The 2025 workshop’s overarching goal was to gather operator perspectives regarding the status and plans for TraCSS, EU SST Spaceflight Safety and SSA, and other commercial and international initiatives that have potential to support responsible actions for a sustainable space economy. Another key goal was to discuss critical stakeholders to bring into the conversation, why they matter, and how to develop opportunities and mechanisms to engage with them, including China. The workshop purposefully included more participants from the commercial space industry than in past years.
As reflected in the agenda below, the first session began with a presentation of a graphic which showed that in 2025, for the first time, the number of active satellites tracked exceeded the number of tracked space debris objects. The group reflected on how the graphic provides two significant insights, 1) that responsible launch practices, active space object population management, debris mitigation policies and other collective efforts are having a positive impact on the space environment, and 2) encouraging progress in data sharing for collision avoidance and other measures is more urgent than ever because even one major collision would undo this progress. Remarks by two distinguished invited speakers; and a joint presentation by experts from the U.S. Department of Commerce (DOC) and the European Union Space Surveillance and Tracking (EU SST) followed.
The second session began with a panel discussion among former and current U.S., NATO, and European officials, and commercial satellite owner/operators. The panel’s goals were to highlight challenges for satellite operators if China and others remain on the outside of the discussion, identify opportunities and potential models for bringing China and others into the discussion, and to discuss NATO’s emergence as a key SSA stakeholder. A round-table discussion followed which provided an opportunity for representative from each U.S. governmental agency and each participating country to provide brief country updates.
