Who Owns What on the Moon? Article II, the Artemis Accords and Space Resources
Nobody can own the Moon and everyone agrees on that. Whether a company owns the regolith it digs is unsettled, and how…
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Everything we publish, newest first. Analysis, regulatory updates, case notes, interviews and explainers on the law of outer space.
Introducing the Space Law Journal Interview Series
We are looking for regulators, in-house counsel, underwriters and academics. Here is what we ask, how the process runs, and why you…
Space Traffic Management Still Has No Referee
When two satellites are heading for the same point in space, no authority anywhere can require either to move. Funding TraCSS does…
Explainers8 min read
8 min
How to Build a Career in Space Law
The field people imagine and the field that hires are different. Four routes in, what actually differentiates candidates, and an honest answer on whether the specialist…
Regulatory Updates6 min read
6 min
The EU Space Act: What One European Rulebook Would Change
120 articles, three pillars and a reach that follows the service rather than the operator. Where the file has got to in Council and Parliament, and…
Commercial Space7 min read
7 min
Cross Waivers, MPL and Indemnification: How Launch Contracts Allocate Catastrophe
Everyone bears their own losses regardless of fault. Above that sit three tiers of third party protection, one of which has never actually been funded.
Commercial Space7 min read
7 min
Space Insurance Explained: How a $650 Million Market Prices Risk in Orbit
One bad year in 2023 wiped out several good ones and pushed the five year margin negative for the first time since 2001. What that means…
Case Notes6 min read
6 min
Dark-Sky Association v FCC: Standing, Starlink and the Categorical Exclusion
An astronomy body got through the courthouse door where a competitor could not, then lost anyway. Read with Viasat, the two decisions make constellation environmental challenges…
Commercial Space7 min read
7 min
How ITU Filings Decide Who Gets Spectrum and Orbital Slots
Orbital positions are not owned, they are recorded. Here is the filing chain, the seven year bringing into use deadline, and the milestone rule that shrinks…
Regulatory Updates6 min read
6 min
The FCC Five Year Deorbit Rule: Who It Binds and What It Requires
Twenty five years became five. The scope limits matter more than the headline: below 2,000 km, uncontrolled reentry, launches after 29 September 2024, and non-US operators…
Case Notes5 min read
5 min
The DISH Consent Decree: The First Orbital Debris Fine, and What It Settled
A $150,000 penalty that nobody at DISH felt, over a satellite parked 178 km lower than it should have been. The number is not the point.…
Insights7 min read
7 min
Space Debris Liability: Who Pays When Satellites Collide
The Liability Convention applies a fault standard to orbital collisions and never defines fault. That gap is why no claim has ever been brought for a…