Private spaceflight is any spaceflight development that is not conducted by a government agency, such as NASA or ESA. During the early decades of the Space Age, the government space agencies of the Soviet Union and United States pioneered space technology in collaboration with affiliated design bureaus in the USSR and private companies in the US. They entirely funded both the development of new spaceflight technologies and the operational costs of spaceflight. Following a similar model of space technology development, the European Space Agency was formed in 1975. Arianespace, born out of ESA's independent spaceflight efforts, became the world's first commercial launch service provider in the early 1980s. Subsequently, large defense contractors began to develop and operate space launch systems, which were derived from government rockets. In the United States, the FAA has created a new certification called Commercial Astronaut, a new occupation. In the 2000s, entrepreneurs began designing—and by the 2010s, deploying—space systems competitive to the governmental systems of the early decades of the space age. These new offerings have brought about significant market competition in space launch services after 2010 that had not been present previously, principally through the reduction of the cost of space launch and the availability of more space launch capacity. Private spaceflight accomplishments to date include flying suborbital spaceplanes (SpaceShipOne and SpaceShipTwo), launching orbital rockets, flying two orbital expandable test modules (Genesis I and II). On the opposite, launching astronauts to the International Space Station and certain satellite launches are performed on behalf of and financed by government agencies. Planned private spaceflights beyond Earth orbit include personal spaceflights around the Moon. Two private orbital habitat prototypes are already in Earth orbit, with larger versions to follow. Planned private spaceflights beyond Earth orbit include solar sailing prototypes (LightSail-3).
History of commercial space transportation
During the principal period of spaceflight in the mid-twentieth century, only countries developed and flew spacecraft above the Kármán line, the nominal boundary of space. Both the U.S. civilian space program and Soviet space program were operated using mainly military pilots as astronauts. During this period, no commercial space launches were available to private operators, and no private organization was able to offer space launches. Eventually, private organizations were able to both offer and purchase space launches, thus beginning the period of private spaceflight. The first phase of private space operation was the launch of the first commercial communications satellites. The U.S. Communications Satellite Act of 1962 allowed commercial consortia owning and operating their own satellites, although these were still deployed on state-owned launch vehicles. In 1980, the European Space Agency created Arianespace, a company to be operated commercially after initial hardware and launch facilities were developed with government funding. Arianespace has since launched numerous satellites as a commercial entity. The history of full private space transportation includes early efforts by German company OTRAG in the 20th century. Founded in 1975 as the first private company to attempt to launch a private spacecraft, testing of its OTRAG rocket began in 1977. The history also covers numerous modern orbital and suborbital launch systems in the 21st century. More recent commercial spaceflight projects include the suborbital flights of Virgin Galactic and Blue Origin, the orbital flights of SpaceX and other COTS participants. Development of alternatives to government-provided space launch services began in earnest in the 2000s. Private interests began funding limited development programs, but the US government later sponsored a series of programs to incentivize and encourage private companies to begin offering both cargo, and later, crew space transportation services. Lower prices for launch services after 2010, and published prices for standard launch services, have brought about significant space launch market competition that had not been present previously. By 2012, a private company had begun transporting cargo to and from the International Space Station, while a second private company was scheduled to begin making deliveries in 2013, ushering in a time of regular private space cargo delivery to and return from the government-owned space facility in low Earth orbit (LEO). In this new paradigm for LEO cargo transport, the government contracts for and pays for cargo services on substantially privately developed space vehicles rather than the government operating each of the cargo vehicles and cargo delivery systems. As of 2013, there is a mix of private and government resupply vehicles being used for the ISS, as the Russian Soyuz and Progress vehicles, and the European Space Agency (ESA) ATV (through 2014) and the Japanese Kounotori (through 2021) remain in operation after the 2011 retirement of the US Space Shuttle. In June 2013, British newspaper The Independent claimed that "the space race is flaring back into life, and it's not massive institutions such as NASA that are in the running. The old view that human space flight is so complex, difficult and expensive that only huge government agencies could hope to accomplish it is being disproved by a new breed of flamboyant space privateers, who are planning to send humans out beyond the Earth's orbit for the first time since 1972," particularly noting projects underway by Mars One, Inspiration Mars Foundation, Bigelow Aerospace and SpaceX.
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