thus leading to mccarthyism and the "red scare" which caused many people to be grieved and hide in the shadows of their former freedoms thereby making anyone acting even slightly suspicious a spy and general cause for flogging

so instead of being open about it on both sides they hid behind walls and fought each other with paper bullets eventually calling ceasefire with an uprise of civil liberties and humantiarianism

You might be interested to know of the new alliance that "ensure that the benefits of renewable clean energy from space solar power are understood and supported by business, governments and the general public."

The inaugural event of the new alliance, held at the National Press Club in Washington D.C. 10 October, highlighted a study underway by the National Security Space Office (NSSO) on the viability of space-based solar power, presented by Lt. Col. Paul Damphousse, National Security Space Office. John Mankins, President, SUNSAT Energy Council, a leading expert on space solar power, also spoke.

P.S. I embedded the link, but it didn't appear. Let's see if I can give it unbedded...

http://www.kurzweilai.net/news/frame.html?main=/news/news_single.html?id%3D7334

OK?

Hi Amara,

Nice to hear from you! Thanks for the heads up: Interesting! Is there any literature on what sort of implementations are being considered?

-cvj

Thanks... just saw your second comment. Will have a look.

-cvj

what happened to our space program? it seems as if we as a nation have forgotten about the importance of HUMAN exploration, that is what led us to where we are today. whether it was north africa, asia, austrialia, the americas, or the moon people have been driven to see whats next. we could go to the moon in a year why arent we going?

Hi Kevin Hannah,

In my opinion, the space program is *fantastic*! There's been marvellous work done on the exploration of our solar system. Have you been looking at the images from the Mars Rovers, the Cassini-Huygens mission for example? The Dawn spacecraft launched just a few weeks ago... The Phoenix mission... So many wonderful missions bringing so much wonderful science. My opinion, for what its worth, is that focusing on manned missions is a poor use of resources. Especially when resources are limited (as they are), small missions are the way to go, I'd say.... You then don't have to worry about supporting and feeding of the large mammals who came along for the ride.

Best,

-cvj

Dear Clifford,

I wasn't at that press conference and didn't follow up any details, but I picked up some tidbits from some people behind the scenes, and I know something of their goals. In addition, my affiliated institute: Planetary Science Institute in Tucson, engaged in a discussion on this topic late last Spring, so let's start with that, with Bill Hartmann's words first. Bill was an invited speaker at a conference on Environmental Ethics of Space Exploration, at NASA Ames. and heard a very interesting talk by John Lewis that goes like this: (quote by Bill Hartmann follows)

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" The main problem is that we are running out of fossil fuels in this century. (Side comment: Recent articles in Science suggest global oil production will peak and start to decline between 2020 and 2060.) In a crude sense, we could say that as we run out of fossil fuels, the CO2 global warming problem will take care of itself, though our children will be a lot less comfortable.

So the real problem for civilization is: What do we do about energy? To spin off what John Lewis, Dave Criswell (in Houston) and others have been saying for years, we need to develop solar. (We may need more messy nuclear as a transition -- it's sustainable put produces nasty radioactive waste.) I understand, from Dave for example, that wind and geothermal, though locally useful, will never do the job for the planet; in terms of clean, sustainable energy, only solar can do that. John and Dave's vision is that we collect "free" solar energy in space or on the moon, and beam it down into the Earth grid by microwave. The old objection was that the beam would fry birds and hikers who wandered into the beam, but John indicates that dispersed receiving antennae can create receiving farms where body temperature would go up by only 1/2 degree. (And as he says, all energy systems have some down sides; the up side here is "endless," sustainable amounts of pollution-free energy, without having to mine coal, petroleum, etc.) John talked about 1000 or 2000 solar photovoltaic power satellites in geosynch orbit (a band of brighter-than-Venus "stars" along the celestial equator. David talks about putting the photovoltaics on the moon, in a band stretching around all longitudes, with transmitters on the front side.

Action item? The conclusion would be that we should all be lobbying for NASA (who foster photovoltaic production for spacecraft solar panels anyway) to be a "part of the global solution" and develop a initial demonstration project, even if only modest number of megawatts, to find out if this can be done. Plus....as USA improves photovoltaic efficiency, we can spin this off into industry and start to market US solar panels to small farmers, businesses, and families around the world...which becomes our answer to terrorism based on Western intrusion into other cultures......"

Since writing the above, Bill suggests a good web reference to similar ideas from a National Security Space Office study dated October 10, 2007. The National Space Society posted a discussion of this at:

www.nss.org/settlement/ssp/library/nsso.htm
(see the Press page, too, for how widely this event was covered)

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(Bill Hartmann)

* [...] if you do the standard "20th century economist" cost-benefit tradeoff of infrastructure investment cost against likely price of other fossil fuels, it's hard to see an economic payoff soon enough to encourage any investment in solar power satellites. However, what convinces me to predict this is that it's not just an economic situation, but a geo-political-economic situation. It addresses global warming, but perhaps more immediate is the few hundred billion $$/year (isn't that about right?) that we are now spending to fight terrorists who want to blow up our cities. Terrorists successfully recruit more terrorists on the perceived grounds that Western nations and businesses have come into their lands and corrupted their culture, mostly in search of fossil fuels. So it seems to me that a very public and dramatic move toward solar power can be justified by nations or national networks like European Union -- on the geoeconomic strategic rationale that it makes us less reliant on mid-east oil and getting us out of the middle east. The perfect analog was Pres. Kennedy's decision to stimulate US technology and demonstrate power of our economic system by making 1st landings on the moon. (There was very little direct economic justification). But this time, instead of six landings on the moon, we offer the world pollution free, zero-CO2-footprint power into the grid.

* This is also the obvious answer to any concerns from environmental groups. It would be taking a step toward letting the Earth relax back to a more natural state by taking heavy energy (and some resource production (as opposed to mining and burning more fossil fuels in the ecosphere.)

* In any case, at beginning, you simply don't assess this on conventional economic grounds the way investors would. It's more like all the citizens are investors trying to get the payoff of ending some really major problems.

* Any program of this type would have additional benefits of spinoffs into private industry -- esp. in the direction of developing more efficient solar photovoltaic cells, which can then be marketed by American (or other) companies to middle east and other developing regions.

* Carol and others raise danger of beam being a weapon. Lewis's answer it 2-fold. If stations are built to send a diffuse beam, it can be harvested by an antenna-farm array. Human in the beam gets T raised by only 1/2 degree. Second, instead of one big lunar base or satellite subject to attack, you deploy ~1000 geosynch satellites, so no one is a decisive target. [Besides, if someone aimed a beam at Tucson and raised T another 100 degrees, no one would notice. Just kidding.]

* I've read that EU contemplates an array of wind-generating stations in an off-shore chain. Such sites might also be good collector antennae locations.

(end Hartmann quote)

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So for references on this topic, I'll give you a trail to David Criswell's work. I have been always impressed by his lunar dust levitation and his 'star lifting' ideas, then became impressed all over again with his solar power ideas. I think that Criswell's proposal is GREAT, and if anyone can pull it off, he can.

http://www.aip.org/tip/INPHFA/vol-8/iss-2/p12.pdf
Solar Power Via the Moon
David Criswell

--
http://www.aip.org/tip/INPHFA/vol-8/iss-4/p31.pdf
Return to the Moon
David Criswell

http://www.aip.org/tip/INPHFA/vol-8/iss-5/p28.pdf
Microwaves from the Moon

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And this AIP Press Report on Criswell's work

http://www.aip.org/isns/reports/2002/040.html
Getting Power From The Moon

Houston, TX (April 15, 2002) - If a physicist in Houston has his way you'll be able to say good-bye to pollution-causing energy production from fossil fuels. In the April/May issue of The Industrial Physicist Dr. David Criswell suggests that the Earth could be getting all of the electricity it needs using solar cells - on the moon.

In the article Criswell proposes a Lunar Solar Power (LSP) System, using arrays of solar cells on the lunar surface to beam energy back to Earth. Criswell estimates that the 10 billion people living on Earth in 2050 will require 20 Terawatts (TW) of power. The Moon receives 13,000 TW of power from the sun. Criswell suggests that harnessing just 1% of the solar power and directing it toward Earth could replace fossil fuel power plants on Earth.

"The lunar operations are primarily industrial engineering," says Criswell. He and Dr, Robert Waldron first described LSP in 1984 at a NASA symposium on Lunar Bases and Space Activities in the 21st Century. "Adequate knowledge of the moon and practical technologies have been available since the late 1970's to collect this power and beam it to Earth. The system can be built on the moon from lunar materials and operated on the moon and on Earth using existing technologies," reducing the expenses associated with transporting materials to the moon. He adds that LSP would be even cheaper if parts of the production machinery are designed to be made of lunar materials.

The LSP system consists of 20-40 lunar power bases, situated on the eastern and western edges of the moon, as seen from Earth. Each power base has a series of solar cells to collect energy from the sun, which is sent over buried electric wires to microwave generators that convert the solar electricity to microwaves. The generators then send the energy to screens that reflect the microwave beams toward Earth, where they are received by arrays of special antennas strategically placed about the globe. "Each antenna converts the microwave power to electricity that is fed into the local power grid," says Criswell.

"LSP is probably the only option for powering a prosperous world within the 21st century," says Criswell. "However, it does require a return to the moon." The system depends on some human occupation of the moon to build and run the lunar bases, but Criswell also sees this as an opportunity. "Once we are back and operating at large scale then going down the various learning curves will make traveling to the moon and working there 'routine."

## ## ##

For more information:
Rory Richards, (301) 209-3088

Expert:
David Criswell
University of Houston, Director of
the Institute for Space Systems Operation
(281)-486-5019

The impact of this event on our culture cannot be underestimated.

You obviously want to say the opposite:
it cannot be overestimated

:-))

Absolutely. A mistake brought on by my changing "should not" to "cannot" in a final edit. Will change. Thanks!

-cvj