Why Canada Still Has No Rocket Launch Sites? Polaris Calls for Canada’s First Sovereign Rocket Site

Polaris Aerospace, a space business and engineering consulting firm, have called for a sovereign launch capability to be introduced, developing the North American country as an option for space launches.

Polaris Aerospace: It’s Time for Canada to Launch Its Own Rockets

Polaris was founded by Neil Woodcock and Oleg Khalimonov, and this is not the first time people have called for Canada to develop more in terms of launch capacity. The country is well-positioned and has a lot of potential sites that could prove ideal for launches and other space facilities and startups.

Woodcock and Khalimonov have impressive CVs. Woodcock was Chief Operating Officer of Reaction Dynamics earlier in his career, before moving more into marketing. Khalimonov is currently the Program Lead for Starsailor, a Space Concordia student project at Concordia University, they plan to launch the first ever university rocket into space. 

They have now released a whitepaper that is designed to provide analysis and they have called for sovereign space facilities.

The authors explained in the summary that “Canada has long lacked a sovereign space launch capability, which has slowed the growth of its space sector, left it reliant on partners for critical space infrastructure, and has left the nation’s economic interests vulnerable to foreign actors.”

Canada has been earmarked by many as an area of development. The country’s vast countryside and potential suitable spots for launch capabilities makes it an outlier. Canada is one of the few space-faring nations without sovereign launches. The white paper explains:

“Without launch, there could be no space industry. Given that deriving value from space is only possible with launch, it follows that Canada’s space sector is wholly reliant on foreign services for its continued existence and growth. This is different from countries like the United States, France, or China, which engage with foreign partners to enhance the output of their space sectors, but are not reliant on foreign partners for the end-to-end functioning of their space sectors.”

There has been movement recently in the Canadian space industry. Maritime Launch Services, a Canadian firm founded in 2016 and based in Nova Scotia, is already building a spaceport near Canso, N.S. It plans a first orbital launch as early as 2026 and the company has already achieved a suborbital launch in 2023.

Canada has the potential to be a key player in the space industry and areas with sparse populations could be ideal for development. This white paper outlines both the benefits and some of the requirements to make this happen.