In Defense of Japan

Japan Presses Forward with Post-2015 ISS Utilization, Plans HTV-R

Japan is pressing forward with ambitious plans to enhance Japan’s role on the International Space Station (ISS) in the post-2015 era by before 2020 adding supply/equipment return capability for the H-II Transfer Vehicle (HTV), Japan’s automated cargo ferry, and better utilizing the Kibo laboratory, according to government and agency officials here.
In an August 11 briefing to the Space Activities Commission (SAC), the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) outlined two major enhancement options for the automated HTV cargo supply ship that will sooner or later give the vessel the ability to carry humans, said Seiichi Ueno, director of Program Management and Integration Department of Human Space Systems Directorate at JAXA, who gave the briefing.
Scenario 1 for the new HTV with Return Vehicle (HTV-R) seeks to equip the HTV with a 2.6-meter diameter pressurized capsule that would detach itself from the belly of the 9.2 meter long, 4.4-meter diameter HTV and deorbit payloads of up to 300kg. The more ambitious Scenario 2 would create a much larger 4-meter diameter pressurized capsule capable of returning 1.6 tons. Both designs would be considered stepping stones to adding human capability to the HTV-R sometime after 2020, Ueno said in an August 13 interview.
The decision to develop an HTV-R is founded on two principals, Ueno said. Overall, evolving sample/equipment return and human rating has always been part of HTV’s development since designing started in the early 1990s, and JAXA is interested in finding ways to continue to support the ISS program to provide more supply options. Secondly, the Japanese government in May recommended that Japan develop basic technologies for independent human space capabilities.
The present HTV will play a major role in keeping the ISS working, ferrying around 6 tons of vital supplies to the ISS on each mission. Following the successful first launch of the HTV-1 aboard Japan’s new heavy-lift H-2B launcher in September 2009, the HTV is scheduled to make another six resupply missions to the ISS by the end of 2015.
With the probable development of the HTV-R, JAXA will conduct a Mission Definition Review for preparation of the development phase by the end of this year, Ueno said.
“JAXA will determine which option to take as the best path….for future human transportation, considering the cost-benefit trade-off and the available and affordable funding level. The demerit for Option 2 would be mainly the cost and the deployment schedule. Option 1 will leave more work for us get to human transportation capability,” he said.
Ueno declined to answer questions on possible development costs, although he called a first flight of an HTV-R between 2016-18 “likely” but dependent on technical challenges and budget.
According to Shigekazu Matsuura, director of the Office of Space Utilization Promotion at the Ministry of the Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology, (MEXT) JAXA’s plans for HTV-R are an important part of Japan’s desire to make the most of the Kibo module in the post 2016 era.
Following this February’s budget approval by the Obama Administration to keep the vast floating laboratory operational until 2020 and the Heads of Agency International Space Station Joint Statement this March to reach consensus on how best to do that, Japan has conducted a major review of the future of the ISS and Japan’s role. In a report published this June, SAC, which has oversight of JAXA, strongly endorsed making the most of the station, praising the ISS program for its major role in supporting technology development, particularly in developing Japan’s human spaceflight capability and in maintaining the nation’s space industrial base.
“About 650 Japanese companies are involved in the space station in one way or another and saying you are involved has tremendous international prestige,” Matsuura said in an August 10 interview.
Atsushi Sunami, director, Science and Technology Policy Program at Japan’s National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies and a key author of the SAC report said that participation in the ISS is important for Japan’s soft diplomacy and power projection.
“Japan is the only Asian nation to participate in the ISS at this moment. Given the rise of China and followed by India…policy makers understand the importance of Japan’s continuous presence in the ISS perhaps more easily.”
Because Kibo’s specific scientific utility for on-orbit experiments, which relies on a domestic peer review system, is less clear at the moment, the report strongly recommends that JAXA should broaden requests for proposals to so-called “power users,” meaning major Japanese and top-class research institutes in the post-2016 era to yield a great variety of research themes that can be selected by a much wider scientific community, Matsuura said.
MEXT is hoping to maintain its current budget as near as possible to the the present 40 billion yen ($469 million) annual utilization budget in the post 2015 era, Matsuura said.