How many 'excuses' for manned space flight has NASA offered?

On Nov 28, 7:42*am, bob haller wrote:
a constelation of low earth orbiting solar power plants could cover
the entire planet as they go round and round.

lets say solar plants replace coal and other fossil fuels for electric
power, and coal to gasoline plants are built..

just the announcement would drive down the price of oil

Won't that be massively wasteful. If they are geostationary or
even high orbit getting the power down would be much easier
to use far fewer power sats.

Don't get me wrong I'd love to replace the use of most oil on earth
and
most nuclear as well except in deep space and were processing
on earth is needed to get it into space. I'd love fusion as well but
that is always 30 years in the future. How far in the future is
a space solar power system? 50 years?

wrote in message
...

How far in the future is a space solar power system? 50 years?

So many people assume Space Solar Power would take many
decades like fusion. But I think most would be surprised just
how quickly it could happen.

President George W Bush canceled the SERT program in his
first budget in 2002. The SERT program was planning on building
several increasingly larger SSP satellites. Here's the schedule they
were planning on, and presented to Congress....

Laying the Foundation for Space Solar Power (SERT)
http://www.nap.edu/openbook.php?record_id=10202&page=1


TABLE 2-1 NASA's SERT Program

NASA Model System Category

MSC 1

~100 kW
Free flyer
LEO-to-Earth power beaming research platform
Solar power plug in space
Cryogenic propellant depot
"Mega-commsat" demonstrator
(2006-2007)

MSC 1.5

~1 MW
GEO-to-Earth solar power satellite
(SPS) demonstrator
Lunar exploration SPS platform
(2011-2012)

MSC 3

~10 MW
Free flyer
GEO-based SPS demonstration platforms for
wireless power transmission, solar power
generation, power management and distribution,
and solar electric propulsion
(2016-2017)

MSC 4

~1 GW
Commercial space full-scale solar power satellite
(2021+)


Model System Category
http://www.nap.edu/openbook.php?record_id=10202&page=13


Now that's with the government and a dozen committees doing
all of it. This start-up private corporation below claims 6 years
to build a full scale gigawatt class satellite for around $17 billion
dollars.

That's the same /price/ and /time/ it would take to build
a new nuclear power plant of similar output. SSP is
already practical. It's no pipe-dream, but a matter
of someone floating a power-plant sized loan for the
...first one.

Space Energy Inc
http://www.spaceenergy.com/s/Default.htm

And I'd suggest taking the time to look over the
technical consultants of this start-up corp making
those claims. The best and brightest in this
technology.

Space Energy Inc Technical Consultants
http://www.spaceenergy.com/s/TechnicalAdvisors.htm

Somehow I doubt a Texas /Oilman/ like George Bush
canceled the Space /Solar/ Power program out of
cost and benefit analysis concerns. Lockheed wanted
the Moon, and Bush/Cheney/Lockheed have been
in bed together for years like few others. Lockheed
even gave Lynn Cheney a seat on the board.
And Bush tried to turn the Texas welfare system
over to Lockheed.

When Bush/Cheney came into town, Big Aero
got to write their own ticket just like Big Oil wrote
energy policy.


Jonathan


s

"bob haller" wrote in message
...
a constelation of low earth orbiting solar power plants could cover
the entire planet as they go round and round.

lets say solar plants replace coal and other fossil fuels for electric
power, and coal to gasoline plants are built..

just the announcement would drive down the price of oil


That's probably the best reason of all. Why did the price of
oil quadruple in just months during Iraq? That's the classic
sign of a 'thin' market. Which is a market that doesn't know
how it's going to replace a disruption in supply. The market
knows it'll take many years.

A credible SSP program by the US would go a long way
towards calming the markets by demonstrating a new
clean and endlessly abundant source is waiting in the wings.

I can't emphasize this point enough, everyone saw what
happened to the stock market with the Big Crash three
years ago, and the havoc it's causing. You should know
the oil market can panic in just the same way.

And it would be the Industrial Age that collapses and comes
to a sudden halt. That's when the wars over oil will truly
begin.

For instance in Japan now. An existing SSP satellite could
deliver gigawatt flows to the disaster area in weeks or
months. All it takes in laying down nothing more than a
large chicken wire fence as a receiving rectenna and
hooking it up to a grid. While new conventional power plants
take five and ten years to build.

There's no existing power source, conventional or green, that
can provide continuous baseload power into a grid to ANY
place on Earth and in weeks. SSP is ...wireless...green...power
transmission, two of the Holy Grails of energy. The third
is an bottomless supply of green...energy. Which SSP also
promises.

The fact SSP can travel so well means it doesn't have to
compete with conventional sources, it'll have plenty
of market niches all too itself.

Jonathan


s

In sci.physics | wrote:
On Nov 28, 7:42Â*am, bob haller wrote:
a constelation of low earth orbiting solar power plants could cover
the entire planet as they go round and round.

lets say solar plants replace coal and other fossil fuels for electric
power, and coal to gasoline plants are built..

just the announcement would drive down the price of oil

Won't that be massively wasteful. If they are geostationary or
even high orbit getting the power down would be much easier
to use far fewer power sats.

It doesn't matter much as:

Absent the invention of Star Trek technology the cost will far exceed the
cost of ground based power.

Statutory limitations on RF field intensity will limit what you can beam
down and lawsuits from the tinfoil hat crowd will effectively reduce that
limit to 0.0 mW/m^2.



--
Jim Pennino

Remove .spam.sux to reply.

On 24/11/2011 12:23, Jonathan wrote:


When will NASA propose a goal that sticks?


When they are given a long term budget?

"CWatters" wrote in message
o.uk...
On 24/11/2011 12:23, Jonathan wrote:


When will NASA propose a goal that sticks?



When they are given a long term budget?


Which comes first?
Weak goals get similar budgets.

On Dec 1, 7:45*pm, "Jonathan" wrote:
"CWatters" wrote in message
o.uk...
On 24/11/2011 12:23, Jonathan wrote:

When will NASA propose a goal that sticks?

When they are given a long term budget?

Which comes first?
Weak goals get similar budgets.

It isn't NASA's business to set goals. The politicians give NASA the
goals *as well as* the budget.

So if no one has said that the United States is "committed, before
this decade is out, to send a" person to Mars, and return him or her
"safely to Earth", it isn't a NASA administrator who didn't say it.

As it happened, G. W. Bush sort of hinted at sending a man to Mars,
and Obama hasn't really gone right out and contradicted this, even if
he intends to use a different booster. But nobody really cares enough
about this to vote for an Apollo-style budget. (As if that would be
enough.)

NASA has its failings, such as not using limited resources more
effectively by concentrating more on robotic missions and less on the
ISS boondoggle. But the absence of a clear goal for manned exploration
is a failing at the level of those who actually decide about spending
the money.

John Savard

"Quadibloc" wrote in message
...

It isn't NASA's business to set goals. The politicians give NASA the
goals *as well as* the budget.

That's the way it's been. But the duty of any government agency
is to provide the expertize and advice for setting the best
goal possible. The politicians and Big Aero have co-opted
that responsibility for too long. And NASA has been complacent
in merely doing what they're told.

NASA needs to grow a backbone and insist on a goal that
makes sense. Is tracking asteroids really the stuff of a
signature goal?


So if no one has said that the United States is "committed, before
this decade is out, to send a" person to Mars, and return him or her
"safely to Earth", it isn't a NASA administrator who didn't say it.

As it happened, G. W. Bush sort of hinted at sending a man to Mars,
and Obama hasn't really gone right out and contradicted this, even if
he intends to use a different booster. But nobody really cares enough
about this to vote for an Apollo-style budget. (As if that would be
enough.)

If a goal is so long-term that future administrations have to fund it, then
it's not likely to happen. A politician isn't going to stick his neck out
for someone else's program unless it's a crucial matter.


NASA has its failings, such as not using limited resources more
effectively by concentrating more on robotic missions and less on the
ISS boondoggle. But the absence of a clear goal for manned exploration
is a failing at the level of those who actually decide about spending
the money.


The problem has been in trying to contrive some goal to justify
a manned program. NASA should be about paving the way, not
the end it itself. And soon enough commercial launchers will
be man rated.

What could NASA be paving the way for that has the greatest
potential to benefit the future?


How about this program....

NASA'S SPACE SOLAR POWER
(SERT) PROGRAM
http://www.nap.edu/openbook.php?record_id=10202&page=1


Paving the way for more start-ups like this...?
Makes sense to me.

Space Energy Inc
http://spaceenergy.com/


Jonathan


John Savard


s