STARLINK – THE SATELLITE INTERNET CONSTELLATION

INTRODUCTION

Starlink is a satellite internet service provider enabling high-speed, low-latency broadband internet in remote and rural locations across the globe. It is operated by American aerospace company, SpaceX. SpaceX started launching Starlink satellites in 2019. As of August 2023, Starlink consists of over 4,900 mass-produced small operational satellites in low Earth orbit (LEO), which communicate with designated ground transceivers, according to Astronomer Jonathan McDowell who tracks the constellation on his website. In total, nearly 12,000 satellites are planned to be deployed, with a possible later extension to 42,000.

Also, the aerospace company aims for global mobile phone service after 2023.

Starlink Logo

AN OVERVIEW OF THE STARLINK SATELLITE

The SpaceX satellite development facility in Redmond, Washington, houses the Starlink research, development, manufacturing, and orbit control teams.

The Starlink satellites are equipped with krypton or argon-fueled Hall thrusters which allow the satellite to de-orbit at the end of their life. Additionally, the satellites are designed to autonomously and smoothly avoid collisions based on uplinked tracking data.

Starlink is ideally suited for areas where connectivity has been unreliable or completely unavailable. People across the globe are using Starlink to gain access to education, health services and even communications support during natural disasters.

It enables video calls, online gaming, streaming, and other high data rate activities that historically have not been possible with satellite internet.

The cost of the decade-long project to design, build, and deploy the constellation was estimated by SpaceX in May 2018 to be at least US$10 billion. SpaceX expects more than $30 billion in revenue by 2025 from its satellite constellation, while revenues from its launch business were expected to reach $5 billion in the same year. SpaceX(website) announced reaching more than 1 million subscribers in December 2022 and 1.5 million subscribers in May 2023.

SERVICES OFFERRED BY STARLINK

Starlink were designed to serves different services that could make improvement on how human run and execute some tasks that was complicated before the invention of Starlink satellite internet constellation. Services offered by the Starlink include but not limited to the following:

1. Satellite Internet:
   Starlink provides satellite-based internet connectivity to underserved areas of the planet, as well as competitively priced service in more urbanized areas.
   Standard kit users are expected to have typical throughput speed of "50 Mbps to 150 Mbps and latency from 20ms to 40ms". A higher performance version of the service (Starlink Business) has a speeds of 220Mbit/s. Another service called Starlink Maritime became available in July 2022 providing internet access on the open ocean, with speeds of 220Mbit/s.
2. Military Satellites:
   SpaceX also designs, builds, and launches customized military satellites based on variants of the Starlink satellite bus, with the largest publicly known customer being the Space Development Agency (SDA) - a United States Space Force direct-reporting unit tasked with deploying disruptive space technology.
   In October 2020, SDA awarded SpaceX an initial $150 million dual-use contract to develop a deluxe military version of the Starlink satellites. The first batch of satellites were originally scheduled to launch September 2022 to form part of the Tracking Layer Tranche 0 of the Space Force's National Defense Space Architecture (NDSA). The launch schedule slipped multiple times but eventually launched in April 2023.
   The NDSA architecture will be composed of seven layers with specific functions: data transport, battle management, missile tracking, custody/weapons targeting, satellite navigation, deterrence, and ground support. Historically, space-based missile defence concepts were expensive, but reusable launch systems have mitigated costs according to a 2019 U.S. Congressional Budget Office analysis. NSDA leverages existing commercial satellite bus development such as Starlink to reduce costs, including free-space optical laser terminals for a secure command and control mesh network.
   Since 2021, Starlink's military satellite development is overseen internally at SpaceX by a U.S. retired four-star general Terrence J. O'Shaughnessy. O'Shaughnessy advocated before the United States Senate Committee on Armed Services for a layered capability with lethal follow-on that incorporates machine learning and artificial intelligence to gather and act upon sensor data quickly.
3. Military Communications:
   A test conducted by the United States Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) in 2019 demonstrated a 610 Mbit/s data link through Starlink to a Beechcraft C-12 Huron aircraft in flight. Additionally, in late 2019, the United States Air Force successfully tested a connection with Starlink on an AC-130 Gunship.
   Also, the U.S. Air Force utilized Starlink in support of its Advanced Battlefield Management System during a live-fire exercise happened in 2021. They demonstrated Starlink connected to a "variety of air and terrestrial assets" including the Boeing KC-135 Stratotanker.
   Expert on battlefield communications, Thomas Wellington argues that Starlink signals, because they use narrow focused beams, are less vulnerable to interference and jamming by the enemy in wartime than satellites flying in higher orbit.
4. Starshield Program:
   In December 2022, SpaceX announced Starshield, a program to incorporate military or government entity payloads on board, a customized satellite bus (potentially based on Starlink Block v1.5 and v2.0 technology). These satellites are heavier, with twice the area as a single Starlink v1.5 and have two pair of solar arrays as opposed to one on Starlink Block v1.5. While Starlink is designed for consumer and commercial use, Starshield is designed for US government use, with an initial focus on three areas, namely, >earth observation, communications, and hosting payloads.
5. Satellite Cellular Service:
   In March 2023, SpaceX confirmed that they have partnered with T-Mobile US to add satellite cellular service capability to Starlink satellites. It will provide dead-zone cell phone coverage across the US using existing midband PCS spectrum that T-Mobile owns. Cell coverage will begin with messaging and expand to include voice and limited data services later, with testing to begin later of 2023.
   T-Mobile plans to connect to Starlink satellites via existing mobile devices, unlike previous generations of satellite phones which used specialized radios, modems, and antennas to connect to satellites in higher orbits. Bandwidth will be limited to approximately 2 to 4 megabits per second total, split across a very large cell coverage area.

STARLINK HARDWARE EQUIPMENTS

Starlink Internet constellation uses three (3) different hardware to provide the Internet service to its users. These sophisticated technical devices are Starlink Satellite, User terminal (Dishy McFlatface) including the router, and a ground station.

Let’s briefly explore these devices and read about their role in providing connectivity around the Planet.

1. Starlink Satellite Hardware
   The Starlink Internet communication satellites was in the smallsat-class of 227kg (500lb) mass, and also placed in low Earth orbit (LEO) at an altitude of 550 (340mi). In May 2019, SpaceX largely deployed 60 satellites into the orbit, which signifies the first batch satellites for the company into the space. Initial plans as of January 2015 were for the constellation to be made up of approximately 4,000 cross-linked satellites, more than twice as many operational satellites as were in orbit in January 2015.
   The satellites employed optical inter-satellite links and phased array beam-forming, and digital processing technologies in the Ku and Ka microwave bands (super high frequency [SHF] to extremely high frequency [EHF]), according to documents filed with the U.S. FCC.
   Starlink satellites are orbiting at 1?105 to 1?30 of the height of geostationary orbits, and thus offer more practical Earth-to-sat latencies of around 25 to 35 ms, comparable to existing cable and fiber networks. The system uses a peer-to-peer protocol reported to be "simpler than IPv6", it also incorporated end-to-end encryption natively. Starlink satellites use Hall-effect thrusters with krypton or argon gas as the reaction mass for orbit raising and station keeping.
   
   Starlink satellites first batch of second-generation gen2, which the SpaceX company calls V2 Mini.

   Image Credit: SpaceX



2. User Terminal:
   The Starlink satellites from the orbit does not provide connectivity directly to devices at ground-level as with other constellation like Iridium, Globalstar, Inmarsat, or Thuraya Satellites. Instead, it is linked to a flat user terminals, the size of a pizza box, which have phased array antennas and track the satellites from above.
   The terminals can be mounted anywhere, as long as it can see the sky. This includes fast-moving objects like trains and ships on the ocean.
   Starlink Terminal has motors, which used to self-adjust optimal angle to view sky. The terminal antenna is known internally as "Dishy McFlatface".
   The terminals are ships bundled together with its router from the company, which enabled sharing of the internet service to devices within the same building or close by.
   
   
   Starlink Dishy McFlatface (First generation – Gen_1 rounded dish, and the second generation – Gen_2 dish)

   Image Credit: SpaceX



3. Ground Stations:
   To deliver internet connectivity to its users, Starlink relies on a system of ground stations called gateways. These gateways act as an interlink between the user’s terminal dish and the satellites roaming earth’s low orbit.
   Consequently, the dish will connect to the nearest satellite, which in turn sends that signal to the closest gateway. Gateways, therefore, need to be in somewhat close distance (500 miles or 1,000 kilometers) to receive that signal.
   Till February 2023, Starlink used the Ka-band to connect with ground stations. With the launch of v2 mini, they added frequencies in the E band range.
   However, in recent times, Starlink has started to decrease its dependence on gateways. Its newer generation satellites, namely versions 1.5 and 2.0, rely on satellite-to-satellite laser communication.
   
   Starlink ground station dishes

STARLINK SERVICE COVERAGE

Starlink Internet uses a satellite constellation technology to provide the internet and other radio connectivity services. By using the satellites techniques, it’s feasible to provide an Internet service that could cover the globe. However, things don’t work out like that without a standard protocol that guides the usage of such services. There should be a government policy and the industry policies which must be agreed upon by both parties before the service would be deploy out to a particular country or region.

To see current Starlink internet availability around the world, and if it's available where you are, Starlink has an interactive map detailing locations where Starlink internet is available, which areas are on the waitlist as well as areas that are "coming soon".

Starlink is ideally suited for areas where connectivity has been unreliable or completely unavailable," the Starlink main page reports. "People across the globe are using Starlink to gain access to education, health services and even communications support during natural disasters.

SIMILAR SATELLITES INTERNET CONSTELLATON WITH STARLINK

1. OneWeb Satellite Constellation:
   Announced nearly concurrently with the SpaceX constellation. In 2015, Samsung Inc. outlined a proposal to deploy 4,600-satellite constellation orbiting at 1,400 km (870mi) that could provide a zettabyte per month capacity worldwide, an equivalent of 200 gigabytes per month for 5 billion users of Internet data. However, by 2020 no more public information had been released about the Samsung constellation.
2. Kuiper Systems:
   It is a planned 3,276 low earth orbit (LEO) satellite Internet constellation by an Amazon subsidiary. A satellite constellation that will work in concert with Amazon's previously announced large network of twelve satellite ground station facilities (the "AWS ground station unit") announced in November 2018.
3. China National Satellite Internet Project:
   It is a planned satellite internet offering for the Chinese market.
4. Hughes Network Systems:
   A current broadband satellite provider providing fixed, cellular backhaul, and airborne antennas.
5. Viasat Inc.:
   It is also a current broadband satellite provider providing fixed, ground mobile, and airborne antennas.
6. O3b:
   It is a Medium Earth orbit constellation that provides access to mobile phone operators and internet service providers. It covers only the equatorial region.

STARLINK LIFESPAN (DE-ORBIT)

SpaceX designed the Starlink satellites to be refresh with newer technology after five years of the initial orbit for each satellite into space. At the end of the satellites five years service, the old satellites will be steered into Earth's atmosphere where they will burn up.

Steering the burnt old satellites into Earth’s atmosphere is certainly commendable when it comes to space debris prevention, however, there is another problem.

The vast number of satellites that will be burning in the otherwise pristine upper layers of the atmosphere could alter the atmospheric chemistry and have unforeseen consequences for life on the planet.

CONCLUSION

Starlink satellite internet constellation enabled high-speed, low-latency broadband internet in remote and rural locations across Planet. Some of the services expected from Starlink include Satellite Internet, Military Satellites, Military Communications, Starshield program, and Satellite cellular service.

The connection of the user to Starlink Internet service is achieved through three (3) different hardware devices. These devices include Starlink Satellites that orbit at 550km above the earth, the user terminal called dishy in short with its router, and the ground station that serves as a gateway to satellites at orbit.

SpaceX designed the Starlink satellites to be refresh with newer technology after five years of the initial orbit for each satellite into space.

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REFERENCES

• Starlink (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starlink)Retrieved 25 July, 2023.
• Starlink satellites: Everything you need to know about the controversial internet megaconstellation (https://www.space.com/spacex-starlink-satellites.html) Retrieved on 25 july, 2023.
• Starlink Website (https://www.starlink.com/)