CALTECH beats MIT -- Too much Ivy on the launch pad

At least with regard to this old rivalry it is clear to the space and energy community who has the bigger vision and ambition as of today! (http://blog.nss.org/?p=4727)

A bit surprising since MIT has been in the lead, with a 2007 workshop, and their relationship with Masdar in the UAE where there is apparently strong interest in Space Solar Power from its visionary leader His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum.  It could have been MIT making these headlines...and imagine the progress that little engineering school could have made in that time.

Looks like the NE school has ceded the final frontier to their West-coast rival where the Silicon Valley space billionaires reside. 

What's that famous energy mantra?...."Burn baby burn"

MIT Space Solar Power Workshop

May 14-16, 2007

Sponsored by: MIT Technology and Development Program

Leading experts from industry, government, and academia participated in this two day workshop motivated by the pressing need to develop alternative clean renewable energy supplies. The group agreed that exploring alternative energy sources (wind, hydro-electric, terrestrial solar power, geothermal, and bio-fuels) as well as promoting conservation are high priorities. And it stressed that space solar and existing sources of power are not competitors.

Working groups:

• Space Systems Technology for Space Solar Power
• Solar Energy Technology: Terrestrial vs. Space Solar Power
• Economics, the Environment, Public Policy, and Legal Issues
• Integration Strategies

Each working group discussed many topics, including: the advantages of space solar power, technical unknowns and challenges, what research needs to be done, and what issues are unresolved.

The Future Cannot Be Sustained by Present Technologies

Workshop participants concluded that the United States, Japan, and Europe must take the lead in Space Solar Power, but acceptance and active participation by developing countries is essential. Awareness of Space Solar Power must be increased, a goal this group and others may pursue with future workshops and initiatives.

For list of program committee members and participants, visit: http://web.mit.edu/space_solar_power/index.html

The Failure of Durban

New frontiers of physics?  Possible discovery of the Higgs Boson?
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=higgs-lhc&print=true

An Earth-like exo-planet (Kepler 22b) discovered and top target for the Search for Extraterrestrial Life:
http://news.cnet.com/8301-17938_105-57338719-1/kepler-22-b-a-top-target-in-restarted-seti-alien-search/

Excellent Counterpoint to the Limits of Growth by Dennis Wingo:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/12/10/the-true-failure-of-durban/#more-52789

The True Failure of Durban

Posted on December 10, 2011 by Anthony Watts

Guest post by Dennis Ray Wingo

First I want to say thanks to Anthony for providing this forum for the discussion of climate in a different sense, that is to focus on Durban and what this conference means from the wider perspective of the direction of our global civilization.

When I was young and beginning in the world of technology I complained to my mentor, my company’s regional manager, about a bad performance review delivered to me by a boss who I and he thought was incompetent. His response was to say that “a performance review can be used as a tool or as a bludgeon”. The same thing is true about CO2 and its role on the global stage as providing a tool whereby the technocrats of the UN and its NGO’s seek to reorganize our planetary civilization In keeping with their desired future.

The fear of the negative consequences of the emission of CO2 is being used as a tool to bludgeon the developed world into economic and political suicide. We in the west are told that we must commit this suicide because we must commit to a “Fair and equitable allocation of the atmospheric space, taking into account the criteria of historic climate debt and population;” [bullet 33g of the FCCC/AWGLCA/2011/CRP.39 document]. We are told that the only just and equitable way to do this is to transfer large sums of money to the Non-Annex 1 world and that we must have peak CO2 emissions in Annex 1 (western civilization) immediately [bullet 33d, bullet 32].

There are two critical assumptions that underpin the entire Durban conference as well as previous efforts; the first assumption is that we live in a limited world and that this wealth transfer and the immediate cessation of CO2 emissions is the only possible path toward a “sustainable” future. The second is that technology cannot solve the problem but politics can. What are these assumptions built upon and are they valid? Is this the only path forward? Are we destined to leave our global posterity in a state of perpetual semi-poverty? Human nature rebels against this doom and gloom view of the future, and with good reason.

The Assumptions

I do not wish to seem overdramatic, but I can only conclude from the information that is available to me as Secretary-General, that the Members of the United Nations have perhaps ten years left in which to subordinate their ancient quarrels and launch a global partnership to curb the arms race, to improve the human environment, to defuse the population explosion, and to supply the required momentum to development efforts. If such a global partnership is not forged within the next decade, then I very much fear that the problems that I have mentioned will have reached staggering proportions that they will be beyond our capacity to control.

Who said this? This statement could have very well have been the preamble to the Durban conference but it actually was uttered by UN Secretary General U Thant in 1969 and is included as the introduction to the book, Limits to Growth. The book “Limits to Growth” (LTG) is the touchstone of the environmental movement as well as the ultimate source of the two underpinning assumptions of the Durban conference.

The Limited Earth

The first assumption that the Earth is all we have and that our resources are limited to only what we have here. This is a patently false assumption. In 2005 I was invited to contribute a chapter to a book on “Spacepower Theory” which was commissioned by the defense department as an extension of Clauswitz’s classic “Landpower Theory”, Alfred Mahan’s “Seapower Theory”, and General Billy Mitchell’s “Airpower Theory”. In my chapter on the “Economic Development of the Solar System as the Heart of a Spacepower Theory”, a word was coined and defined.

“geocentric” is defined as a mindset that sees spacepower and its application as focused primarily on actions, actors, and influences on earthly powers, the earth itself, and its nearby orbital environs. (available online at the NDU press here)

The underpinning assumption that the Earth and its resources constitutes all the wealth that exists for humans to access and use is by definition a geocentric mindset and has been falsified by the last three decades of NASA, ESA, and other nations scientific probes sent to the Moon and beyond. Just in the last few years we have discovered billions of tons of water on the Moon to support propulsion, trillions of tons of aluminum, titanium, iron, Uranium, thorium and other rare Earth metals along with Platinum Group Metals, Cobalt, nickel and iron derived from asteroid impacts. In the asteroid belt are untold riches of water, metals and other resources yet to be identified. Just a single small metal asteroid, 3554 Amun, has tens of trillions of dollars worth of metals, and an asteroid of the same type, 216 Cleopatra, has a billion trillion times more resources of the same type. We now know that Mars has extensive water resources and the two rovers Spirit and Opportunity, found in just a few kilometers of driving, enough metallic asteroid fragments to kick start industry on Mars. It is absurd to think that the geocentric mindset of LTG and today in Durban is correct.

No Faith In Technology

The supposed inability of technology to solve our current problems is the other key assumption of LTG and today in Durban. To anyone who understands history and technology this is absurd but here is what the authors of LTG say about technology;

Applying technology to the natural pressures that the environment exerts against any growth process has been so successful in the past that a whole culture has evolved around the principle of fighting against limits rather than learning to live with them. This culture has been reinforced by the apparent immensity of the earth and its resources and by the relative smallness of man and his activities….

(page 156, Limits to Growth)

… We have felt it necessary to dwell so long on an analysis of technology here because we have found that technological optimism is the most common and the most dangerous reaction to our findings from the world model. Technology can relieve the symptoms of a problem without affecting the underlying causes. Faith in technology as the ultimate solution to all fundamental problems can thus divert our attention from the most fundamental problem – the problem of growth in a finite system – and prevent us from taking effective action to solve it.

(Page 159, LTG)

If you think that this thought pattern is one of the 1970’s, here is what Al Gore said in his book, Earth in the Balance in 1992:

It is important, however, to remember that there is a great danger in seeing technology alone as the answer to the environmental crisis. In fact, the idea that new technology is the solution to all our problems is a central part of the faulty way of thinking that created the crisis in the first place.

Unless we come to a better understanding of both the potential and the danger of technology, the addition of more technological power simply ensures further degradation of the environment, and no matter what new technologies we discover, no matter how cleverly and efficiently we manage to get them into the hands of people throughout the world, the underlying crisis will worsen unless, at the same time, we redefine our relationship to the environment, stabilize human population, and use every possible means to bring the earth back into balance.

(Page 328, Earth in the Balance)

Technology and technological development, in the form of the industrial revolution (the faulty way of thinking according to Gore), has done more to lift mankind out of poverty than all of the political systems tried in the entire one hundred and seventy thousand year history of our species put together. It is amazing that this neo Luddite attitude could exist today, but it does, and as an example of how it influences the Durban conference, only 15% of the money from their massive wealth transfer would be applied to developing technology. That is less than their administrative overhead! At the end of the day, this a key divergence between the NGO’s and technocrats of the UN and those of us who see another way, one rooted in finding solutions to the problems that confront us today.

Developing an Alternative

Let us, for the sake of the hypothetical and to put us on the same page as the delegates in Durban, let us grant the following:

1. The increase in CO2 and other IR absorbing gasses in the atmosphere are bad and we must do something about it or suffer the secular apocalypse.
2. We apply the minimum financial resources of the $100 billion per year as set forth in Durban to the problem.

Let us set as the requirements the following as well:

1. Whatever solution is found, it must in the end result in a more prosperous world for all mankind.
2. Whatever solution is found, it must also preserve individual liberty and provide opportunity for the further advance of mankind.

Unfortunately the requirements of brevity in this forum preclude an advanced treatment of this but lets lay the groundwork and if the reader wants more it can be provided in the future.

Energy

The first area to attack is energy. At the end of the day, energy is the key to the future. Just think that if a megawatt of electrical power was as inexpensive as a kilowatt is today, how many things would be different. A trash compactor could atomize your trash and separate it into its basic constituents for recycling. You could easily create your own hydrogen at home for your fuel cell car. Mining on the Earth could extract metals from base rock with oxygen as the waste product.

Half of the $100 billion per year would be spent on a crash program to develop various fusion technologies, including advanced forms of the National Ignition Facility, Polywell Fusion, Thorium fission, and the “traditional” ITER type Tokomak fusion. Applying this much money to these energy technologies would do far more than all of the political world shaping of the wealth transfer of Durban. Providing advanced energy sources would do far more than solar panels or wind turbines to power a prosperous civilization. Both solar and wind are inherently low energy multiple technologies, meaning that the energy that you get out of either of these is only low multiples of the energy that it takes the make, install, and maintain them.

If we put the proper amount of resources into these energy technologies, then we would “solve” the CO2 problem as a side benefit and we could build a world energy grid that would do more than all the antipoverty programs in place today put together to improve life on Earth. In researching the history of the industrial revolution, human lifespan has been directly proportional to the amount of inexpensive energy available to us. human lifespans in the west went from 35 years of age in the year 1700 to almost 50 years of age at the peak of the age of coal in 1900. Today at the peak of the oil age that number has climbed to almost 80 years in Annex 1 countries. It is also in the advanced energy countries where population growth has dropped to replacement or even below. There is a direct correlation between wealth and population and it is far more fun to make everyone wealthy than to make everyone suffer in poverty as would be the ultimate result of Durban.

Space Resource Development

In just the past few years the Lunar Recon Orbiter, the LCROSS, and other missions have made a very preliminary map of the resources available on the surface of the Moon. It is inevitable that there are upside surprises waiting us there. Despite the problems of NASA in getting us back to the Moon, to the Moon is our first destination. Let us apply the other $50 billion a year to an effort to begin the industrialization of the Moon. In inflation adjusted terms, this is still only 40% of the budget spent per year at the peak of the Apollo program. If it is that important, then we can increase that budget to the full $100 billion a year (we are talking about building a sustainable global civilization) on a multi-pronged effort in this area.

This would not just be a NASA effort or a NASA, ESA, JAXA effort but an effort that would provide the means whereby private enterprise could contribute through their own efforts and funds. Tax relief, prizes, and other incentives. We begin with the industrialization of the Moon and the construction of a transportation infrastructure to allow humans to easily move about in the inner solar system. The resources of the Moon enable this. We move forward to build infrastructure in geosynch orbit that are many times larger than today, to enable communications and remote sensing infrastructure that would fundamentally transform our global society for the better.

These are not fantasies, these are not science fiction ideas, they are 100% doable today. The problem has been that the financial support has not been there, even considering the $18 billion dollar a year NASA. NASA is not designed to lead the economic development of the solar system, nor should it be, this is something that the American people and our fellows in western civilization are uniquely qualified to do. Dr. John Marburger, the head of the Office of Science and Technology Policy in the Bush administration had a marvelous speech on this subject at the Goddard symposium in 2006. In it he said:

The ultimate goal is not to impress others, or merely to explore our planetary system, but to use accessible space for the benefit of humankind. It is a goal that is not confined to a decade or a century. Nor is it confined to a single nearby destination, or to a fleeting dash to plant a flag. The idea is to begin preparing now for a future in which the material trapped in the Sun’s vicinity is available for incorporation into our way of life.

This is the alternative to the Durban failure that should be investigated and I submit that if we did this, our future would be far better in the year 2100 than even the most optimistic scenarios developed in any of these conferences that focus on how to split the existing pie up in a way that supports their political proclivities. We want to build a far bigger pie. Today the average welfare recipient in the United States lives a life style that Augustus Caesar or the greatest emperor of old China would think of as magic. Our goal should be to create a world in the year 2100 where the poor live a lifestyle that George Soros would envy.

Beyond Artificial Limits

For those of us who work in the space business and who develop new architectures for lunar development and beyond it seems absurd that these false assumptions should underpin serious global deliberations at crafting a better future for the citizens of our planetary civilization. This at the end of the day is my greatest objection to the role that climate scientists play in the arena of solutions to the “CO2 problem”. Whether or not you believe that CO2 is the secular apocalypse, one thing is certain, the people that are trained in the arcane science of climate proxies are inadequate in training and incompetent in execution of something as large as architecting a future for our civilization. We must open up the boundaries of the discussion to include energy development on the Earth and resource development off planet as serious and viable alternatives to plans such as the failed ones being drawn up in places like Durban.

There is a future out there, a glorious one, that while it may not solve all of our problems, it will certainly get us beyond these artificial limits to growth.

Why Not Space Solar Power?

Spacenews has published an OpEd by Don Flournoy on Space Solar Power

From: http://blog.nss.org/?p=2064  or www.spacenews.com/commentaries

Why Not Space Solar Power?

Mon, 13 September, 2010

www.spacenews.com/commentaries

By Don Flournoy

The 2010 U.S. National Space Policy, which supports a robust and competitive commercial space sector, is good news for those of us working to design and launch the new types of satellites that will collect solar energy in space and deliver it to Earth as a nonpolluting source of electrical power.

Among the goals of President Barack Obama’s National Space Policy is expansion of international cooperation on mutually beneficial space activities to “broaden and extend the benefits of space” and “further the peaceful use of space.”

As members of the National Space Society, the Society of Satellite Professionals International and the Space Energy Group, we believe space, as a shared resource, can best be explored and developed by a partnership of nations and businesses working together.

Since acquiring clean and abundant energy is a common requirement for economic growth and an eventual necessity for the health of all societies, harvesting space solar power is a logical human endeavor when the high frontier is precisely where energy is most plentiful. But achieving success doing large-scale commercial innovation in outer space requires long-range planning, pooling of financial resources, sharing of knowledge and expertise, and the careful framing of a way forward that will earn and sustain the public trust.

In naming the CEOs who will serve on his new advisory board on trade issues, Obama noted in July that the U.S. is on track to double exports in the next five years, and he pointed to some of the ways the American economy is being repositioned to better compete abroad. When adding that announcement to the outcomes of the June summit of the Group of 20 major industrial countries in Canada and recent federal policy statements intimating that (certain) export controls will be relaxed and cooperation in space will be encouraged, it would appear that the U.S. could be entering a new era of openness for international business.

To this end, we would like to see some greater leadership and support given to space solar power development by NASA and the U.S. departments of Energy and Commerce. A helpful first step would be a U.S.-led space solar power feasibility study to which all interested nations are invited to contribute.

In the context of the U.S. National Space Policy, such a feasibility study could lead the way in assessing and promoting “appropriate cost and risk sharing among participating nations in international partnerships.” It would demonstrate U.S. “tangible leadership in space,” leveraging the capabilities of allies while assuring continuing adherence to the U.N. Treaty on Exploration and Use of Outer Space — now signed by 125 states, including China and India — that dictates “nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction” shall not be placed in outer space.

At the International Space Development Conference held in Chicago in May, multiple nations participated in a National Space Society-initiated Solar Power Symposium to examine in depth opportunities and challenges for energy generation in near space. Former Indian President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam, scientist, aeronautical engineer and proponent of space solar power, addressing the symposium via videoconference, spoke to the need for international cooperation in space. He proposed a multilateral global initiative that could map out for us what needs to be done to bring space solar power to operational reality.

From our perspective, space solar power is a meaningful science, engineering and commercial challenge that deserves our attention and investment. In the wake of the Gulf of Mexico oil disaster, we think it is time for the U.S. to put space solar power on our national energy agenda. At the same time, we must seek opportunities to learn from and participate with Canada, China, India, Japan, the European Union and others taking their first tentative steps to bring space solar energy to Earth.

In a June Times of India commentary on strategic international diplomacy, U.S. Sen. John Kerry expressed support for a partnership with India that would include “the quest for new technologies and fresh ideas for economically viable ways to speed the shift to renewable energy sources.”

We believe that within the mainstream of global science, engineering and environmental management there are game-changing ideas and technologies that await testing. It is time to see some space solar power demonstration projects. Of all the possible alternative energy sources on the near horizon, we believe space solar power is our best chance for addressing the worldwide challenges of climate change, renewable energy and continued economic growth.

__________

Don Flournoy is a professor and editor of the Online Journal of Space Communication (www.spacejournal.org) at Ohio University. This article also reflects the opinions of Robert Bell of the Society of Satellite Professionals International, Mark Hopkins of the National Space Society, Stephan Tennsel of Space Energy AG, and Feng Hsu of the Space Energy Group.

More news and blog entries on the Indo-US SBSP proposal:

From: http://adpnews.info/?nid=af95d8c333f5d1e2

India-US space-based solar power plan could solve major energy issues - study

(ADPnews) - Sep 14, 2010 - A space-based solar power (SBSP) programme developed by India and the US could solve the energy security and climate change issues, according to a report by US Air Force lieutenant colonel Peter Garretson.

Garretson, who is on a sabbatical as an international fellow at the institute for defence studies and analyses in New Delhi, considers that the two countries should conduct a feasibility analysis on such a programme, whose aim will be to replace fossil fuel energy with SBSP by 2025. However, in order to work on such a plan, India should first sign the Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR) document, which the country declined to do earlier, deeming it discriminatory.

In his report, Garretson has included a three-phase plan, which starts with an initial five-year programme costing USD 10 million to USD 30 million for the development of contributing technologies and competent workforce. It is followed by a USD-10-billion investment in the construction of a sub-scale space solar power system over a 10-year period. The concluding stage envisages the establishment of an Indian-US consortium to face energy security and carbon mitigation issues.

Such a SBSP programme could be managed by the US Department of State's Office of Ocean Environment and Science and the Prime Minister's Council on Climate Change in India, according to Garretson's report.

From: http://evworld.com/currents.cfm?jid=144

Making the Case An Indo-USA Space-Based Solar Power Programme

By Bill Moore

I had a rude awakening this evening. What began as a casual journey into India's space programme -- the reasons will be apparent momentarily -- ended with the sobering realization that along with the sub-continent's explosive economic growth and the rise of the middle class, also comes the apparent need to flex its political muscles militarily in the form of nuclear submarines -- the first launched last year with more on order -- tactical transport aircraft jointly developed with the Russians, and even their own armada of aircraft carriers. And then there's their plan to send men to the moon by 2016.

I've been reading Peter Garretson's 2009 research paper for Indian Defense Studies and Analysis entitled, "Sky's No Limit: Space-based Solar Power, The Next Major Step in the Indo-US Strategic Partnership?" It is a heavily footnoted document of some 174 pages and six appendices. In it, Garretson makes the case that the next step in the United States and India's strategic relationship should be establishment of a "big policy" programme (I'll use the British spelling) to put solar power generation systems in earth orbit. While the paper doesn't go into the technological issues, it does focus on the policy implementation barriers of such a collaboration.

Of course, as a parochial American with only a passing knowledge of Indian food -- which I love -- and Bollywood movies -- which I also find highly entertaining as long as I can keep up with the English subtitles -- I asked myself was India, in fact, technologically capable of making a meaningful contribution to such a programme? Sure, their Chandrayaan-1 moon mission was an impressive achievement, discovering evidence for water, but could they really be expected to lift millions of pounds of components into geosynchronous orbit to build hundreds, even thousands of 5 km width solar arrays?

The answer is, in fact, yes. The Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) has a series of launch vehicles; the largest being the GSLV III, now in development, will be capable of lifting 4,500kg (10,000 lbs) of payload into geosynchronous transfer orbit, putting it on a par with competing American and French launch vehicles. Importantly, it appears they can do it rather cheaply. The Chandrayaan-1 mission in 2008 cost just US$79 million.

And why should India or the United States even consider such an initiative, either alone or in partnership? Besides the fact that the Japanese are spending money on their own SBSP program and plan to have a 1 GW platform in orbit by 2030, you mean? Garretson takes pains to explain that it may, in fact, be the only choice the planet has to provide humanity with the clean, pollution-free, electric power it needs, especially in populous nations like India where 50-60% of it citizens will be living in cities by 2039. At present, India, as well as the United States, depends on coal-fired power plants for half of its electricl power generation capacity. It is estimated India's coal reserves will last 80 years, but Garretson points out that at a projected growth rate of just 5 percent a year, those reserves will be exhausted in 45 years; and this doesn't even address the critical problem of water shortages in India, water on which thermoelectric power plants, both fossil fuel and nuclear, are dependent.

So, why not simply build vast solar farms in India's Thar Desert, which stretches across the northwestern states of Rajasthan and Gujara, and occupies more than 2.5 million square kilometers? Efficiency and intermittency are why. All earth-bound solar installations suffer from the same problem: the sun shines on them only part of the day and the atmosphere -- and its associated weather -- reduce their efficiency even further. Space-based solar stations can provide solar power, transmitted back to earth in the form of low-frequency radio waves, 24 hours a day at the sun's maximum power rate of 1330+ watts per meter. At least that's the theory. Those same radio waves have to penetrate the atmosphere and its weather, be converted by circular farms of specially-designed rectenna's with 80 percent-plus efficiency back to electric power and then distributed to urban centers. In a footnote(14) on page 23 of Garretson's paper, it is estimated that only two percent of the energy transmitted down to earth would be lost in the form of heat, and that the type of radio wave being considered will have no or virtually no impact on humans or animals. He notes that, "NASA, DOE, and EPA have conducted extensive experiments to assess if there were ill effects to biological life or the upper atmosphere due to such beams. None of the studies conducted so far suggest that there is any significant detrimental effect."

Assuming all other objections and technical issues can be resolved, what's the potential of SBSP and what's its cost? Citing studies by James Snead and Harry Stine (footnote 10, page 22) Garretson estimates, "the exploitable energy in orbit exceeds not just the electrical demand of the planet today, but the total energy needs of a fully developed planet with over 10 billion people." As for the question of cost, Sky's No Limit estimates that the world currently spends $6 trillion on energy of all forms annually. Most of that energy produces highly undesirably pollution and climate change, which SBSP would not. Further, SBSP would make no environmental demands on the planet's freshwater supply.

The idea would certainly seem to have merit. Imagine an EV world where all our motor vehicles are powered by electricity transmitted from thousands of orbiting solar stations. However, moving such a project from the dreamer's stage to the schemer's stage will prove the first major obstacle to overcome. If nothing else, Sky's No Limit makes thought-provoking reading. It certainly opened my eyes to the state of technological development taking place in India beyond Tata Nanos, Revas and Hero electric bicycles.

New Space Energy Newsletter:
http://www.spaceenergy.com/AnnouncementRetrieve.aspx?ID=56424
It reviews the IDSA-CFR paper on Indo-US Space Solar Power cooperation.

Introduction of Peter Garretson´s New SBSP Paper: "Sky´s No Limit"

Hot off the press, Space Energy is proud to announce the publication of the latest paper from one of the original SBSP `caballeros´, Peter Garretson, entitled “Sky’s No Limit: Space-Based Solar Power, the Next Major Step in the Indo-US Strategic Partnership?”

Referred to as IDSA Occasional Paper No. 9, this paper provides a policymaker's overview of a highly scalable, revolutionary, renewable energy technology, Space-Based Solar Power (SBSP), and evaluates its utility within the context of the Indo-US strategic partnership.  After providing an overview of the concept and its significance to the compelling problems of sustainable growth, economic development, energy security and climate change, it evaluates the utility of the concept in the context of respective Indian and US political and energy-climate trajectories.  The paper concludes that a bilateral initiative to develop Space-Based Solar Power is highly consistent with the objectives of the Indo-US strategic partnership, and ultimately recommends an actionable three-tiered programme to realize its potential.

Peter Garretson's credentials are unparalleled.  He was a Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), International Fellow in India, and a Visiting Fellow at the Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses (IDSA) in New Delhi.  He is an active duty Air Force officer on sabbatical as an Air Force Fellow.  He was previously the Chief of Future Science and Technology Exploration for Headquarters Air Force, Directorate of Strategic Plans and Programs, and is a former DARPA Service Chiefs’ Intern, and former Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) Service Academy Research Associate.  He is a published author on Space Grand Strategy, and is a recipient of the National Space Society’s (NSS) Space Pioneer Award.

Peter Garretson´s past IDSA papers can be found here.

A presentation made by the author of the IDSA-CFR Report can be downloaded from here:

http://www.maficstudios.com/pete/download.html

Space Based Solar Power for India - US Strategic Partnership

Just two months to the day before President Obama visits India, India' premier strategic think tank publishes this
"Skies No Limit: Space-Based Solar Power as the Next Major step in the Indo-US strategic Partnership"
http://www.idsa.in/occasionalpapers/SkysNoLimit_pgarretson_2010

Providing a blueprint for binational cooperation to address the linked problems of energy security, sustainable development and climate change!

Lockheed Martin and Space Based Solar Power

From: http://www.lmco.cn/data/assets/corporate/documents/April2009-LMToday.pdf

“Energy and climate change are dominant issues for our customers, our nation and the world. It is imperative that we apply our tremendous depth of engineering and technical talent to solutions for energy independence, and at the same time open up adjacent markets for continued business growth.”
— Ray O. Johnson, Lockheed Martin senior vice president and chief technology officer

Space-based solar power has significant potential. After collecting the solar energy, the space-based solar power system converts it to radio frequency energy and conveys it efficiently and safely to the ground through large-aperture transmitters and collectors. This artist’s rendering of a space-based solar array shows the wide aperture delivery of the space-generated power, an important safety feature.

Another technology that is some years away but holds tremendous potential is space-based solar power.  Lockheed Martin Space Systems is in the early stages of forming a program in conjunction with government and industry partners to develop a solar power system that operates where the sun is always shining — above Earth’s atmosphere.  Around-the-clock access to sunshine with no weather outages, as well as the space-based system’s ability to collect solar energy before any is lost to the atmosphere, makes it potentially four to eight times more efficient than systems currently on the ground, says Rick Halbach, Space Systems senior manager.  After collecting the solar energy, the space-based solar power system would convert it to radio frequency energy and convey it efficiently and safely to the ground through large-aperture transmitters and collectors.  Related technology work, such as advanced photovoltaic solar cells designed specifically for use in space are being matured by Space Systems’ Advanced Technology Center in Palo Alto, Calif. The ATC is also working on thermovoltaics and battery technologies for space applications.

CIA shares intelligence with climate scientists

From: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/34699949/ns/us_news-the_new_york_times/

As we often find after-the-fact, cutting edge technologies and capabilities designed for one thing end up being useful for unintended peaceful purposes.  It is terrific that the world can engage its intelligence assets to track climate change.  Could we find a similar match of capabilities in our security space capabilities be applied to the Near Earth Object (NEO) / Planetary Defense.

NEAR MISS RENEWS U.N. INTEREST IN ASTEROID DEFENSE

From: http://www.tmcnet.com/usubmit/2009/03/13/4055719.htm
[March 13, 2009]
POLITICS: NEAR MISS RENEWS U.N. INTEREST IN ASTEROID DEFENSE
(English IPS News Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) UNITED NATIONS, Mar. 12, 2009 (IPS/GIN) -- As the United Nations grapples with global problems from the economy to climate change, there is apparently a new threat looming over Earth: plummeting asteroids.
A small asteroid, estimated to be over 200 feet wide, zoomed past the planet last week, causing consternation among scientists and space watchers."The asteroid that missed the Earth would have had a destructive capacity of between 600 and 1,000 Hiroshima atomic bombs," said Walther Lichem, an Austrian diplomat and a member of the International Panel on Asteroid Threat Mitigation.
He said last week's asteroid, if it had crashed, would have totally destroyed 4,000 to 8,000 square miles of Earth's surface, with additional regional implications.The National Aeronautics and Space Administration defines asteroids as metallic, rocky bodies, without atmosphere, that orbit the sun but are too small to be classified as planets.The largest of the asteroids, Ceres, first discovered in 1801, is about 600 miles in diameter, while the smallest are the size of pebbles.The risk path of one of the identified asteroids -- dubbed Apophis -- is expected to run from Siberia, the Pacific, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Colombia and Venezuela to the west coast of Africa.In a paper to the United Nations last September, the Association of Space Explorers and its International Panel on Asteroid Threat Mitigation said within the next 10 to 15 years, the world body will face decisions about whether, and how, to prevent a threatened asteroid impact."To counter a threat of global dimension, information-sharing and communications capabilities must be harnessed to identify and warn society of hazardous Near Earth Objects [NEOs]," it said.The study also said that to prevent an actual impact, an international decision-making program, including necessary institutional requirements, must be agreed upon and implemented within the framework of the United Nations."If the international community fails to adopt an effective, internationally mandated program, society will likely suffer the effects of some future cosmic disaster -- intensified by the knowledge that loss of life, economic devastation, and long-lasting societal disruption could have been prevented," it warned."[And] we cannot afford to shirk that responsibility," the report declared.In February, the report was submitted to the Scientific and Technical Sub Committee of the General Assembly's Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space (COPUOS), and will eventually be part of the U.N.-COPUOS report to the General Assembly at its 64th session in September.However, the focus of COPUOS is technical and does not include the profound security and legal issues of mitigation operations.A delegation from the Association of Space Explorers, which includes former astronauts and cosmonauts, met the president of the U.N. General Assembly, Miguel D'Escoto Brockmann, late last year to press their case.Lichem said the 192-member General Assembly has to address the issues involved, and launch an institutional development and capacity-building process.He said d'Escoto felt it appropriate that the General Assembly, i.e. the entire community of nations, be briefed of the challenges planetary defense is posing."It will also be meaningful if the Security Council initiates a process of introducing the planetary defense into its agenda even if concrete decision-making needs may arise only once every seven to 10 years," said Lichem, who is also an academic and a former Austrian ambassador and head of the Department for International Organizations in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.Lichem, who also authored a 30-page study on Asteroid Threat Mitigation -- Institutional and Legal Implications, said "the issue of considering the defense of our planet against impacts by Near Earth Objects reflects in many ways the New Global Agenda the international community is facing." Addressing the threat of asteroids is "almost incomprehensibly complex, requiring the essential input from the scientific and technical sectors of our societies, yet is at the same time in need of decision-making at political levels with the corresponding dimension of political responsibility," he added.Meanwhile, the Association of Space Explores has also posed a series of critical questions, including: Who will issue warnings to evacuate a predicted impact point? Based on what information? How will the public react if there are conflicting predictions? Who pays to deflect an asteroid? What does such a mission cost? A U.N. official said that COPUOS is expected to discuss the association's report during its meeting in June.Laying out the U.N. decision-making process, he said the General Assembly can take this up only after a specialized body discusses it.An expert in space law said that no one is responsible or liable if and when an asteroid crashes into Earth."Technically, it is a massive piece that comes down like the shuttle or a plane coming down. But debris in space keeps orbiting for years, with the danger of debris damaging other functional satellites also in orbit, including the space station," he explained.Needless to say, he added, "an asteroid could do damage on Earth or to other satellites, but it is almost an act of God and there is little we can do." He also said that over the last couple of years, the Association of Space Explorers has worked out a protocol and presented it to COPUOS for adoption.Last month, the U.N. Office for Outer Space Affairs (UNOOSA) in Vienna called all member states and international organizations to fully implement measures to curb space debris following the collision of an inactive Russian satellite with an operational one from the United States."The prompt implementation of appropriate space debris mitigation measures is in humanity's common interest, particularly if we are to preserve the outer space environment for future generations," the director of UNOOSA, Mazlan Othman, told reporters.According to UNOOSA, the inactive Russian communications satellite Cosmos 2251 and the operational U.S. satellite Iridium 33 collided at an altitude of some 500 miles above Earth, creating a cloud of nearly 700 pieces of space debris.Space debris remains in orbit for a considerable length of time and poses a risk to spacecraft orbiting Earth, the U.N. body warned.