The International Lunar Decade

Effective utilization of lunar resources may require an international regime to avoid potential conflicts and maximize the return on investment [NASA].

Vid Beldavs

The Space Review

While much has been learned about the Moon over the decades since the beginning of spaceflight, understanding of its potential resource wealth is incomplete and the technologies to exploit those resources remain to be developed. Now with China, Russia, and the US demonstrating the ability to land and operate on the Moon, and with ESA, India, Japan, and others developing such abilities, it is becoming increasingly clear that capabilities to exploit the resources of the Moon can be developed. Furthermore, the discovery of water in the lunar polar regions, near elevations in permanent sunshine, has led to the development of specific plans for the exploitation of the water resources for fuel for transportation operations in cislunar space, notably by Paul Spudis.

The obvious high value of the Moon’s water resources creates a basis for international competition—a Moon Race—and potential conflict. The necessity of an international regime for the exploitation of the natural resources of the Moon is likely to become an urgent matter for all spacefaring powers. The development of an effective international regime for the exploitation of the Moon’s resources would benefit from a thorough, internationally coordinated study of those resources and from the development of necessary technologies and governance mechanisms for their exploitation including funding for this purpose. What is proposed is an “International Lunar Decade” to study lunar resources and to develop capabilities for exploiting such resources with the following goals:

Read the full article at The Space Review, HERE.

Human space exploration: asteroids vs. the Moon?

Sunflower solar panel-powered architecture, featuring the LER, Athlete and Chariot vehicles, that were well along in development before Congress and the Obama administration shelved the Constellation program [NASA/John Frassanito & Associates].

Jeff Foust

The Space Review

Two years ago, the Obama Administration changed the direction of the nation’s human spaceflight programs in a number of ways, including the destinations of those efforts. Gone was the goal of the previous administration of a human return to the Moon by 2020, a date that was looking increasingly unrealistic in the eyes of many, including the Augustine Committee that reviewed NASA’s plans in 2009. In its place was something resembling the “flexible path” approach in that committee’s final report, with the Moon replaced as an initial beyond-Earth destination by a near Earth asteroid. President Obama established a 2025 goal for a human mission to an asteroid in a speech at the Kennedy Space Center in April 2010, also setting a goal of a human mission to Mars in the mid-2030s.

From a technical standpoint, a human mission to a near Earth asteroid could be done solely by the United States given both existing capabilities and those under development, like the Orion spacecraft and Space Launch System heavy-lift rocket. Yet, from a financial standpoint, particular in an era of constrained and even declining budgets, it’s likely the US will seek international partners for an asteroid mission, and almost certainly for later missions to Mars. But do the potential partners of the US also want to participate in human asteroid missions?

The recent Global Space Exploration Conference, or GLEX, held in Washington, DC last month by the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) and the International Astronautical Federation (IAF), offered some mixed messages about international interest in human asteroid missions. Some space agency executives instead spoke openly about going back to the Moon, comments that have some support among former NASA officials who believe that human lunar exploration will have greater support internationally.

Perhaps the boldest endorsement of the Moon, and not near Earth asteroids, as the next destination for human exploration came from Vladimir Popovkin, general director of the Russian space agency Roscosmos. Speaking at a plenary session at GLEX on May 22 that featured the leaders or other top officials of six space agencies, Popovkin suggested the Moon, and not the asteroids, was the preferred destination of the Russian space program.

“We arrived at the conclusion that the Moon is supposed to be the next target” for human exploration, Popovkin said through an interpreter. “We’re not trying to convince you that we shouldn’t be doing anything in the area of Mars exploration, asteroid exploration, just that, in our professional opinion, today we have much better chances to come up with very productive and tangible results when concentrating on the Moon.”

Read the in-depth article, HERE.

Lee calls on S. Korea to join ILN

The Chosun IIbo (South Korean) President Lee Myung-bak wants Korea to join an international lunar exploration program. In a speech at the opening of the 60th International Astronautical Congress in Daejeon on Monday, Lee said, "Many countries are cooperating to carry out large-scale space projects such as the lunar exploration program."

He said gaining an understanding of outer space through international cooperation and sharing achievements in space research "are necessary to improve quality of life for all mankind."

Lee was referring to the International Lunar Network project which brings together eight countries under NASA supervision and aims to explore the environment and resources of the Moon by sending six to eight robotic spacecraft to various locations on the lunar surface and building mobile or fixed science stations.

The ILN was chosen on the agenda for the Korea-U.S. summit last year, and Korea signed a letter of intent to join. The government has set a goal to launch a lunar orbit satellite by 2020 and a lunar probe by 2025. Before it attains this goal, it is looking for help in obtaining space technology by participating in the ILN.

Lee also said, "Korea is strong in information technology, nanotechnology and biotechnology. The country can make contributions significantly, though belatedly, to the development of the world's space industry, if it uses those technologies to enhance space technology."

The congress is attended by about 3,000 space experts from some 70 countries and will run until Oct. 16.

Aldrin: World should build Moonbase

Noted al.com space sciences reporter Shelby G. Spires has noted an entry in the HuffingtonPost.com blog credited to Buzz Aldrin. The lunar module pilot for Apollo 11, second man to walk on the Moon writes, "Instead of duplicating -- at great cost and effort -- the lunar competition that Neil Armstrong, Mike Collins and I won more than four decades ago last summer, I propose instead America call the world to the Moon. In a new global effort to use the Moon to establish a global space consortium with a lunar surface facility as its epicenter, America can gain new leadership, international respect, and technological progress by collaborating with emerging space powers, not merely competing with them."

Read the full entry by Aldrin, HERE.

International Partnerships and Interface Standards for Exploration

Kathy Laurini
ESMD/Directorate Integration Office
Constellation Associate Program Manager for
Lunar Formation

Presentation to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce
Programmatic Workshop on NASA
Lunar Surface Systems Concepts
February 25, 2009

Objective: Involve interested international agencies in a discussion of lunar surface system exploration scenarios and architectures in order to facilitate identification of interfaces benefiting from standardization andpossible contributions to multilateral exploration activity

Download the Presentation HERE.

As part of an ongoing collaboration, NASA and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce (USCC) Space Enterprise Council (SEC) conducted a workshop on NASA Lunar Surface Systems (LSS) Concepts. The objective was to provide a status of NASA's lunar surface exploration architecture, to share results of recent innovative lunar concept studies, and to seek feedback from U.S. industry and other interested parties.

The workshop included briefings on NASA, industry, and university analyses performed for NASA's Exploration Systems Mission Directorate (ESMD) and Constellation Program (CxP), with particular emphasis on a recently completed suite of lunar surface study contracts administered by the Constellation Program's LSS Project Office.

Other presentations online HERE.

The Law of Neutrality in Outer Space

Robert Jarman
McGill University, Montreal
Defense Technical Information Center (DTIC)

Satellite telecommunications, global navigation and remote sensing systems are key drivers in the ongoing transformation of an industrial based global economic order to one increasingly dominated by information services.

A growing number of States are establishing an independent presence in outer space and all States (and indeed, individuals) can access a broad range of affordable space-related products and services (e.g., Google Earth imagery, PSreceivers, and global voice and data transmissions). Consistent with broad historical trends, these technologies are inevitably influencing the way States think about, plan for, and conduct warfare.

Inspired by the prospect of seizing the ultimate "high ground" of outer space and achieving "information superiority" over an enemy, militaries around the world are rapidly pursuing independent space capabilities and adapting their strategies, doctrine and force structures to reflect these capabilities. These trends have prompted various political and legal efforts to ban the placement and/or use of weapons in outer space.

As these efforts have failed to gain traction and seem unlikely to do so in the foreseeable future, this thesis argues that existing bodies of international law grounded in a pragmatic acceptance of armed conflict must be consulted if humankind wishes to mitigate the impact and spread of warfare conducted in, from and through outer space. In particular, this thesis examines how the traditional customary principles underlying the law of neutrality may be reconceptualized by States to serve as a mechanism to mediate competing claims of belligerents and neutrals during armed conflict in outer space.

After a brief introduction, Chapters One and Two will develop the economic and military trends discussed above. Chapter Three will provide an overview of the relevant international law governing military activities in outer space. Chapter four will analyze the law governing State responsibility for Outer Space.

Download the pdf Study HERE.

Implementing International Standards for "Continuing Supervision"

Ronald L. Spencer
McGill University, Montreal
Defense Technical Information Center (DTIC)

The Outer Space Treaty established the obligation to provide continuing supervision of its national space activities by the appropriate state. The implementation of this obligation remains a matter of state discretion.

Since this Treaty came into force the world has evolved to become reliant on space based utilities to enable the global economy and state governance. Today, space faring states are increasingly dependent upon the supervision practices of other states to assure its space interests as the attribution of state responsibility becomes more difficult to ascribe. Therefore, the absence of binding supervision standards may become an impediment to future space applications due to three identified trends.

First, the trend towards space commercialization requires active state supervision. Second, the rise in environmental hazards requires minimal safety standards to decrease the harmful effects on space applications. Third, space security requires identification of intentional acts and prudent measures to safeguard vital space applications.

Download the Study pdf HERE.