Abstract
The performance of elecrodynamic tether orbit transfer system was analyzed to examine its possibility of the application to the round trip transportation mission between low earth orbits. The mass, the electric power and the mission time of tether orbit transfer system were obtained by the principle of operation of electrodynamic tether and the mission analysis based on the simplified orbit transfer analysis model of ion thruster for representative parameters and were compared with that of ion thruster orbit transfer. The results showed that there is a lower limit of mission time for each altitude of arrival orbit or higher limit of altitude of arrival orbit for each mission time and the most effective mechanical parameter on the improvement of system performance is the tether length. The results also showed that the tether orbit transfer system had mass advantage compared with the ion thruster orbit transfer system for the same missions.
