Space hotelier Bigelow wants capitalists to FIGHT comm-MOON-ist takeover Bigelow Aerospace, sellers of inflatable bubble habitats for infinity and beyond, is filing for an amendment to the 1967 Outer Space Treaty to allow private individuals to own sections of the Moon. "No one 'anything' should own the moon, but yes, multiple entities, groups, individuals, they should have the opportunity to own …
"The Chinese establish a base on the moon, which they probably will in 20 years it will make Obamas project cancellations at Nasa seem very foolish."
Firstly the SLS is going ahead and is bit enough to go to the Moon.
However because it's mostly sized to keep a bunch of Mormons in Salt Lake City employed at just about the worst place in the country to build a very big SRB it'll only launch about once every 2 years.
If the Legislature dumped SLS and re-structured a programme around LV's which already exist and have flight records (the EELV's and F9) the same funding level could probably get America back to the Moon in 5 years.
Once you know the biggest single item that's transported is propellant, which is also the easiest to sub divide into pieces for transport, you have to ask WTF would you build a big rocket at the start of your development when it's the vehicles that carry that propellant (the EDS, living module, landing module, service module etc) that matter most.
The only honest answer is politics.
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"It's the psychological impact that has the value, of every soul looking at the moon and knowing that it belongs to China," he said
Oh man, we should come up with some sort of international treaty to prevent exactly that scenario from happening.
Sorry, what's that? Oh, they did? Back in 1967 you say? And the Chinese signed on to it in 1983? Huh...
We could go all 15th century on the moon. "I claim this land in the name of his Presidential pulcritude, Barak the First!!". And I'm sure that Queen Liz is looking to expand her title to include "Queen of England, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and the Sea of Storms". Sounds almost Tolkeinesque.
Now all we need are some natives to exploit :)
More seriously, I expect that the high-90th percentile of nations that don't have the coin and expertise to join the lunar gold rush will want some revenue sharing in return for their current rights.
Because what you end up with is the UN as the "one government" for off-planet humanity and a bunch of infighting egoists on-planet. Under no circumstances do the infighting egoists want to give the UN any form of legitimacy as a governmental body whatsoever. Ultimately, they want to rule. They want to see their "enemies" - for that is how they all truly see other nations - sundered. America does not want a "United Nations colony" any more than it wants a "United Earth" under anything but the heel of it's own jackboots. China, Russia, the UK and 99%* of the rest of the nations out there are not different.
*Exceptions made for Norway, Denmark, Finland, Sweden, Switzerland Estonia, Canada and possibly New Zealand.
I'm not too worried myself, the cost of getting there and back is so huge that any business venture would be bound to fail anyway. However the following quote concerning bubbles in orbit was quite intruiging :
"The bubble will form an extra module on the ISS and will be deployed and monitored for two years, although astronauts are still deciding if they want to live in it and are more likely to pop in every month or so to check out systems."
I'm thinking that a bubble habitat in space is not something you'd want to "pop in" to.
In 1967 only a govt could launch LEO or BEO vehicles.
All going well that will change and "sub national"organizations will need to be allowed to take responsibility and the rewards of both transport and ownership. If a private LV crashes that's not the responsibility of the country their HO is based in, it's the companies. Likewise if a company lands on the Moon it would seem fair to have rights to an unclaimed area (and what about any "salvage" scrap they happen to pick up there?).
I already own the moon, all of it.
I had an email some time back with an offer to purchase so i took advantage of this once-in-a-lifetime-opportunity and I now have a piece of paper that says it's mine.
There is a collection of unwanted local space junk I have on E-Bay (buyer collects)
This is all academic isn't it, seeing as Humanity doesn't have
a delivery device that can transport all the Earth bound metal
to the Moon to clad the inflatable tents with, not unless the Yanks
can persuade Human beings that having their cells continuously
bombarded with 'X' and 'Gamma' rays is good for them?....they'll
certainly lose a lot of weight !!
Why not drop some autonomous bots onto the moon with all the instructions they need to scavenge/process materials, then use a 3D printer bot to manufacture more bots until you have an army digging away.
Then get some of the bots to make a big ship and send all that lurvly moon cheese back once in a while.
Yes it will take time, but I assure you, they will grind the entire moon down to Earth bound dust so efficiently, it will replace sand and gravel as aggregate in concrete.
and just to keep the "it's all mine, mine I tell you!" people happy, we can fit them with guns to shoot each other for digging outside their mandated area.
Here's a thought, the oxygen component of the several billion tons of water on the moon can be set into the cargo ship as frozen blocks that will sublimate on re-entry thus allowing a powered landing.
"Crucially, Article Six defines states to cover non-governmental entities operating within their jurisdiction,"
So, A Bigalow bubble hotel in LEO and he moves his "corporation base" to it. Exactly which "jurisdiction" is he then operating in?
At this extremely early stage in space colonisation, he couldn't really operate from space since all manufacturing and finance would have to happen on earth, but give it 20 years or so of commercial lift vehicles and bubble hotels and maybe space manufacture of new alloys or drugs only possible in microgravity and it could be a whole different story.
Administration of space should remain in the hands of publicly accountable and electable organisations.
If this guy gets what he wants, then the corporatisation of space for profit above all else will inevitably follow. And the inevitable outcome of that can be expressed in two words:
Weyland-Yutani.
Let's not kid ourselves here. Any Moon treaty is worthless. The only nations that can afford to go there are powerful enough and arrogant enough to ignore any piffling bit paper, if it suits their purpose. The Moon will be, for all intents and purposes, owned by the people who go their and can defend their territory. Unfortunate, but imo, true.
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