Griffin Tells Astronomers To Lower Expectations

Griffin Tells Astronomers To Lower Expectations
By Frank Morring, Jr.
01/14/2006

Astronomers in the U.S. can still look forward to a human servicing mission to the Hubble Space Telescope next year, and perhaps to big observatories on the far side of the Moon some day.

But for the most part, the funding outlook at NASA for space science is tight as the agency shifts its focus to sending humans back to the Moon, meaning near-term priorities like searching for Earth-like planets around other stars will slip, and it will take longer to begin answering new questions like "What is dark energy?"

"NASA simply cannot accomplish everything that was on our plate when I took office last April," Administrator Michael Griffin told the American Astronomical Society (AAS). "In space-based astronomy, as in other areas, we will have to make tough trade-offs between maintaining current missions--of which there are 14 ongoing--and developing new capabilities."

Griffin drew applause when he reminded his audience that he reversed a decision by his predecessor not to send another space shuttle mission to service the Hubble telescope, which continues to produce important new discoveries.

But he cautioned that the final Hubble servicing mission, tentatively scheduled before the end of next year, will be launched only "if at all possible." And he said bluntly that there is no way from an engineering standpoint to mount a robotic servicing mission, as former Administrator Sean O'Keefe opted to do, that could do more than deorbit the telescope safely before it is expected to become uncontrollable.

The fate of the Hubble--and a lot of NASA's other programs--will depend on White House funding decisions due for public release with the Fiscal 2007 budget next month. Griffin conceded, "I do not know in all its details what it will contain," which suggests a debate is still underway within the Bush Administration on how to cover a shortfall of at least $3 billion in the shuttle program (AW&ST Nov. 7, 2005, p. 40).

"By any measure, one would have to say that the growth of science in NASA has been in the 5-7% range, annualized, over the last decade or so, and that's all been great," Griffin said. "We're in a budget environment now where that level of growth can't be maintained, although science at NASA will still have growth."

SOME OF THAT GROWTH will be absorbed by the James Webb Space Telescope, the top space mission in the U.S. National Academies' decadal list of astronomy priorities. Terming the $1.5-billion shortfall in available funding for the mission "under-costing" rather than an overrun, Griffin said his agency has a better handle on the cost of the deep-space infrared observatory. Launch of the Webb telescope has been slipped from 2011 to 2013 to cover the extra cost without hampering its ability to peer back to the earliest galaxies in the Universe, and penetrate closer dust clouds to watch star formation within.

Under questioning from AAS President-elect J. Craig Wheeler of the University of Texas, who collected queries from members, Griffin said the problems with the Webb observatory will force a delay in starting the Space Interferometry Mission (SIM) and its successor, the Terrestrial Planet Finder, both National Academies priorities designed to find Earth-like extrasolar planets.

Griffin noted that President Bush's human-exploration directive has raised concerns in all of the communities of scientists who use NASA systems in their work, and vowed to do what he could to keep the disruption to a minimum.

"Our cost estimates for returning astronauts to the Moon are conservatively structured to achieve our goals within budget," he said. "Also, while we certainly are not claiming cost savings that have not been proven, we very much intend to find ways to reduce the cost of the exploration program through improved technology, commercial involvement and international partnerships."

And in the long term, he said under Wheeler's questioning, astronomers may some day find the Moon a better place to conduct their business than Earth orbit or the L-2 Sun-Earth Lagrangian point where the Webb observatory is bound. The Moon's far side offers a much quieter environment for radio telescopes, and many types of sensors could be laid out in arrays on the Moon for higher-resolution imaging than is possible on Earth.

"I would argue strongly with those who assert that human spaceflight is inimical to science," he said. "Our scientific initiatives go hand in hand with our extended reach into the Solar System. It is not our desire to sacrifice present-day scientific efforts for the sake of future benefits to be derived from exploration.

"A stable platform like the Moon offers advantages in the engineering aspects of astronomy that are hard to obtain in space."

His views on using the Moon as an observatory notwithstanding, Griffin ducked a question from Wheeler on whether it would be worthwhile for U.S. astronomers, working through the National Academies, to reconsider their priorities in light of the new possibilities raised by the exploration initiative, or by recent discoveries.

"I think the astronomy community has to decide for itself whether the priorities have changed enough to warrant doing a decadal survey in an off year," Griffin said.

One thing pushing astronomers to change their priorities is the discovery of a mysterious force driving the expansion of the Universe at a rate that appears greater than can be explained by what is visible to telescopes like the Hubble and the most advanced ground-based instruments. The force, dubbed dark energy, was confirmed after the astronomy priorities for this decade were set. A National Academies panel created for the job stopped short of recommending that new priorities be drafted.

INSTEAD, THE PANEL called for "balanced" planning of future astronomy missions, with a greater role for the U.S. Energy Dept. and greater use of Explorer-class space missions. And it cautioned that slips in programs growing out of the exploration initiative could "adversely affect NASA's ability to generate the kind of transformative science that is the hallmark of the past decades."

NASA is already working with the Energy Dept. to draw up a Joint Dark Energy Mission, for which concepts are due in March. Among them is the SuperNova/Acceleration Probe (Snap), a two-meter space telescope (see artist's concept) that would continue detailed measurements of the Type Ia supernovae that provided evidence the Universe is expanding more rapidly than thought.

But with the science budget already squeezed, and the possibility of more budget cuts in the offing, it is unlikely that new starts like Snap will be funded, regardless of the science they produce. Indeed, senior astronomers like Wheeler, are worried they won't be able to fund graduate students today who will be called on in the future to make sense of dark energy and other new questions.

"We're all holding our breath, waiting to see what the budget's going to be," Wheeler said. "The budget for NASA is probably not going up. The budget for the science division is almost certainly not going up. The question is whether it will go down."

Heinlein's The Moon is a Hars Mistress is science fiction.
So? The science is real:

§ 3.4.3 Lunar Launch by Mass Driver "Slingshot"
The "mass driver" is a "catapult" tube which launches materials from the lunar surface to a Catcher/Collector, perhaps near a factory in orbit near the Moon. The mass driver is like a gun without the explosive gunpowder. It is powered by electricity, producing magnetic fields to accelerate cargoes through an accelerator tube. No fuel propellant is required for lunar launch, and there's no big vehicle to launch. The mass driver shoots a large number of small payloads, continuously, rather than an occasional large payload.

Mass driver on the Moon. Source: SSI (www.ssi.org)
The mass driver will eventually become the main means of supplying material from the Moon to industry in orbital space, though not in the early years of space development. It can help preserve the lunar environment by reducing the creation of a tenuous atmosphere from rocket fuel propellants, and it saves on the consumption and costs of producing fuel propellant. It can be argued that the mass driver can ship materials in much larger volumes than is feasible by chemical rocketry, and at lower costs per unit mass.
The "mass driver" has been a popular lunar launch concept, largely due to promotion, research and development by the Space Studies Institute (SSI). A laboratory prototype of the accelerator section has been built and tested successfully by SSI.
Powered only by electricity, it is a solar powered launcher using the principle of electromagnetism to magenically accelerate a payload equipped with a magnetic bucket to excape velocity.
It has been argued that the mass driver is a relatively inexpensive and automated device to create a stream of material at the rate of up to a few small packages per second, depending upon design. Total amount of material deliverable each month could dwarf any feasible lunar or Earth launch capacity by rocketry, in terms of tonnage of payload launched.
As it is covered most prevalently in the literature to date, minerals mined and processed are packaged in a thin glass/fiberglass bag easily manufactured using lunar materials. The bag is made to conform to the shape of the bucket so that the bucket assumes the stresses during acceleration, whereas the package contains the minerals after acceleration and snapout from the bucket.
By the time the payloads climb up out of the Moon's gravity well, they have lost most of their velocity and are travelling slowly. At this point, the orbital-based catcher collects them. The payload material's momentum carries it through the funnel-shaped catcher into a collector bag. After the bag fills up, it is detached from the funnel and is replaced by an empty bag.
The mass driver accelerator tube would be less than 200 meters (600 feet) long and probably about half a meter wide, though downrange trajectory correction equipment will probably be worth the cost. The mass driver would fit into only one Shuttle cargo bay, disassembled, not including power plant, material handling apparatus, and fuel for delivery. The electric power plant size determines the launch RATE, not ability -- a small rate initially, increasing permanently with more power modules and support apparatus.
Unfortunately, the mass driver is feasible to operate only on the Moon, because it needs vacuum. A mass driver operating on Earth would cause meteoric friction heat to such hypervelocity payloads and great physical stresses, at the dense bottom of Earth's atmosphere (ocean of air) as they left the catapult tunnel. Secondly, the air would aerodynamically deflect such objects in unpredictable ways which would disperse their trajectories. Thirdly, an operable mass driver on Earth would require a long vacuum tunnel (much longer than on the Moon, since the escape velocity is higher). Fourth, the air would create hypersonic sonic boom shockwaves that would be loud for a long distance. Fifth, individual payloads would have to be massive enough to punch through the atmosphere in an acceptable way. Such massive payloads demand alot of the catapulter as well as the orbital based catcher/collector.
In contrast, the Moon has no air and low gravity.
The orbital-based Catcher/Collector would be located in lunar-stationary orbit (the "L-2" or "L1" point), where it would collect the stream of numerous small payloads after they slowed down in climbing up in the Moon's gravity well. Various catcher/collector designs exist.
Pollution of space should be avoided, so the containment of material is important. If a package misses the catcher, it should return to crash on the Moon, not orbit Earth. This must be built into the trajectory design.
A number of bottom-line facts about the mass driver for space transportation :

It is a relatively simple and automatic device to operate.

There is little significant mechanical contact between parts (e.g., no fiery fuels, no hi-speed fuel pumps, no rubbing components, no lubricants, etc.)

The mass driver operates at humanly temperatures.

Maximum forces are measured in hundreds of pounds, not thousands of tons. (Rockets lift ONE payload of several tons plus fuel and vehicle, for a few minutes each month, whereas the mass driver lifts only a kilogram or so at a time but for the whole month.)

The mass driver can potentially catapult thousands of tons per month. That would take numerous rockets of revolutionary size launched per month.

The catapulter-to-payload ratio is about 1 : 10,000 over its lifetime. Each rocket has about a 1 : 1/2 vehicle-to-payload ratio at best, plus a 1 : 1/50th fuel-to-payload ratio.

The mass driver requires no fuel propellants, and is "fully reusable".

The mass driver is made of a small variety of parts, all simple and repeated in a modular way which expedites simple replacement and maintenance using a small stock of spares in case of a small failure. It is a lightweight device, which makes stockpiles of spare parts are relatively inexpensive; all of which are attractive features of a device operating in a remote place like the Moon.

The mass driver, as you can see, is an entirely different kind of launching device.
With the advent of space-based industry and the demand for products and materials, the small step of basing a mass driver on the Moon will be a giant leap for the eventual low cost transportation of material to space, and will make the Moon more competitive as a source of materials compared to asteroids.
However, it is my opinion that the mass driver will not be used until large scale space infrastructure has been established. It is my opinion that a successful, privately funded investment into lunar materials would need a strong case for the reliability of the mass driver before it would use or invest in development of a mass driver over chemical rocketry. If the mass driver in its popular implementation -- pull-only with no magnetic levitation guide strips -- were put on the Moon and something went wrong with the launch so that the bucket coil scraped along the wall of the tunnel at anything near its terminal velocity (2.4 km/sec), the mass driver could sustain major damage, delaying delivery of material for a significant time unless there were good repair infrastructure already emplaced. This is a risk issue for private investors. Before the mass driver is developed further, a good, peer reviewed case must be made for its reliability. Notably, a safer, more robust design may be more attractive, e.g., using magnetic levitation guide strips, even it it's significantly less efficient and more expensive.
In comparison, chemical rocketry has its risks in terms of rocket engine failure. Regarding the latter, rockets for launching off the Moon are significantly safer than rockets launching off of Earth because the Moon's gravity is much less. The lower gravity has a compounding effect: rockets on Earth have far more fuel than payload (e.g., 50 times more fuel weight than payload) -- fuel for later in the flight -- which means the Earth rocket must launch a much heavier mass than its payload. The rocket engines on the Moon need not be the very high performance ones as on Earth, and the stresses are much less.
Work to date has emphasized the mass driver acceleration coils, in order to reduce the size of the acceleration section to, say, 160 meters. No laboratory work has been performed yet on any other element, e.g., assuring the precision required to hit the Mass Catcher in orbit, though many paper studies have been performed. Notably, many designs call for the buckets to be recycled, which would reduce the cost of manufacturing bucket coils for every payload or returning bucket coils from orbit to the Moon, e.g., by chemical rocketry. If this approach was adopted, the bucket coils would need to be recycled, which gets into the very risky business of diverting high speed objects into a deceleration tunnel in a precise way, and decelerating them properly. One alternative is to launch large payloads so that manufacturing or returning bucket coils becomes economically feasible, which goes counter to many designs of mass driver to launch small payloads and keep the launch tube short and lightweight.
I've not seen a good analysis of potential failure modes or remedial actions.
In the long term, a mass driver is preferable in order to preserve the Moon's environment. The Moon has sufficient gravity to retain an atmosphere, and chemical rocketry launches could create a significant atmosphere which would take many years to dissipate if we were to later cut back dramatically on rocket operations on the Moon.
Explanations of the mass driver as developed by SSI are on the following pages. However it's worth noting that I have worked on electromagnetic launchers for the Pentagon in the Star Wars/SDI program (largely reviewing and assessing the different concepts for SDIO decisionmakers), and there are a few interesting alternatives to the prevalent "coaxial" mass driver developed by SSI.
How the mass driver works
The mass driver works by the magnetic attraction between electromagnets. One electromagnet is the bucket coil, and the other electromagnets are the drive coils.
What is an electromagnet ? Electric current in a coil of wire always produces a magnetic field, called an electromagnet, which behaves basically just like a bar magnet, except for the fact that an electromagnet can be made to be stronger than a bar magnet by increasing the electric current through the coil.
By proper orientation of the poles, a bar magnet and an electromagnet can be made to attract or repel each other. Similarly, two electromagnets can be made to attract or repel each other and hence accelerate towards or away from each other. Which side of an electromagnet is the north pole depends on whether the electric current is clockwise or counterclockwise through the coil of wire.
The mass driver works by two electromagnets being attracted to each other and hence causing acceleration. One coil is smaller than the other, and passes through the center of the larger coil. The larger coil is the "drive coil", anchored down to be stationary, and the smaller coil is the accelerated "bucket coil".
The mass driver is a tunnel of numerous drive coils accelerating a bucket coil. The bucket coil pulls a bucket of material with it.
The drive coils are not always turned on. Each drive coil must turn off its electric current when the bucket passes through its center in order not to slow the bucket coil back down on the other side by the same attractive force. Secondly, each drive coil turns on only when the bucket coil is close enough to feel the pull significantly (in order to save power), and turns off when the bucket coil reaches about the center of the drive coil. Thus, each drive coil gets only a pulse of current, when the bucket coil is closely in front of it, and must be off when the bucket coil is behind it.
The bucket coil always has current.
What the bucket coil "sees" as it travels down the tunnel of drive coils is a series of dead drive coils each of which suddenly turns on quickly when the bucket is very close, and then turns back off by the time the bucket coil passes through the exact center of the drive coil. This happens for each drive coil in sequence as the bucket flies down the tunnel of drive coils, picking up more and more speed.
This version of "coaxial" mass driver is called a "pull-only" mass driver, because the bucket is pulled by magnetic attraction but is not pushed by magnetic repulsion. Other versions exist, such as pull-push, which we won't consider here. With the pull-only mass driver, no mechanical guidance means is needed to keep the bucket from crashing into a drive coil because the pull-only magnetic field of the drive coils strongly forces the bucket to levitate along the center of the drive coil tunnel. The drive coils are side by side; in fact, and the next can turn on before the previous one turns off.
The technical details of the mass driver won't be discussed in this nontechnical brief (e.g., drive coil kilohertz halfwave power pulsation, capacitors, bucket current induction, etc.). Suffice it to note that a prototype mass driver accelerator tube was built and tested successfully by the Space Studies Institute of Princeton, N.J., with lunar duty as its objective, and produced an acceleration 1,800 times Earth's gravitational aceleration. A lunar-based mass driver accelerator can be built using present-day off-the-shelf technology, but other parts of the mass driver need to be developed.
Next, an overall view of the mass driver on the Moon will be given.
Operating the mass driver on the Moon
After lunar soil is excavated, transported, refined using simple conventional means, packaged, weighed, and made to be of precise weight (e.g., added molten glass weights). The packages are loaded into buckets with bucket coils. The buckets are emplaced in a special device in front of the first drive coil, and current is induced in the bucket coil.
The drive coils are fired in sequence, with the aid of "electronic eye" sensors to trigger the drive coils and monitor the location of the bucket for adjustment in timing if necessary. The drive coils induce further current in the bucket coil.
After the bucket leaves the accelerator section, it is travelling at lunar escape velocity. Even though the mass driver is horizontal, the bucket and payload would not fall to the ground because of its high speed and the Moon's curvature and low gravity.
Immediately after the acceleration tunnel is a payload snapout and bucket diversion section, where the bucket is magnetically decelerated to separate it from the payload (which isn't decelerated and hence leaves the bucket behind) and to make the decelerated bucket fall downwards in the lunar gravity to a lower tunnel track to get out of the way of payloads coming behind it. Magnetic levitation guide strips will be required here.
The bucket is then decelerated magnetically on the lower track and returned on a parallel track to be reloaded with another payload.
The mass driver's deceleration section converts the bucket's momentum back into electrical energy as it slows it down, by "regenerative braking", using the same fundamental principle as electric generators. In fact, the decelerator is a generator while the accelerator is a motor (a linear motor instead of a rotational motor). By getting electrical energy back out of the bucket's momentum, the overall efficiency of the mass driver remains between 70% and 90%, depending on the details of the design.
In the deceleration section, the bucket requires magnetic guide means to prevent it from striking a drive coil. The well known principle of magnetic flight (i.e., passive magnetic levitational guide strips) would prevent any mechanical rubbing.
Very important is the need for payloads leaving the mass driver to have precisely the same velocity so that they all go to the same place in orbit and so that the catcher/collector can be of reasonable size. Very small variations in speed or significant lateral velocity can make payloads miss the catcher/collector. Thus, it is desirable to have a way of correcting trajectories after payload snapout from the bucket.
Downrange trajectory correction stations are possible for a horizontal mass driver. Several methods have been proposed for both trajectory determination and correction. Trajectory determination can be done by radar or laser ranging. Trajectory correction may be achieved by electrostatic means, or puffs of air, or by striking the side, front, and/or back of the payload with a low power laser or particle beam to boil off a thin layer of the payload's outer skin to create an action-reaction impulse sufficient to prevent the payload from missing the catcher/collector in orbit.
It's important for the mass driver to maintain consistency so that payloads all go to the same point. It may not be necessary to predict that precise point in advance and then try to adjust the mass driver, but it is important that the mass driver be consistent wherever it may be firing payloads. Once the mass driver starts shooting payloads, it may be necessary to move the catcher to adjust for design imperfections in the mass driver. In other words, instead of putting the catcher at the ideal point and then working to make the mass driver shoot that point, we would just shoot the mass driver and then move the catcher to where the stream of payloads is going. Further, as the sun slowly moved relative to the Earth and Moon, the stream of payloads would also slowly shift, requiring the Mass Catcher to follow the stream. Thus, what is most important is that the mass driver be consistent in producing a narrow stream.
The catcher could be located at the so-called "L-2 point" or "L-1 point in orbit, as discussed in the section on Lagrangian libration points. In short, the L-1 and L-2 points in orbit are stationary relative to the Moon's surface so that the mass driver is always shooting at the same point. The L-2 point acts kind of like the top of a gravitational hill that isn't very steep, so that one doesn't have to be stationed at the absolute balance point on top to be sufficiently stable for economical stationkeeping.
The propellant needed for station-keeping and maneuvering would not be very large. The payloads would arrive at about 70 meters per second, so they push the catcher around a bit. For example, it has been proposed that a stationkeeping device shooting slag pellets out at a velocity 30 times the incoming payload velocity (i.e., 2100 meters per second) would theoretically be able to compensate entirely for this momentum transfer at a 1 to 30 ratio of propellant to payload. As for polluting space with propellant pellets, the ejection speed of 2000 meters per second easily escapes the Earth-Moon system, and does not add significantly to the quantity of rocks naturally populating space. Of course, slag pellet shooters aren't our only option, and gaseous propellants are much more efficient since they have much higher exhaust velocities.
It has also been proposed that the catcher be stationed in a lunar-synchronous position whereby it would fall down towards the Moon except for the throughst produced by the incoming packages impacting it.
For technical information on the mass driver in particular, one may wish to contact the builders of the laboratory prototype lunar mass driver, The Space Studies Inst., P.O. Box 82, Princeton, N.J., 08540, (609) 921-0377, ssi@ssi.org and http://www.ssi.org
(The founder of PERMANENT, Mark Prado, did research on electromagnetic launchers as part of the "Star Wars"/SDI program, and also on mass driver power conditioning systems. As a humorous aside, in my office I had a miniature mass driver quickly made from cheap parts, charged by a regular batttery, and sized to shoot caps from coke bottles. When friendly associates would enter my office, I'd shoot a bottle cap at them.)

Ex-astronaut, Harrison Schmitt echoes your views, at:

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Monday, January 16, 2006

Testimony of Hon. Harrison H. Schmitt: Senate Hearing on "Lunar Exploration" STATUS REPORT
Date Released: Thursday, November 6, 2003
Source: Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation

RETURN TO THE MOON

A return to the Moon to stay would be at least comparable to the first permanent settlement of America if not to the movement of our species out of Africa.

I am skeptical that the U.S. Government can be counted on to make such a "sustained commitment" absent unanticipated circumstances comparable to those of the late 1950s and early 1960s. Therefore, I have spent much of the last decade exploring what it would take for private investors to make such a commitment. At least it is clear that investors will stick with a project if presented to them with a credible business plan and a rate of return commensurate with the risk to invested capital. My colleagues at the Fusion Technology Institute of the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the Interlune-Intermars Initiative, Inc. believe that such a commercially viable project exists in lunar helium-3 used as a fuel for fusion electric power plants on Earth. Lunar helium-3, arriving at the Moon as part of the solar wind, is imbedded as a trace, non-radioactive isotope in the lunar soils. There is a resource base of helium-3 about of 10,000 metric tonnes just in upper three meters of the titanium-rich soils of Mare Tranquillitatis. The energy equivalent value of Helium-3 delivered to operating fusion power plants on Earth would be about $4 billion per tonne relative to today's coal. Coal, of course, supplies about half of the approximately $40 billion domestic electrical power market.

A business and investor based approach to a return to the Moon to stay represents a clear alternative to initiatives by the U.S. Government or by a coalition of other countries. A business-investor approach, supported by the potential of lunar Helium-3 fusion power, and derivative technologies and resources, offers the greatest likelihood of a predictable and sustained commitment to a return to deep space.

TESTIMONY

HON. HARRISON H. SCHMITT,CHAIRMAN
INTERLUNE-INTERMARS INITIATIVE, INC.
P.O. Box 90730
Albuquerque, NM 87199
505 823 2616
hhschmitt@earthlink.net

RETURN TO THE MOON

ORAL SUMMARY

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for the invitation to participate in this hearing. It is good to be back in these familiar surroundings.

A return to the Moon to stay, when it occurs, will be a truly historic event. It would be at least comparable to the first permanent settlement of America if not to the movement of our species out of Africa.

The Apollo 17 mission on which I was privileged to fly in December 1972 was the most recent visit by human beings to the Moon, indeed to deep space. A return by Americans to the Moon at least 40 years after the end of the Apollo 17 mission probably would represent a commitment to return to stay. Otherwise, it is hard to imagine how a sustained commitment to return would develop in this country.

I must admit to being skeptical that the U.S. Government can be counted on to make such a "sustained commitment" absent unanticipated circumstances comparable to those of the late 1950s and early 1960s. Therefore, I have spent much of the last decade exploring what it would take for private investors to make such a commitment. At least it is clear that investors will stick with a project if presented to them with a credible business plan and a rate of return commensurate with the risk to invested capital. My colleagues at the Fusion Technology Institute of the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the Interlune-Intermars Initiative, Inc. believe that such a commercially viable project exists in lunar helium-3 used as a fuel for fusion electric power plants on Earth. Global demand and need for energy will likely increase by at least a factor of eight by the mid-point of the 21st Century. This rapid rise will be due to a combination of population increase, new energy intensive technologies, aspirations for improved standards of living and lower birth rates in the less-developed world, and the need to mitigate the adverse consequences of climate warming or cooling.

Helium has two stable isotopes, helium 4, familiar to all who have received helium-filled balloons, and the even lighter helium 3. Lunar helium-3, arriving at the Moon as part of the solar wind, is imbedded as a trace, non-radioactive isotope in the lunar soils. It represents one potential energy source to meet this century's rapidly escalating demand. There is a resource base of helium-3 about of 10,000 metric tonnes just in upper three meters of the titanium-rich soils of Mare Tranquillitatis. This was the landing region for Neil Armstrong and Apollo 11 in 1969. The energy equivalent value of Helium-3 delivered to operating fusion power plants on Earth would be about $4 billion per tonne relative to today's coal. Coal, of course, supplies about half of the approximately $40 billion domestic electrical power market. These numbers illustrate the magnitude of the business opportunity for helium-3 fusion power to compete for the creation of new electrical capacity and the replacement of old during the 21st Century.

Past technical activities on Earth and in deep space provide a strong base for initiating this enterprise. Also, over the last decade, there has been historic progress in the development of inertial electrostatic confinement (IEC) fusion at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Progress there includes the production of over a milliwatt of steady-state power from the fusion of helium-3 and deuterium. Steady progress in IEC research as well as basic physics argues strongly that the IEC approach to fusion power has significantly more commercial viability than other technologies pursued by the fusion community. It will have inherently lower capital costs, higher energy conversion efficiency, a range of power from a few hundred megawatts upward, and little or no associated radioactivity or radioactive waste. It should be noted, however, that IEC research has received no significant support as an alternative to Tokamak-based fusion from the Department of Energy in spite of that Department's large fusion technology budgets. The Office of Science and Technology Policy under several Administrations also has ignored this approach.

The creation of capabilities to support helium-3 mining operations also will provide the opportunity to support NASA's human lunar and planetary research at much reduced cost, as the cost of capital for launch and basic operations will be carried by the business enterprise. Technology and facilities required for success of a lunar commercial enterprise, particularly heavy lift launch and fusion technologies, also will enable the conduct, and reduce the cost of many space activities in addition to science. These include exploration and settlement of Mars, asteroid interception and diversion, and various national security initiatives.

If Government were to lead a return to deep space, the NASA of today is probably not the agency to undertake a significant new program to return humans to deep space, particularly the Moon and then to Mars. NASA today lacks the critical mass of youthful energy and imagination required for work in deep space. It also has become too bureaucratic and too risk-adverse. Either a new agency would need to be created to implement such a program or NASA would need to be totally restructured using the lessons of what has worked and has not worked since it was created 45 years ago. Of particular importance would be the need for most of the agency to be made up of engineers and technicians in their 20s and managers in their 30s, the re-institution of design engineering activities in parallel with those of contractors, and the streamlining of management responsibility. The existing NASA also would need to undergo a major restructuring and streamlining of its program management, risk management, and financial management structures. Such total restructuring would be necessary to re-create the competence and discipline necessary to operate successfully in the much higher risk and more complex deep space environment relative to that in near-earth orbit.

Most important for a new NASA or a new agency would be the guarantee of a sustained political (financial) commitment to see the job through and to not turn back once a deep space operational capability exists once again or accidents happen. At this point in history, we cannot count on the Government for such a sustained commitment. This includes not under-funding the effort - a huge problem still plaguing the Space Shuttle, the International Space Station, and other current and past programs. That is why I have been looking to a more predictable commitment from investors who have been given a credible business plan and a return on investment commensurable with the risk. Attaining a level of sustaining operations for a core business in fusion power and lunar resources requires about 10-15 years and $10-15 billion of private investment capital as well as the successful interim marketing and profitable sales related to a variety of applied fusion technologies. The time required from start-up to the delivery of the first 100 kg years supply to the first operating 1000 megawatt fusion power plant on Earth will be a function of the rate at which capital is available, but probably no less than 10 years. This schedule also depends to some degree on the U.S. Government being actively supportive in matters involving taxes, regulations, and international law but no more so than is expected for other commercial endeavors. If the U.S. Government also provided an internal environment for research and development of important technologies, investors would be encouraged as well. As you are aware, the precursor to NASA, the National Advisory Committee on Aeronautics (NACA), provided similar assistance and antitrust protection to aeronautics industry research during most of the 20th Century.

A business and investor based approach to a return to the Moon to stay represents a clear alternative to initiatives by the U.S. Government or by a coalition of other countries. Although not yet certain of success, a business-investor approach, supported by the potential of lunar Helium-3 fusion power, and derivative technologies and resources, offers the greatest likelihood of a predictable and sustained commitment to a return to deep space.

FULL TEXT

I must admit to being skeptical that the U.S. Government can be counted on to make such a "sustained commitment" absent unanticipated circumstances comparable to those of the late 1950s and early 1960s. Therefore, I have spent much of the last decade exploring what it would take for private investors to make such a commitment. At least it is clear that investors will stick with a project if presented to them with a credible business plan and a rate of return commensurate with the risk to invested capital. My colleagues at the Fusion Technology Institute of the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the Interlune-Intermars Initiative, Inc. believe that such a commercially viable project exists in lunar helium-3 used as a fuel for fusion electric power plants on Earth. Global demand and need for energy will likely increase by at least a factor of eight by the mid-point of the 21st Century. This factor represents the total of a factor of two to stay even with population growth and a factor of four or more to meet the aspirations of people who wish to significantly improve their standards of living. There is another unknown factor that will be necessary to mitigate the adverse effects of climate change, whether warming or cooling, and the demands of new, energy intensive technologies.

Helium has two stable isotopes, helium 4, familiar to all who have received helium-filled baloons, and the even lighter helium 3. Lunar helium-3, arriving at the Moon as part of the solar wind, is imbedded as a trace, non-radioactive isotope in the lunar soils. It represents one potential energy source to meet this century's rapidly escalating demand. There is a resource base of helium-3 of about 10,000 metric tonnes just in upper three meters of the titanium-rich soils of Mare Tranquillitatis. This was the landing region for Neil Armstrong and Apollo 11 in 1969. The energy equivalent value of Helium-3 delivered to operating fusion power plants on Earth would be about $4 billion per tonne relative to today's coal. Coal, of course, supplies about half of the approximately $40 billion domestic electrical power market. These numbers illustrate the magnitude of the business opportunity for helium-3 fusion power to compete for the creation of new electrical capacity and the replacement of old plant during the 21st Century.

Past technical activities on Earth and in deep space provide a strong base for initiating this enterprise. Such activities include access to and operations in deep space as well as the terrestrial mining and surface materials processing industries. Also, over the last decade, there has been historic progress in the development of inertial electrostatic confinement (IEC) fusion at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Progress there includes the production of over a milliwatt of steady-state power from the fusion of helium-3 and deuterium. Steady progress in IEC research as well as basic physics argues strongly that the IEC approach to fusion power has significantly more commercial viability than other technologies pursued by the fusion community. It will have inherently lower capital costs, higher energy conversion efficiency, a range of power from a few hundred megawatts upward, and little or no associated radioactivity or radioactive waste. It should be noted, however, that IEC research has received no significant support as an alternative to Tokamak-based fusion from the Department of Energy in spite of that Department's large fusion technology budgets. The Office of Science and Technology Policy under several Administrations also has ignored this approach.

On the question of international law relative to outer space, specifically the Outer Space Treaty of 1967, that law is permissive relative to properly licensed and regulated commercial endeavors. Under the 1967 Treaty, lunar resources can be extracted and owned, but national sovereignty cannot be asserted over the mining area. If the Moon Agreement of 1979, however, is ever submitted to the Senate for ratification, it should be deep sixed. The uncertainty that this Agreement would create in terms of international management regimes would make it impossible to raise private capital for a return to the Moon for helium-3 and would seriously hamper if not prevent a successful initiative by the United States Government.

The general technologies required for the success of this enterprise are known. Mining, extraction, processing, and transportation of helium-3 to Earth requires innovations in engineering, particularly in light-weight, robotic mining systems, but no known new engineering concepts. By-products of lunar helium-3 extraction, largely hydrogen, oxygen, and water, have large potential markets in space and ultimately will add to the economic attractiveness of this business opportunity. Inertial electrostatic confinement (IEC) fusion technology appears be the most attractive and least capital intensive approach to terrestrial fusion power plants, although engineering challenges of scaling remain for this technolgy. Heavy lift launch costs comprise the largest cost uncertainty facing initial business planning, however, many factors, particularly long term production contracts, promise to lower these costs into the range of $1-2000 per kilogram versus about $70,000 per kilogram fully burdened for the Apollo Saturn V rocket.

A business enterprise based on lunar resources will be driven by cost considerations to minimize the number of humans required for the extraction of each unit of resource. Humans will be required, on the other hand, to prevent costly breakdowns of semi-robotic mining, processing, and delivery systems, to provide manual back-up to robotic or tele-robotic operation, and to support human activities in general. On the Moon, humans will provide instantaneous observation, interpretation, and assimilation of the environment in which they work and in the creative reaction to that environment. Human eyes, experience, judgement, ingenuity, and manipulative capabilities are unique in and of themselves and highly additive in synergistic and spontaneous interaction with instruments and robotic systems (see Appendix A).

Thus, the next return to the Moon will approach work on the lunar surface very pragmatically with humans in the roles of exploration geologist, mining geologist/engineer, heavy equipment operator/engineer, heavy equipment/robotic maintenance engineer, mine manager, and the like. During the early years of operations the number of personnel will be about six per mining/processing unit plus four support personnel per three mining/processing units. Cost considerations also will drive business to encourage or require personnel to settle, provide all medical care and recreation, and conduct most or all operations control on the Moon.

The creation of capabilities to support helium-3 mining operations also will provide the opportunity to support NASA's human lunar and planetary research at much reduced cost, as the cost of capital for launch and basic operations will be carried by the business enterprise. Science thus will be one of several ancillary profit centers for the business, but at a cost to scientists much below that of purely scientific effort to return to the Moon or explore Mars. Technology and facilities required for success of a lunar commercial enterprise, particularly heavy lift launch and fusion technologies, also will enable the conduct, and reduce the cost of many space activities in addition to science. These include exploration and settlement of Mars, asteroid interception and diversion, and various national security initiatives.

It is doubtful that the United States or any government will initiate or sustain a return of humans to the Moon absent a comparable set of circumstances as those facing the Congress and Presidents Eisenhower, Kennedy, and Johnson in the late 1950s and throughout 1960s. Huge unfunded "entitlement" liabilities and a lack of sustained media and therefore public interest will prevent the long-term commitment of resources and attention that such an effort requires. Even if tax-based funding commitments could be guaranteed, it is not a foregone conclusion that the competent and disciplined management system necessary to work in deep space would be created and sustained. If Government were to lead a return to deep space, the NASA of today is probably not the agency to undertake a significant new program to return humans to deep space, particularly the Moon and then to Mars. NASA today lacks the critical mass of youthful energy and imagination required for work in deep space. It also has become too bureaucratic and too risk-adverse. Either a new agency would needed to implement such a program or NASA would need to be totally restructured using the lessons of what has worked and has not worked since it was created 45 years ago. Of particular importance would be for most of the agency to be made up of engineers and technicians in their 20s and managers in their 30s, the re-institution of design engineering activities in parallel with those of contractors, and the streamlining of management responsibility. The existing NASA also would need to undergo a major restructuring and streamlining of its program management, risk management, and financial management structures. Such total restructuring would be necessary to re-create the competence and discipline necessary to operate successfully in the much higher risk and more complex deep space environment relative to that in near-earth orbit.

In spite of the large, long-term potential return on investment, access to capital markets for a lunar 3He and terrestrial fusion power business will require a near-term return on investment, based on early applications of IEC fusion technology (10). Business plan development for commercial production and use of lunar Helium-3 requires a number of major steps all of which are necessary if long investor interest is to be attracted and held to the venture. The basic lunar resource endeavor would require a sustained commitment of investor capital for 10 to 15 years before there would be an adequate return on investment, far to long to expect to be competitive in the world's capital markets. Thus, "business bridges" with realistic and competitive returns on investment in three to five years will be necessary to reach the point where the lunar energy opportunity can attract the necessary investment capital. They include PET isotope production at point-of-use, therapeutic medical isotope production independent of fission reactors, nuclear waste transmutation, and mobile land mine and other explosive detection. Once fusion energy breakeven is exceeded, mobile, very long duration electrical power sources will be possible. These business bridges also should advance the development of the lunar energy technology base if at all possible. A business and investor based approach to a return to the Moon to stay represents a clear alternative to initiatives by the U.S. Government or by a coalition of other countries. Although not yet certain of success, a business-investor approach, supported by the potential of lunar Helium-3 fusion power, and derivative technologies and resources, offers the greatest likelihood of a predictable and sustained commitment to a return to deep space.

APPENDIX A: SPACE EXPLORATION AND DEVELOPMENT - WHY HUMANS?

The term "space exploration" implies the exploration of the Moon, planets and asteroids, that is, "deep space," in contrast to continuing human activities in Earth orbit. Human activities in Earth orbit have less to do with exploration and more to do with international commitments, as in the case of the Space Station, and prestige and technological development, as in the case of China and Russia. There are also research opportunities, not fully recognized even after 40 years, that exploit the opportunities presented by being in Earth orbit.

Deep space exploration has been and should always be conducted with the best combination of human and robotic techniques. Many here will argue the value of robotics. I will just say that any data collection that can be successfully automated at reasonable cost should be. In general, human being's should not waste their time with activities such as surveying, systematic photography, and routine data collection. Robotic precursors into situations of undefined or uncertain risk also are clearly appropriate.

Direct human exploration, however, offers exceptional benefits that robotic exploration currently cannot and probably will not duplicate in the foreseeable future, certainly not at competitive costs. What we are really talking about here is the value of field geology. Many of my scientific colleagues, including the late Carl Sagan, have made the argument that everything we learned scientifically from Apollo exploration could have been done roboticly. Not only do the facts not support this claim, but such individuals and groups have never been forced to cost out such a robotic exploration program. I submit that robotic duplication of the vast scientific return of human exploration of six sites on the Moon would cost far more that the approximately $7 billion spent on science and probably more than the $100 million total cost of Apollo. Those are estimates in today's dollars.

What do human's bring to the table?

First, there is the human brain - a semi-quantitative super computer, with hundreds of millions years of research and development behind it and several million years of accelerated refinement based on the requirements for survival of our genus. This brain is both programmable and instantly re-programmable on the basis of training, experience, and preceding observations.

Second, there are the human eyes - a high resolution, stereo optical system of extraordinary dynamic range that also have resulted from hundreds of millions of years of trial and error. Integrated with the human brain, this system continuously adjusts to the changing optical and intellectual environment encountered during exploration of new situations. In that sense, field geological and biological exploration is little different from many other types of scientific research where integration of the eyes and brain are essential parts of successful inquires into the workings of Nature.

Third, there are the human hands - a highly dexterous and sensitive bio-mechanical system also integrated with the human brain as well as the human eyes and also particularly benefiting from several million years of recent development. We so far have grossly underutilized human hands during space exploration, but the potential is there to bring them fully to bear on future activities possibly through integration with robotic extensions or micro-mechanical device integration into gloves.

Fourth, there are human emotions - the spontaneous reaction to the exploration environment that brings creativity to bear on any new circumstance, opportunity, or problem. Human emotions also are the basis for public interest in support of space exploration, interest beyond that which can be engendered by robotic exploration. Human emotions further create the very special bond that space exploration has with young people, both those of all ages in school and those who wish to participate directly in such exploration.

Fifth, there is the natural urge of the human species to expand its accessible habitats and thus enhance the probability of its long-term survival. Deep space exploration by humans provides the foundations for long-term survival through the settlement of the Moon and Mars in this century and the Galaxy in the next.

Finally, there is a special benefit to deep space exploration by Americans - the continual transplantation of the institutions of freedom to those human settlements on the Moon and Mars. This is our special gift and our special obligation to the future.

SELECTED REFERENCES

. Schmitt, H. H., Journal of Aerospace Engineering, April 1997, pp 60-67.
. Wittenberg, L. J., and co-workers, Fusion Technology, 1986, 10, pp 167-178.
. Johnson, J. R., Geophysical Research Letter, 26, 3, 1999, pp 385-388.
. Cameron, E. N., Helium Resources of MareTranquillitatis, Technical Report, WCSAR-TR-AR3-9207-1, 1992.
. Kulcinski, G. L., and Schmitt, H. H., 1992, Fusion Technology, 21, p. 2221.
. Feldman, W. C., and co-workers, Science, 281, 1998, pp 1496-1500.
. Schmitt, H. H., in Mark, H., Ed., Encyclopedia of Space, 2003, Wiley, New York.
. Kulcinski, G. L., 1993, Proceedings, 2nd Wisconsin Symposium on Helium-3 and Fusion Power, WCSAR-TR-AR3-9307-3.
. Schmitt, H. H., 1998, Space 98, Proceedings of the Conference, p. 1-14.
. Kulcinski, G. L. 1996, Proceedings, 12th Topical Meeting on the Technology of Fusion Power, UWFDM-1025.

Related Testimony Links

Testimony of Dr. David R. Criswell: Senate Hearing on "Lunar Exploration"

Testimony of Dr. Roger Angel: Senate Hearing on "Lunar Exploration"

Testimony of Dr. Paul D. Spudis: Senate Hearing on "Lunar Exploration"

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