Rescue Mission For European Space Industry 563
metz2000 writes "The New Scientist reports that the European Space Agency (ESA) has pledged hundreds of millions of Euros to guarantee its independent access to space. Europe also looks set to co-operate with the Russian Space Agency. Looks like the space industry is hotting up again. How will NASA react to this news after being the dominant space agency over the past three decades? A lot of money is going into rocket technology also; with this and the 'European version' of GPS are we heading towards a future conflict across the Atlantic?"
First! (Score:2, Interesting)
Most european countries just purchase American or Russian military vehicles and weapons anyway.
I think it would be great for nasa to work together. If the US wants to be seen as a world player they may need to increase funding to NASA and have it work with the European space agency. The russians have been great help working with Nasa and I expect the same.
Space is hotting up indeed (Score:5, Interesting)
btw, I find it so very amusing that whenever western sources refer to the chinese space program, they just HAVE to add phrase like "secret, military linked," as if NASA is completely independent of the military, or something...
anyhoo. maybe there is still a chance for me to visit mars before I die eh? or some serious possibility of WWIII - as China and EU becomes increasingly suspicious of US... (not unwarrented or anything)
Hmmm, Interesting (Score:5, Interesting)
It is important to remember that Arianne is also somewhat cheaper than the Shuttle for any given weight of payload - the shuttles main advantage is that its live crew (which is the reason for the higher cost) can perform and regulate scientific tests.
I await the next Arianne launch with baited breath.
Heavy lifters (Score:5, Interesting)
It seems like 30 years ago we did pretty well with expendable rockets. Since each shuttle mission costs hundreds of millions, is it really worth it? Why not invest in the development of a 'cheap' single-use lifting technology, like a successor for Soyuz? Even if each rocket cost $100 million wouldn't it still save lots of money, and wouldn't it mean much larger payloads could be delivered?
Is there more to it than traditional exploration? (Score:2, Interesting)
A Good Thing (TM) for the Space Industry (Score:3, Interesting)
Didn't the really great advances in space travel come about because of the intellectual battle between the US and the Soviet Union?
If the ESA starts making inroads into space research and NASA wants to keep its top position, it will be forced to become really competitive, and this might mean that we will see missions which *succeed*!!!
Or we may just see more missions, with more cut corners...
Re:Space is hotting up indeed (Score:5, Interesting)
You need three visible satellites for triangulation. Picture the globe, and work out where the satellites would be. Either they're geostationary, clustered over one part (which would give a crude GPS service - over one chunk of the Earth only) or they're not (in which case you can't triangulate anything from them on Earth). You might be able to use them from a lower orbit, though, for positioning satellites; all 3 equidistant GEO satellites would be visible when you're over either pole. Whatever it is, it's not [yet] a GPS rival!
btw, I find it so very amusing that whenever western sources refer to the chinese space program, they just HAVE to add phrase like "secret, military linked," as if NASA is completely independent of the military, or something...
It is independent of the military, actually; the Pentagon did have input in the Shuttle program early on (they wanted to be able to use it for launching and servicing/upgrading spy satellites, which can't be done with a rocket) but these days they launch their own stuff, on rockets from Lockheed Martin. (Built in what Michael Moore claimed in BFC was a "missile factory", as it happens.) NASA probably handle some stuff for the military, still, but most of it is done "in-house" using their own systems - in fact, orbital monitoring is military, with a full-time member of staff to liase with NASA and monitor the status of the Shuttle and ISS.
European GPS (Score:1, Interesting)
Re:European GPS (Score:4, Interesting)
And "eruo-gps" is supposed to be hundred percent commercial. If the military want to use it, they'll have to pay like everybody else.
How's that for free market, US?
Re:Space is hotting up indeed (Score:2, Interesting)
He actually refers to them as "rockets with a Pentagon payload", which is about right. There's a good chance that the kind of payload that those Titan and Atlas rockets carry is a LOT more dangerous than a Tomahawk.
no need to keep 100% accurate local time (Score:4, Interesting)
Few reasons for this, IIRC:
1) all three satellites are keeping perfect time, so if your clock is off, it is very easy to compensate for.
2) satellites transmit positional information - this can be compared with your local positional table to correct your local time
Besides the point - since details are sketchy, they might even be using dual-band per satellite to compensate for atmospheric delay errors.
Of course, i might be talking out of my ass - so if you have evidence backing up what you say, prove me wrong.
Re:First! (Score:5, Interesting)
Pretty sweeping unsupported statement that, you might want to look at EADS [eads.com] before making any more blind assumptions there... That said I think you're missing the point.
The first space race might have been driven by the military, but if there is to be a second race between ESA and NASA I imagine it'll most likely be driven more by developments in civil aerospace.
Arianespace [arianespace.com] are hardly a minor global player, neither are Airbus. While admitedly they've yet to show a direct interest in space flight, they are part of EADS and given Boeing's development, it's unimaginable that Airbus hasn't got it's eye on space at some point in the future...
As it stands the ESA have already been working with NASA and the remnants of the old soviet space agency (calling it "Russian" is confusing, since Russia is in Europe) and I expect that they'll continue doing just that, the Space Station is after all an International venture, not just an American thing.
Race or not, this news seems to suggest that (as happened with civil aviation technology in the later years of last century,) Europe might be about to take the dominant role in Space technology now... maybe. Should be interesting anyway, and anything that drives us forward globally has to be a good thing.
Few problems, many positives (Score:3, Interesting)
The system redundancy argument is a good one. I am sure that there's a lot of obscure politics involved, but technically speaking I am looking forward to being able to utilize a GPS receiver that can correlate the results from two independent systems. There were receivers that did that with GLONASS, I don't know if that system is still operable.
Competition is of course good, however I think that the potential for commercial competition is fairly slim for the time being due to the high cost of anything space related and that you can't 'claim' resources in space like you do on earth (AFAIK).
All in all - the more people/equipment/systems we can bring out into space, the easier it will be to colaborate and go 'where no man has gone before'. Manned mission to Mars, anyone?
-Kris
Conflict US - Europe (Score:1, Interesting)
I don't think so, Europeans are quite pacifists (If we remove the uk, of course) they are not oriented to conflict aspects and try to avoid violence as much as possible.
The GPS systems was indeed good to be launched, in Europe there is a huge ammount of GPS civilian users as well there is big investments in adding services to this system. I believe all the GPS users(like me) don't like to feel dependent of the us army to remove the resolution of the GPS location.
In the first day of the iraque attack, I was traveling from the netherlands to austria, and believe in me, it was not funny to loose the sinal and go the wrong way!
Conflict? Competition. (Score:1, Interesting)
One down side I could imagine: competition will not allow for much environmental cleaning... near-earth space is getting more dirty every day. Cleaning does not immediately contribute to lower cost numbers so will be ignored when there's loads of competition.
Eventually we will not be able to send anything into space anymore (all non-dirty time-slots will be gone... it'll be too risky to launch). Then we'll have to start building space buildozers
Our integrated circuit technology (Score:3, Interesting)
For quite a few years, the military / aerospace sector has basically been building on electronic and computer technology developed for the private consumer sector.
Perhaps it's time for another driver for new technology to show up on the market. Especially given the increasingly successful attempt to suppress new consumer technology by the *AA (RIAA/MPAA) organizations.
Rail Gun system coming (Score:4, Interesting)
put payload in space with a rail gun as a launchor assisted launch
A variation on that theme would be a high altitude platform using
something like www.21stcenturyairships.com to lift the cargo to
near 100,000 ft , then use the rail gun to kick start it and if a
heavy payload fire a booster as well . The first 20 miles of flight would be eliminated
A series of MANY of these balloons could be used to hold the launch
platform up and the tremendous cargo
If you run it all with remote control robots, you do not need
to worry about life support systems on the launching pad
Also you use remote control robots to build your space station,
and do your repairs up in space
Solar power in space is not filtered by the earth's atmosphere,
there is ALOT more watts per sq. meter up there
Imagine the work that could be done with no need for food and
water, no need for atmosphere , and protected enclosure for the
repair robots
If the chinese are smart when they go to build their base on the
moon they will start it out unmanned and built by robots
the logistics are just SOOOO much cheaper than trying to keep
humans alive and sane in deep space
Once they have a large Teraformed cavern underground on the moon
then test it for problems over a period of time , with redundant
systems and escape pod like rescue vehicles . Test it with robots
The majority of the moon base being underground would be shielded
against meteors , and cosmic radiation
The dark side of the moon could be used to acquire cooling for
machinery and computers, etc etc
The light side could be used for a permanent solar farm
Robots coming back and plugging into the grid when they get
low or redundant battery packs get switched out by battery
serving bots that change one pack at a time and every robot
has two or three, lol
Once we get a moon base, we have a MUCH cheaper launching
platform than the earth . Less Gravity, no atmosphere
burning you up , and no wind shear
Then wash, rinse and repeat for mars, pretty simple plan and
we have already sent a tiny robot there
Just send a larger one and start rail gunning cargo from the
moon base , the cargo goes into orbit around mars and is picked
up by the space station there and then sent down to the surface
by the bouncing ball airbag method used by path finder
The airbag material can be saved and reused for other needs
once humans arrive once the base is built and safely tested
Once again an underground base using the heat from the core of
mars would keep the underground base somewhat liveable
Solar power on mars would not be that good, would need an
alternative like geo-thermal
For safety reasons the drilling should be a great distance from
the mars base in case a geological problem is let loose similar
to a kick experienced when drilling here in north america
Run the geo thermal power plant with robots, and have it
beyond a ridge or mountain to protect the colony from
any possible disasters
A large low light garden would be needed to turn CO2 into O@
to breathe , and provide food , enriched soil with bacteria
would have to be sent to the moon and mars
How mars bacteria and earth bacteria interact could be dangerous,
another reason to test it with robots for some time
The big dig in boston has made underground earth works much
cheaper, this tech would be perfect for mars, just implementing
it all the distance aways would be VERY hard
Due to delay a LARGE space ship/station would need to be built
in orbit best from the moon base, then travel to mars
and ppl could remote control the mars robots from orbit
Ok I am really rambling here
Peace,
Ex-MislTech
Re:Some perspective (Score:3, Interesting)
2: The "Space Race" was little more than a cold war pissing contest, and It ended decades ago.
3: The ESA is already very much "a player" in space: for one thing it's the market leader in commercial satelite launches, and for another it's one of the few agencies with an active launch vehicle development programme (unlike NASA for example).
Re:Heavy lifters (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Some prospective (Score:5, Interesting)
The Galileo project has been really launched now. It's a project funded by different partners (*including* ESA) : European Commision, ESA, European Investment Bank and other smaller partners to come. The goal of Galileo is double : 1) get rid of our current dependency towards the american military GPS system for strategic reasons and because there are reliability issues with the GPS (in particular for civil planes) 2) offer a better system (better precision in localization), primarily for civil usage (but not only) and make money from that.
Galileo's price is 3.2 billions Euros which is roughly the price for building 150 kilometers of semi-urban motorway.
All these informations were taken from the official Galileo website at:
http://europa.eu.int/comm/dgs/energy_transport/ga
Re:Heavy lifters (Score:3, Interesting)
They want to launch more often, and this idea
will get them clear of the air traffic lanes
Just position this out over the pacific high
above any storm systems reach
I think a high altitude rail gun platform would work
nicely to get cargo into space
It would not work for ppl, as it would pull so many G's
it would kill them
Some tested rail guns have hit Mach 120+ in the low earth
atmosphere with all its friction
At 160,000 feet using high altitude balloon tech to build
a suspended launch platform you could fire a rail gun
to launch cylinders into space with needed materials
Getting ppl into space would require a more conventional means,
but the cargo has always been the heavier portion
www.21stcenturyairships.com has already got working prototype
ballons working at near 70,000 feet
NASA set a world record for a ballon at 161,000 feet , so it
can be done , 32 miles up would be a good head start
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2002/08/02
These guys could provide the balloon logistics
http://www.andyelson.com/proj_theedgeofspace.ht
With 99% of the earth's atmosphere out of the way, a high power
rail gun shooting something at speeds in excess of mach 120
would get it to the moon with NO PROBLEM
Less atmosphere, less friction, less gravity
Building a space elevator sounds cool, but cost is
prohibitive and the logistics sound VERY scary
The link to the world's fastest rail gun is
http://www.totse.com/en/technology/science_tech
use CTRL+F and then enter "fastest" for your search
speed of sound at sea level is 330 yds/sec, they achieved
39,991M/sec
Peace,
Ex-MislTech
Very unlikely on both counts (Score:3, Interesting)
The recent tiff over Iraq is nothing to worry about, and will largely blow over. There's far too much trade in both directions, and there's a lot of Europeans in America and a lot of Americans in Europe. We're just too close to go to war.
As for The UK splitting off from Europe to join with America - I really can't see that happening. The loss of sovereignty in joining Europe is small fry compared to becoming a state of the US.
Re:Cooperation (Score:5, Interesting)
Anyways...I thought the EU was all about international cooperation and getting along. I am glad NASA and the ESA cooperate as much as they already do...they should likely do more. I seriously doubt NASA has a problem with working with other agencies abroad...
Re:Heavy lifters (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Heavy lifters (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:yes, major conflict brewing (Score:3, Interesting)
The beginning of the decline probably was some time in the 1980's when the US started going into debt more and more (see here [epinet.org]). Ultimately, the whole idea of "America" itself becomes fuzzy, when a significant fraction of its assets are foreign-owned.
I think 9/11 is mostly irrelevant to the long term position of the US in the world. If anything, it has harmed US power because of Bush's foreign policy blunders.
and an apples-to-apples comparison would measure the EU against NAFTA
No. NAFTA is primarily a trade arrangement, while the EU is much closer to a federation (free movement of people, harmonized laws, etc.).
it's a phenomenon that will last as long as America lasts,
Well, you reiterate common attitudes among Americans; the question is: are there any rational reasons to believe this?
or until other nations become so much like America that one can't tell them apart.
That's impossible: there simply isn't enough foreign investment (or oil, for that matter) to run other large nations like the US.
In any case, the issue is not whether Europe or the US is "better" or a little bigger. The issue is whether the US is clearly predominant or whether it is just one of many centers of power in the world. I think the world will actually consist of half a dozen or so roughly equally powerful blocks or regions, one of which is the US. The question is whether Americans will accept that fact willingly.
Re:Timely (Score:3, Interesting)
I guess you're not from a business background. No company likes the fact that there are multiple currencies - it means uncertainty. Many companies have multiple currency accounts to try to counteract currency movements to reduce the uncertainty.
Let me explain it this way. You as a Brit sell a product to, say, the USA. It costs you £5 to make, you sell it for $15. The dollar weakens (in case you haven't noticed, it just has quite considerably). Either you have to charge more for your product (making it less competitive with products produced within the USA, because of course the currency change doesn't affect them), or you make less profit. Here's the crunch - you have no control over currency fluctuations. One day you could be making a profit, the next day a loss, due to something completely out of your control. Now are you seriously going to argue that this is something that businesses like?
Umm, I thought it was kinda obvious that the papers have thier own agendas
There's a huge difference between the press voicing their opinions about things and deliberately lying to or misleading their readership, which is what happens in the UK these days unfortunately.
Re:Heavy lifters (Score:2, Interesting)
Part of the reason that the energia was pulled out of active service was the environmental impact of the thing. Claiming to lift up to 100 tones in to high altitude the rocket packed a huge punch in terms of fuel. So much so that it had a demonstratable impact on the launch site. This and the cost made it untenable. It's easier, less costly, lower risk to launch large structures (eg ISS) into orbit in a modular fashion.
Current space philosophy is smaller lighter faster. What's the need for 100 ton launchers if we can do the same job with smaller rockets?
Re:Very unlikely on both counts (Score:3, Interesting)
The US on the other had can deploy 3 divisions a month (we have 12 total, I believe), 3 additional Marine divisions (MEU) and 12 super carrier groups. If it came down to a war anywhere in the world, unless there is a act of supreme incompetence or a act of God, you don't want to root against the US.
The Iraq tiff will blow over, but there are people in Europe who make no bones about wanting to challange American power. Frankly, with how poor Europe is doing with minority populations (see Monyiham's(sp) book) I suspect that Europe will have to challange radical islamists (ala Russia and the middle east) before they challange the US.
As for the UK, poll after poll states that the English trust America to come to Englands need in case of emergency far more then the commonwealth (Canada, Australia) and orders of magnitude above the EU. I suspect the anglosphere will continue to gain momentum.
Re:Very unlikely on both counts (Score:3, Interesting)
The other large factor (again) is NATO. Countries that have military units "lend" them to NATO (for example, I believe that the US lends NATO three American divisions). Over time, the European units have focused on front line units, giving them punch in NATO (while the US does all of the logistical concerns). Outside of NATO, they simply do not have the logistical or C2 (command and control) structures neccesary to fight a war.
The UK and France both have "independent" systems. France however has huge issues with their navy. The UK OTOH under UKUSA and other "anglosphere" agreements focueses much more on integration with the US then anythign else.
Re:Conflict across the 49th parallel (Score:2, Interesting)
IMHO the US ended up not buying the plane because of the NIH syndrome and the fact that the US really does not buy weapons technology from abroad: period.
Regarding the Canadian government pulling the plug, at that time several governments considered that bombers were obsolete, hence fighters were unnecessary. Missiles were all the rage.
The UK RAF also suffered terribly from this misguided perception.