Posted on 06/14/2004 9:47:50 AM PDT by NormsRevenge
WASHINGTON (AP) - A White House commission will recommend that NASA overhaul its Apollo-era relationships with private industries, giving corporations a broader role in upcoming space launches to ensure President Bush's goal of ultimately flying to Mars, according to documents obtained Monday.
The role of NASA "must be limited to only those areas where there is irrefutable demonstration that only government can perform the proposed activity," according to a summary obtained by The Associated Press that was prepared by the president's commission. Its final report is expected later this week.
The commission determined that NASA should recognize "a far larger presence of private industry in space operations with the specific goal of allowing private industry to assume the primary role of providing services to NASA, and most immediately in accessing low-earth orbit."
Experts said that conclusion clearly signals intentions to hand over nearly all space launches - except manned missions - to private corporations.
"It carves out the launch of astronauts," said George T. Whitesides, head of the National Space Society. "I'm sure there will be a lot of debate about that over the coming weeks."
Bush created the President's Commission on Implementation of U.S. Space Exploration Policy to help decide the best way to accomplish his new space vision, which includes resuming flights to the moon and Mars over the next few decades.
Rutan's first launch attempt at 62 miles and officially declared "space" is scheduled for next week.
Ping
Government is not the answer. Now where have i heard that before?
Private property creates the existence of the private sector and capitalism.
Private sector = private property
If you want the private sector in outer space, create private property out there.
Interesting idea. I don't have a problem with a company laying claim to any asteroid it can land a ship on. Theres wealth in space that's beyond our wildest dreams.
Million's worth of iron and nickel ore alone. Let alone any of the other elements floating around.
It's only thirty years late.
Now to find someway of reforming the launch contractors, or breaking their stranglehold on the market.
The 1967 UN Treaty precludes public ownership of celestial resources, which makes no sense at all since by signing the treaty they have implicitly assumed public ownership. The net effect is that they have assumed public ownership and denied private ownership. You cannot have a claim to ownership of any asteroid or moon. Is that clear?
Not only private property, but also contract out with the companie(s) to build the transportation system to get there.
The prototype should be how we got the transcontinental railroad. It was brilliant. The US government loaned the rail companies the money to build it. They gave the railroads some property, which is where their profit came from.
The government retained some land, that it sold and made money from (the land previously being worthless, because you couldn't travel to/from there with any serious tonnage). Then governments were formed from the population that moved to the new rail transportation areas, and taxes were derived from the new population.
In the end, the original loans for rail were repaid, with interest.
The railroads made money. The government made money. The people made money. Litteraly everybody won.
Do the same thing with the Moon/Mars/Asteroids. Anyone who can design a serious space transportation system should get the loan to build and operate it plus some percentage of the property that can now be accessed.
The American railroad system was highly successful and might be the model for space development. We could go with the highly successful British system of crown charters, which strangely is still in use in this country, or we could go with leases like oil/gas leases. Phoebe is an ice moon. Worth its weight in gold? Hah! Nothing so cheap as gold. No, it is the most precious substance, as Solomon pointed out.
UN is anti-private property, like any other communist organization.
The US can withdraw from the Treaty. They should.
Easy, get your company chartered in Taiwan, land on the asteroid, and say "MINE"!
What would anyone do about it? :)
Unfortunately, most countries are signatory. Find a country that isn't, and you will find a country that can't enforce zoning laws in front of city hall.
Space Ping! This is the Space Ping List! Let me know if you want on or off this list!
thats a good point that there will have to be a government in control for a private sector to start up. The wierd thing though is that we've never done anything quite like this before and its going to take a while for the world to work out how its going to work. since there isn't really anything contiguous about space its hard to specify who owns what and who is subject to what government. Inevitably, through war or rebellion or whatever, the space stations, asteroids and planetary bases are going to be ruled only by spacefaring nations. And what if a certain space colony or martian territory applies for statehood? How do you put that on the US map?
Although space is certainly going to become a private sector thing to a large extent, the government must stay involved and in benevolent control if we don't want our colonies to rebel.
Yes, I've been reading red mars.
Taiwan isn't in the UN, so I doubt they've signed the UN's outer space treaty. Heck, it would be worth it just to stick a finger in the PRC's eye.
Regardless, if a company landed on an asteroid and started mining, who'd stop them? Does the treaty even have any enforcement mechanisms? I'd bet it is one of those "we'll go along because we're nice" treaties that fly out the window as soon as a good excuse comes along. What would the UN do, not like us even more?
Eh, fhqwghads, the UN can kiss my derriere. The universe is more important than a bunch of bureaucrats grousing from offices in the worlds ugliest building.
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