I hear what you are saying about the risk averse and hidebound culture that has descended over engineering innovation, especially nuclear power. Also, the softening of US higher education.
Part of turning public opinion against nuclear power may well have been successful influence operations by the Soviets through “peace” “disarmament” and “anti-nuclear” front groups.
But I am trying to cheer you up here. Hope springs eternal, and all is not yet lost. Technology is accelerating with the explosion of computers, AI, robotics and biotech. Big changes are coming. Feel the excitement!
One hope, is that the same political involvement which restrains nuclear development, can be turned to permit it, by the bribes of wealthy industrialists with a financial interest in it.
Bill Gates was recently in Paris at the “Climate Change” Conference, lobbying for political support for his nuclear power venture (Terrapower). That particular project might not be a winner due to the collapse of the price of competing oil and gas, but it is an example of a businessman who could buy influence to break a technological logjam (or hire sub-contractors to do so).
I think that the current law was promoted (whether by persuasion, inducements or an artful mix of both) by up and coming asteroid mining companies like Planetary Resources and Deep Space Industries, which are already preparing small “cubesat” probes for surveying. This legislative effort was just clearing potential obstacles to their business plan, as a Board of Directors would reasonably require, before big investments are sunk.
When they need the power of strong nuclear propulsion for big hauls, their lobbyists will probably make it happen for them as well. As you pointed out, effective technology has been sitting on the shelf for a long time, just awaiting approval and funding.
One estimate from the late 1990s of the wealth available from asteroid mining (from water for space use and fuel production, as well as the platinum family of elements), was about $10 billion - for every person on earth at the time. One asteroid was estimated to have more platinum than the total cumulative production on Earth so far, and significant quantities of other precious elements as well. With that kind of money at stake you could buy a majority at the UN, let alone congress.
The 2020’s will be the serious opening of the near solar system.
“But I am trying to cheer you up here. Hope springs eternal ...”
Thanks! I’ll try, but don’t have that many years left...
Did you know that there is a diamond many light years from here that is as big as the moon? Interesting things are out there.
It was estimated some years back that US$4 billion would buy the land (Argentina, I think), build the launch pad, and the rocket to return to the moon?
However, there may be other reasons why going to the moon or Mars other than robotically is a very bad idea.
The moon is a very strange place - it is not what most think it is - just a large rock - there’s more to it than that. We have (or had unless NASA destroyed it all as they have of much of the pre-Apollo and Apollo images and data) mountains of data no one has looked at, piles of images no one has studied in detail.
Only a small to vanishing percentage of all of that data has been analyzed.
Much of the US Navy’s Moon Mapping images (Clementine 1994) remain classified - which begged the question at the time - why was the Navy spending precious millions taking hi-res images of the entire lunar surface? That which is now available - all lunar images are very hard to find, harder still to find a particular image and then only in lo-res to medium res - they use the most obscure, the most clumsy of online data bases imaginable (using image names like lhd0363b.032).