What's Next After the International Space Station? (vox.com) 98
$100 billion was spent building the International Space Station — including 42 different assembly flights, reports Recode. Yet "after two decades in orbit, the International Space Station will shut down," as NASA re-focuses on sending humans back to the moon. (UPDATE: NASA has extended ISS operation through 2030.)
While they plan to keep it functioning as long as possible, NASA "has only technically certified the station's hardware until 2028 and has awarded more than $400 million to fund private replacements." (Which they estimate will save them $1 billion a year.)
So then what happens? When these stations are ready, NASA will guide the ISS into the atmosphere, where it will burn up and disintegrate. At that point, anyone hoping to work in space will have to choose among several different outposts. That means countries won't just be using these new stations to strengthen their own national space programs, but as lucrative business ventures, too. "Commercial companies have the capability now to do this, and so we don't want to compete with that," Robyn Gatens, the director of the ISS, told Recode. "We want to transition lower-Earth orbit over to commercial companies so that the government and NASA can go use resources to do harder things in deep space."
Private companies currently backed by NASA, including Lockheed Martin and Jeff Bezos's Blue Origin, could launch as many as four space stations into Earth's orbit over the next decade. NASA is also building a space station called Gateway near the moon; a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket carrying the living quarters for the station is scheduled to launch in 2024.
Russia and India are planning to launch their own space stations to low-Earth orbit, too, and China's Tiangong station, which is currently under construction, already has astronauts living aboard... Russia may leave the ISS as soon as 2025, the same year its space agency, Roscosmos, plans to launch its new $5 billion space station. The European Space Agency, which represents 22 different European countries, is now training its astronauts for eventual missions to Tiangong...
[C]ompetition for customers could get even more intense as space stations launched by China, Russia, and India open for business.
Recode ultimately sees a future where private-sector customers choose from competing space stations — and even have to consider the political consequences of "favoring one nation's space station over another..."
"In the best of scenarios, these new stations will learn from each other and massively expand scientific knowledge. But they will also make global politics a much bigger part of space, which could impact what happens here on Earth and how humanity explores the moon and Mars."
While they plan to keep it functioning as long as possible, NASA "has only technically certified the station's hardware until 2028 and has awarded more than $400 million to fund private replacements." (Which they estimate will save them $1 billion a year.)
So then what happens? When these stations are ready, NASA will guide the ISS into the atmosphere, where it will burn up and disintegrate. At that point, anyone hoping to work in space will have to choose among several different outposts. That means countries won't just be using these new stations to strengthen their own national space programs, but as lucrative business ventures, too. "Commercial companies have the capability now to do this, and so we don't want to compete with that," Robyn Gatens, the director of the ISS, told Recode. "We want to transition lower-Earth orbit over to commercial companies so that the government and NASA can go use resources to do harder things in deep space."
Private companies currently backed by NASA, including Lockheed Martin and Jeff Bezos's Blue Origin, could launch as many as four space stations into Earth's orbit over the next decade. NASA is also building a space station called Gateway near the moon; a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket carrying the living quarters for the station is scheduled to launch in 2024.
Russia and India are planning to launch their own space stations to low-Earth orbit, too, and China's Tiangong station, which is currently under construction, already has astronauts living aboard... Russia may leave the ISS as soon as 2025, the same year its space agency, Roscosmos, plans to launch its new $5 billion space station. The European Space Agency, which represents 22 different European countries, is now training its astronauts for eventual missions to Tiangong...
[C]ompetition for customers could get even more intense as space stations launched by China, Russia, and India open for business.
Recode ultimately sees a future where private-sector customers choose from competing space stations — and even have to consider the political consequences of "favoring one nation's space station over another..."
"In the best of scenarios, these new stations will learn from each other and massively expand scientific knowledge. But they will also make global politics a much bigger part of space, which could impact what happens here on Earth and how humanity explores the moon and Mars."
Sell the parts (Score:3)
Maybe a rather unfeasible idea given how the station has been meld together, but could parts not be sold off and repositioned with new stations? If you open this for auction, with associated costs and insurances, seems you could make a bit of a profit. Fuck, for space tourism alone, having a module from this station seems like a huge selling point.
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Good idea, but they're obsolete and worn out, (especially the original Russian models that have been up there since 1998) so I doubt people would want to go to the trouble of splitting modules off...although it does seem a huge waste after all the money spent to build them and get them into LEO
Re: Sell the parts (Score:2)
I know most the modules are but some I believe are far newer. The Russian ones are technically theirs, so I am just talking about US property. Even older modules seem like they could be partially refurbished for space tourism. We know that industry is mostly bragging rights. When the station is fully decommissioned, there would be a lot to brag about with stepping foot on one of these modules plus all the historicity of it. Basically this would be the first space museum...
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Yeah, get your point. It's true that space tourism is a thing these days...not sure if that's good or bad
Re: Sell the parts (Score:5, Insightful)
The main issue with making it a museum would be the maintenance required to keep it in orbit. Currently, drag from the extremely thin atmosphere causes its orbit to shrink, so it needs to be boosted periodically into a higher orbit. That would be an ongoing cost that far exceeds what a few rich tourists can bring in.
A one-time boost to a very high orbit can alleviate the drag, but that would put it outside the safety zone created by Earth's magnetic field. So whoever tries to visit it would be subject to fairly dangerous levels of radiation from the Sun, as well as during their passage through the Van Allen belts.
Another problem is contributing to space debris. Small meteors are a constant threat, eventually it will be hit, which would cause it to break apart and spray dangerous fragments everywhere.
Re: Sell the parts (Score:2)
All rather great points except the last.
I really don't understand the market for space tourism. You say boosting it costs more than any revenue generated from space tourism but does that depend on the size of any installation attached to it. A facility housing 4 to 6 might not be profitable but 30 might. If two of these space hotels are competing, the one with a tour of an ISS module seems like it has a market advantage and if it's mass is significantly less than the attached station, the fuel to maintain i
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You say boosting it costs more than any revenue generated from space tourism but does that depend on the size of any installation attached to it.
Or more crushingly against his argument, that it depends on time but he hasnt accounted for it.
Tourism is forever. There is effectively no upper limit to how much money the old station can make, even if its completely uninhabitable such that visitors must wear full kit environmental suits and can only spend a few minutes there.
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There is effectively no upper limit to how much money the old station can make, even if its completely uninhabitable such that visitors must wear full kit environmental suits and can only spend a few minutes there.
Or... there is effectively no upper limit to how much money if could lose. Tourism is a high cost business to run.
Also, are the people who are going to be paying the money to boost the ISS into a higher orbit going to be collecting those tourism profits (if any)?
If the idea is that the U.S tax payer would foot the bill for the benefit of some future space entrepreneur that is not exactly a compelling case for NASA to do this with its existing resources, nor are you likely to get special appropriations for i
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The issue with space debris is magnified by the amount of time it stays in orbit. If it stays as a museum for 100 years, that's 5x the exposure to meteorites that its current 20-year life has. If it stays for 1000 years, it's 50x the exposure. It being blasted apart by an unlucky hit is inevitable as long as it stays up there.
While having 5 new stations would create the same problem in 1/5th the amount of time, if you de-orbit them after a few decades, the problem goes away.
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Yes, as it turns out, sooner or later a space station is going to get struck in a critical part by a meteorite and likewise as I said, we are going to have to consider cleaning up debris. Your explanation of statistics is superfluous, in that it basically just states how stats work. The risk is minimal enough that we are planning to build many more space stations and in no way are those space stations designed to be more resilient to meteorites. The inevitablity is simply, sooner or later such an impact wil
Re:Sell the parts (Score:5, Insightful)
Maybe a rather unfeasible idea given how the station has been meld together, but could parts not be sold off and repositioned with new stations?
Russia might split off their parts of ISS to be the core of their independent station. Putting any part of the ISS into a different orbit would burn so much fuel that it would be cheaper to build and launch something new.
If you open this for auction, with associated costs and insurances, seems you could make a bit of a profit.
Who would buy it and what would they use it for? If the inclination of the orbit wasn't so high then maybe parts would be useful as an oasis to stop before heading off to the moon or Mars. With the orbit it has now the ISS has very limited uses. It's too steep to act as a fueling station and too shallow for getting a good look at Earth for weather/climate observations, mapping, or spying.
Fuck, for space tourism alone, having a module from this station seems like a huge selling point.
It might make a museum but that means people go there, look around, and go back to Earth. It won't be a stopping point for going on to the moon. Given the age of the station the parts in orbit may not be safe to occupy much longer. The orbital museum would need a new module for tourists to live in, and then tourists may have to suit up to tour a depressurized museum piece. Keeping pressurized oxygen would become a fire hazard, a rapid decompression hazard, and biological hazard (fungus or something growing in inaccessible parts of the station but still can be breathed in).
There was a joke about the ISS being a place for the Shuttle to go, and the Shuttle a vehicle to service the ISS. Both projects were highly political and that meant compromises made to their utility for science. That's not saying they were worthless for science, they were quite valuable in advancing the science and technology of space exploration. The problem was to get funds out of Congress they had to be nice to the Russians to get the ISS, and NASA had to play nice with the Department of Defense to get the Shuttle. The ISS was in an orbit that was easy for Russia to reach, a bad orbit for much else. The Shuttle was built to specifications to service early spy satellites, a mission that became obsolete very quickly with newer satellite technology.
It would be great to see ISS remain in orbit indefinitely as a museum piece but I don't see that happening. I'm sure parts will be ripped out and put in museums on Earth but the bulk of the station will burn up as it is brought out of orbit.
Re: Sell the parts (Score:2)
Yeah. It would be kind of great. I also understand the points you make about tourism. I know other modules would be needed and mitigating hazards would be a serious concern.
As for the fuel, I was wondering about that. I mean seems like you could adjust the orbit gradually, over 3 to 5 years and in that period potentially retrofit or add more modules. We don't have the shuttle anymore though, so I don't really know how manned retrofit missions could be achieved. Since building such a station would take time
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an expensive space tourism gimmick is mostly what it has been in these 20 years. contrary to popular belief, observing how bacteria do in zero gravity is not really useful science. now it's old and crumbling down and is a security hazard, it's just not even profitable to have millionaires having selfie weekends there. they have other options to do that which don't stink as bad.
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Toilet bracket: $20.00
Shipping & Delivery: $35,000.
Moon is the next ISS. (Score:1)
Much matter + low G -> a site for space elevator-driven construction of generation-ships.
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No atmosphere -> a launchpad for laser-propelled interstellar probes.
Newton says what?
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See radiation pressure.
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However, if you keep reading, you'll reach Newton's third law.
Your launch laser is equivalent to a drive.
Planets make great launch stations because they have a whole shit ton of mass. Hard to move.
Orbital stations? Not so much.
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But one on an orbital platform makes no sense. You need fuel lifted to the orbital platform to offset the impulse from the launch laser. It can only be less efficient than putting the fuel on the probe itself (assuming the probe can be designed to jettison spent fuel modules).
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Shoot the same amount of energy the other direction. Newton's Third Law, which he also used to derive Conservation of Momentum from by the way.
Now you're doubling your energy expenditure.
And since lasers run on electricity you could possibly get enough from solar power. The flux density of solar energy is still relatively high around the orbit of Earth.
So the argument is that we can afford the inefficiency. You might be right.
The main difference between a solar sail probe relying only on the Sun and a laser assisted solar sail probe would be that a laser, potentially an entire array of lasers, is better able to focus the energy into a point of higher flux density. That is because the laser beams can be steered to somewhat counteract the inverse square law while the energy from the sun can't be done much with in terms of the inverse square law. Well, perhaps we could build giant lenses in space?
Sure. The problem I had was with the inefficiency of using a reaction launcher from an inertial space station. You're either expending chemical fuel in an opposite vector of your launch vector, which balloons the launch cost tremendously, or you're blasting a laser that way, which hopefully doesn't melt anything behind you.
No matter how you swing it, using an inertial body that can't just
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Newton's Third Law, which he also used to derive Conservation of Momentum from by the way.
BTW, on this one...
Newton's second law is literally conservation of momentum in an inertial frame... How was it derived from the third?
Point me in a direction where I can read about this?
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The alteration of motion is ever proportional to the motive force impress'd; and is made in the direction of the right line in which that force is impress'd.
If any force generates a motion, a double force will generate double the motion, a triple force triple the motion, whether that force be impress'd altogether and at once, or gradually and successively. And this motion (being always directed the same way with the generating force) if the body moved before, is added to or subducted from the former motion, according as they directly conspire with or are directly contrary to each other; or obliquely joyned, when they are oblique, so as to produce a new motion compounded from the determination of both.
From this, you can conclude that 2 balls hitting head on with equal momentum will come to a stop.
Momentum is conserved. If they hit obliquely, the final motion is the sum of the 2 momenta. Momentum is conserved.
Corollary III.
The quantity of motion, which is collected by taking the sum of the motions directed towards the same parts, and the difference of those that are directed to contrary parts, suffers no change from the action of bodies among themselves.
For Action and its opposite Re-action are equal, by Law 3, and therefore, by Law 2, they produce in the motions equal changes towards opposite parts. Therefore if the motions are directed towards the same parts, whatever is added to the motion of the preceding body will be subducted from the motion of that which follows; so that the sum will be the same as before. If the bodies meet, with contrary motions, there will be an equal deduction from the motions of both; and therefore the difference of the motions directed towards opposite parts will remain the same.
Sounds about right.
I'd argue that 3 is implicit from 2's reading, though.
So you could say he derived conservation of momentum from the third law, but I'd argue he derived the third law from the second.
The third really just expands the second to handle co
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You don't have to focus the energy in the same way in both directions as long as the mean orientation of the momentum on both sides cancels each other out. So on one side you can have a highly focused beam. While on the other side you can have the energy diffused to create an incredibly wide beam where flux density even at close distances to the source is harmless.
As I said, as long as we're talking about small amounts of energy, that's fine. But it takes MW of radiation to produce enough momentum to move grams.
Launch lasers aren't something you can compensate for by putting a flashlight on the other end of the station.
The one paper I've seen on the topic stated 142MW to accelerate a 100g probe at 1 gravity.
Sure, you can use less power to accelerate less, but low levels of acceleration quickly turn into a "Why did we do this again?" due to the fact that the probe
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Just like you can split a beam with a beam splitter, you can also have them combine again, regardless of whether they're from the same source or not.
Yes, the paper I was referring to was proposing a phased array. Which is reasonable.
A laser bolted onto the ISS is not, because of Newton's third law.
A widely dispersed phased array solves the problem handily, by turning it into manageable amounts of power.
Ultimately, a photon driver is a photon rocket. Big photon rockets, which would be required for this to be anything worth considering, require either immense amounts of fuel to keep you in your orbit, which have to be lifted from the planet, or an eq
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There are plenty of ways to use an orbital station as laser push station.
a) a simple ion thruster on the station compensates for a simple laser "reflection based" probe "engine"
b) the probe hs fuel, the laser is only igniting the fuel, hence transferring mostly energy and not momentum
c) in both cases you even can imagine to balance propulsion by having your solar panels work as solar sails and counter the momentum
d) the laser could be used to just transfer energy and the probe is running on a plasma or ion
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There are plenty of ways to use an orbital station as laser push station.
Of course there are. This isn't about how you would go about accomplishing this worthless task.
a) a simple ion thruster on the station compensates for a simple laser "reflection based" probe "engine"
That requires fuel. Fuel must be lifted from Earth.
b) the probe hs fuel, the laser is only igniting the fuel, hence transferring mostly energy and not momentum
This statement is nonsensical.
A photon has momentum. You can't ask it to leave the momentum at home and just transfer its energy.
c) in both cases you even can imagine to balance propulsion by having your solar panels work as solar sails and counter the momentum
Nonsense.
Sure, it's hypothetically possible with large enough sails, but for any impulse worth talking about, you're talking kilometers of sail.
d) the laser could be used to just transfer energy and the probe is running on a plasma or ion drive
Firing the laser will impart an impulse on the inertial space station. It will accelerate i
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b) the probe hs fuel, the laser is only igniting the fuel, hence transferring mostly energy and not momentum
This statement is nonsensical.
A photon has momentum.
And what has the momentum of the photon to do with that? (* facepalm *)
Firing the laser will impart an impulse on the inertial space station. It will accelerate it. ....
Obviously. But somehow you forgot point a)
Sorry, I'm tired about your fake physics knowledge, so I do not comment on the rest of your post.
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And what has the momentum of the photon to do with that? (* facepalm *)
I imagine you facepalm yourself a lot.
You said:
b) the probe hs fuel, the laser is only igniting the fuel, hence transferring mostly energy and not momentum
That's not a thing. It's the ravings of a lunatic.
A photon driver is a photon drive. Momentum is not separable from energy. p=mv.
The ratio of m to p is static, because v is c.
So what does the momentum of the photon have to do with that? Just pointing out that you're a fucking moron, and what you said is fucking nonsensical.
Firing the laser will impart an impulse on the inertial space station. It will accelerate it. Obviously. But somehow you forgot point a) ....
No, I didn't. I directly responded to point A.
You're the one who pretends like point A is not a problem. Probably because you suck at
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A lunar elevator, however, could be constructed using commercially available mass-produced high-strength para-aramid fibres (such as Kevlar and M5) or ultra-high-molecular-weight polyethylene fibre.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
So, apart from all the money seems feasible!
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Are you being sarcastic? Elon Musk has promised many things, most of which didn't pan out, and the few that did are still miles away from his promised features and costs. I'm still waiting for a $30,000 electric sedan with a range comparable to my gasoline-fueled car. Oh and it was supposed to be able to drive itself from New York to California, charging itself on the way.
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Elon Musk has built the largest rocket ever
Which has never had a single successful flight.
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Elon Musk has built the largest rocket ever
Which has never had a single successful flight.
Wanna bet on how soon you'll be forced to move that goalpost? :D
Re:All this is academic... (Score:4, Insightful)
Are you being sarcastic? Elon Musk has promised many things, most of which didn't pan out, and the few that did are still miles away from his promised features and costs. I'm still waiting for a $30,000 electric sedan with a range comparable to my gasoline-fueled car. Oh and it was supposed to be able to drive itself from New York to California, charging itself on the way.
He's taken electric cars farther than anyone else. Put vehicles in space. Seems to be doing better at space programs than most governments, really.
I mean props where props are due, ya know.
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His company took electric cars from the dead end that big auto left it at to a viable consumer product that people want, forcing big auto to also have to go down the same path to remain competitive - exactly the goal he wanted.
If he did nothing else that alone is a massive achievement - but he hasn't stopped there. Rather than retire to a private tropical island and sipping margaritas all day he's gone on to also launch a space company that's completely changed the way we look at getting to orbit. T
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Not sure what your point his but he and his brother are majority stockholders. Even after 10% divestment he just did.
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Tesla isnâ(TM)t muskâ(TM)s company
Who's company is it?
Obviously as a publicly traded company anyone with enough money can buy one or more shares, but they direct the strategy and operations of the company.
If not Musk, who would you say is the person who is setting the strategic direction and providing the leadership and motivation for everyone else to achieve goals?
Some companies shamble around aimlessly due to a lack of leadership or due to multiple people leading in conflicting directions. Tesla may fall short of some ambitious goals but
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Who's company is it?
It’s the company of teslas founders. Musk isn’t a founder of Tesla.
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No, he hasn't. His contribution is marketing.
That certainly must be a comforting shibboleth to you for some reason.
Elon Musk is a marketing disaster. When he joined (not started) Tesla 9.5 out of 10 investment bankers and press pundits predicted failure before the fact and how electric cars were just not feasible. His clumsy public presence did not help.
Were it not for ACTUAL, not just perceived, engineering accomplishments via his leadership Tesla would have dried up in bankruptcy a decade ago.
Also: Stop pretending that Musk presents himsel
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I'll give you electric cars. Not for making them, since many people did that long before him, but for changing the perception that they're not viable as a replacement for personal vehicles. PHEVs were already in production when Tesla started to make the news so it was only a matter of time before they made pure electric ones. However, I would say he pushed the timeline for EV adoption earlier by a few years.
Putting an EV in space though? NASA did it in the 70's [wikipedia.org]. In fact they landed several on the moon. And
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How was this moderated Troll? I sense the presence of a deranged Elon Musk hater.
Human space flight is tremendously expensive (Score:2)
with little to show for it that couldn't have been achieved with uncrewed missions a lot cheaper. If private companies want to pursue it, fine, but let countries spend the money on more useful things here on Earth, or on uncrewed space exploration.
Re: Human space flight is tremendously expensive (Score:4, Insightful)
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> Human flight was once tremendously expensive too, now it's a vital part of our world.
But we are not anywhere near there yet for space. It has one of the slowest improvement curves of any technology (except maybe flying cars nuke fusion).
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Correction: "except maybe flying cars or nuke fusion."
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Human flight was once tremendously expensive too
Balloons became affordable in the 19th century and heavier then air flight in 1903 when some bicycle parts were cobbled together to fly and a dozen years later mass production made them common.
Basically flight has been affordable for the wealthy since invented, the Wright brothers weren't super wealthy and I believe not even particularly wealthy, being mechanics.
Now, 60 odd years since the first man in space, only the wealthiest people in the world can afford to fly into space, mostly suborbital.
We will see... (Score:2)
Nonsense summary without mentioning Spacex (Score:2, Insightful)
"Killer app" for space station (Score:1)
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Re: "Killer app" for space station (Score:2)
Space based manufacturing. 3d printers that can build in 3d at the same time a 6 head 3d printer building from a center dot outwards can only ve done in micro gravity.
Cut build times by order of magnitudes.
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Scammers at this point (Score:1)
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We've been doing this shit for decades, what other experiment is left?
Actually building a spinning station with simulated gravity. That way we can find out once and for all if humans can actually live long-term in low gravity environments like you would find on the Moon or Mars or if they will experience the same kind of bone density loss and eye problems, etc. that they experience in freefall.
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That's a bit along the lines of "all has been discovered".
Keep imagining! Lots more to learn & discover
Given NASA's track record... (Score:2)
When these stations are ready, NASA will guide the ISS into the atmosphere, where it will burn up and disintegrate.
Or, given NASA's track record, it will enter the atmosphere, start to burn up and promptly plough into Western Australia. They're still finding bits of SkyLab there! And NASA never paid the littering fine to Esperance, either.
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They're still finding bits of SkyLab there! And NASA never paid the littering fine to Esperance, either.
Have they tried selling the bits on eBay?
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I was trying to find an example, but couldn't. There are certainly new reports about SkyLab parts on eBay; for example this [space.com].
Who's decision? (Score:4, Insightful)
The politicians and accountants or the scientists and engineers?
It seem like a tremendous waste or resources to let it burn up rather than push it out into higher parking orbit even if only to provide resources for the future.
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But the maintenance cost and time on old parts also has to be considered. There comes a time when launching newer modules is cheaper than maintaining old ones.
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How about considering the ISS modules as raw material when we finally get around to doing space based manufacturing or refining?
Am sure the ISS module component alloys and materials are already known. Might make things easier having a chunk of known material out there, and with known quality.
It does not have to be in working condition if you going to melt it and build something else out of it.
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Cost-effective re-melting & pressing metals in space is a loooong way off.
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Well, how about seeing how a known material is affected during long exposure in space? Maybe check on ISS modules every 5-10 years, to see how the material degrades.
It will probably be something worth doing and knowing, if we are planning to have rockets / satellites / space stations / etc for many years up there. We can't exactly visit an old satellite from 50 years ago to check on it easily. Especially if one of the modules is attached to a new station. Even if not used for anything else, except to check
Can't sell it (Score:3)
There is too much space mold [science.org].
Seriously.
It won't pass a building safety inspection in any state and besides, the state of California has determined that the ISS contains material that is known to cause cancer or reproductive harm.
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Talidon terrorist
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Talidon? The blood pressure med?
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"Donnieban"?
Crazy instinct or clearing a Kestle cloud maker? (Score:2)
At first it seems wasteful to orbit tons of usable hardware put into orbit at great cost. Give it to me if you are done with it; seems a frugal circular economy response. But think of the downside. The more junk in orbit there is the likelier it becomes that collisions will cause a chain reaction of collisions: a Kestle cloud of high velocity debris depriving us of LEO for aeons, and making future passage through this high velocity shrapnel field that once was once pristine empty space problematic. So
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a Kestle cloud of high velocity debris
That should be Kessler [wikipedia.org], not Kestle.
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Yes. You are right Kessler cloud. Thanks!
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Space debris is a real concern, but for the record, it typically doesn't last eons. At least, not in LEO where space stations are located.
Debris left in orbits below 600 km normally fall back to Earth within several years. At altitudes of 800 km, the time for orbital decay is often measured in decades. Above 1,000 km, orbital debris will normally continue circling the Earth for a century or more.
For comparison, I believe the ISS orbits at 400km. Geostationary orbit is at ~35,000km, so it might last eons out there.
At least ... (Score:2)
Well, I don't relly know but in my opinion this "lets de-orbit them and get burned" is a mirror of our waste culture.
Is it really so difficult to at least safe the solar panels? A few ion thrusters that push them to 10,000km hight? for later reuse?
Or what about putting ion thrusters everywhere and trying to get it into a low orbit of the moon, like 100km for later safe de-orbiting? Might take a decade to let them fly there ...
But for me it is absurd to let a 100billion dollar project burn up in reentry ...
Y
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Jumbo jets. Cruise ships and war ships. Bridges.
There's not a lot of value in saving the parts for re-use when those parts are brittle, worn-out and obsolete.
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The concrete of bridges is reused.
Warships metal usually - at least in our times - is reused.
That thing is just burning up ...
Commercial company did so well on earth ! (Score:1)
It's amazing,
after ruining everything on earth for the sake of money, let's give away low orbit to commercial use.
profit of a few instead of benefit for all, cost reduction, I have no idea what could go wrong.
Just build a new one (Score:2)
We can fund it from from the first 3 months of 2022's the US military's budget.
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I think having a moon base would be a better use of government money at this point.
Plus, John Madden!
Why? (Score:2)
I'm as ardent a space-advocate as anyone, and sure, I'd love to see our L-points littered with O'Neill habitats but...but why would all these companies do such a thing?
US Corporations (and most in the western world) have trouble making THREE year plans and sticking to them, much less a plan that's going to take a decade or more of MASSIVE, no-return investment to even *start*, much less tolerate the decades it's going to take for payback for such a project (even if that payback is guaranteed to be googols o
The ISS is the hopes of Mankind. (Score:1)
Politics will drag humanity's worst attributes... (Score:1)
Politics and religion have proven to be mankind's biggest blunders.
Perhaps, somehow, (we) figure out how to behave like an advanced, space-faring species before we screw that up.