Strong case for deportees

A legal representative says deportees could have a strong case to challenge the Australian government. Waitemata Community Law Centre is working with the Commonwealth Ombudsman and 500 deportees to mount a law suit against the Australian government, first in the High Court then the United Nations. CEO Tom Harris says they’ve collected evidence from 100 people so far. He says most deportees just want to be back with their family and friends. Many have lived in Australia for more than 30 years.

Jamie Morton

Kiwi-founded Rocket Lab will develop and run a mission-control centre for a methane-tracking satellite, before handing the reins to an Auckland University-based space institute.

MethaneSAT marks New Zealand’s first state-funded journey into orbit, the Government having already earmarked $26 million for the not-for-profit global space programme.

Once operational late next year, the mission, led by the US-based Environmental Defence Fund (EDF), will monitor methane pollution from oil and gas around the world.

As methane accounts for about a quarter of today’s planetary warming, the data will prove crucial to emissionsreduction efforts.

With a highly sensitive spectrometer capable of detecting methane concentrations as low as two parts per billion, MethaneSAT will report emissions in near real-time from sources large and small.

The project, in which the fledgling New Zealand Space Agency has partnered with the EDF, will also freely publish data so progress by companies and countries can be compared.

Two years after New Zealand first signed on to the project, it was announced yesterday that Rocket Lab would play a central role in getting it off the ground, with the university’s Te Pu¯naha A¯teaAuckland Space Institute to serve as a permanent host.

Rocket Lab will develop, manage and operate MethaneSAT’s Auckland-based Mission Operations and Control Centre, set to be up and running by mid next year ahead of launch in late 2022. That means delivering the critical IT and software infrastructure necessary to task the satellite on orbit, including tracking, pointing and positioning, and maintaining collision avoidance.

Rocket Lab will also manage the collection of climate data generated by

"We’re changing the way important global missions are operated."

Peter Beck, Rocket Lab

MethaneSAT, and feed it to the programme’s international team of scientists and researchers.

“Rocket Lab’s technology changed the way satellites are launched, and now we’re changing the way important global missions are operated and managed too,” the company’s founder and chief executive, Peter Beck, said in a statement.

After a year, the centre will be managed by the Te Pu¯naha A¯teaAuckland Space Institute, with a Kiwibased team leading the mission’s science on agricultural methane emissions. A separate US team will be led by Harvard University, in partnership with The Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory.

Research, Science and Innovation Minister Megan Woods said the partnership would boost New Zealand’s capability and reputation.

“The mission will see the New Zealand Space Agency partner with one of the world’s leading environmental NGOs, the Environmental Defence Fund, which will also include a team of leading New Zealand atmospheric science and remote sensing researchers led by Niwa’s Dr Sara Mikaloff-Fletcher.”

The five-year, $88m project is also a major step for the New Zealand Space Agency, set up within the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment in 2016 and which has largely worked in policy and helping space-faring businesses. But because MethaneSAT is too large for Rocket Lab’s Electron launch vehicle, the mission won’t launch from New Zealand.