“(Third-party) Rating Certification” encourage toensure sustainable space activities ?
-Challenge of the Space Sustainability Rating (SSR)–
Yukihito Kitazawa, Dr.
Yasuhiro Miyazaki, Prof. Dr.
Nihon University

Brief history of SSR
 2016-2019
First conceptualized within the World Economic Forum（WEF） Global Future Council on Space Technologies
 Development of the rating’s approach 2019-2021
SSR was designed by a consortia at WEF including- Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Media Lab., -European Space Agency(ESA),- University of Texas at Austin, - Bryce Space and Technology.

 Development of the rating’s methodology

 2021-2022
The WEF and technical design team have selected the EPFL Space Center to operate the rating.
 Platform development, Partnership building, Business planning • Beta tastings with 8 operators
 June, 2022SSR going live
(Based on Saad,et al.,2022) Mission of SSR
Encouraging space actors to design and implement sustainable & responsible space missions to ensure
the long-term sustainability of the space environment (Saad,et al.,2022)

 How to?

To Promote Sustainable Behavior of Space Actors by issuing a recognized rating”
By
Creating an incentive to design missions compatible with sustainable operations and operate missions
considering also the potential harm to the orbital environment and on other operators. (David,et.al.,2022)

 From an industrial view:

SSR methodology = Third-party (rating) certification system based on forum standards*.

*:“Standard”(in industry): It address product performance, safety, reliability, and the methods for evaluatingproduct performance, reliability, and safety. (M. Pfeifer, in Materials Enabled Designs, 2009) de Facto standard : a custom that has achieved a dominant position by market forces. It is a “winner” inmarket (ex. Windows, Google, PDF format etc.)
 de jure standard: standards defined by (public) organizations (ISO,IEC, ANSI, JIS, etc.)
 forum standard:A standard established by an arbitrary group (forum) that gathers companies and experts
related to a specific technical field. (DVD,etc.) Why Third-party certification system useful ?

 Traditional Space Industries : Restricted customers (actors) and specified suppliers) Requirements and Audit• Second party audit
Supplier
Customers themselves can confirm (audit) whetherCustomer(Space Products and/or Services the products and services requested by them areactor)(Space agencies, Military,provided and whether the process is correct.
SupplierLarge company)(So-called "acceptance inspection" and "typeapproval", "company audit" by a customer)
Supplier
Present and Future Space Industries: Many commercial (small) customers and many (small) suppliers
Customer (ex.
Space data user)
Customer

Customer

Customer

Supplier
Supplier
Supplier
Supplier
Supplier
Supplier

How to select?
How to evaluate?

• Third-party Certification
There are benefits for all those involved in thesuppliers in seeking certification as a means todemonstrate compliance with customer’s
requirements and/or reliability of suppliers, based on
objective evaluations by neutral third-party.

 Third-party certification using AS/EN/JISQ9100 is widely used for quality assurance in the aerospace industry.
（AS/EN/JISQ9100 ： Requirements for aviation, space and defense organizations ） Will the SSR be effectively used in the space industry? Will SSR ratings be useful to customers and suppliers??

SSR PAPER PRESENTED AT IAC2022

Compare and detailbest-practise vs. minimal effort scenarios interms of rating results
Table: Scores for a single small satellite mission

The SSR rating score of spacecraft (space object) is evaluated by summing the calculation
scores of 5 (+1) modules.
(Saad,et al.,2022)

*DIT

SPACE SUSTAINABILITY RATING

Modules Overview
Mission Index

Risk
quantification andimpact on thespaceenvironment*COLA

De t e ct a bilit y, ide nt ifica t ion a nd Collis ion Avoida ncet ra cka bilit yCa pa bilit ie s*ADOSApplica t ion of De s ign a ndOpe ra t ion St a nda rds

DIT*COLA*

Data Sharing

ADOS*

External Services

Ability to detect,identify and track
spacecraft

Operator’savailability andability to respondto collisionsituations

Increasedtransparency
between different
stakeholders

Compliance withexisting
guidelines andbest-practises

Ability to beserviced in thefuture(BONUSMODULE)

Simulation(Quantitative evaluation)

Questionnaire based(Qualitative evaluation)

W hy t heal.,2022)
Me t hodology Te s t ca s (Saad,ete s The
proce s s Conclus ion
SSR?

6SSR rating process
Input data

Input file

Input data

Satellite
OperatorsConsulting for improvementof rating score

Mission Index scores

Feedbackloop

Detectability, Trackability scores

Computation

Rating results(Saad,et al.,2022（Modified ）)W hy t heMe t hodology Te s t ca s e s The proce s s Conclus ion
SSR?

7 SSR: By making the rules as a forum standard by members with a strong interest in environmental
conservation, rather than ISO or other de jure standards, a certification system and support systemwith clear objectives have been established.
 On the other hand, technical and operational issues still remain. For example,
Marketability: Can operators use "SSR certification" to secure "superiority" in the market ,cost effectively?
 Does the SSR have "brand strength" like as "ISO"?
 Will the insurance and investment industries understand SSR?
 Will SSR be judged effective in public policies and projects (eg, ESA's "Zero debris", "NET ZEROSPACE" activities, STM rule-making, etc.)?
(cf. ESA seeks global adoption of “zero debris” policy – SpaceNews)Technical issues: Weight balances of evaluation modules, evaluation method of conformity to debris
mitigation documents, etc.
Operation of SSR: Revision process of certification method and revision process of evaluation contents
are not clearly decided.
EPFL is trying to address these issues through the SSR association working groups, in order to fill thegaps that were identified through the first ratings and by the partners that are advising them (such as
Nihon university).
 It is not yet clear whether SSR is "the best method" to ensure sustainable space activities.
However, it is meaningful to try to give incentives actors have taken "good practices" for spacesustainability, and Nihon University will be actively supporting espace/EPFL.

Acknowledgment

Emmanuelle Davida
Adrien Saadaa
Florian Miccoa
andAll members of the SSR Team of École
Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) eSpace,
Switzerland