China's Space Program Thread II

[tamsen_ikard]

View attachment 166700
(Q1 2023)
This should give a sense of the huge gap between US and China in terms actual mass launched. Number of launches is a deceptive metric as right now most of Chinese launches are medium or small lift rockets while basically every US launch is a reasonably fully loaded F9 B5 and even then China still lags behind the US in total launch by a good amount.

Chinese rockets right now lack turn around time and payload capacity to compete with SpaceX and the gap is huge even if their launch prices can compete.

We need to make a distinction between launch capacity vs launch demand. Does China lack the capacity to make more rockets with its high industrial base?

No

So, the reason China is doing less launches is because they don't need to make more launches. They don't have the demand.

Spacex has this high demand because of they are launching their own starlink satellites. On top of that, western countries are richer and have the surveillence companies who need to launch more satellites.

Compare that with China which is only starting to launch starlink like service and will take some time to ramp up. China's launch customers outside the government are basically some poorer global south countries. They are not going to generate demand for that many launches either.

Western government and western survellience companies will never launch using Chinese rockets even if it was 10 times cheaper than SpaceX. So, China's customer base will always remain limited.

Therefore, China's launch count will continue to remain low as long as there isn't enough demand for it. And I don't think reusable rocket tech will change this dynamic.

 

[Blitzo]

So maybe China should be focusing on a starship type delivery system to try and catch up? Any companies in China doing that?

That's like saying they should be focusing on building a nuclear powered super carrier when they've just started sea trials of Liaoning.

 

[AndrewS]

We need to make a distinction between launch capacity vs launch demand. Does China lack the capacity to make more rockets with its high industrial base?

No

So, the reason China is doing less launches is because they don't need to make more launches. They don't have the demand.

Spacex has this high demand because of they are launching their own starlink satellites. On top of that, western countries are richer and have the surveillence companies who need to launch more satellites.

Compare that with China which is only starting to launch starlink like service and will take some time to ramp up. China's launch customers outside the government are basically some poorer global south countries. They are not going to generate demand for that many launches either.

Western government and western survellience companies will never launch using Chinese rockets even if it was 10 times cheaper than SpaceX. So, China's customer base will always remain limited.

Therefore, China's launch count will continue to remain low as long as there isn't enough demand for it. And I don't think reusable rocket tech will change this dynamic.

If the price of Chinese launches was as low as SpaceX, then there would be a lot more demand.

There's a lot of people (in China and elsewhere in the world) who would pay for affordable, fast Satellite Broadband services.

 

[MortyandRick]

Well I hope China can keep pace and not let this have to be another Manhattan project.

 

[tphuang]

I understand people are disappointed, but some of the takes here are just overly alarmist.

Lack of re-usable rockets most definitely slows down their launch payload delivery to LEO, but pure launching capacity isn't the only reason SpaceSail or Guowang constellations haven't been larger so far. You need satellites themselves to be ready technologically, the satellite production to be up to par, the launchers to be available and the launch site available to be up to par also. And frankly, most of the delays in these program are not due to launchers being unavailable.

It actually should be expected that you fail 1 or 2 times with a new rocket before it lands correctly. I don't think any of the constellations have been planned with the expectations that re-usable rockets will be ready by 2026Q1.

Other programs have been launching on schedule based on what I can see. So, as usual, just need to have patience. It will all be alright, believe it or not.

 

[sunnymaxi]

We need to make a distinction between launch capacity vs launch demand. Does China lack the capacity to make more rockets with its high industrial base?

No

So, the reason China is doing less launches is because they don't need to make more launches. They don't have the demand.

Spacex has this high demand because of they are launching their own starlink satellites. On top of that, western countries are richer and have the surveillence companies who need to launch more satellites.

Compare that with China which is only starting to launch starlink like service and will take some time to ramp up. China's launch customers outside the government are basically some poorer global south countries. They are not going to generate demand for that many launches either.

Western government and western survellience companies will never launch using Chinese rockets even if it was 10 times cheaper than SpaceX. So, China's customer base will always remain limited.

Therefore, China's launch count will continue to remain low as long as there isn't enough demand for it. And I don't think reusable rocket tech will change this dynamic.

your points are fine but @Tomboy has valid point as well.

there was less demand but things have completely changed in past couple of years.

Qianfan and Guowang two mega constellations right now.

Jilin-1 Constellation: This is the world's largest commercial sub-meter remote sensing satellite constellation

Tianqi Constellation: A smaller LEO constellation focused on Internet-of-Things (IoT) communications

Geely Future Mobility Constellation: this is a commercial LEO constellation for communication. they are planning for 6000 satellites.

Three-Body Computing Constellation: that aims to integrate space and ground computing into a single AI-enabled infrastructure

now you see, we have immense demand right now.



China launched more than doubled satellites in first quarter of this year and in later half of this year we launched approx. 3X more satellites. and this is just the beginning. more heavy rockets coming next year and Wenchang commercial launch pad planning 3X launches in 2026. there are two more launching pads under construction in Hainan.
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apart from this, they also started large satellite manufacturing clusters.

China's commercial satellite corporation plans an annual production capacity of 500 satellites in the first phase and 1,000 satellites in the second phase.. this is just one satellite manufacturing cluster. there are two more.



the only missing piece is a reusable rocket right now. hopefully they achieve success soon. ZQ-3/LM-10/TL-3 and few more all are coming for reusable rockets next year.

 

[TheRathalos]

EDIT: nvm, The Guowang/Qianfan deployment chart was shared here: China's Space Program Thread II
I apologize

Deploying 310 Guowang satellites in 2026 is feasible if the launch rate of CZ-6A/CZ-8A/CZ-12/CZ-5B we've seen recently is kept up.
The rest... will depend on private and reusable launchers.

Also nice to have official data on the chinese upmass, brycetech's initial estimates are generally way off, they usually refine it by the end of the year but it's still not exact.
This is what I could find:
2023 brycetech estimate: 131,838kg
2023 real upmass: 123,380 kg

2024 brycetech estimate: 181,334kg
2024 real upmass: 202,000kg

 

[ZachL111]

EDIT: nvm, The Guowang/Qianfan deployment chart was shared here: China's Space Program Thread II
I apologize
View attachment 166745
Deploying 310 Guowang satellites in 2026 is feasible if the launch rate of CZ-6A/CZ-8A/CZ-12/CZ-5B we've seen recently is kept up.
The rest... will depend on private and reusable launchers.

Also nice to have official data on the chinese upmass, brycetech's initial estimates are generally way off, they usually refine it by the end of the year but it's still not exact.
This is what I could find:
2023 brycetech estimate: 131,838kg
2023 real upmass: 123,380 kg

2024 brycetech estimate: 181,334kg
2024 real upmass: 202,000kg

Yeah honestly I should've posted the pictures with the Weibo posts as well, I was running late to something yesterday so I forgot.

 

[iewgnem]

There should be some level of collaboration between these companies doing reusable rockets. Multiple space companies are all trying to individually do the same thing and you can’t have each one fail repeating the same mistakes. It just seems to waste time and resources when they are repeating each other’s mistakes. Some level of knowledge sharing so they can learn off each other will be better for China. The longer the delay for an operational reusable rocket, the further China will fall behind Starlink.

There's a disconnect between some people on the internet and real life: a lot of people on the internet sees VTVL as the singularly most important thing in spaceflight, in no small part because, not being involved in the industry, they evaluate everything based on amount of media attention, but it's pretty obvious in real life China doesn't consider VTVL the highest priority and certainly not enough to concentrate resources to get going.

Spaceflight is about a lot more than LEO launch or the small corner SpaceX occupies, for the US launching LEO constellation is the entirety of their space program right now, there's no more money for NASA, no more money for lunar, no money for next gen tech and no money for advanced missions, while China's priority the project in focus is clearly on lunar landing, lunar base and CSS expansion. To the US VTVL is their entire space program and the only thing they can afford to care about, while to China VTVL is a side project that can be left to commercial players, and arguably should be left to commercial players since cost is the goal, not the act in itself.

People who obsess over VTVL is missing forest for the trees, at end of the day the goal is capability and cost, not matching whatever the US is doing. If a capability is actually critical for national security then 200x LM5B launches to put up 10,000 satellites averaging 500 kg will only run around $20B, 2% of China's defence budget per year over 3 years or building 200 km of subway, but China obviously don't consider that capability important enough to allocate the money. If on the other hand the goal is low cost, then dumping money into VTVL defeats the point of VTVL to begin with.

China has the resources to go the moon, US does not, it makes little sense for China to focus fire on what the US is doing at the expense of what the US can't afford to do.

 

[Andy1974]

Spaceflight is about a lot more than LEO launch or the small corner SpaceX occupies, for the US launching LEO constellation is the entirety of their space program right now,

Didn’t Blue Origin just send a mission to Mars, and don’t they have a moon lander also?

Isn’t SpaceX’s entire reason for existence to send humans to occupy Mars?