performed tasks like safety risk assessments, reliability analysis, review of regulation and certification requirements, analysis and definition of RAMS requirements.
