ESA Satellite Navigation Competition

The European Space Agency (ESA) is giving prizes of million euros (about $1.3 million USD) in its European Satellite Navigation Competition to promote startups at its four incubators.

http://www.redorbit.com/news/space/1864274/european_competition_seeks_best_satnav_ideas/

ESA is ahead of NASA in promoting startups so the U.S. needs has some catching up to do.

Factiva to Publish Space Articles

The U.S. Department of Commerce, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has chosen Factiva Inc. to receive international space-based leading news articles and business sources. NOAA's goal is to educate the public about space commercialization.

https://www.fbo.gov/index?s=opportunity&mode=form&id=a686be931ce3252bbbf7a9093f449a24&tab=core&tabmode=list&=

DARPA Ideas for NASA Commercialization

DARPA's Autonomous Urban Challenge, a contest for remotely-controlled cars, has stimulated lots of innovative technologies and earth applications, such as open-pit mining vehicles described here by TORC Technologies. Future applications could be innovations for car, truck and bus systems.

http://engineeringtv.com/video/Commercializing-Autonomous-Vehi?page=2

NASA has a long history of tech transfers, but needs to ramp up its emphasis on sustainable earth applications like TORC, which will generate a lot more jobs than commercial space flight alone. European Space Agency experts estimate a 20x economic multiplier for each Euro of space spending, so the economic growth potential is enormous for NASA.

Senators Support Commercial Space

Several senators and my family friend, former Dept. of Transportation chief Norman Mineta, support commercial low-orbit space flight:

http://www.commercialspaceflight.org/?p=1218

For sustainable earth applications, the spaceports that would benefit from NASA and commercial spending on space flights will generate new jobs in support industries, including materials, IT, design, transport, and energy. The U.S. focuses on environmental impact statements (EIS), but needs to also consider impacts on aerospace and terrestrial job creation, which is probably the #1 concern of American citizens right now. How can the U.S. stimulate more new jobs from its NASA spending?

NASA Virtual World Lab

NASA researchers and engineers are collaborating in a new NASA CoLab in San Francisco using Second Life to create virtual worlds:

http://www.nasacolab.org/nasa-annual-budget-is-sacrificed-over-war_156

With cloud computing and mobile pads emerging fast, we will see educators, students, professionals and families creating and playing in virtual worlds, which would be excellent for communicating and collaborating in new ways. NASA CoLab reminds me of the first video games, which were slow and blocky, but rapidly progressed to photorealism that we know today.

In Sweden, JIBS.se is collaborating with UmbilicalDesign.se, a design adviser to NASA Houston and the European Space Agency, to commercialize space technologies for sustainable earth products and services. CoLab would be the ideal vehicle for engaging companies, schools, and cities who are collaborating with us.

Revising Export Controls

Unlike Canada, the U.S. has prevented space commercialization due to its fear of technology use for military purposes. The Toshiba incident, where critical propeller-grinding technology was leaked to the Soviets, heightened this fear during the 1980s.

http://acuriousguy.blogspot.com/2010/05/itar-foreign-policy-and-space-focused.html

Space commercialization will require legal reforms, perhaps even stricter rules, since the dual military/commercial use issues will not disappear, but will increase due to the spread of terrorism and nuclear know-how worldwide. China, Russia, Japan, Europe and the U.S. keep close reins on their space technologies for this reason so we are likely to see lively debate between business people and policymakers over the extent of space tech transfers to space and terrestrial applications. Balancing national security with sustainable commerce is probably the biggest issue facing the space industry.

Earth Spinoffs of Commercial Space Projects

Space commercialization primarily focuses on funding private companies to develop new and better launch vehicles for NASA, satellites and space tourism. Some experts forecast that this activity will lead to $700 million annually in sales.

If we use the ESA economic multipler estimate of 20x, this spending would generate up to $14 billion in economic growth. At $100,000 per new job, it could yield 140,000 exciting new jobs annually in additional sales in aerospace and terrestrial industries.

Obama's New Space Commercialization Program

Obama just announced his policies for promoting space technology commercialization. The $6 billion NASA budget will include $429 million next year and $1.9 billion over the next 5 years to modernize the Kennedy Space Center and space launch facilities in Florida. The goal is to stimulate new businesses, innovations and job creation.

http://blog.taragana.com/politics/2010/05/03/presidential-memoranda-task-force-on-space-industry-workforce-and-economic-development-32938/

European Space Agency (ESA) experts estimate a 15x to 20x economic multiplier for each Euro spent on space projects. Thus, Obama's policies could potentially generate up to $120 billion in new economic growth, or 1.2 million new jobs at $100,000 per job, if NASA optimizes its technology transfer programs.

Florida badly needs new jobs to counter its real estate collapse. Hopefully, the new NASA program will help boost the local economy and stimulate businesses elsewhere.

Electricity from Space Orbit

The U.S. National Security Space Office just released a report discussing the feasibility of beaming solar-generated electricity from space via lasers or microwaves to earth and recommending a test project.

While expensive and risky, the U.S. needs to test various solar generation technologies since we may make unexpected discoveries along the way that lead to totally new products and services. Besides electricity, would a solar satellite be useful for ultra broadband communications replacing current cellular networks? Until we experiment, it's hard to know. That's why space technologies are valuable; they open our minds to totally new ways to doing things.

http://www.solar-power-electrics.com/solar-power-electricity/electricity-from-orbit-the-case-for-r-d

China's Plans for Solar Power Satellites

Here's a useful summary of China's latest plans for solar power satellites. It appears that China wants to dominate solar power both on earth and in space.

http://blog.nss.org/?p=1805