THE DEVELOPMENT OF A REGULATORY AND SPACEPORT INFRASTRUCTURE TO ENABLE COMMERCIAL HUMAN SPACEFLIGHT IN EUROPE

摘要

The emergence in the United States of many different suborbital vehicle companies, along with the concurrent development of commercial spaceports to service and support these vehicles, can be traced directly to enactment of enabling legislation by the US Congress in 2004 and the subsequent adoption of regulations by FAA/AST in 2006. There are now many different vehicles companies in the final stages of engineering and development on suborbital vehicles, with flight testing expected in the next year or two and commercial spaceflight commencing within two to three years. The Catalonia Airport Authority has signed a MOU with Rocketplane Global to operate commercial human spaceflights from the new Lleida Airport outside Barcelona. This location has several advantages, including low traffic, an available military restricted airspace for supersonic flight operations, superb flying weather and visibility, plus numerous benefits of being located at one of the world's greatest tourist destinations. The location is also in the heart of the EU, with the largest concentration of potential customers. Spaceport Barcelona will be able to service both the tourism and research markets for a customer base of 500 million people within a few hours travel. In order to operate a US vehicle in a foreign location, a unique set of regulatory conditions is needed. The FAA/AST enabling legislation permits licensing of spaceflight operations anywhere in the world for US companies. For Spaceport Barcelona, a dual jurisdiction licensing regime is planned whereby Spain adopts a parallel set of regulations following the US model, and the flight activity approved under the sovereign authority of both the US and Spain. This paper will describe the planned flight operations at Spaceport Barcelona and the proposed regulatory system under which it will operate, and how safety and environmental issues will be addressed to provide a viable domestic human spaceflight business in the heart of continental Europe.