For posterity
Dec. 9th, 2009 07:30 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
spiderplanetParaphrased directive = Make a prediction about where an international issue will be in the future. Back up your argument in a reasonable fashion.
The most significant change to affect the International Space Station and the larger field of Space Exploration within the next few months will be the winding down of the American Space Shuttle Program and the resultant loss of some transportation to and from the International Space Station (ISS).
This change is not directly caused by, but is peripherally related to a long and ongoing move towards privatization. Where once the private market in that field was dominated by powerhouse corporations such as Boeing and Lockheed-Martin, bidding on pre-defined contract jobs with rigorous standards set by publicly controlled and publicly accountable entities; private companies are now moving into the areas of design, and into the oversight of hardware quality control and mission management. Eventually, private companies will take a more aggressive role in setting standards for the space program, with the long term goal of taking over any exploration that includes the probability of monetary gain.
In September, it was reported that the Space Shuttle program would be winding down in February of 2010, in December, it is reported that the end of the program will be September of 2010. Though the date is spreading, the variable date will not be extended indefinitely, as the number of missions remains very small and current funding levels would not allow an indefinite end without triggering a financial loss for other programs. The remaining American space shuttle missions will focus on carrying hardware and other supplies to the ISS, with the current expectation that the ISS will be functioning to at least 2015.
Although current NASA funding only sees the ISS project through 2015, the advisory committee reviewing the future of U.S. human spaceflight (otherwise known as the “Augustine Panel”) recently recommended to the White House that the station's life be extended to 2020. If the United States decided to end their involvement with the Space Station, the ISS program would continue with some combination of funding from the fourteen other government entities currently participating in the program. European Space Agency director Simonetta Di Pippo has been meeting regularly with Russian Space Agency officials on how to best maintain and use the low earth orbit research station, and the joint continuation of low earth orbit research beyond 2025.
After the end of the Space Shuttle program, the Russian Federation Soyuz will be the sole provider of astronauts and cosmonauts to and from the ISS. Equipment, supplies and any non-personnel materials to the ISS will be furnished by recently developed cargo vehicles of publicly directed Russian, European and Japanese design and control, and two privately owned, for-profit American companies; Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) and Orbital Sciences Corporation, which took over Kistler Aerospace‘s contract with NASA after Kistler Aerospace went bankrupt.
Both SpaceX and Orbital Sciences Corporation have submitted proposals, or are working on proposals for vehicles to transport humans to the ISS, though the most frequently discussed options do not currently include a launch escape system, a requirement of NASA’s human-ratings standards. A cursory view of these privately developed proposals would make them appear to be redundant versions of the ongoing NASA project known as Ares1/Orion, a component of the Constellation program which has nearly completed the design phase, and is currently undergoing early testing.
The Constellation program was begun in 2004, in the wake of the Columbia disaster with the long range goal to establish an Antarctica-type lunar research stations in the early 2020s where astronauts can live and work for several months at a time. Key components of this program include the directive that the program be safer and less expensive to operate than the Space Shuttle.
The Augustine panel has now recommended that NASA’s human-rating standards be altered so as to be more accessible to aspiring commercial entities. What’s changed between 2004 and 2009 is that the findings of some of the most recent publicly funded space exploration missions and academic speculations point to the strong possibility of profitable, non-terrestrial mining.
Many raw materials, including platinum, gold, silver, antimony and indium, all prominent and necessary components of technological hardware, have no synthetic alternative and are unlikely to be replaced by an alternative. These are all resources that are currently becoming more difficult to mine terrestrially, and mining methods are not without serious environmental consequences, including but not limited to water pollution and land disturbance. By crude calculation methods that assume that there will be no changes in either the demand or the technology to procure the resources, it is expected that some raw materials will run out in under a decade. The frequency of these metals is relatively consistent among the inner ring planets, and non-terrestrial mining has been speculated upon seriously for around a decade.
Luna, because of its small size and resultant low gravity, lacks plate-tectonics and moving water, two actions necessary for rare metals to concentrate enough so as to be minable in any specific area. The closest astronomical body with minable forms of any of these metals is Mars, currently infeasible for any two way trip for either a human or robot.
On November 13, 2009, LCROSS (Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite) at a cost of around $79 million, confirmed water on Luna, and subsequently confirmed the likelihood of a lunar base. LCROSS is a companion mission to the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO), a satellite that is currently orbiting and mapping the lunar surface so as to identify a location for the future lunar base.
Though much of NASA's current work focuses on returning astronauts to Luna by 2020, Luna is probably not the most necessary destination for a private entity and therefore not a profitable venture. However, any long term space exploration will probably be dependent on the existence of a lunar base, approximately a halfway point in the destination to Mars when measured in fuel.
In addition to water, the moon is embedded with Helium-3, a byproduct of solar radiation and a component of an emerging technology to produce fuel energy from nuclear fusion.
Already, legal experts are building a case for the legal rights to stake claims in space around Luna and other astronomical properties. The two documents that currently exist in this field are the Outer Space Treaty of 1967 and the moribund 1979 Treaty of the Moon, which socializes any resources of the moon but has only been ratified by 13 governments. Both documents were written during a time in human history when it was assumed that the resources available from extra-terrestrial sources were predominately cultural and scientific.
The Outer Space Treaty of 1967 says that “the exploration and use of outer space, including the moon and other celestial bodies, shall be carried out for the benefit and in the interests of all countries, irrespective of their degree of economic or scientific development, and shall be the province of all mankind.”
In order for private entities to successfully profit from extra-terrestrial efforts, this document must be undermined in the political arena. Legal speculators are beginning the groundwork of abolishing the document by implying that it is antiquated and therefore unenforceable, despite the fact that the document has been cited as recently as 2004.
Though virtually all space exploration to date has been funded exclusively by public means, an aggressive, grandiose and nationalistic reference to rugged individualism such as “America exists because it offered people the land and ability to pursue their hopes and dreams. The power of the untamed frontier is immense in the human psyche.” in an online publication aimed at astronomy nerds is not too over-the-top in the earliest attempts at encouraging public support for the privatization of what currently exists as an exclusively public resource.
From the perspective of a private corporation, a preferable document would be similar to the Treaty on Antarctica or the Law of the Sea Convention, both of which do not include all countries by blanket default, but instead must be ratified individually and tend to be dominated by the most economically powerful participants.
The move to privatization will be gradual, but key components of it will take place over the next year or two. The next few weeks will see a significant component of this progression. On December 8th, 2009 U.S. Senate and House negotiators reached agreement upon the continued funding of the Constellation program, and it is likely that something similar to that agreement will be supported by the president and the legislature sometime in late 2009 or early 2010. Many but not all of the recommendations of the Augustine panel will be adopted, some will be tabled for future discussion.
Constellation/Ares1 funding will continue far enough to see the program to fruition. Over the next few years, publicly owned and controlled entities will face increasing competition from private corporations for public monies. Private corporations will decreasingly be expected to adhere to the rigorous standards that publicly controlled entities operate under, and corporations will eventually be given the leeway to define the standards under which they operate. The planned lunar base will continue on schedule, the entirety of the project will be wholly paid for with public funds. Private corporations currently involved in contracts with the U.S. and other governments will continue to receive the bulk of their existence from government contracted projects, and they will consequently have the capital and technological resources to focus their long term goals on using publicly funded components for their own profit.
The first incarnations of a document to replace the Outer Space Treaty of 1967 will appear sometime in 2010, and that document will not be a treaty that includes the language “irrespective of their degree of economic or scientific development.”
Caveat: Citations are not included because it would have been a bunch of HTML coding that I didn't feel like. Most sources are online sources. Though I made deliberate and concerted efforts to avoid crackpottery, astronomy and space exploration in general tends to attract a higher than average percentage of crackpots. Information accuracy is meant to be reliable, but is not guaranteed. Look it up yerself if it's important.
The most significant change to affect the International Space Station and the larger field of Space Exploration within the next few months will be the winding down of the American Space Shuttle Program and the resultant loss of some transportation to and from the International Space Station (ISS).
This change is not directly caused by, but is peripherally related to a long and ongoing move towards privatization. Where once the private market in that field was dominated by powerhouse corporations such as Boeing and Lockheed-Martin, bidding on pre-defined contract jobs with rigorous standards set by publicly controlled and publicly accountable entities; private companies are now moving into the areas of design, and into the oversight of hardware quality control and mission management. Eventually, private companies will take a more aggressive role in setting standards for the space program, with the long term goal of taking over any exploration that includes the probability of monetary gain.
In September, it was reported that the Space Shuttle program would be winding down in February of 2010, in December, it is reported that the end of the program will be September of 2010. Though the date is spreading, the variable date will not be extended indefinitely, as the number of missions remains very small and current funding levels would not allow an indefinite end without triggering a financial loss for other programs. The remaining American space shuttle missions will focus on carrying hardware and other supplies to the ISS, with the current expectation that the ISS will be functioning to at least 2015.
Although current NASA funding only sees the ISS project through 2015, the advisory committee reviewing the future of U.S. human spaceflight (otherwise known as the “Augustine Panel”) recently recommended to the White House that the station's life be extended to 2020. If the United States decided to end their involvement with the Space Station, the ISS program would continue with some combination of funding from the fourteen other government entities currently participating in the program. European Space Agency director Simonetta Di Pippo has been meeting regularly with Russian Space Agency officials on how to best maintain and use the low earth orbit research station, and the joint continuation of low earth orbit research beyond 2025.
After the end of the Space Shuttle program, the Russian Federation Soyuz will be the sole provider of astronauts and cosmonauts to and from the ISS. Equipment, supplies and any non-personnel materials to the ISS will be furnished by recently developed cargo vehicles of publicly directed Russian, European and Japanese design and control, and two privately owned, for-profit American companies; Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) and Orbital Sciences Corporation, which took over Kistler Aerospace‘s contract with NASA after Kistler Aerospace went bankrupt.
Both SpaceX and Orbital Sciences Corporation have submitted proposals, or are working on proposals for vehicles to transport humans to the ISS, though the most frequently discussed options do not currently include a launch escape system, a requirement of NASA’s human-ratings standards. A cursory view of these privately developed proposals would make them appear to be redundant versions of the ongoing NASA project known as Ares1/Orion, a component of the Constellation program which has nearly completed the design phase, and is currently undergoing early testing.
The Constellation program was begun in 2004, in the wake of the Columbia disaster with the long range goal to establish an Antarctica-type lunar research stations in the early 2020s where astronauts can live and work for several months at a time. Key components of this program include the directive that the program be safer and less expensive to operate than the Space Shuttle.
The Augustine panel has now recommended that NASA’s human-rating standards be altered so as to be more accessible to aspiring commercial entities. What’s changed between 2004 and 2009 is that the findings of some of the most recent publicly funded space exploration missions and academic speculations point to the strong possibility of profitable, non-terrestrial mining.
Many raw materials, including platinum, gold, silver, antimony and indium, all prominent and necessary components of technological hardware, have no synthetic alternative and are unlikely to be replaced by an alternative. These are all resources that are currently becoming more difficult to mine terrestrially, and mining methods are not without serious environmental consequences, including but not limited to water pollution and land disturbance. By crude calculation methods that assume that there will be no changes in either the demand or the technology to procure the resources, it is expected that some raw materials will run out in under a decade. The frequency of these metals is relatively consistent among the inner ring planets, and non-terrestrial mining has been speculated upon seriously for around a decade.
Luna, because of its small size and resultant low gravity, lacks plate-tectonics and moving water, two actions necessary for rare metals to concentrate enough so as to be minable in any specific area. The closest astronomical body with minable forms of any of these metals is Mars, currently infeasible for any two way trip for either a human or robot.
On November 13, 2009, LCROSS (Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite) at a cost of around $79 million, confirmed water on Luna, and subsequently confirmed the likelihood of a lunar base. LCROSS is a companion mission to the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO), a satellite that is currently orbiting and mapping the lunar surface so as to identify a location for the future lunar base.
Though much of NASA's current work focuses on returning astronauts to Luna by 2020, Luna is probably not the most necessary destination for a private entity and therefore not a profitable venture. However, any long term space exploration will probably be dependent on the existence of a lunar base, approximately a halfway point in the destination to Mars when measured in fuel.
In addition to water, the moon is embedded with Helium-3, a byproduct of solar radiation and a component of an emerging technology to produce fuel energy from nuclear fusion.
Already, legal experts are building a case for the legal rights to stake claims in space around Luna and other astronomical properties. The two documents that currently exist in this field are the Outer Space Treaty of 1967 and the moribund 1979 Treaty of the Moon, which socializes any resources of the moon but has only been ratified by 13 governments. Both documents were written during a time in human history when it was assumed that the resources available from extra-terrestrial sources were predominately cultural and scientific.
The Outer Space Treaty of 1967 says that “the exploration and use of outer space, including the moon and other celestial bodies, shall be carried out for the benefit and in the interests of all countries, irrespective of their degree of economic or scientific development, and shall be the province of all mankind.”
In order for private entities to successfully profit from extra-terrestrial efforts, this document must be undermined in the political arena. Legal speculators are beginning the groundwork of abolishing the document by implying that it is antiquated and therefore unenforceable, despite the fact that the document has been cited as recently as 2004.
Though virtually all space exploration to date has been funded exclusively by public means, an aggressive, grandiose and nationalistic reference to rugged individualism such as “America exists because it offered people the land and ability to pursue their hopes and dreams. The power of the untamed frontier is immense in the human psyche.” in an online publication aimed at astronomy nerds is not too over-the-top in the earliest attempts at encouraging public support for the privatization of what currently exists as an exclusively public resource.
From the perspective of a private corporation, a preferable document would be similar to the Treaty on Antarctica or the Law of the Sea Convention, both of which do not include all countries by blanket default, but instead must be ratified individually and tend to be dominated by the most economically powerful participants.
The move to privatization will be gradual, but key components of it will take place over the next year or two. The next few weeks will see a significant component of this progression. On December 8th, 2009 U.S. Senate and House negotiators reached agreement upon the continued funding of the Constellation program, and it is likely that something similar to that agreement will be supported by the president and the legislature sometime in late 2009 or early 2010. Many but not all of the recommendations of the Augustine panel will be adopted, some will be tabled for future discussion.
Constellation/Ares1 funding will continue far enough to see the program to fruition. Over the next few years, publicly owned and controlled entities will face increasing competition from private corporations for public monies. Private corporations will decreasingly be expected to adhere to the rigorous standards that publicly controlled entities operate under, and corporations will eventually be given the leeway to define the standards under which they operate. The planned lunar base will continue on schedule, the entirety of the project will be wholly paid for with public funds. Private corporations currently involved in contracts with the U.S. and other governments will continue to receive the bulk of their existence from government contracted projects, and they will consequently have the capital and technological resources to focus their long term goals on using publicly funded components for their own profit.
The first incarnations of a document to replace the Outer Space Treaty of 1967 will appear sometime in 2010, and that document will not be a treaty that includes the language “irrespective of their degree of economic or scientific development.”
Caveat: Citations are not included because it would have been a bunch of HTML coding that I didn't feel like. Most sources are online sources. Though I made deliberate and concerted efforts to avoid crackpottery, astronomy and space exploration in general tends to attract a higher than average percentage of crackpots. Information accuracy is meant to be reliable, but is not guaranteed. Look it up yerself if it's important.
