347 cm nasa aff neg

SPS Aff/Neg WorkDDI 2008 <CM> Silly Wabbitt.

SPS AFF NEG WORK

NASA Private Sector Investment ......................................................................................................... 2

SPS Opens Markets ................................................................................................................................... 7

Incentives Solve .......................................................................................................................................... 8

SPS Innovation ....................................................................................................................................... 9

WE don’t Want Space Wars!!! ............................................................................................................... 10

NASA Needs to Do Plan .......................................................................................................................... 12

Military Likes the Plan ............................................................................................................................ 15

Space Geeks Like the Plan ...................................................................................................................... 16

DOD Fails ................................................................................................................................................. 17

NEG ........................................................................................................................................................... 19

SPS Electricity Bad .................................................................................................................................. 20

SPS Not Viable ......................................................................................................................................... 20

DOD CP .................................................................................................................................................... 21

Space weapons Good ............................................................................................................................... 22

SPS key to Space Weapons ..................................................................................................................... 23

Peaceful Military Space Weapons (DOD) ............................................................................................. 24

SPS Bad for NASA ................................................................................................................................... 25

NASA SUCKS! ......................................................................................................................................... 26

The Space Disease .................................................................................................................................... 28

Six Reasons why SPS kills NASA ........................................................................................................... 29

I fell asleep, and woke up thinking there was a murderer in Kemeny.1


NASA Private Sector Investment

Increased incentives opens private access to space, but the Government is key. NASA, 2007 (NASA, “Space Based Solar Power as an Opportunity for Strategic Security” Phase 0 Architecture Feasibility Study, October 10, 2007)

Several major challenges will need to be overcome to make SBSP a reality, including the creation of low-cost space access and a supporting infrastructure system on Earth and in space. Solving these space access and operations challenges for SBSP will in turn also open space for a host of other activities that include space tourism, manufacturing, lunar or asteroid resource utilization, and eventually settlement to extend the human race. Because DoD would not want to own SBSP satellites, but rather just purchase the delivered energy as it currently does via traditional terrestrial utilities, a repeated review finding is that the commercial sector will need the government to accomplish three major tasks to catalyze SBSP development. The first is to retire a major portion of the early technical risks. This can be accomplished via an incremental research and development program that culminates with a space-borne proof-of-concept demonstration in the next decade. A spiral development proposal to field a 10 MW continuous pilot plant en route to gigawatts-class systems is included in Appendix B. The second challenge is to facilitate the policy, regulatory, legal, and organizational instruments that will be necessary to create the partnerships and relationships (commercial-commercial, government-commercial, and government-government) needed for this concept to succeed. The final Government contribution is to become a direct early adopter and to incentivize other early adopters much as is accomplished on a regular basis with other renewable energy systems coming on-line today.

SPS fuels missions.NASA, 2007 (NASA, “Space Based Solar Power as an Opportunity for Strategic Security” Phase 0 Architecture Feasibility Study, October 10, 2007)

The SBSP Study Group found that one immediate application of space-based solar power would be to broadcast power directly to energy-deprived areas and to persons performing disaster relief, nation-building, and other humanitarian missions often associated with the United Nations and related non-governmental organizations . Recommendation: The SBSP Study Group recommends that during subsequent phases of the SBSP feasibility study opportunities for broad international partnerships with non-state and trans-state actors should be explored. In particular, cooperation with the United Nations and related organizations to employ SBSP in support of various humanitarian relief efforts support consistent with the U.N. Millennium Objectives must be assessed with the help of affiliated professionals.



SPS investment in private sector brings back huge economic returns.NASA, 2007 (NASA, “Space Based Solar Power as an Opportunity for Strategic Security” Phase 0 Architecture Feasibility Study, October 10, 2007)

The business case is much more likely to close in the near future if the U.S. Government agrees to: o Sign up as an anchor tenant customer, and o Make appropriate technology investment and risk reduction efforts by the U.S. Government, and o Provide appropriate financial incentives to the SBSP industry that are similar to the significant incentives that Federal and State Governments are providing for private industry investments in other clean and renewable power sources. The business case may close in the near future with appropriate technology investment and risk reduction efforts by the U.S. Government, and with appropriate financial incentives to industry. Federal and State Governments are providing significant financial incentives for private industry investments in other clean and renewable power sources . Recommendation: The SBSP Study Group recommends that in order to reduce risk and to promote development of SBSP, the U.S. Government should increase and accelerate its investments in the development and demonstration of key component, subsystem, and system level technologies that will be required for the creation of operational and scalable SBSP systems. The SBSP Study Group found that a small amount of entry capital by the US Government is likely to catalyze substantially more investment by the private sector. This opinion was expressed many times over from energy and aerospace companies alike. Indeed, there is anecdotal evidence that even the activity of this interim study has already provoked significant activity by at least three major aerospace companies. Should the United States put some dollars in for a study or demonstration, it is likely to catalyze significant amounts of internal research and development. Study leaders likewise heard that the DoD could have a catalytic role by sponsoring prizes or The SBSP Study Group found that SBSP appears to have significant growth potential in the long run, and a national investment in SBSP may return many times its value. Most of America’s spending in space does not provide any direct monetary revenue. SBSP, however, may create new markets and the need for new products that will provide many new, high paying technical jobs and net significant tax revenues. Great powers have historically succeeded by finding or inventing products and services not just to sell to themselves, but to others. Today, investments in space are measured in billions of dollars. The energy market is trillions of dollars, and there are many billions of people in the developing world that have yet to connect to the various global markets. Such a large export market could generate substantial new wealth for our nation and our world. Investments to mature SBSP are similarly likely to have significant economic spin offs, each with their own independent revenue stream, and open up or enable other new industries such as space industrial processes, space tourism, enhanced telecommunications, and use of off world resources. Not all of the returns may be obvious. SBSP is a both infrastructure and a global utility. Estimating the value of utilities is difficult since they benefit society as a whole more than any one user in particular—consider what the contribution to productivity and GDP are by imagining what the world would be like without electric lines, roads, railroads, fiber, or airports. Not all of the economic impact is immediately captured in direct SBSP jobs, but also in the services and products that spring up to support those workers and their communities. Historically such infrastructure projects have received significant government support, from land grants for railroads, to subsidized rural electrification, to development of atomic energy. While the initial capability on ramp may be slow, SBSP has the capability to be a very significant portion of the world energy portfolio by mid century and beyond. signaling its willingness to become the anchor customer for the product. These findings are consistent with the findings of the recent President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST) report which recommended the federal government “expand its role as an early adopter in order to demonstrate commercial feasibility of advanced energy technologies.” The SBSP Study Group found that adequate capital exists in the private sector to finance construction, however private capital is unlikely to develop this concept without government assistance because the timeframe of reward and degree of risk are outside the window of normal private sector investment. Capital in the energy and other sectors is available on the level needed for such a large project, but capital flows under fairly conservative criteria, and SBSP has not yet experienced a suitable demonstration, nor have the risks been adequately characterized to make informed business plan decisions.



Private Sector Key

Personal advocacy is the first crucial step to change,O’Neill, 92 (Gerard K. O’Neill, Doctorates Degree, Trilogy: “The World’s Energy Future Belongs in Orbit,” January/ February 1992, http://ssi.org/?page_id=8)

That’s why research support toward satellite power has been left largely to the Space Studies Institute, a small foundation supported by thousands of private citizens -much as the organizations of the environmental movement are supported. Environmentally concerned citizens and groups, and SSI, should be talking. Their concerns are the same and their goals are the same. Since the governmental-scientific establishment in the United States is making no useful move toward a serious review of satellite power as a practical alternative, it may well be that concerned citizens are the only force that can bring about the necessary action. We as citizens have often succeeded in “Stop!” actions. Let us review, carefully and with open minds, whether SPS is something that we may want to “Start!”



Government key to Private Sector Development

USFG modeling key to private sector development in SPS. NASA, 2007 (NASA, “Space Based Solar Power as an Opportunity for Strategic Security” Phase 0 Architecture Feasibility Study, October 10, 2007)

Several major challenges will need to be overcome to make SBSP a reality, including the creation of low-cost space access and a supporting infrastructure system on Earth and in space. Solving these space access and operations challenges for SBSP will in turn also open space for a host of other activities that include space tourism, manufacturing, lunar or asteroid resource utilization, and eventually settlement to extend the human race. Because DoD would not want to own SBSP satellites, but rather just purchase the delivered energy as it currently does via traditional terrestrial utilities, a repeated review finding is that the commercial sector will need the government to accomplish three major tasks to catalyze SBSP development. The first is to retire a major portion of the early technical risks. This can be accomplished via an incremental research and development program that culminates with a space-borne proof-of-concept demonstration in the next decade. A spiral development proposal to field a 10 MW continuous pilot plant en route to gigawatts-class systems is included in Appendix B. The second challenge is to facilitate the policy, regulatory, legal, and organizational instruments that will be necessary to create the partnerships and relationships (commercial-commercial, government-commercial, and government-government) needed for this concept to succeed. The final Government contribution is to become a direct early adopter and to incentivize other early adopters much as is accomplished on a regular basis with other renewable energy systems coming on-line today.

Only Federal Government can incentivize effectively. Executive Branch Of The Untied States Federal Government 2006 National Aeronatuics Research And Development Policy

In order to achieve the goal of this policy, the executive departments and agencies of the U.S. Government should adhere to the following general guidelines: Role of the Federal Government in Aeronautics R&D. The Federal Government should only undertake roles in supporting aeronautics R&D that are not more appropriately per- formed by the private sector. Specifically, the Federal Government plays a key role in the following three aspects of aeronautics R&D. Investment in a full range of aeronautics R&D that supports national defense and home- land security, from basic research through advanced technology development and beyond, is a responsibility of executive departments and agencies and should remain a U.S. Government priority. The U.S. Government plays a unique role in long-term, fundamental aeronautics research that provides the foundation for future technology development. Executive departments and agencies perform this role through direct Federal investment and indirectly through policies and regulations that stimulate academic or private sector R&D investment and innovation. In addition, executive departments and agencies should provide for the widest practical and appropriate dissemination of research results, consistent with national security, foreign policy, and the Office of Management and Budget’s Information Quality Guidelines. The Federal Government also has a role in more advanced civil aeronautics research. In these cases, the Federal Government’s involvement in R&D must be based on well-defined goals with objective measures of efficacy. These goals must be scrutinized to ensure that the government is not stepping beyond its legitimate purpose by competing with or un- fairly subsidizing commercial ventures. In such cases, the primary areas of government involvement are: Public Interest Research: Research that directly benefits the public by improving public safety and security, by promoting energy efficiency, or by protecting the environment. Research and Development to Address Gaps: In certain cases where risks or other market factors limit private sector investment in more advanced research, the Federal Government may decide investment is required . The appropriateness of Federal investment in such research must be justified by an assessment indicating that the benefits of such R&D would occur far in the future or the risks would be too great for non-Federal participants, and the results from the research would not be appropriable to a single entity. In these cases, Federal R&D investment must be the best means to achieve the objectives as opposed to other means such as regulatory, policy or tax incentives. Government Internal R&D: Research in direct support of government infrastructure or services and the setting and enforcement of regulations.



Federal Incentives For Space Based R+D Solve BestExecutive Branch Of The Untied States Federal Government 2006 National Aeronatuics Research And Development Policy

The aeronautics enterprise is an integral part of the nation’s economy. In order to foster a competitive domestic commercial aeronautics sector, executive departments and agencies should continue to: • Engage the private sector in government activities related to the design and development of the U.S. aeronautics enterprise, including leveraging private sector resources as appropriate to further U.S. Government interests; • Ensure that U.S. Government aeronautics activities, technology, and infrastructure are accessible for private use, consistent with national security; • Draw on industry’s expertise to help inform government R&D priorities, programs, and planning processes; • Provide a timely and responsive regulatory environment, consistent with national security and foreign policy considerations, for civil and commercial aeronautical activities that supports the infusion of new technology into the U.S. aeronautics enterprise;



SPS Opens Markets

SPS opens markets, and industry.Space Future, 2005 (SpaceFuture.com, think tank dedicated to space issues and space power, http://www.spacefuture.com/power/business.shtml)

In addition to these 3 reasons, there is a 4th reason why developing power from space will be beneficial. This is because building and operating SPS units in Earth orbit will lead on spontaneously, through purely commercial evolution, to a range of further developments in space - to our space future, in fact. It's easy to see this by considering the ways in which business typically grows - which is much easier to predict than political decisions. Selling electricity from space to Earth will provide commercial companies with both the finance and the incentive to develop and use extra-terrestrial materials. The world electricity market is already the best part of $1 trillion per year, and due to grow by 10 times. So, without predicting the details, it's easy to see that if an electricity-from-space industry develops there will be a market in Earth orbit for hundreds of thousands of tons a year of a range of materials including aluminum, glass, silicon (for solar cells), oxygen, iron, titanium etc - all of which are of course available in Moon rock and other extra-terrestrial resources.

SPS key to the manufacturing market. Space Future, 2005 (SpaceFuture.com, think tank dedicated to space issues and space power, http://www.spacefuture.com/power/business.shtml)

For SPS construction there will be even bigger things - tugs and cranes maneuvering kilometer-sized structures, electrical engineering of Gigawatt cables, orbit-raising of power-satellite sections 10 square kilometers or more in area, orbital manufacturing plants using materials from comets and asteroids. And there's no limit to the innovative technological employment that will be created by these new and profitable commercial activities in space. This will be just the same as the way that the amazing contemporary technologies of deep-sea oil-rigs that operate in stormy seas hundreds of meters deep, or wide-body jets that carry hundreds of passengers non-stop half-way round the world, have created many new career-paths, from diving to air-traffic control, from geological analysis to aircraft leasing, from underwater welding to international ticket sales. And note that these jobs have all been created by two industries on Earth - energy and tourism - which represent $trillion segments of the mass consumer markets that power economic growth world-wide. These two industries can and will power the economic development of space, through the use of large-scale solar energy generating systems for electricity supply to Earth, and tourism activities in Earth orbit and beyond.


http://www.spacefuture.com/power/business.shtml



Incentives Solve

Economic Incentives key to 2012Boyle, 2007 (Alan Boyle, MSNCB, Science Editor, “Power From Space?,” October 12, 2007)

A new Pentagon study lays out the roadmap for a multibillion-dollar push to the final frontier of energy: a satellite system that collects gigawatts’ worth of solar power and beams it down to Earth. The military itself could become the “anchor tenant” for such a power source, due to the current high cost of fueling combat operations abroad, the study says. The 75-page report, released Wednesday, says new economic incentives would have to be put in place to “close the business case” for space-based solar power systems — but it suggests that the technology could be tested in orbit by as early as 2012.

Economic incentives crucial for infrastructure and launch NASA, 2007 (NASA, “Space Based Solar Power as an Opportunity for Strategic Security” Phase 0 Architecture Feasibility Study, October 10, 2007)

Today the United States initiates less than 15 launches per year (at 25MT or less). Construction of a single SBSP satellite alone would require in excess of 120 such launches. That may seem like an astounding operations tempo until one considers the volume of other transportation infrastructure. For instance, in 2005, Atlanta International Airport saw 980,197 takeoffs & landings alone, an average of 1,342 takeoffs/day, or about 1 every minute 24 hours a day. In the same year, Singapore’s 41 ship cargo berths served 130,318 vessel arrivals (about 15 per hour), handling about 1.15 billion gross tons (GT), and 23.2 million twenty-foot equivalent units (TFUs). Technology adoption can move at astounding speeds once a concept has been demonstrated and a market is created. Who would have imagined that barely 100 years after the single wood & cloth, 338 kg Wright Flier flew only 120 feet at a mere 30 mph, that the world would have fleets of thousands of jet-powered, all-metal giants weighing as much as 590,000 kg cruising between continents at close to the speed of sound? Who, as the first miles were being laid, would have foreseen the rate at which railroads, highways, electrification or communications infrastructure would grow? SBSP calls mankind to look at the means to achieve orbit and in-space maneuver differently—not as monuments in themselves, but as a utilitarian infrastructure purposefully designed to achieve a very worthwhile goal.



SPS Innovation

Companies will innovate to profit off SPS. Energy and tourism prove. Space Future, 2005 (SpaceFuture.com, think tank dedicated to space issues and space power, http://www.spacefuture.com/power/business.shtml)

For SPS construction there will be even bigger things - tugs and cranes maneuvering kilometer-sized structures, electrical engineering of Gigawatt cables, orbit-raising of power-satellite sections 10 square kilometers or more in area, orbital manufacturing plants using materials from comets and asteroids. And there's no limit to the innovative technological employment that will be created by these new and profitable commercial activities in space. This will be just the same as the way that the amazing contemporary technologies of deep-sea oil-rigs that operate in stormy seas hundreds of meters deep, or wide-body jets that carry hundreds of passengers non-stop half-way round the world, have created many new career-paths, from diving to air-traffic control, from geological analysis to aircraft leasing, from underwater welding to international ticket sales. And note that these jobs have all been created by two industries on Earth - energy and tourism - which represent $trillion segments of the mass consumer markets that power economic growth world-wide. These two industries can and will power the economic development of space, through the use of large-scale solar energy generating systems for electricity supply to Earth, and tourism activities in Earth orbit and beyond.

SPS spin offs are the benefactor for society. Leads to partnerships as well. David E. Steitz, 12/21/2007, Commissioner of NASA HQ in Washington, “NASA Spinoff 2007 Highlights Space Innovation in Everyday Life, http://74.125.45.104/search?q=cache:09upywcQTyEJ:www.nasa.gov/home/hqnews/2007/dec/HQ_07285_Spinoff_2007.html+nasa+innovation&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=5&gl=us

WASHINGTON - NASA's Spinoff 2007, an annual online and print publication featuring NASA space technologies that provide practical, tangible benefits to society, is now available. Spinoff 2007 highlights 39 new examples of how NASA innovation can be transferred to the commercial market place and applied to areas such as health and medicine, transportation, public safety, consumer goods, homes and recreation, environmental and agricultural resources, computer technology and industrial productivity. "NASA's science, aeronautics and space exploration drives inspiration, innovation and discovery which in turn keep this nation at the forefront of technology advancements at a global level," NASA Deputy Administrator Shana Dale said. An example of NASA innovation helping to better lives today is a method for non-invasive, painless, ultrasound examination of the carotid artery, which carries blood from the heart to the brain. The test helps to identify risk for atherosclerosis, a major cause of heart attacks and strokes. The test uses software based on a program NASA uses to interpret spacecraft imagery from Mars. Spinoff 2007 also profiles NASA's education efforts and other partnership successes, and provides reference and resource information available through the agency's programs. NASA's Innovative Partnerships Program produces the NASA Spinoff series. The program fosters technology partnerships, commercialization and innovation in support of NASA's overall mission and national priorities.


http://74.125.45.104/search?q=cache:09upywcQTyEJ:www.nasa.gov/home/hqnews/2007/dec/HQ_07285_Spinoff_2007.html+nasa+innovation&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=5&gl=us

http://74.125.45.104/search?q=cache:09upywcQTyEJ:www.nasa.gov/home/hqnews/2007/dec/HQ_07285_Spinoff_2007.html+nasa+innovation&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=5&gl=us



WE don’t Want Space Wars!!!

Militarization causes World War IIISenator Charles S. Robb, Senate committees on armed services, foreign relations and intelligence, Washington Quarterly, 1999 Winter

In a second, more likely scenario, the United States deploys the same capabilities, but other nations do not simply acquiesce. Understanding the tremendous advantages of military space operations, China deploys nuclear weapons into space that can either be detonated near U.S. satellites or delivered to the earth in just minutes. Russia fields ground-based lasers for disabling and destroying our satellites, then deploys satellites with kinetic-kill munitions for eradicating ground targets. It also reneges on the START treaties, knowing that, rather than trying to replicate America's costly defensive systems, its incremental defense dollar is better spent on offensive warheads for overwhelming American defenses. Other rogue nations, realizing that their limited missile attack capabilities are now useless against our new defense screen, focus on commercially available cruise missiles, which they load with chemical and biological warheads and plan to deploy from commercial ships and aircraft. Still others bring to fruition the long-expected threat of a nuclear weapon in a suitcase . If history has taught us anything, it is that a future more like the second scenario will prevail. It defies reason to assume that nations would sit idle while the United States invests billions of dollars in weaponizing space, leaving them at an unprecedented disadvantage. This second scenario suggests three equally troubling consequences. The first is that Americans would, in a relative sense, lose the most from a space-based arms race. The United States is currently the preeminent world military power, and much of that power resides in our ability to use space for military applications. A large percentage of our military communications now passes through space. Our troops rely on weather satellites, our targeteers on satellite photos, and virtually all of our new generations of weapons on the Global Positioning System satellites for pin-point accuracy. By encouraging potential adversaries to deploy weapons into space that could quickly destroy many of these systems, a space-based arms race would render many of these more vulnerable to attack than they are today. Even if our potential adversaries were unable to build a competing force, they could still position deadly satellites disguised as commercial assets near or in the path of our most vital military satellites. And even if we could sustain our space advantage, the costs would be extraordinary. Why pursue this option when there is no compelling reason to do so at this time? Why make a battlefield out of an arena upon which we depend so heavily? The second consequence would be that a space-based arms race would be essentially irreversible -- we would face the difficulty, if not impossibility, of assessing what is being put into space. Under the START regime, signatories currently cooperate in inspecting and monitoring each other's intercontinental ballistic missiles, bombers, and submarines, all of which operate within a narrow band above and below sea level. Most space payloads, however, are built and launched with great secrecy and can operate at any distance from the earth, even on celestial bodies such as the moon. Most satellites would operate up to geostationary orbit, or about 22,000 miles from the earth's surface, yielding a total operational volume millions of times greater than that now occupied by missiles, bombers, and submarines. Attempting to monitor weapons in this vast volume of space would be daunting. We would no longer be counting with reasonable confidence the number of concrete silos at missile wings or submarine missile tubes at piers or bombers on airfields. In many cases we would have no idea what is out there. Military planners, conservative by nature, would assume the worst and try to meet enemy deployments in space with an equal or greater capability. Of course, for about $ 400 million per launch, we could use the space shuttle to make closer inspections, assuming that other nations would be willing to tolerate our presence near their critical space assets. Due to orbital constraints, however, the shuttle could reach only a fraction of the total number of satellites in orbit. Another option would be to expand and improve our space monitoring assets -- but only at a cost of tens of billions of dollars. Once this genie is out of the bottle, there is no way to put it back in. We could never afford to bring all these systems back to earth, and destroying them would be equally unfeasible, because the billions of pieces of space debris would jeopardize commercial satellites and manned missions. The third consequence of U.S. space weaponization would be the heightened probability of strategic conflict. Anyone familiar with the destabilizing impact of MIRVs will understand that weapons in space will bring a new meaning to the expression "hair trigger." Lasers can engage targets in seconds. Munitions fired from satellites in low-earth orbit can reach the earth's surface in minutes. As in the MIRV scenario, the side to strike first would be able to destroy much of its opponent's space weaponry before the opponent had a chance to respond. The temptation to strike first during a crisis would be overwhelming; much of the decisionmaking would have to be automated. Imagine that during a crisis one of our key military satellites stops functioning and we cannot determine why. We -- or a computer controlling our weapons for us -- must then decide whether or not to treat this as an act of war and respond accordingly. The fog of war would reach an entirely new density, with our situational awareness of the course of battle in space limited and our decision cycles too slow to properly command engagements. Events would occur so quickly that we could not even be sure which nation had initiated a strike . We would be repeating history, but this time with far graver



consequences. In the absence of explicit evidence that another nation with the economic and technical means is developing weapons for space, we should forgo our advanced prototyping and testing of space weapons. We should seek to expand the 1967 Treaty on the Exploration and Use of Outer Space to prohibit not just weapons of mass destruction in space, but all space-based weapons capable of destroying space, ground, air, or sea targets. We should also explore a verification regime that would allow inspection of space-bound payloads. During the Reagan years advocates of the Strategic Defense Initiative ran an effective television spot featuring children being saved from nuclear attack by a shield represented by a rainbow. If we weaponize space, we will face a very different image -- the image of hundreds of weapons-laden satellites orbiting directly over our homes and our families 24 hours a day, ready to fire within seconds. If fired, they would destroy thousands of ground, air and space targets within minutes, before there is even a chance of knowing what has happened, or why. This would be a dark future, a future we should avoid at all costs.



NASA Needs to Do Plan

Failed initiatives gave NASA a bad name. SPS key to change this perception.Peltona, 2006 (Joseph N. Pelton, Director of the Space and Advanced Communications Research Institute, “Revitalizing NASA? A Five-Point Plan,” October 16, 2006)

Following its early successes, NASA has taken a number of mis-steps, resulting in a loss of focus at the agency . Over-reliance on the Space Shuttle, treating it as an operational rather than an experimental vehicle, and the massive-cost-for-limited-results debacle of the ISS are chief among them, while the new and expensive Project Constellation targetting the Moon and Mars also promises little return. NASA needs to revitalize itself by pursuing missions more relevant to ordinary people—solar energy generation, planetary protection and sustainability, development of a robotically assembled Moon colony, among others—by restructuring itself and by working much more closely with industry and private entrepreneurs.

-Warrant Extension Privates key.

Construction Of SPS Systems Revitalizes NASA As An Agency. Helps public, with jobs and other services. Peltona, 2006 (Joseph N. Pelton, Director of the Space and Advanced Communications Research Institute, “Revitalizing NASA? A Five-Point Plan,” October 16, 2006)

The key question that everyone—i.e. Congress and the White House, space enthusiasts, the space industry, and the public—should ask at this time is simply this: ‘How do we revitalize NASA and make the space program more successful, productive and innovative? How do we make NASA relevant again?’ To try to simplify and focus NASA's vision for the future, we might begin by asking these basic questions: • Could we use space technology to make the Earth's biosphere more sustainable so that humans might have a chance to survive for the longer term? • Is it possible to design, build and deploy at reasonable cost solar power systems in space that could allow us to achieve independence from petrochemical fuels and also help address global warming? • Is it possible to use, in an economically and ecologically valid way, the resources of the solar system to sustain life on Earth, and if so how might we prioritize our actions? • Can we deploy space systems to prevent the destruction of human civilization by the impact of asteroids, meteorites, comets or other near Earth objects? (In light of the possibility of a major impact by NEO 2004MN4 that could come crashing into the Earth sometime around the 2029–2036 time period, this is really a very pertinent question.) When one asks such basic questions, and reasonable answers are explored to such thought-provoking inquiries, it tends to call into question some of NASA's current goals. Do we really have the right ‘vision’? Is the right vision in fact sending astronauts to the Moon in 12 years or so and to Mars at some future date at least two decades from now? Is the best way to go to Mars to use a conventional set of chemical rockets? In short, is Project Constellation, an undertaking that will expend over a $100 billion of taxpayer's money, the best possible plan? Can’t we do better? Longer-term goals for NASA could indeed be much different. These might be something like energy independence via space solar power technology, creating a permanent space elevator system to offer long-term and low-cost transportation to outer space, or creating an entrepreneurial enterprise to develop a Moon colony, largely by using robotic systems—something the Italians and Chinese have given a lot of serious thought to in their plans to create an astronomical observatory on the Moon using robotic assemblage. Should we irrevocably commit ourselves to a $100 billion project that is a retro ‘Apollo Program on steroids’, as NASA Administrator Michael Griffin has described it himself? Might not we think a bit more imaginatively? Could we come up with a space program with objectives that might even seem like a good idea to Joe or Josephine Q. Public? Is it possible to devise low-cost and reasonably reliable launchers to send highly capable robotic missions to the lunar surface over the next decade to prepare a ‘safe habitat for astronauts’? Could this habitat, over time, perhaps become equipped with radiation shielding, water and oxygen generators and material processors that could sustain astronauts for the longer term? Could this robotically built infrastructure include material processing and a mass driver transport system which could actually support longer-term industrial activity that would justify the investment? Could private enterprise take the lead in many of these activities with NASA limiting its role to developing the most demanding and longer-term technology? Or maybe the vision should be solar powered satellite systems that could reduce our dependence on oil? Or perhaps we need to find a way to build a planetary heat irradiator to help us cool our warming planet? The point is that we might try to get our brightest minds from universities, as well as space innovators and entrepreneurs such as Elon Musk, Paul Allen, Bert Rutan, Robert Bigelow, James Benson, Sir Richard Branson, Dr



Peter Diamandis, Brad Edwards and others, to come up with some better ideas whereby NASA might do more with less. Could we not build some public–private enterprises that would let private capital and entrepreneurial scientists and engineers do some of the heavy lifting? Simply as a possible baseline for such an effort, I offer a five point program that could lead to a ‘new NASA’. This slimmer and more agile NASA, perhaps even with a smaller budget, would undertake a US Space Program along the following lines. • A true ‘Mission to Planet Earth’. This would be a NASA that seeks to be more relevant. It would be more focused on immediate planetary needs (i.e. saving the planet's biosphere, providing access to clean, cheap energy and enhancing the provision of low-cost educational and health care services to a world community that seemingly sees the USA as ‘the enemy’ rather than as a ‘caring friend’) These would not need to be entirely NASA-funded programs. Rather NASA would work with industry, international agencies and other governments, international industry, and even entities like the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to realize these goals. NASA could simply be the stimulator and provide vital technical help to key projects. 3. A five-point program for a revitalized NASA Here are the five reforms that could make NASA more focused, more efficient and more cost effective. This five-step program would not be easy but it could go a long way to restoring NASA to its former glory and make it relevant to 21st century needs of real people. 3.1. Re-establishing balance for space science, space applications and space exploration Not too surprisingly, the average tax payer would like to think that NASA expenditures go in some good part to developing new space applications related to saving the Earth from life-threatening NEOs, or supplying low-cost, clean and non-polluting energy to the planet or otherwise making the everyday lives of humans better or safer. The man or woman in the street would be more interested in NASA if it could be demonstrated that space programs could have a positive impact on their lives. This might be in generating new jobs, taming violent weather, monitoring pollution, beaming down clean and affordable energy, preventing destruction from asteroids and comets or simply making education and health systems better . If the ‘new NASA’ came forward with a truly sincere bumper sticker proclaiming: ‘NASA—working for you’ suddenly showed up, public support might indeed rise. The key here would be to develop new forms of public–private partnerships where NASA would do the advanced R&D for only the most advanced technologies.

Perm solves, NASA usually does R&D, and works well with other agencies cross apply Peltona.

Performance And Credibility Are Key To Increased NASA Budgets Ian Koski February 3, 2003 The Performance Institute Bush’s ’04 Budget Puts Premium on Transparency and Performance

The Government Performance and Results Act (GPRA) of 1993 intended to make government agencies more accountable for tangible results by requiring the use of performance measures to justify and drive budgets. The Administration’s use of the PART assessment and associated budget requests for the programs makes clear its commitment to make performance budgeting a reality, not just a dream. On the Administration’s use of performance in the budget, DeMaio noted: “Federal managers for years have said that performance budgeting and GPRA would go away eventually if they waited long enough. Anyone in government who doubted whether GPRA is real need only look at the President’s ‘04 budget proposal. The performance evaluations of the programs are out there for the entire public to see—complete with supporting evidence. That’s real transparency! More importantly, there is a direct correlation between good performance and budget increases as well as bad performance and budget decreases.” Analysis of the President’s requested funding levels for the 234 programs demonstrates the extent of the use of performance evaluations. On average , the President’s proposal rewards programs deemed effective with a 6 percent funding increase, while those not showing results were held to less than a 1 percent increase.



Necessary To Reverse The Trend.HSTC, 2008 (House Science and Technology Committee, “House Science and Technology Subcommitte Expresses Concern Over Budgetary Outlook for NASA Science Programs,” March 13, 2008)

"NASA's science program has long been one of the agency's 'crown jewels', and it has delivered outstanding results since the dawn of the Space Age 50 years ago--results that have rewritten the scientific textbooks and captivated the imagination of the public both here and around the world.," stated Subcommittee Chairman Mark Udall (D-CO). "I want to see that record of accomplishment and inspiration continue. However, I'm concerned that NASA's science program is facing an uncertain future under the funding plan offered by the Administration." NASA's science programs represent 25% of the agency's FY09 budget. That budget directs $4.4 billion toward NASA's Science Mission Directorate (SMD) programs which include Earth science, space colonization, heliophysics, astrophysics, and planetary science. The FY09 budget for these programs is $264.7 million less than the FY08 appropriated amount. Chairman Udall recognized NASA Associate Administrator Dr. S. Alan Stern for his efforts to further science programs at the agency, but cautioned that sustaining those activities under current budget conditions looked unlikely. "I commend Dr. Stern for his efforts to address some of the stresses facing the science community from past NASA budgetary problems, and for the energy and commitment he has brought to his job. Yet, as we heard from a number of our witnesses today, it is not at all clear that it is going to be possible to sustain those new initiatives in an effective manner under the Administration's assumed funding plan." As an example of this concern, Udall pointed to a recent National Academies estimate that some $7 billion would be required over the next 12 years to carry out the 15 NASA Earth Science missions recommended in the Decadal Survey. Yet, the Administration's budget plan for the next five years would allocate less than $1 billion to that effort. Udall expressed similar concerns about the programmatic and budgetary outlook for NASA's highly productive robotic Mars exploration program, as well as for the agency's astrophysics program. Over the last year, NASA's Science Mission Directorate launched the Dawn mission that will explore two large asteroids; the Phoenix Mars lander mission; the Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory (STEREO) mission to study coronal mass ejections from the Sun; the Time History of Events and Macroscale Interactions During Substorms (THEMIS) mission, and the Aeronomy of Ice in the Mesosphere (AIM) mission. In 2008, the Science Mission Directorate plans to launch the Interstellar Boundary Explorer (IBEX), the Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO), the Gamma Ray Large Area Space Telescope (GLAST), the Ocean Surface Topography Mission (OSTM), the Orbiting Carbon Observatory (OCO), conduct a fourth Hubble servicing mission, and complete contributions to international and interagency partner missions that are planned for launch in 2008. Added Udall, "NASA's challenging new science initiatives are to be built on a budget that increases by only 1% through FY11, and that assumes only inflationary increases at best in the years beyond that. There will be little new money--instead, there will be a continuing need to transfer of funds across the science accounts to support each new initiative--an approach some might call 'robbing Peter to pay Paul'. I'm very concerned that such an approach will not prove sustainable or credible."

Performance And Credibility Is Key To Funding NASA’s ProgramsKoski, 2003 (Ian Koski, The Performance Institute, “Bush’s 04 Budget Puts Premium on Transparency and Performance,” February 3, 2003)

The Government Performance and Results Act (GPRA) of 1993 intended to make government agencies more accountable for tangible results by requiring the use of performance measures to justify and drive budgets. The Administration’s use of the PART assessment and associated budget requests for the programs makes clear its commitment to make performance budgeting a reality, not just a dream. On the Administration’s use of performance in the budget, DeMaio noted: “Federal managers for years have said that performance budgeting and GPRA would go away eventually if they waited long enough. Anyone in government who doubted whether GPRA is real need only look at the President’s ‘04 budget proposal. The performance evaluations of the programs are out there for the entire public to see—complete with supporting evidence. That’s real transparency! More importantly, there is a direct correlation between good performance and budget increases as well as bad performance and budget decreases.” Analysis of the President’s requested funding levels for the 234 programs demonstrates the extent of the use of performance evaluations. On average, the President’s proposal rewards programs deemed effective with a 6 percent funding increase, while those not showing results were held to less than a 1 percent increase.


http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewpr.html?pid=24966#






Military Likes the Plan

Military loves the planCho, 2007 (Dan Cho, NewScientist.com news service, “Pentagon Backs Plan to Beam Solar Power From Space,” October 11, 2007)

Washington, DC A futuristic scheme to collect solar energy on satellites and beam it to Earth has gained a large supporter in the US military. A report released yesterday by the National Security Space Office recommends that the US government sponsor projects to demonstrate solar-power-generating satellites and provide financial incentives for further private development of the technology. Space-based solar power would use kilometre-sized solar panel arrays to gather sunlight in orbit. It would then beam power down to Earth in the form of microwaves or a laser, which would be collected in antennas on the ground and then converted to electricity. Unlike solar panels based on the ground, solar power satellites placed in geostationary orbit above the Earth could operate at night and during cloudy conditions."We think we can be a catalyst to make this technology advance," said US Marine Corps lieutenant colonel Paul

Military loves the planFoust, 2007 (Jeff Foust, The Space Review, “A Renaissance for Space Solar Power?,” August 13, 2007)

“The military would like nothing better than to have highly mobile energy sources that can provide our forces with some form of energy in those forward areas,” Smith said. One way to do that, he said, is with space solar power, something that Smith and a few fellow officers had been looking at in their spare time. They gave a briefing on the subject to Maj. Gen. James Armor, the head of the NSSO, who agreed earlier this year to commission a study on the feasibility of space solar power.



Space Geeks Like the Plan

Space lobbyists love the planCho, 2007 (Dan Cho, NewScientist.com news service, “Pentagon Backs Plan to Beam Solar Power From Space,” October 11, 2007)

Washington, DC At the same press conference, over a dozen space advocacy groups announced a new alliance to promote space solar power – the Space Solar Alliance for Future Energy. These supporters of space-based solar power say the technology has the potential to provide more energy than fossil fuels, wind and nuclear power combined.

Space Lobbies Love The Plan Because It Coordinates Our Efforts In SpaceBoyle, 2007 (Alan Boyle, MSNCB, Science Editor, “Power From Space?,” October 12, 2007)

"I think we have found the killer application that we have been looking for to tie everything together that we're doing in space," Air Force Col. Michael V. "Coyote" Smith, who initiated the study for the Defense Department's National Security Space Office, told msnbc.com on Thursday. Space advocacy groups immediately seized on the idea and formed a new alliance to push the plan.



DOD Fails

Funding the military. Unqualified workers, and delayed contracting Noa Shachtman 6/18/2008 journalist for Wired Magazine and computer expert, published on The Danger Room, “DARPA Brain Drain Costs Agency 32 Million,”

The U.S. military is shifting $32 million away from its premiere research agency -- because that agency, Darpa, can't find enough qualified people to run its cutting-edge projects.A Pentagon "reprogramming action," obtained by DANGER ROOM, takes the cash from Darpa to "fund higher priorities within the Department" -- including "infrastructure to prevent IT security breaches." That money is available, the document adds, because the agency "continues to underexecute its Research, Development, Test and Evaluation programs."The document gives two reasons why: "first, several key program managers' positions are unfilled because there are few experts in advanced sciences and technology; and second, Darpa's approval process is delaying contract awards ." Darpa's shortage of qualified program managers has been evident for quite some time; at the agency's conference in Anaheim, CA last year, Darpa's director promised the assembled geeks that joining the agency "is the best thing you can do for your career." In between speeches, the video screens were filled with filmed testimonials of how totally freakin' rad it is to work at the agency. Even the folders and playing cards handed out to the attendees came with a plea to "JOIN DARPA!"

DARPA mismanages funds. Noa Shachtman 6/18/2008 journalist for Wired Magazine and computer expert, published on The Danger Room, “DARPA Brain Drain Costs Agency 32 Million,”

The head of the Defense Department's premiere science and technology arm is blasting the Pentagon's higher-ups in an unusually public spat over tens of millions of dollars for cutting-edge research. Darpa director Tony Tether even went so far as to say that the U.S. military's chief financiers "apparently d[o] not believe in accountability." The Pentagon recently took $32 million away from Darpa , to fund other military efforts. According to a Defense Department document, the agency's budget was cut because it "continues to underexecute" many of its high-tech programs -- in other words, not spend the money that it was allotted.

DARPA tech doesn’t spill over to private sector, too secure.Jim Dempsey 5/28/2003 President for Public Policy, has been with CDT since 1997, Privacy’s Gap: The Largely Non-Existent Legal Framework for Government Mining of Commercial Data

On December 12, 2003, the DOD Inspector General released the results of an audit of TIA conducted as a result of Congressional inquiries. The audit concluded that although DARPA development of TIA-type technologies could prove valuable in combating terrorism," DARPA failed to perform any form of privacy impact assessment, did not involve appropriate privacy and legal experts, and 'focused on development of new technology rather than on the policies, procedures, and legal implications associated with the operational use of technology . ' The report acknowledged that DARPA was sponsoring "research of privacy safeguards and options that would balance security and privacy issues," but found that such measures "were not as comprehensive as a privacy impact assessment would have been in scrutinizing TIA technology."

No Spill Over - The DoD is not a key model for alternative energy – it is too small of a market and has different energy needs than the civilian sectorPaul Dimotakis, The MITRE Corporation, 2006 [December 09, 2006, Reducing DoD Fossil-Fuel Dependence, http://www.fas.org/irp/agency/dod/jason/fossil.pdf]


http://blog.wired.com/defense/2008/06/the-us-military.html

http://blog.wired.com/defense/2008/06/the-us-military.html

http://www.darpa.mil/body/pms_video.html

http://blog.wired.com/defense/2007/08/i-have-been-ask.html

http://blog.wired.com/defense/2007/08/i-have-been-ask.html

http://blog.wired.com/defense/files/2008_06_18_13_34_231.pdf


2. The 2006 DoD fossil-fuel budget is, approximately, 2.5-3% of the national-defense budget, the range dependent on what is chosen as the total national-defense budget. Larger (percentage) fuel costs are borne by families and many businesses, for example, and fuel costs have only relatively recently become noticeable to the DoD.3. At present, there is a large spread between oil-production cost and crude-oil prices. Many projections, however, including that of the U.S. Energy Information Agency, indicate that crude oil prices may well decrease to $40-$50/barrel within the next few years, as production and refining capacity increases to match demand.4. DoD is not a sufficiently large customer to drive the domestic market for demand and consumption of fossil fuel alternatives, or to drive fuel and transportation technology developments, in general. Barring externalities, e.g., subsidies, governmental and departmental directives, etc., non-fossil-derived fuels are not likely to play a significant role in the next 25 years.5. DoD fuel consumption constraints and patterns of use do not align well with those of the commercial sector. Most commercial-sector fuel use, for example, is in ground transportation, with only 4% of domestic petroleum consumption used for aviation. In contrast, almost 60% of DoD fuel use is by the Air Force, with additional fuel used in DoD aviation if Naval aviation consumption is included. Options for refueling ships at sea are more limited (or nonexistent) compared to those for commercial vehicles in urban areas. Options for DoD use of electrical energy on ground vehicles are limited, since one can not expect to plug into the grid in hostile territory, for example, to refuel/recharge an electric vehicle. Furthermore, drive cycles for DoD ground vehicles differ significantly from EPA drive cycles that, as a consequence, provide poor standards for fuel consumption.



NEG



SPS Electricity Bad

Even if SPS is possible, the cost of alternative energy is not economically competitive. Meaning it won’t be used in the Markey, subsidies will not solve. Boswell 2004 (David Boswell, expert speaker at the 1991 International Space Development Conference, “Whatever happened to solar power satellites?”) Even if a solar power system was built and launched there would still be the economic problem of producing electricity at a cost that is comparable to other options. Government subsidies can help get this new industry on its feet but it will need to compete in the market in order to survive. This is a challenge for all emerging renewable energy solutions. Current non-renewable energy supplies are cheap. Even with the recent increases in the price of oil, it is still historically low. Adjusted for inflation, gas prices are still much lower than they were during the oil crisis in the 1970s. With current prices there is little incentive for customers or producers to pursue alternatives. Even if oil prices continue to increase, it is not likely that this will be enough to drive demand for alternatives. Although we will eventually run out of oil, coal, and other non-renewable energy sources, in the short term rising oil prices will simply generate more oil. There are large amounts of known reserves that are too expensive to profitably develop when oil is below a certain price. As soon as the price increases past a certain threshold, a given field can be developed at a profit. From an economic standpoint, energy producers will take advantage of this and will make use of their existing infrastructure to extract, refine, and distribute as much oil as possible regardless of how high the price of a barrel of oil goes.

SPS Not Viable

SPS not viable.Boswell 2004 (David Boswell, expert speaker at the 1991 International Space Development Conference, “Whatever happened to solar power satellites?”)

There are a number of reasons why we won’t be seeing huge orbiting solar collectors beaming us lots of energy anytime soon. Starting the development of such a system by building small proof of concept satellites is completely within our reach, though. There are economic, political, and engineering hurdles in the way, but none of these should be enough to stop the idea if we choose to pursue it. Once a successful demonstration has been achieved, there may be enough interest in government or in private industry to continue working toward fully-operational solar power satellites.

Innovations In Other Renewables Make SPS UneconomicalShiner 2008 (Linda Shiner, writer, “Where the Sun Does Shine: Will Space Solar Power Ever Be Practical?”, Air & Space Magazine, July 01)

If the government put money into space solar power, would taxpayers get a return on their investment? Molly Macauley, an economist with Resources for the Future, a Washington, D.C. energy and environment think tank, has studied the ability of sunsats to compete with other renewable energy technologies. It’s a hard case to make, she says. “Advocates of space solar power fail to acknowledge that technological change and innovation are happening in other types of renewable energy—ground-based solar power, concentrated solar power, wind, geothermal energy. The ability to compete on a cents-per-kilowatt-hour basis is going to get more difficult, not less difficult.”



DOD CP



Space weapons Good

Weaponization inevitableMoltz 02, Associate Director and research professor for the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies, 02 (James Clay, April 15, 2002, http://cns.miis.edu/pubs/week/020415.htm)

Supporters of space weapons argue that arms control negotiations will be too difficult and that cheating will occur, in any case, thus making space weapons inevitable.[4] They argue that commercial and military assets alike are vulnerable to simple ASAT attacks, thus requiring countermeasures in the form of anti-ASAT weapons. In the area of missile defense, space-based systems are touted by supporters as the best means of achieving boost-phase interceptions. One problem for such defenses, however, is that they suffer from the "absentee problem"--the necessity of orbiting multiple constellations so that weapons are always in place over the target in case of a missile launch. This will raise costs considerably. Laser enthusiasts point to the possible attractiveness of weapons against hostile missiles or satellites and the possible utility of lasers for removing space debris. Yet current lasers lack power sources light enough to boost them into space. Russian sources continue to discuss the desirability of space weapons for the purposes of anti-asteroid defense and other exotic schemes, but it is not clear whether these are serious initiatives or make-work efforts intended to save cash-strapped missile and space design bureaus within the former Soviet weapons complex.

Space weaponization leads to stability and US key to heg David 05, Senior Space Writer for Space.com, June 17 (Leonard,http://www.space.com/news/050617_space_warfare.html, accessed 7-12-2008)

"The time to weaponize and administer space for the good of global commerce is now, when the United States could do so without fear of an arms race there." This is the view of Everett Dolman, Associate Professor of Comparative Military Studies in the School of Advanced Air and Space Studies at Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama. No peer competitors are capable of challenging the United States, Dolman explained, as was the case in the Cold War, and so no "race" is possible. The longer the United States waits, however, the more opportunities for a peer competitor to show up on the scene. Dolman argues that, in ten or twenty years, America might be confronting an active space power that could weaponize space. And they might do so in a manner that prevents the United States from competing in the space arena. "The short answer is, if you want an arms race in space, do nothing now," Dolman said. For those that think space weaponization is impossible, Dolman said such belief falls into the same camp that "man will never fly". The fact that space weaponization is technically feasible is indisputable, he said, and nowhere challenged by a credible authority. "Space weaponization can work," Dolman said. "It will be very expensive. But the rewards for the state that weaponizes first--and establishes itself at the top of the Earth's gravity well, garnering all the many advantages that the high ground has always provided in war--will find the benefits worth the costs." What if America weaponizes space? One would think such an action would kick-start a procession of other nations to follow suit. Dolman said he takes issues with that notion. "This argument comes from the mirror-image analogy that if another state were to weaponize space, well then, the U.S. would have to react. Of course it would! But this is an entirely different situation," Dolman responded. "The U.S. is the world's most powerful state. The international system looks to it for order. If the U.S. were to weaponize space, it would be perceived as an attempt to maintain or extend its position, in effect, the status quo," Dolman suggested. It is likely that most states--recognizing the vast expense and effort needed to hone their space skills to where America is today--would opt not to bother competing, he said.


http://cns.miis.edu/pubs/week/020415.htm


SPS key to Space Weapons

Solar key to space weaponsHagen 98, Writer for the Global Futures Bulletin, October 1 (Regina, “Military interest in space-based solar power,” http://www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/27b/051.html, accessed 7-12-2008

The US Air Force is officially planning for war from Space and for war in Space. The required new technologies are explored in a 13 volume document entitled New World Vistas: Air and Space Power for the 21st Century by the USAF Scientific Advisory Board. Each volume of “New World Vistas” focuses on a specific topic, eg on “Materials”, “Attack”, “Munitions”, or “Aircraft & Propulsion”. Due to general budgetary cutbacks in defense spending “... the successful pursuit of our new missions will demand creative use of commercial systems and technologies. This will produce an intimate intertwining of commercial and military applications to an extent not yet encountered.” A key consideration is how to provide the tremendous power requirement for the desired Space-based platforms and weapons systems. Although they see that radioisotope thermoelectric generators, nuclear reactors, as well as nuclear propulsion—is the “natural technology to enable high power in space”, they recognise political and social resistance to this option. Current international treaties do not preclude the location of nuclear reactors in Space. Their vision: “It is highly likely that very large orbiting solar power stations capable of delivering energy to the earth will be built in space in the next several decades by the commercial sector. ... These systems will likely use microwaves or millimeter waves for power transmission. It is not likely that we could use such systems in a dual-use mode as space weapons.. [however] ...the DoD could purchase power on demand from such systems.”

Solar can power space weaponsGrossman 91, Professor of Journalism at State University of New York, May 31 (Karl, “We don’t need reactors in space,” http://www.animatedsoftware.com/cassini/kg9105we.htm, accessed 7-12-2008)

The U.S. government prefers nuclear power even when solar energy is an ideal alternative, as on Ulysses. For the 1996 Comet Rendezvous Asteroid Flyby mission, the Jet Propulsion Laboratory has said that solar energy could replace plutonium power. There is plenty of time to arrange the solar alternative. Nevertheless, NASA last year began contract negotiations with GE to build plutonium-fueled generators for this mission. Even for Star Wars, solar power could suffice (that is, if we want Star Wars in any form). Pressed at a congressional hearing in 1988 on "The Future of Space Nuclear Power," Col. George Hess, then of the Strategic Defense Initiative Organization, the Pentagon's Star Wars office, declared: "I believe in the inventiveness of the American engineer, sir; that if we were restricted to have no nuclear power that we would address other options."



Peaceful Military Space Weapons (DOD)

Military will coopt peaceful military usesDavid 02 (By Leonard David Senior Space Writer posted: 07:00 am ET 15 May 2002Space Weapons For Earth Wars, http://www.space.com/businesstechnology/technology/space_war_020515-1.html)

"The prospect of space weapons and the growing military space agenda engenders a wide variety of viewpoints. Such is the case for America's first woman in Earth orbit, Sally Ride. She recently underscored the fact that space has been used for military purposes for decades. (Ride is the former president of SPACE.com.) Last month, Ride presented the annual Drell Lecture at Stanford University, sponsored by the on-campus Center for International Security and Cooperation (CISAC). After her NASA tour-of-duty, Ride worked in the late 1980s as a CISAC science fellow, serving alongside Sidney Drell, noted physicist and arms control expert. "Space is a real priority for national security," Ride said. She is presently a physics professor at the University of California-San Diego and director of the University of California's Space Institute in La Jolla. Today, U.S. intelligence agencies and the military count on some 100 satellites as part of the country's national security. These space-based assets snap detailed images day and night, keeping an eye on global hotspots, even pinpointing missile launchings around the globe for early warning purposes. A satellite that in peacetime uses the global positioning system (GPS) constellation of spacecraft for navigation purposes, may in wartime utilize that same capability to target bombs or remotely piloted vehicles, Ride said.


http://www.space.com/businesstechnology/technology/space_war_020515-1.html


SPS Bad for NASA

Space technology accidents lead to stalls in NASA programsMalik 06 (Tarig, January 27, Space.com, staff writer, “Remembering Challenger: Shuttle Disaster and Others Refocus NASA,” http://www.space.com/news/060127_challenger_anniversary.html)

"This is a time to think about those kinds of losses," NASA chief Michael Griffin said in a news conference last week. "Spaceflight is the most technically challenging things nations do...it is difficult, it is dangerous and it is expensive, given the technology we have today." Each fatal accident grounded NASA spacecraft as the agency rooted out their causes and dealt out new safety plans before again launching astronauts into space. It took more than two years following both the Challenger and Columbia accident before NASA launched another shuttle - most recently with last year's STS-114 flight aboard Discovery on a test flight which proved that still more work was needed to prevent fuel tank debris at liftoff. "The anniversaries remind us that we can never be complacent about anything," astronaut Steven Lindsey, commander of NASA's next shuttle flight STS-121, told SPACE.com. "[They] help us remind each other, each year, to refocus...because the next several years, that's all we're going to thing about, but what about 10 years from now? If we've been successful for 10 years and haven't had an accident, that's what you worry about. "We've got to pay attention to the past so that we don't repeat it," Lindsey said. Lindsey's STS-121 mission, currently set to launch no early than May 3, will mark NASA's second shuttle flight since the Columbia disaster and complete a series tests designed to increase shuttle safety. "When you look back at all these accident anniversaries coming within a few days of each other, they've had a cumulative effect that suggests how important a well-designed crew carrying vehicle is," said John Logsdon, director of the Space Policy Institute at George Washington University in Washington, D.C., in a telephone interview. "The point that's been made over and over again is that the shuttle will always be an experimental vehicle." NASA first learned that lesson after the Challenger accident, but then had to relearn it after the loss of Columbia, Logsdon said. The Challenger and Columbia accidents were devastating losses and the lessons learned from them--both mechanically and culturally--came at great cost, said Tony Ceccacci, who served as an ascent and reentry flight controller during Challenger's ill-fated final flight and is now lead shuttle flight director for NASA's STS-121 mission. " The very public loss of Challenger and Columbia were vivid reminders of the risks inherent to human spaceflight, astronauts said.

Space technology accidents harm NASA’s credibility NASA 07 (September, “Public Opinion of the American Space Program,” http://www.hq.nasa.gov/office/hqlibrary/pathfinders/opinion.htm)

NASA depends on the will of the people, as expressed through their senators and representatives and the president, for its funding and direction. NASA has to take the pulse of the American people and obtain its good will. This has not been easy. NASA had to play "catch-up" through much of its first five years, as the Soviets launched one space spectacular after another. It has had to recover America's trust after several fatal accidents and other misfortunes, such as the losses of the Mars Climate Orbiter in 1998 and the Mars Polar Lander in 1999. However, NASA does not work alone. Several space advocacy organizations work at the grassroots level to get people interested in space exploration and to write to Washington to ask for better finding for NASA. This pathfinder covers how the American people's opinion of NASA is shaped.


http://www.hq.nasa.gov/office/hqlibrary/pathfinders/opinion.htm


NASA SUCKS!

NASA accidents and mistakes cause significant setbacks for space programsFreemantle 03 (Tony, February 9, The Houston Chronicle, “NASA facing a test crisis of trust,” http://www.globalsecurity.org/org/news/2003/030209-shuttle02.htm)

NASA took nearly three years to get back into space after the shuttle Challenger blew up shortly after liftoff in 1986. It took that long in part because, in addition to repairing the spacecraft's physical flaws, the space agency had to completely rebuild its public image, which lay in ruins as a result of mistakes it made responding to the crisis. Today, underfunded and its mission under siege, NASA cannot afford to make those errors again.. "There was a horrible revulsion in public opinion at the cover-up by NASA in the Challenger case, and they are determined not to let that happen again," said David Acheson, a member of the Rogers Commission, the blue-ribbon panel appointed by President Ronald Reagan to investigate the disaster. "Some people at NASA must recall how close NASA came to losing the confidence of Congress and the taxpayers.". For the shuttle program to continue, whatever its mission, public confidence will be paramount. "Unavoidably, there is going to be some rough sailing here because unavoidably, it will eventually be understood that mistakes were made and eventually it will be understood that someone was asleep at the switch," Pike said. "But if this develops into a massive cover-up of pervasive incompetence and there is an absence of accounting, things could go badly.”



NASA’s culture makes programs both inefficient and dangerousDunn 03 (Marcia, August 2, Associated Press, “Investigator says NASA culture must change,” http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4176/is_20030802/ai_n14555684/pg_1?tag=artBody;col1)

A Nobel Prize-winning member of the board investigating the space shuttle Columbia disaster says he fears NASA may be doomed to suffer more tragedies unless it changes the culture that has led to flawed decision-making. The "same faulty reasoning" that led to the 1986 Challenger accident led to Columbia, said Douglas Osheroff, one of the 13 board members wrapping up the report on the Columbia accident. "No matter how good the report looks, if we don't do something to change the way NASA makes its decisions, I would say that we will have been whistling in the wind," Osheroff told the Associated Press in a telephone interview this week. "At the moment, I'm in a state of depression," he said from his office at Stanford University. Several Columbia board members have said the space agency needs dramatic change, but Osheroff is pessimistic that can be accomplished. "Look, I think it's been clear for a long time that what has to change is not NASA's policies and procedures or management structure. I suppose they have to change as well, but it's culture," he said. "Culture is a very funny thing, of course. It is the way people intuitively behave to a situation." Board members and former NASA employees have pointed to attitudes of superiority, fear of retribution among lower-level employees, communications problems and strained relationships between key divisions of NASA as part of its difficult culture. Osheroff is also troubled that some managers who made crucial decisions during Columbia's flight seem unwilling to accept individual blame. NASA Administrator Sean O'Keefe has promised things will change. Just last week, he said he was committed to "creating an atmosphere in which we're all encouraged to raise our hand and speak out" when there are life-threatening hazards. But Osheroff's own experience tells him how hard it will be to accomplish that. "I was at Bell Laboratories at the time of the breakup of the Bell system, and they had industrial psychologists come in trying to change the culture," he said. "I don't think it was at all successful, at least certainly not in the research area where I was." In NASA's case, Osheroff and other board members have noted the similarities between February's Columbia accident, in which seven astronauts died on their way home, and the Challenger tragedy, which killed seven on their way to space. Challenger's loss also led to a hard-hitting report on NASA. Yet, Osheroff notes, "the same faulty reasoning led to both accidents, right? I mean, in both cases, it was a failure to recognize the potential hazards posed by an in-flight anomaly." With Challenger, faulty O-ring seals in the solid-fuel rocket boosters were to blame. With Columbia, it was foam insulation that broke off the fuel tank and gouged a hole in the shuttle's left wing, letting in the searing gases of re-entry. In both cases, worried engineers were not heard -- or were ignored. Foam repeatedly broke off shuttles during launch, but the problem was never fixed. With Columbia's final launch on Jan. 16 the biggest foam chunk ever struck with deadly force. Boston College sociology professor Diane Vaughan, author of "The Challenger Launch Decision," sympathizes with the worried Osheroff. "Challenger, like Columbia, was an institutional failure. That is, it wasn't just a matter of the decision-making structure. It had to do with the entire organization and its culture, and the critical parts of that really didn't get changed," Vaughan said Thursday night.


http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4176/is_20030802/ai_n14555684/pg_1?tag=artBody;col1


The Space Disease

Salmonella makes Mission to Mars a “no-go”The Guardian 07 (James Randerson, Salmonella More Virulent In Space, Study Suggests, September 25, l/n)

Food poisoning bacteria become super-virulent in space, according to a study of salmonella that spent 12 days orbiting the Earth on the space shuttle Atlantis. The research raises fears that diseases boosted by low gravity could pose unexpected medical problems on future long-haul space journeys or for astronauts on a proposed future moon base. It is the first study to examine the effect of space flight on the virulence of a pathogen. "Given the proposed increase in both duration and distance from Earth for future manned space flight missions - including lunar colonisation and a mission to Mars - the risk for in-flight infectious diseases will be increased," said Cheryl Nickerson at Arizona State University.

Diseases are even worse in space!The Guardian, 07 (London, September 25, “Science: Salmonella more virulent in space, study suggests”, James Randerson, L/N, accessed on 7/14/08)

Food poisoning bacteria become super-virulent in space, according to a study of salmonella that spent 12 days orbiting the Earth on the space shuttle Atlantis. The research raises fears that diseases boosted by low gravity could pose unexpected medical problems on future long-haul space journeys or for astronauts on a proposed future moon base. It is the first study to examine the effect of space flight on the virulence of a pathogen. "Given the proposed increase in both duration and distance from Earth for future manned space flight missions - including lunar colonisation and a mission to Mars - the risk for in-flight infectious diseases will be increased," said Cheryl Nickerson at Arizona State University. Her team sent vials of salmonella bacteria into orbit on Atlantis's 12-day mission in September last year. They kept bacteria from the same strain in conditions as close to the space shuttle as possible on Earth. When they fed the samples to different groups of mice they found that the bacteria that had been in space were nearly three times as likely to kill the animals. "Since spaceflight involves a number of environmental changes we do not know the exact part of spaceflight that caused the change in virulence or other phenotypes we observed in our experiment," said Professor Nickerson, "However, our collective data strongly suggests it is the low fluid shear growth environment, where turbulence and fluid action is minimal, that plays a major role in the response of salmonella to spaceflight." The team also compared the pattern of gene expression in the space bacteria and those that had stayed on the ground. They found that the expression level in 167 different genes had been altered, they report in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. "This experiment is a 'first of its kind' in spaceflight biological study. It is the first study to examine the effect of spaceflight on the virulence of a pathogen, and the first to obtain the entire gene expression response of a bacterium to spaceflight," said Prof Nickerson. Although the team cannot be sure that the same increase in virulence occurs in other pathogens, the results will concern those planning future missions in which astronauts spend extended periods in space. President Bush has committed the US to returning astronauts to the moon by 2020 and setting up a permanent moon base. This would require much more time in zero gravity and low gravity conditions which would mean more opportunities for astronauts to fall ill. Two weeks ago a government advisory committee said the UK should reconsider its ban on human space flight and begin a crewed space programme. The committee, convened by the British National Space Centre, said there would be huge scientific, cultural and economic benefits to sending humans into space. Building up an astronaut corps from scratch would cost £50m to £75m over five years.



Six Reasons why SPS kills NASA

6 Reason why SPS kills NASA – Star this Card

NASA IS ON THE BRINK- SOLAR SPACE POWER KILLS NASA

(Taylor Dinerman, Monday, May 19, 2008, “NASA and space solar power” http://www.thespacereview.com/article/1130/1)

NASA has good reason to be afraid that the Congress or maybe even the White House will give them a mandate to work on space solar power at a time when the agency’s budget is even tighter than usual and when everything that can be safely cut has been cut. This includes almost all technology development programs that are not directly tied to the Exploration Missions System Directorate’s Project Constellation. Not only that, the management talent inside the organization is similarly under stress. Adding a new program might bring down the US civil space program like a house of cards. In the mid-1990s, urged on by the new chairman of the House Science Committee’s space subcommittee, Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA), NASA did conduct a so-called “Fresh Look” study of space solar power. According to John Mankins, one of the world’s greatest authorities on space solar power, “Several innovative concepts were defined and a variety of new technology applications considered including solid state microwave transmitters, extremely large tension stabilized structures (both tether and inflatable structures), and autonomously self assembling systems using advanced in-space computing systems.” Concluding his 2003 paper on the study, Mankins wrote: The economic viability of such systems depends, of course, on many factors and the successful development of various new technologies—not least of which is the availability of exceptionally low cost access to space. However the same can be said of many other advanced power technologies options. There was no follow-up to this study, partly because of a lack of urgency in the era of cheap energy that existed a decade ago and also because NASA did not, and does not today, see itself as an auxiliary to the Department of Energy. NASA does science and exploration and not much else. Along with its contractors it can develop new technologies that apply directly to those two missions, but outside of that it will resist being forced to spend money on projects that it does not see as falling within those two missions. Technology development in general has been cut back. The NASA Institute for Advanced Concepts has been closed. There is a minimal ongoing effort to build up some technologies that may in the future be useful for reusable launch vehicle development, but it is hard to see how this fits into a coherent future program. The agency has its priorities and is ruthlessly sticking to them. NASA is not the US Department of Spatial Affairs: it does not have the statutory authority to control, regulate, or promote commercial space activities such as telecommunications satellites, space tourism, space manufacturing, or space solar power. Such powers are spread throughout the government in places like the FAA’s Office of Commercial Space Transportation, the Department of Commerce, and elsewhere. Even if NASA were somehow to get the funds and the motivation to do space solar power, these other institutions would resist what they would recognize as an encroachment on their turf. Until the shuttle is retired and NASA has a new and secure method of getting people into space, either with the Orion capsule on top of the Ares 1 or perhaps another rocket, or using the SpaceX Dragon capsule and Falcon 9 combination, there is no room for any other major programs. It will require all they can do to cope with their current programs and to deal with a new president and his or her administration. They don’t need any more distractions right now.


http://www.thespacereview.com/article/1130/1

347 cm nasa aff neg

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