Sunday 29 April 2007

Commercial Space Race

I wonder how long it will be before we can go into space as tourists sponsored by commercial companies. So far only governments have had the desire and money to send men to space although many companies have paid to have satellites put into orbit.This is an issue many have thought would happen for many years.

It is becoming cheaper to make spacecraft and get them into orbit but fuel costs are increasing. Money can be recouped through paying passengers for a trip around the Earth, to the moon and beyond.

There is an impact upon the environment from fuel. Space elevators or nuclear powered rockets may bridge the gap between chemical propellents and advanced technologies such as matter-antimatter drives, zero point energy (antigravity) or macroscopic quantum teleportation.

If there is going to be a commercial space race I hope it is to build solar panels in orbit, provide research bases and for platforms to build interplanery craft. It be worthwhile to consider building in space and mining asteroids for raw materials. Maybe we could develop self replicating machines that can extract raw materials and convert them into useful building resources.

Please do not pollute space with huge advertisements or create artificial light pollution. This will not go down well with the public or with astronomers.

Anyone for launching a series of telescopes using the Earth's orbit as a baseline for spying on alien Earth's or determining the shape of the universe?

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