Browse Resources by Year

Products and Services: Space Products and Services – TSR 2015

Space Products and Services – TSR 2015 explores some of the ways in which space products and services have enriched the lives and businesses of everyday people, from travel, lifestyle,…

Workforce: Space Workforce – TSR 2015

Workforce: Space Workforce – TSR 2015 explores U.S. space, European space and Japanese space at national levels, including NASA and U.S. National Security space workforce. Related Resources Workforce: Workforce and…

Snapshots: The Global Space Economy in 2015

This visualization illustrates the composition of the 2015 global space economy, which was$323 billion in size. Segments are grouped and color-coded according to the economic sectors detailed in Section 2…

Economy: Space Economy – TSR 2015

Economy: Space Economy – TSR 2015 an annual review of the commercial space infrastructure and support industries and space-based products and services used on Earth. This edition also delves into…

2014 – Positioning, Navigation, and Timing Systems

Note: The exhibit in this section is from The Space Report 2015. Please refer to this year’s exhibits for the most current data as numbers may have been revised since this edition was published.

2014 – Iranian Suborbital

An example of a country using suborbital rockets for testing is Iran, which sent its second monkey into space in December 2013. Lifted aboard a Kavoshgar-e Pazhuhesh sounding rocket to an altitude of 120 kilometers (75 miles), the capsule containing the monkey parachuted safely back to Earth. The monkey, capsule, and rocket are part of Iran’s efforts to send a human into space by 2024.

2014 – Military Communications

Global, dedicated, and secure communications networks are vital to governments, militaries, and agencies around the world. Increased demand for capacity—particularly secure connectivity using non-commercial frequency bands—continued to drive deployment of dedicated military communications satellite systems. The U.S. military bought significant capacity from commercial operators such as Intelsat and SES in 2014. However, the way the military buys the bandwidth has been criticized by commercial satellite communications services as expensive and outdated.

2014 – Military Reconnaissance

While many remote-sensing and Earth observation satellites can be used for reconnaissance or other types of intelligence-gathering, military-specific and government-run satellites and sensor payloads are guided by very different mission requirements and laws than their commercial counterparts. There are several intelligence disciplines, or INTs, in which reconnaissance satellites are used to gain information: imagery intelligence (IMINT), signals intelligence (SIGINT), and measurement and signature intelligence (MASINT).

2014 – Meteorology

Weather satellites are a major segment of remote sensing satellites, using a mix of electro-optical, atmospheric, gravimetric, SAR, and other sensor payloads to detect fully formed weather systems as well as precursor conditions. Most weather satellites are in GEO or polar LEO orbits and have traditionally been operated by national governments for near-term weather forecasting and long-term climate modeling.

2014 – Land Imaging

Collectively, land-imaging satellites are systems used to observe, monitor, and track changes and developments on the Earth’s surface using a variety of optical or electronic imaging capabilities. Earth observation satellites may be distinguished from each other on the basis of spatial resolution—the level of detail their images are capable of recording. Another distinction is the sensor type, such as optical cameras, synthetic aperture radar (SAR), or various types of infrared and electronic imaging.