Spacefarer thinking

Spacefaring Institute LLC: Spacefarer thinking

$350 million satellite being unloaded from C-5
following transport to the launch site.
Count the number of people. Contrast this to Space Shuttle operations.

This is what "aircraft-like" safety and operability brings—routine operations.

The long-overdue retirement of the Space Shuttle without a better replacement coming into service represents a fundamental failure of national aerospace leadership.

With the retirement of the Space Shuttle, a never achieved historical record was established -- for the first time in American history, a major national infrastructure capability ended without a better capability becoming operational or being operational. While there are many causes that led us up to this point, fundamentally, Americans still view human space operations as somewhat of a lark and an expensive one at that. This view will change.

Nations flounder when the necessities of the present overcome the natural zeal to seek a better tomorrow. This is what happened to America’s human space enterprise. The “necessity” of prolonging jobs within the Space Shuttle industry overcame the natural inclination of American aerospace professionals to push on into the future. Instead of undertaking the hard and difficult tasks of making true progress in advancing our human spacefaring logistical capabilities, the national investment dollars that should have been preparing America for its exciting future as a true spacefaring nation have been consumed with “expeditions” to a space station producing little in the way of bang for the buck. This path was bound to fail and it did on July 21, 2011, when the Space Shuttle Orbiter Atlantis landed on the final Shuttle mission leaving America stuck on the ground with nothing better waiting in the wings.

Humankind's greatest challenge this century will be remaining civilized while we become globally civilized.

Opening and, to use a somewhat crude word, exploiting the natural resources of new frontiers have been how human civilization has progressed these past 12,000 years. This century, roughly 7 billion additional humans will want to join those of us fortunate enough to live in the developed nations by substantially increasing their standard of living. To do this will require a substantial growth in the exploitation of natural resources. Meeting these reasonable expectations of developing nations while maintaining the standard of living in developed nations will be out greatest global challenge this century—being civilized while becoming civilized.

Fundamentally, when you step back and look at this issue, the big picture is that the two essential needs are energy and land for producing food. With sufficient land and energy, we can use technology to meet our other needs for water, shelter, “things” in general, and, with enough inexpensive energy, even make more land. Hence, the primary challenge of the 21st century for Americans, for those living in most other developed nations, and, certainly, for the billions living in developing nations, will be to civilize our energy supplies by making them reliable, sustainable, and capable of supplying a staggeringly large amount of energy each year, year in and year out.

By the end of the century, the world will be seeking new reliable and sustainable energy sources capable of providing up to 3X today's annual global energy production.

For the world average standard of living to climb by the end of the century to match that in Japan, South Korea, and Western Europe, the world will need to expand the energy infrastructure until it is capable of producing nearly three times as much energy as today. Three times! Where will this come from? When you run through options, as I have done in the Spacefaring Institute video Space Solar Power, you are led to the conclusion that space solar power will likely be a necessary 21st century energy source.

Ultimately, human civilization will need some new form of nuclear energy that is capable of being scaled in size, is substantially safer than the uranium fission nuclear energy in use today, does not depend on scarce resources, and does not have WMD proliferation concerns. This may be a version of fusion energy or some other breakthrough waiting to be discovered. Until this emerges from the research labs and is ready for commercialization, we must have a Plan B to replace the fossil fuels that the world is depleting at an ever-increasing rate. Space solar power has the potential to be this Plan B interim solution. As such, it is now coming onto the radar screens of national energy planners around the world.

To exploit the energy potential of space solar power, American must become a true spacefaring nation—something we are not now.

When you come to understand and accept this line of reasoning, you will then conclude that America has no choice but to become a true human spacefaring nation capable of substantial and permanent human operations throughout the Earth-Moon frontier. We will do what we did with aeronautics in and after the 1940’s; we will grow, improve, and expand America’s commercial human spacefaring operations on a scale that is now, for most, inconceivable in a lifetime. Undoubtedly, the same was said about the future of aviation in the 1920’s and 1930’s. Yet, as you read this, several thousand commercial airliners, carrying about a quarter million people, are flying above your heads and you don’t give it a second thought. Unleashed from unwarranted constraints, America’s aerospace industry is capable of remarkable progress. Boeing, for example, is now introducing its eighth-generation commercial airliner in about 60 years.

America is NOT yet a true spacefaring nation. Americans, as spacefarers, do NOT yet have the ability to routinely, frequently, and safely travel to and within space and to live and work in space. The first step in crossing this perceived barrier to becoming a true spacefaring nation is for Americans to think as spacefarers—to hold expectations that all Americans wishing to engage in space commerce should have the ability to routinely, frequently, and safely travel to and within space and to live and work in space. Consequently, from this new way of looking at America's future in space, the need to establish new spacefaring logistics capabilities to support American human spacefaring operations throughout the Earth-Moon frontier becomes the next logical step in America's transformation into a true spacefaring nation—a necessity not only for America, but for every world-leading nation in the 21st century.

Building a commercial human spacefaring logistics infrastructure extending throughout the Earth-Moon system is the enabling step for America to become spacefaring.

Creating this needed/vital spacefaring logistics infrastructure will be the 21st century’s version of building the Transcontinental Railroad, Panama Canal, and Interstate Highway System. It will bring a new American mastery of commercial human space operations that will lead us forward into this exciting future just as we did with aeronautics after World War II. This is why the Spacefaring Institute LLC was founded—to help America transform into a true spacefaring nation by focusing on building the enabling human spacefaring logistics infrastructure.