BY ERSHAD KAMOL
West Virginia University has teamed up with NASA to develop West Virginia Small Satellite Center of Excellence at WVU’s Statler College of Engineering, with the aim to launch a small satellite and create new jobs.
The project started in July and recruitment to staff the center is underway, said David Martinelli, WVU civil and environmental engineering department professor, who is coordinating the project, working with NASA’s West Virginia Space Grant Consortium.
“We will soon hire a team of experts in areas like aerospace science and will hire contractors to work with us for developing a small satellite within a couple of years. The center will be a hub for small satellite research, development, testing, production and commercialization,” Martinelli said.
Statler College already has some sophisticated facilities in terms of clean rooms and environmental chambers required for developing such facilities, he said.
The first of its kind in the state, the small satellite center will work with businesses and other organizations to develop West Virginia’s second small satellite and will offer services and products to businesses, academic institutions and government agencies, Martinelli said.
The project will not only boost the aerospace industry in the state but will also create opportunities for new businesses and jobs in telecommunications, internet, cybersecurity, environment, automobiles and other sectors, he said.
“Though the small satellite will be second in the state, it will be the first one that is truly commercial in terms of facilitating business and creating jobs and skilled workforce,” Martinelli said.
West Virginia’s first small satellite, Simulation To Flight-1 (STF1), was launched in 2018 and is still transmitting signals from outer space, The Dominion Post previously reported.
The $911,708 center project has been funded by the American Rescue Plan and the U.S. Economic Development Administration’s $300 million Coal Communities Commitment, reads a release issued by EDA in July.
The proposal was initially developed by previous NASA WV Space Grant Consortium Director Majid Jaridi and the consortium’s assistant director Candy Cordwell. After Jaridi’s retirement, Martinelli, Cordwell and current director Melanie Page submitted the final grant-winning proposal.
Cordwell said that STF1 was built under NASA’s CubeSat Launch Initiative, designed for NASA from concept planning to mission operations.
“The initiative was introduced at the White House Maker Fair as an opportunity to expand spacecraft production’s economic and social benefits nationwide,” Cordwell said. “NASA set the pathway for small satellite payloads to advance scientific and human exploration, reduce the cost of new space missions and expand access to space.”
The satellite to be developed by the new center will be a novel “two-spacecraft-in-one” concept; physically, one part of the SmallSat will be used for typical spacecraft operations (ground station/ receiving data), Cordwell said.
“The other part of the SmallSat will be used for science instrument payloads, cybersecurity experiments and/or reconfigurable computing, which is an innovative, cost-effective, robust and flexible way to re-use the hardware while in orbit for various experiments. [It will] operate as a ‘bring-your-own-experiment’ for external organizations to use as a testing platform. We will consult with a HUBZone small business in north-central West Virginia to identify the need of the experiment.”
Cordwell said she is thrilled about the project because of its potential to start a promising industry in the Mountain State that would serve as a hub to engage students and researchers in designing and building small satellites for launch into space.
“Through the EDA funds, we will foster collaboration among public and private partners to advance SmallSats and identify markets to be served by SmallSats,” she said.
The shape, size and form of the satellite will depend on the demands of the clients, Martinelli said.
“The demand for small satellites is on the rise across the globe and the center will be able to sell data on weather, climate and other issues to the local and foreign government agencies, companies and research institutions,” he said.
The aim of the project is to facilitate economic diversification and nurture ready-to-hire skilled workforce in science, technology, engineering and mathematics fields in the state amid the declining revenues of coal mines, said Martinelli, an adjunct professor at WVU economics department.
“The project brings academic, industrial and government partners together for enabling West Virginia to participate in the rapidly growing commercial sector associated with the launch and operation of small satellites,” he said.
Within three to five years, Martinelli hopes, high-wage staff positions will increase to more than 30 jobs in administration, business development, education and advanced aerospace manufacturing in the center.
But, the real value of the center is not in the firsthand employment of people to run the center and contracted by the center, he said. “The driving force is the residual employment benefits that would come after beginning of its operations attracting firms to work in West Virginia.”
Businesses, research institutions and government agencies will use the service and recruit people in various other sectors such as computer science and engineering, electrical engineering, aerospace engineering, structural engineers, chemical engineering and data analysts, he said. “So in this sense, the project will be a perfect combination of science and business. We are expecting that a tech-based farm will flourish here. We will do everything keeping the targets in mind.”
Moreover, the center will be able to produce data on climate change and weather for commercial use, he said.
