Top Stories of 2009

Alan Boyle at MSNBC reviews the top space stories of 2009 and allows you to vote for your favorite.

Titan, the New Middle East

Apparently Titan, Saturn's largest moon, has hundreds of times more liquid hydrocarbons than all the known oil and natural gas reserves on Earth. Maybe we can talk big oil into funding some trips. (That is only a half joke, because new space would certainly jump on that trip).

Space Solar Power Study

Here is the formal press release:


New Space Solar Power Organization Announced

The Space Solar Alliance for Future Energy
Will Pursue Recommendations of New NSSO-Led Study


Study Concludes Space Solar Power Could Deliver Clean, Renewable Energy for Planet,
But Requires a Coordinated National Program of Investment


Wednesday, October 10, 2007: The Space Solar Alliance for Future Energy (SSAFE), a new organization advocating investment in space-based solar power technologies to address the planet's future energy needs, was announced today at the National Press Club.

The coalition of thirteen leading research organizations and space advocacy groups focused their inaugural event on the announcement of a new study of space-based solar power led by the National Security Space Office (NSSO).

The study concludes that space-based solar power deserves substantial national investment as a path towards addressing America's future energy needs via a renewable energy source with no carbon emissions or hazardous waste. In the Space Solar Power concept, developed in the late nineteen-sixties by Dr. Peter Glaser, energy from sunlight is collected in space and transmitted wirelessly for use on Earth.

Mark Hopkins, Senior Vice President of the National Space Society, stated, "As the United States makes decisions now to answer the energy challenges of the next 50 years, space-based solar power must be a part of the answer. While the technical challenges are real, significant investment now can build Space Solar Power into the ultimate energy source: clean, green, renewable, and capable of providing the vast amounts of power that the world will need. Congress, federal agencies and the business community should begin that investment immediately."

The new Space Solar Alliance for Future Energy (SSAFE) will promote the findings of the NSSO-led study, and seek to communicate the benefits of the technology to business, government and the general public.

According to Air Force Colonel-Select M.V. 'Coyote' Smith, the leader of the study, "When we started this work I had my doubts about the technology. But as the facts poured in, it became obvious that my initial assessment was wrong. Not only is this possible, but space-based solar power is probably the greatest opportunity to develop a safe, clean source of energy that can readily be shared with all of humanity."


The founding members of SSAFE are the National Space Society, Space Frontier Foundation, Space Power Association, Aerospace Technology Working Group, Marshall Institute, Moon Society, ShareSpace Foundation, Space Studies Institute, Spaceward Foundation, AIAA Space Colonization Technical Committee, ProSpace, Space Enterprise Council, and Space Generation Foundation.


###

Editors:

Still images of a space solar power system created for today's announcement are available at:

http://www.nss.org/settlement/ssp/mafic.htm


Video animations in NTSC and HD are available upon request. Email: katherine.brick@nss.org


The NSSO-led study will be made available at:


http://ssp.space-frontier.org


New National Space Society white paper on Space Solar Power:

http://www.nss.org/legislative/positions/NSS-SSP-PositionPaper.pdf


The website of the new Space Solar Alliance for Future Energy is:

http://ssafe.org/



SSAFE Founding Organizations and Contacts:



National Space Society
http://nss.org
Mark Hopkins, Senior Vice President
loby4space@aol.com
310-775-3546

Space Studies Institute
http://ssi.org
Lee Valentine, Executive Vice President
lee@ssi.org
412-418-0177

Space Enterprise Council
http://www.uschamber.com/space
David Logsdon, Executive Director
dlogsdon@uschamber.com
202-463-5332

Aerospace Technology Working Group
http://www.atwg.org/
Ken Cox
kcox12@houston.rr.com
281-728-3072


Space Frontier Foundation
http://space-frontier.org
Margo Deckard, Space Solar Power Project Manager
mardeckard@aol.com
937-367-8737

Marshall Institute
http://marshall.org/
Jeff Kueter, President
kueter@marshall.org
202.296.9655

Moon Society
http://www.moonsociety.org/
Peter Kokh, President
KokhMMM@aol.com
414-342-0705

ProSpace
http://prospace.org
Frank Johnson, President
fjohnson3@gmail.com
240-460-8578


Space Generation Foundation
http://www.spacegeneration.org/
Loretta Hidalgo Whitesides, President
loretta@spacegen.org
626-429-6603

Space Power Association
http://www.spacepowerassociation.org
John Mankins, President
sunsat@spacepowerassociation.org
703-858-1574

Spaceward Foundation
http://spaceward.org
Ben Shelef, Co-founder ben@spaceward.org
650-969-2010

ShareSpace Foundation
http://sharespace.org
Lisa Cannon
lcannon@buzzaldrin.com
310-458-4717

AIAA Space Colonization Technical Committee
http://www.aiaa.org/portal/index.cfm?GetComm=195&tc=tc
Klaus Heiss, Chairman
klaus.Heiss@verizon.net
703-535-8774

Why New Space?

Matthew Bowes has an An Introduction to Private Spaceflight It is pretty good.

Orbital Outpost vs. Lunar Outpost

Al Globus makes an argument that orbiting space colonies are better than lunar colonies. I agree with some of what he says, but he only shows one side of it.

His agreements amount to:

1. Orbital colonies are easier to build
2. There's more space
3. Orbital Colonists can live at 1 g.

To address point 3 first, there is little evidence of the effects of 1/6 g on the human body. So it is not a given that Lunnies could not visit Earth. But it might be a valid point.

Argument 2 is true, but I am not sure it matters. As he admits, the Earth is nearly uninhabited by area, so how are we going to fill up huge colonies in the near future, when we don't even fill up our home.

About point 1, he states:

Getting back and forth to orbit is far easier than getting to the Moon or Mars, which is why we've had space stations circling Earth for thirty years and have yet to see the first base on the Moon much less on Mars.

First, we have not had large circling stations in orbit for any years. Skylab, Mir, and ISS together could hold maybe 20 people, if they liked each other. And they all cost a fortune to build. In orbit, everything you build has to come from somewhere else. On the Moon, it could (potentially) come from the dust beneath your feet.

I think it is yet to be seen whether orbital or lunar colonies will be better. Hopefully we will have both along with many other colonies on many other moons and planets in the coming centuries. I think I will lean on the side of the moon for our first foray.

Why the Moon is Worth It?

Charles Krauthammer as an editorial at the Washington Post titled Music Of the Spheres Why a Moon Mission Is Worth the Money.

His basic premise is that our manned space program for the last 30 years has been useless. He puts it as, "[t]here's nothing quite as beautiful as the space station and the shuttle that services it, and nothing quite as useless."

He believes the Moon is useful since it is a "The moon is a destination. The idea this time is not to go to plant a flag, take a golf shot and leave, but to stay and form a real self-sustaining, extraterrestrial human colony."

He also points out that, "Humans can discover things through intuition and pattern recognition that machines thinking in algorithms cannot. Imagine the scientific possibilities if today we had humans patrolling Mars rather than the brilliantly programmed but still limited golf carts now roaming the surface."

Can't argue with it.