Emerging Space Powers: Luxemburg, Canada, and the UAE

 This essay will discuss several emerging space programs. I will focus on national space agencies from the countries of Luxemburg, Canada, and the United Arab Emirates. I will discuss the goals of each agency, its military affiliation, as well as describe the current projects each agency currently operates or supports. 

Luxemburg founded its space agency in September of 2018. It is a stand-alone agency that works with both private companies as well as the ESA, the European Space Agency. They have been a member of United Nations Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space since they joined in 2014. The government of Luxemburg runs a website for its space program in which it describes the agency’s goals as “developing Luxemburg’s space ecosystem in order to create synergy’s with businesses and organizations outside the space sector” (Government of Luxembourg, 2020). The agency also represents Luxembourg at the European Space Agency and in space related projects created by the European Union. This space agency is also known as LuxIMPULSE.

Luxemburg’s space industry, much like the rest of their government and economy, is very closely tied to their private businesses. It is a model that has worked well for them and has brought the country quite a lot of wealth. Because of this model they have participated in establishing a space fund in order to directly fund start-up space companies with visions that align with their goals. They choose companies with a promising space related vision to fund. If LuxIMPULSE believes that the project or idea could have a high degree of “economic spillover” into the rest of the economy, they will fund the private business venture. (Ministry of the Economy of Luxembourg, 2020)

            One of the central projects of Luxemburg’s space fund is to invest in space mining. While a small space agency in the grand scheme of things, Luxemburg has managed to carve out a niche for themselves that has propelled their program into the international spotlight. LuxIMPULSE has funded 223 million dollars into researching potential technologies and programs that will allow both businesses and governments to mine asteroids in the future. These 223 million US dollars is a significant portion of the overall investment made into this field. This along with a total of 1 billion dollars in venture capital provided the funding for what would be known as the asteroid mining gold rush (Yazici, 2018).

For a couple years between 2012 and 2018 the burgeoning space mining industry was propelled into the spotlight with capital from LuxIMPULSE and other angel investors. Laws were being created that gave private industry the rights to own mine any captured asteroid, no questions asked. Before this mining boom, property rights in space were not necessarily a given. Planetary Resources, a company that LuxIMPULSE had given a multimillion-dollar grant to was attempting to develop technology that would allow them to mine ice from asteroids and turn the water into base elements, hydrogen and oxygen, in order to use for fuel. This would allow fuel to be created in space and it would not have to be launched from the earth, a much better alternative to the expensive and unsustainable method of launching fuel into space. Eric Anderson, one of the partners of the company said that he hoped that this technology would be ready by the mid 2020’s (Abrahamian, 2020).

Unfortunately, the asteroid mining boom was not to last forever. Things started going south for Planetary Resources-- now by far the most funded and influential company in the industry-- when in the summer of 2019 they failed to secure the funding they needed to continue research and development. There were also rumblings from within the company, and from other investors, that the potential for profit in the short to midterm was not as promising as they had hoped. The goal of mining asteroids by the mid 2020’s appeared to be a bust, and experts in the company began realizing that there would be no customer base for at least the next 15 years (Abrahamian, 2020). LuxIMPULSE’s investment ended up not amounting to much and the company and equipment was sold and turned into a blockchain developer.

The Canadian Space Agency was formed on March 1st, 1989. It is a stand-alone entity that works directly for the Minister of Innovation, Science, and Economic Development. They are one of the original members of United Nations Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space that was founded on December 13th, 1958. (Jesup & Taubenfeld, 1959)

The Canadian Space Agency’s mission statement is to “advance the knowledge of space through science and ensure that space, science, and technology provide social and economic benefits for Canadians.” (Government of Canada, 2021) They are not a branch of the military, although almost all space technologies are inherently dual use. Better rockets lead to cheaper space travel, but also to better missiles and there isn’t much to be done about that. However, it’s still a main goal of the CSA to remain a peaceful entity in its exploration and development of space.

Canada’s space agency has little ability work on expensive projects on their own as they have a budget of 300 million USD, a fraction of that of NASA or any other countries that are considered space powers today. As a result, many of the CSA’s most noteworthy accomplishments have been joint efforts with the international community. They work closely with NASA and they are a partner of the European Space Agency. Because Canada was involved in international space affairs since the very beginning, they were able to have a profound initial impact on the international laws surrounding space travel. As an initial member of the United Nations Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space they were part of a coalition of UN members to create the very first Outer Space Treaty (OST) (Handberg, 2017).

While formulating this treaty the Canadians had to accommodate the wishes of the US and USSR while also advancing their own future interests and rights. One of the most important parts of this treaty was formalizing laws on accessing and using celestial bodies. Essentially the treaty ensured that the United States or the Soviet Union could not claim all celestial bodies as theirs just because they had arrived into space first. They could also not prevent any country from accessing space. The treaty made sure that as soon as any nation acquired the ability to go into space, they would have guaranteed access and would not have to pay a toll to any other nation. Another central aspect of the treaty was the establishment of unique orbital paths for every nation. If a country does not have the ability to travel into orbit they are able to rent out that orbital path to either another country or a private corporation until they are able to do so on their own (Handberg, 2017).  

The Canadian space program also funds education through space learning grants. They offer a wide variety of grants to Canadian university students who wish to pursue careers in the many space fields that exist. They offer cash grants for research projects as well as unique opportunities to work directly with the CSA and NASA (Clement, 2020).

The United Arab Emirates has the most cohesive and well-funded space agency in the Middle East. The UAE’s space agency was founded in 2014 and today has one of the biggest allocated space budgets in the world, totaling 5.2 billion USD annually. They are a part of United Nations Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space as they joined in 2015. The vision expressed on the government sponsored website states that the mission of the agency is, “To proudly forge a pioneering future for the United Arab Emirates in the field of space, and to inspire our future generations to serve the nation and humanity” (Government of UAE, 2020). The agency works on its own and is not part of the military of the UAE, however that being said, many space technologies that are developed are dual use as mentioned before.

For a nation with such a newly created space agency they are on the verge of becoming one of only 4 other countries that has sent a spacecraft to mars. The Emirate Mars Mission (EMM) launched the Hope satellite on July 16th, 2020 on a Japanese rocket. The Hope satellite is due to arrive in mars orbit next month, February 2021. The Hope satellite will be unique from the 6 other satellites in mars orbit in that it will have a different orbit than the rest of them. Currently all the other satellites are in a polar orbit which allow them to see the different parts of the planet at fixed points throughout the Mars day. Hope, however, will be at an inclined orbit that will allow it to see any given point on the planet at different points in the day allowing for unique insights on weather patterns and other Mars phenomena (El-Showk, 2020).

All in all, for a newly emerging space power, the UAE has proven itself to be a space powerhouse in 6 short years. With high levels of funding and enthusiastic support from their universities they have not only sent their own satellites into earth orbit, but they are about to be the fifth nation to ever reach Mars. In the coming years, the UAE may contribute unique scientific insights about space and other celestial bodies, as well as contribute to the goal of advancing humanity’s reach into space.

Works Cited:

Government of Luxembourg. (2020, July 27). Luxembourg Space Agency. The agency. https://space-agency.public.lu/en/agency/lsa.html.

Ministry of the Economy of Luxembourg. (2020, September 11). Luxembourg backs space technology venture capital fund. Luxembourg backs space technology venture capital fund - News & Media - Luxembourg Space Agency. https://space-agency.public.lu/en/news-media/news/2020/space_technology_venture_capital_fund.html.

Yazici, A. M. (2018). The Impact Of The Development Of Nanotechnology On The Space Economy. Journal of International Social Research, 11(59).

Abrahamian, A. A. (2020, April 2). How the asteroid-mining bubble burst. MIT Technology Review. https://www.technologyreview.com/2019/06/26/134510/asteroid-mining-bubble-burst-history/.

Jessup, P., & Taubenfeld, H. (1959). The United Nations Ad Hoc Committee on the Peaceful uses of Outer Space. The American Journal of International Law, 53(4), 877-881. Retrieved January 31, 2021, from http://www.jstor.org/stable/2195757

Government of Canada. (2021, January 21). Canadian Space Agency. Canada.ca. https://www.asc-csa.gc.ca/eng/default.asp.

Handberg, R. (2017). Dancing with the pygmy elephant: The Canadian space program, future directions amid challenges. ScienceDirect. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1016/j.techsoc.2017.09.008

Jason Clement. (2020). The Canadian Space Agency Space Learning Grants. McGill Journal of Medicine, 13(2).

Government of UAE. (2020, November 15). وكالة الإمارات للفضاء. https://www.space.gov.ae/.

El-Showk, S. (2020). UAE probe aims for Mars—and payoffs on Earth. Science, 369(6500), 127–127. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.369.6500.127

Bartels, M. (2021, February 08). UAE's hope mission is about to reach Mars and the stakes are high. Retrieved March 10, 2021, from https://www.space.com/uae-mars-arrival-hope-mission-stakes