TraCSS Delivers Space Situational Awareness to Spacecraft Operators

In 2009, an on-orbit collision between a defunct Russian satellite and an Iridium communications satellite created more than 1,800 pieces of debris and signaled an emerging need for a space traffic system. Since then, space has only become more congested with the rise of a commercial launch market that has enabled affordable access to space for commercial, civil and military space programs alike. 

The resulting influx of satellites on-orbit inspired the signing of Space Policy Directive-3 (SPD-3) during the first Trump administration, which declared the need for U.S. leadership in establishing a space traffic system to mitigate the risk of on-orbit collisions through a coordinated data-sharing effort between the Department of Defense (DOD) and the Department of Commerce. This joint effort produced a new program, the Traffic Coordination System for Space (TraCSS), which late last year achieved initial operating capability in cataloging assets on-orbit and delivering space situational awareness (SSA) to spacecraft operators. 

In this episode of "The Elara Edge: Expert Insights on Space Security," Elara Nova partner Col (Ret) Charlie McGillis, former director of intelligence at 14th Air Force (Space), describes how TraCSS has emerged as a leading solution for space traffic coordination in an increasingly congested and contested domain, and enables a foundation for future space capabilities and mission areas that serve both economic and national security purposes. McGillis currently serves as a member of the TraCSS Independent Review Board and is also the Vice President, Public Sector, at The Provenance Chain Network.

"The Elara Edge" is hosted by Scott King and produced by Regia Multimedia Services. The full story can be found on Elara Nova's Insights page here. Music was produced by Patrick Watkins of PW Audio.

Transcript

Host: Scott King

SME: Charlie McGillis, Elara Nova partner, former Director of Intelligence at 14th Air Force (Space); former Senior Vice President at Slingshot Aerospace; Vice President, Public Sector, The Provenance Chain Network; TraCSS Independent Review Board member 

00:02 - 01:44 

A 2009 on-orbit collision between a defunct Russian satellite and an Iridium communications satellite created more than 1,800 pieces of debris that signaled an emerging need for a space traffic management system. Since then, space has only become more congested with the rise of a commercial launch market that has enabled affordable access to space for commercial, civil and military space programs alike.  

This influx of on-orbit satellites inspired the 2018 signing of Space Policy Directive-3 during the first Trump administration, which declared the need for U.S. leadership in establishing a space traffic management system to mitigate the risk of future on-orbit collisions through a coordinated effort between the United States Department of Defense - or DOD - and the Department of Commerce.  

This joint effort also produced a new program, the Traffic Coordination System for Space - or TraCSS - which late last year achieved initial operating capability in cataloging on-orbit assets and delivering space situational awareness - or SSA - data to spacecraft operators. 

Welcome to “The Elara Edge: Expert Insights on Space Security.” I’m your host, Scott King. Joining me today to discuss TraCSS and the broader challenges in space traffic management, is Elara Nova partner retired Col Charlie McGillis, former director of intelligence at 14th Air Force (Space). Charlie is also a former Senior Vice President at Slingshot Aerospace and currently serves as Public Sector Vice President at The Provenance Chain Network, as well as a member of the Independent Review Board for TraCSS 

Ma’am, welcome to the show! 

01:44 - 01:46 

Thank you! It’s great to be here with you. 

01:47 - 02:04 

It’s great to have you. Now, in September of 2024, the Traffic Coordination System for Space, or TraCSS, reached a big milestone in achieving initial operating capability. 

But let’s go back to the beginning. Can you describe what TraCSS is and what problem it’s looking to solve? 

02:05 - 05:16 

TraCSS is the first civil space traffic coordination initiative and it was mandated by Space Policy Directive-3, or what we call SPD-3. And this was actually signed by President Trump in 2018 during his first term and it had huge bilateral support. So it leverages government and commercial capabilities to provide that actionable space situational awareness.  

And it does it for free to both civil, commercial operators for space flight safety. And this has been transitioning these capabilities from the Department of Defense. And it's important to note that this is a free basic service because whether you have one or 1000 satellites that are flying, safety is paramount. And the data is actually used by academia and industry too, to do research. 

But also the Office of Space Commerce through SPD-3 was charged with more than just TraCSS. They actually have a policy and advocacy role as well, where they work with industry, foreign governments, organizations to promote that safe and sustainable operations and to grow the U.S. space commerce. They also authorize and supervise the U.S. commercial remote sensing satellite operations, which has actually changed over the last five years. 

This directive, the SPD-3, it aims to address the growing challenges posed by the increasing volume of space traffic and orbital debris, ensure that safety, sustainability and also leadership in U.S. operations in space.  

And I would like to kind of go back for a minute, because I think it's important for people to understand, why is this becoming a Department of Commerce mission [when] before what it was all done by the Department of Defense?  

It was actually back in February of 2009 where we had our first ever accidental collision between two intact satellites in orbit. One was a Russian defunct satellite. So not operating, but still up in space, and an active Iridium satellite. So a satellite communication satellite and no warning was issued, right?  

Think about two planes flying. Visual flight rules and not being warned that the other one was actually approaching each other. And, so this collision happened and I talked to the person from Iridium, and he goes, ‘Yeah, I get this call from the DOD and he's like, you need to come to this classified place, right? Show up at what is Vandenberg now-Space Force Base and had no idea.’ They knew something was wrong with their satellite, but didn't know that the collision had happened - so huge awakening.  

And at that time in 2009. Not a lot of satellites orbiting. You know, it was about 120 military satellites and about over a thousand active commercial satellites. This is what started what we know today as space-track.org where people can go and get the conjunction data messages and so that's when those warnings actually started to happen was after that collision event. So it's important to kind of know that.  

But now today, you fast forward. Tens of thousands of satellites are orbiting in space and so we have to keep that safety paramount and it's both civil, commercial and government operating in that domain all at the same time.

05:17 - 05:29 

Now, just to add a little more context: can you share what makes a collision between any two objects, whether they be a spent rocket body, a satellite, or other debris, exponentially more harmful in the space domain?

05:30 - 06:29 

That's a great point. You know, in space, when two objects actually collide. Think about them going over 17,000mph, which is huge and then they collide and it creates this debris. 

Well, that debris stays up there for decades, even could be 100 years. Now satellite owner-operators actually have to be able to maneuver and avoid that debris. And you can actually see I've been to the Air and Space Museum where I've seen small specks of debris hit like the Hubble Space Telescope or the ISS, and it can cause significant damage. 

Even something very small can cause huge damage to a spacecraft. And I actually liken it to if you have an oil spill and how it permeates the water. From a maritime perspective, that is going to continue and think about the millions of dollars, billions that it takes to clean that up, That's what it is like in space. It's that collision. If it happens in space it will have significant impact for decades. 

06:30 - 06:43 

It seems like the keyword that came out of SPD-3 and other supporting documents around TraCSS is “space situational awareness.”  

Can you define space situational awareness for our audience and explain its relevance to national security space interests? 

06:44 - 08:06 

From a space situational awareness perspective, it's really just about knowing where that spacecraft is? What is its trajectory? Where is it going? 

It’s important to know those things. Just understanding where the objects are in space from a military perspective because you have both civil, commercial and government all operating in that same space and so you have to be able to determine who is who. 

If a conflict begins, you can't just have like a no-fly zone like you do in the air domain or a maritime blockade. In space, you can't do that. And so you have to be aware of wherever all those objects are and that's what space situational awareness is. 

And I know some people kind of confuse SSA space situational awareness with space domain awareness. There's a huge distinction between the two. When you talk about space domain awareness. 

It actually adds into, for a military perspective, that intelligence information: now what is the intent of that object? What is the adversary doing? Is it hostile or not? What are its behaviors? Is it a bad actor? And so you get into more of what is the intent and the capability of that specific object or that satellite? 

Those are two good distinctions between SSA and space domain awareness.

08:07 - 08:23 

Now civil, commercial, and government assets in space all serve a variety of purposes and missions.  

But why is understanding this difference between space situational awareness and space domain awareness an inherently important step toward protecting those assets in space - no matter their purpose? 

08:24 - 09:24 

I'm going to give a little critique for those of us that are such space nerds, but we don't do a good job of talking about why space is important. I mean, those of us that are in the business, we understand it implicitly, but the global public doesn't understand that you actually depend on space every day of your life. 

If you were on your phone, if you use your GPS to get from point A to point B. If you went to an ATM machine and took money out of it - that uses space. If you filled your car up with gas - that uses space. That is a critical piece from an economy perspective in order to understand that we use it every day. 

But it's also important from a national security perspective. We use space for GPS and targeting and communications and trying to get intelligence like imagery and signals intelligence, missile detection capability, electronic warfare. So there's a lot of military capabilities space enables - and so we need to protect and defend those assets. 

09:25 – 09:48 

The space traffic management mission began as a responsibility of the DOD. But the TraCSS program actually operates under the Office of Space Commerce, which is housed within the Department of Commerce’s National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration - or NOAA. 

Can you elaborate on how TraCSS is part of this broader trend of transitioning the space traffic management responsibility from the DOD to the Department of Commerce?

09:49 – 12:35 

You know, as we talked about the historical piece of it with the collision in 2009. Basically, the DOD stood up and said, ‘Hey, somebody needs to do this, from a global perspective and so we didn't have as many satellites on-orbit. 

It wasn't a huge drain on DOD assets. But as we've seen that number of satellites increase difficulty, not just from a government perspective, but also a commercial perspective, having over 10,000 satellites. It's a huge responsibility to have that global safety of flight perspective. Between the DOD, they said, ‘Hey, this isn't really our mission to do this - safety of flight. It's to protect and defend those assets, those military assets, and provide those capabilities for national security.’ So that's when the decision was made. ‘Hey, somebody else needs to do this mission.’ That's when the Office of Space Commerce was stood up, with the direction of SPD-3. 

And then later let's track through history that that's when it was just a year later that the Space Force and U.S. Space Command was stood up too, in realizing that there's more going on in space from a competitive, contested perspective that we're seeing with China, especially in Russia. From a national security perspective, we need to be able to protect and defend our space assets.  

What we're seeing happen on orbit today is troubling, not only with the number of satellites China has launched, but the capabilities that they've launched. And because you can see it, it's not like it's hidden because you can track it in space and you can track that behavior and that intent, whether China has - they have a grappling arm, you know, and they're able to move a satellite from one position to another and take it to a graveyard or, just recently they, we call it a mothership and a baby. 

You know, they have a mother satellite and they release another object out of that satellite. That's huge to be able to track those capabilities, the intent of that, if we knew everybody was doing things for public good, we wouldn't have to worry about it. But we know that's not the case. 

From a commerce perspective, the decision-making was, ‘Hey, DoD assets that we use today to do space tracking. So today we use radar assets, we use optical assets. And then there's actually some space capabilities, as well. But it doesn't give you 24/7 coverage from a space safety kind of perspective. 

And so the thought was, ‘Hey, we need to also use commercial providers in order to do this and to support those commercial operators. It was in order to be able to provide that capability from a commercial perspective and bring it and support a strong commercial aspect of a space ecosystem.

12:36 – 12:45 

Now, Ma’am, you mentioned radar and other optical assets. But can you speak to how the U.S. government, and specifically the DOD, traditionally monitored the space environment? 

 12:46 - 13:54 

The DOD actually uses that same assets as commercial uses: radar, optical, and space-based. They use a system, a legacy system called SPADOC – Space Defense Operations Center system – that analyzes that data and processes it. 

DoD is trying to modernize that infrastructure with a new system called ATLAS -- Advanced Tracking and Launch Analysis System. It’s still not operational yet, but my understanding is it’s on track to achieve initial operational capability (IOC) by the end of 2025. It’s been a long road. 

But, let's be clear: DOD wants to focus their efforts on adversary satellites. And this is why the Commercial Integration Cell was first stood up, which is what I was a part of for about three years and it was brilliant. General Raymond was the Commander at Vandenberg now-Space Force Base, and he goes, "Hey I'm having to track all these satellites and if I knew where the commercial satellites were, and they told me where they were, then I wouldn't have to track them and I could focus on that adversary." This allowed DOD assets to be focused on the adversary and be able to coordinate and share information with commercial partners. 

13:55 - 13:59 

And in what ways is TraCSS different from that traditional approach to space traffic management? 

14:00 – 16:34 

We think about the capabilities that we have today from the infrastructure, cloud-based, being able to do agile software development, being able to field iterative upgrades and capabilities, and being able to do that on a modern infrastructure is huge.That's what they're trying to do in ATLAS and it's taken them a long time because they've had to take those legacy systems, make sure everything works before you transition over from legacy to a modern system.  

Whereas TraCSS could start from ground one and build it up, a lot easier so they're able to ingest that data from the DOD. But also bring in that commercial data, in order to supplement and be able to have that 24/7 coverage and tracking capability. And so today, as you mentioned in the beginning, they have a minimal viable product. They have beta users on it, [it] started in September of ‘24 and now they'll start to actually onboard other owner-operators. 

The Office of Space Commerce has taken a very, I would say methodical and iterative approach to putting out the capability. They had Pathfinders with commercial data providers and they went out to the customer, the commercial satellite owner-operators: What do you need as this basic service? 

And I think that was brilliant. Anybody that's selling a product goes out and finds out from the customer, what do you need? Now I will tell you, most satellite owner operators don't want to pay for things. They want it for free. They've been given the data for free and so defining that basic service was a give and take. 

You know, what are we going to continue to do as a basic service for spaceflight safety?  And then what are we going to, you know, what do you as a satellite owner-operator, if you want more data and more analytics, you're going to have to pay for that, and you're going to have to go to, you know, a company and, and get that additional [information]. 

So as TraCSS has iteratively built this capability, it will be the same. They are able to today do what we call ‘all versus all.’ So think about all the satellites in space. You take all their data and be able to say, ‘Do analysis against all of those satellites against all the others. And where's my risk? Where are the riskiest collisions that are going to happen.’  

And then they would spit out a conjunction data message to those operators. ‘Hey, there's a close conjunction happening and you probably need to maneuver.’ But it really isn't their decision to maneuver. It's up to the operator to take that data in and do that maneuver on their own.  

16:35 - 16:48 

Now, realistically speaking, how many of these satellites on-orbit today, have the capacity to maneuver on their own? Can you speak to how TraCSS being built out iteratively might get to a future where this becomes a reality? 

16:49 – 18:58 

It's a great point. And it's kind of scary to think of how many satellites are able to launch and they have no maneuver capability. I mean, in other words: they have no propulsion, they have no gas, and they're not able to maneuver.  

And should that policy or those regulations change? Probably. You know, at least in today's environment, you should have some kind of capability to do a maneuver if a close approach is coming up, just because as we talked about. If there's a collision in space, this is a massive impact to everybody that’s operating in space and to everything we depend on space for. So you need to be able to have that maneuverability and be able to move out of the way if there is a close conjunction.  

So most people, you hear you're traveling at 17,500 mph and you think, “Wow, that must feel like zip, zip—bling, bling, right? And really in space, it’s actually more like moving incredibly fast in slow motion. Because there's no atmosphere and everything is relative, things happen gradually. So even though you're speeding around the Earth, you typically get plenty of warning—usually a seven day advance notice or a three day if there’s a close conjunction—and that buffer gives you time to plan and actually execute that maneuver safely, which is crucial in the space environment. 

But some of the other challenges from an Office of Space Commerce perspective, they were stood up under SPD-3. The Office of Space Commerce is actually under NOAA, that causes complications when they're trying to let contracts because they have to do it under NOAA's rules and they can't do it under really Department of Commerce rules. 

The other issue is that SPD-3 is a policy. It's not a law. Policies can be changed. And so really that formal authorization of having that infrastructure for TraCSS needs to be elevated out of NOAA and into the Department of Commerce. There is some law that has been introduced on the floor called the Safe Orbit Act that would actually do this and formally create and appropriate the funds to do that, which is super important. 

18:59 - 19:03 

In what ways is the space traffic management mission suitable for commercial space opportunities? 

19:04 - 21:00 

The Office of Space Commerce has brought in commercial data companies and also a commercial vendor to build that infrastructure. So it's been commercial from day one and they're ingesting the DOD data, but it really is supporting the space commercial ecosystem. And when TraCSS is fully operational, which is expected in early 2026; the intent is to bring down spacetrack.org site, the original DOD space traffic management system, which – if you’ll remember - was instituted after the 2009 collision. 

So from data augmenting the commercial vendor for the infrastructure and then also even the data layer, presentation layer as they are calling it is a commercial vendor, and they're building it in such a way that it's modular so that they don't have vendor lock. They can bring in somebody else from an infrastructure perspective. A new innovative data provider could come in and say, ‘Hey, I have this new capability and we have better data than the other ones have,’ and that data could be bought. 

The balance to me is you provide that infrastructure, from a government kind of perspective. But then you buy commercial sources to augment and sometime in the future, it may be that commercial actually has better capability than the government. 

But from a Space Force perspective, you know, they don't want to have to be able to build everything that's costly when they can actually get it from a commercial perspective. So I think it's in line with both from a national security perspective, but also from an economic perspective and a commercial perspective. 

It's using the commercial innovativeness that we have, to supplement and provide that warning to those commercial space operators. So fundamentally build the infrastructure? Government. Like air traffic control - and then provide the data, buy the commercial data in order to supplement that and use commercial resources to keep it going. 

21:01 - 21:09 

Now, we’ve discussed the influx of civil, commercial and U.S. government assets in space, but how do international space assets factor into this effort?  

21:09 - 23:16 

Yeah. Super important because space is global, right? And it's not like you have this contained airspace. And so as we've talked about, it's got civil, commercial and government and that includes anybody internationally. It's not just U.S assets that are flying in space. The Office of Space Commerce actually engages internationally. 

And that's one of their roles and because of that Office being established, they bring that credibility from a U.S. space leadership perspective. [That] doesn't mean that you're not engaging with other countries, which they are and they, it's actually interesting. I was fortunate enough to participate in what they call Track 1.5, and it used to be that it would just be government-to-government meetings. 

Well, between the National Space Council, during the Biden administration and then with the Office of Space Commerce, they actually said, ‘Hey, commercial is so important to this, we need to have these Track 1.5 meetings. And so it was government and commercial coming together to engage international partners.’ And I was fortunate to be a part of that for France and Japan 

But they've continued that with other countries within the EU, the United Kingdom, India, Australia and others. Being able to engage on a government level, but also on a commercial level with these international partners is very important: one for them to understand the capability that TraCSS brings. What are those capabilities? What are you going to get for free to be able to have safety of flight, but then to also partner with others that want to build similar systems? 

And the one that comes to mind is within the EU. They have a SST. So Space Surveillance and Tracking system and it is similar to TraCSS. And it takes in national military data, but also commercial data. So kind of the same model. That coordination between what EUSST is doing and what TraCSS is doing is a great example of that collaboration internationally.

23:17 – 23:34 

Now, Ma’am, you mentioned that the United States has TraCSS and the EU has SST. But do they have the same standardized data?  

If they don’t, how do they reconcile those differences in how they format and share that data? And what might that mean for the imperative of good communication between these two partners? 

23:35 – 24:36 

I don't think we're there yet. I think that we're close and that's part of the conversation, that needs to happen. And even when an owner-operator shares their ephemeris, you know, their location, with whether it's the Department of Defense or Department of Commerce for TraCSS. 

Even that format had to be adjudicated and agreed on. Like, ‘Well, how am I going to send that to you?’ Because they all have different systems and so that data format is really important, but part of this is those conversations between the Office of Space Commerce and EUSST is what is that data format that we want to agree on from an international perspective. 

There are commercial companies that do validation and verification of space data. So if you have two different data sources, you want to be able to determine quickly, which data is more accurate. This is going to be critical and something that the Office of Space Commerce knows and needs to be incorporated into TraCSS at a future date.

24:37 – 24:46 

What about this idea of a universal, internationally recognized space traffic management system.  

Can you elaborate on the possibilities that exist there, but also on the challenges in making that a reality?  

24:47 - 27:04 

From Charlie's perspective, in a world of space is global, would it be nice to have one international system like air traffic control? Yes. But I think because of the dual-nature of space between civil and let's just say government national security, that's going to be hard to do because people are not going to want to be sharing all that data. They're going to want it to remain a national prerogative. Do I share that data or do I not? Because there's something going on in space. 

From a space safety perspective. You're going to have, at least to begin with, these regional, whether it’s EUSST, or TraCSS, or maybe Japan sets up their own system regionally, and so they're going to have to be able to collaborate and coordinate amongst themselves. 

And so it gets to the data standard that we talked about, what's the adoption of the technical SSA standards that we need? How are we actually going to share that information? And what's the direct engagement with those spacecraft operators? 

An example, I would use is if you have a Japanese satellite, do they give their data to the Japanese, you know, whatever that entity is and then that data is shared? They don't actually have to share it with both TraCSS and EUSST, and you want to make it simple, because once the data is in there, you can share it broadly. And then it is that making sure that you work closely amongst the different players and I think that globally many people want space capabilities. 

An individual country, it's like a coming out party. It's like a debutante if you have space capabilities and so being able to actually share that information is super important.  

You talk about a one system, I just don't see that happening anytime in the near future. Russia has kind of put something on the plate to propose a single centralized SSA system. But let's be clear, China doesn't share their information with us today. The only way to track where their satellites are, are through the capabilities that we have today. There is no sharing going on. 

So you would have to come to the table and say, ‘Globally we are all going to share and we're all going to follow these norms of behavior and these rules.’ And I think we're a little far off from that.

27:05 – 27:11 

And how does that speak to the imperative that the United States be the one to take a leadership role in space traffic management? 

27:12 – 27:59 

I mean, there are other nations that are taking a leadership role. Probably a few years ago, the UK actually came out with some very strong norms of behavior policy that they introduced to the UN. Amazing to see that leadership come out from the UK. 

From a US perspective, we have been the leader, we have had the global space traffic system and so we need to continue to be that leader, both from an economic and a national security perspective. 

That engagement with the commercial owner-operators in the norms of behavior. TraCSS has been a huge proponent of that, whether it's their engagement with the commercial side and the commercial owner-operators or it's with governments, or with the UN. They've really been pushing this standard from day one. 

28:00 – 28:12 

In the meantime, the TraCSS program also recently sought feedback on its Collision Avoidance or COLA Pathfinder program? How does this COLA Pathfinder program fit into this broader TraCSS effort? 

28:13 – 30:25 

When TraCSS first started, this was one of the areas that DOD, it was one of their highest priorities, not just to offload space traffic, space safety part of it, but also collision avoidance.  

Let's go through that mission a little bit so people understand it. You have a launch. And you could have one or 60 [satellites.] And so the hardest part is tracking and cataloging those objects once they've been released from the rocket. From a DOD perspective, that was taking a lot of time in order for them to do that. 

Because when you have that many objects, it's hard to discern which object is which? Is it satellite 1000 or is it satellite 1002? Being able to do what they call COLA, is cataloging those satellites. Being able to bring in commercial capability to fill that gap, is huge because obviously from a safety perspective, you want to catalog them as quickly as possible. 

You know, detect them, identify them and catalog them right after they're deployed and that takes a very focused capability, in order to do that. And I actually think this is a great mission for the commercial sector to be able to do.  

They can do it much quicker than DOD can because of the additional capabilities that they have. And I'll be honest, because they don't have legacy systems. They're able to get it in quickly and see it. And it's normally, sometimes they have capability where the DOD doesn't have capability, like they have an optical telescope, maybe where the DOD doesn't have an optical telescope in order to see that. 

So from a commercial company, I can now have those capabilities to have broader coverage across the globe. Commercial can put capabilities maybe where the DOD hasn't been able to put capability. You could put capabilities in Asia and Australia, capabilities in Chile and South Africa. 

Whereas DOD has to go government-to-government and go, ‘Okay, can I? It's like having a base, right? Can I have basing rights in your country?’ Commercial - it's a transaction. So you can add that capability. 

30:26 – 30:37 

And so what are some of the other capabilities that the DOD can look to the commercial space industry to provide solutions for? And how does TraCSS lay the foundation for those future capabilities to come to fruition? 

30:38 – 31:46 

Obviously, the space safety. They're able to add data. I think this COLA mission. I also believe we're not quite there yet, but we're getting there from an innovation perspective from a in-space assembling and manufacturing. 

You know, so being able to actually re-gas or have mobile propulsion for a satellite. So now you're not actually limited to the propulsion that was on the satellite when it launched. Or being able to maneuver a satellite from one position to another or being able to fix a satellite. And I actually see in a future where you could maybe capture the debris in some way. That'll change the dynamic of how we operate in space. 

TraCSS is the first step of getting to that future, because you have to know where those objects are in space in order to have that capability to do what we call an RPO rendezvous in proximity [operation] - like to be able to have another satellite come up to another satellite - is not a simple mission.  

You have to have very exquisite data in order to be able to do that. TraCSS is the foundation to be able to bring those additional capabilities and that innovation to space.

31:47 – 32:00 

And Ma’am, from your perspective as a partner, what role can Elara Nova and its broad team of partners and consultants serve in supporting the government and its commercial and international partners for the purpose of space traffic management? 

32:01 – 33:02 

Elara Nova brings that voice to all the conversations that we have, whether it's in the commercial sector or the government sector, or civil. And whether you're engaging, and having those conversations, on The Hill or with international partners.  

From my perspective, Elara Nova can help commercial businesses understand what TraCSS is about and the capabilities that it provides? And how do they actually integrate with that capability? Whether you're building a propulsion system or whether you're launching satellites, you need to understand this and where you are in that ecosystem. Everybody has a role in keeping space safe, no matter where you are in the ecosystem. 

And then from a government or international perspective, it's being that voice that, ‘Hey, we do need this infrastructure. We do need this foundation from a TraCSS system for U.S. leadership, not only for our economy, but also for national security, and being that bridge, especially on the international side of bringing partners together.’

33:03 – 33:40 

This has been an episode of The Elara Edge: Expert Insights on Space Security. As a global consultancy and professional services firm focused on helping businesses and government agencies maximize the strategic advantages of the space domain, Elara Nova is your source for expertise and guidance in space security. 

If you liked what you heard today, please subscribe to our channel and leave us a rating. Music for this podcast was created by Patrick Watkins of PW Audio. This episode was edited and produced by Regia Multimedia Services. I’m your host, Scott King, and join us next time at the Elara Edge.