Photos: China Starts Construction of First Commercial Space Launch Site in Hainan
© AP Photo / Tu Haichao
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Construction began on a new commercial spacecraft launch site on Wednesday, located near the existing launch site in the southern city of Wenchang. China’s commercial space industry is small, but the government is planning ahead for a major expansion in the coming years, as its state-directed space program accelerates.
Speaking at a groundbreaking ceremony in Wenchang, Hainan Provincial Governor Feng Fei said that once the project is completed in 2024, the island province will use it to turn Wenchang into a world-class spaceport, establishing an “entire space industry chain” including carrier rockets, satellites, and data processing centers.
China Aerospace Construction Group is building the facility for the Hainan government and three state-owned space firms: China Aerospace Science and Technology Corp, China Aerospace Science and Industry Corp and China Satellite Network Group.
Photo taken on July 6, 2022 shows the construction site of Hainan commercial spacecraft launch site in Wenchang City, south China's Hainan Province. Construction of China's first commercial spacecraft launch site started Wednesday in Wenchang City, south China's island province of Hainan.
As a major project of the Hainan free trade port construction, the Hainan commercial spacecraft launch site is committed to becoming world-class, market-oriented, and further improving the launching capability of China's commercial carrier rockets.
The nearby Wenchang Space Launch Center is operated by the Chinese state alongside three other launch centers in Jiquan, Taiyuan, and Xichang, which together focus on state programs like lunar exploration and manned space flight. However, the new commercial launch center will be aimed at meeting China’s burgeoning commercial space industry in the longer term.
"The existing government-run launch centers are well developed but they are too busy to handle the increasing demands from the commercial space sector and it is not uncommon that even a government-assigned mission would have to wait for arrangement at those sites," Hu Shengyun, a senior rocket designer at China Aerospace Science and Industry Corp, told China Daily.
He added that the state-operated launch sites were not designed for the volume of traffic that the commercial site will have to handle, so it is better if they don’t have to worry about it.
Aerial photo taken on July 6, 2022 shows the construction site of Hainan commercial spacecraft launch site in Wenchang City, south China's Hainan Province. Construction of China's first commercial spacecraft launch site started Wednesday in Wenchang City, south China's island province of Hainan.
As a major project of the Hainan free trade port construction, the Hainan commercial spacecraft launch site is committed to becoming world-class, market-oriented, and further improving the launching capability of China's commercial carrier rockets.
The new commercial launch site will also feature a rocket recovery site and specialized launch pads for the Long March 5, 7 and 8 families of rockets, and will have a launch pad reserved for manned missions to the Moon. It will also include facilities for rocket assembly and testing. Its location so close to Earth’s equator will give rockets a major speed boost, saving on fuel.
Ningbo, in the eastern Zhejiang Province, is also expected to build a similarly impressive commercial launch facility, as is Haiyan in Shandong Province.
However, the private space industry sector, which is still small in China, reportedly has doubts about the new facility.
“I don’t think those pads are going to be cheap,” a source who works for a commercial launch start-up based in Beijing told the South China Morning Post. “I’m not sure how many commercial launches will be planned each year, but that is likely to be a small number, so each launch is going to be really expensive.”
