Canadian military should turn to private sector for space surveillance tech, MPs told

The Canadian military could have modern satellite coverage in the Arctic a decade earlier than envisioned if the federal government is willing to follow the example of other countries and embrace commercial options in space, a House of Commons committee heard Monday.

Mike Greenley, chief executive officer of MDA Canada, told committee members Canada has fallen behind the rest of the globe from «a military space capability perspective» and is not effectively working with companies in the aerospace sector.

«As a result, our relevance in a rapidly changing geopolitical world is declining, and along with it, our ability to protect and defend Canadians,» said Greenley, whose company is the largest in the country in the space sector, with over $1 billion in sales annually.

One of the urgent problems facing defence officials is the country's rapidly aging chain of government-owned RADARSAT Constellation satellites.

The federal auditor general warned in late 2022 that those satellites could outrun their useful lifespan by 2026 and their replacement — known as the Defence Enhanced Surveillance from Space Project (DESSP) — is years away from getting off the ground.

The Liberal government promised dedicated military surveillance satellites in its 2017 defence policy and repeated the pledge in its latest strategy document — but the defence department's project status summary shows the multi-billion dollar program is not set for launch until «beyond 2035.»

Greenley said the United States and the United Kingdom have taken an approach of building only the space hardware they absolutely need, while buying the rest from the private sector.

Canada needs to start doing the same to avoid long delays in deploying critical military capabilities, he