Category Archives: Business

Business, Economics, Law, Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Space, Space History, Space Science, Technology and Society

The SEDS Act

7 Comments

Dana has been talking about this for a year, but he’s finally introduced it:

To require the National Aeronautics and Space Administration to investigate and promote the exploration and development of space leading to human settlements beyond Earth, and for other purposes.

Development and settlement demand low cost of access to space, while NASA is forced by Congress to pursue a giant rocket that has exactly the opposite effect. I wish they’d left the E word out, because that’s implicit, and it allows people to maintain the status quo: “Well, the first thing we have to do is exploration, before we can think about development and settlement. And we can’t do exploration without SLS!”

I have a query in to Tony DeTora as to how this differs from the 1989 bill, because I still see no teeth in it regarding what to do if the administrator ignores it and doesn’t submit reports.

[Update a while later]

Related: A new book of essays and stories on the spiritual aspects of space. Here’s a review.

Business, Economics, Political Commentary, Space, Technology and Society

Turning Bubble Wrap Into Satellites

8 Comments

Rob Hoyt told me about this when I was up in Seattle in November:

BOTHELL, WA., 17 March 2016 – NASA has announced that its Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Program has selected Tethers Unlimited, Inc. (TUI) for award of a Phase II contract to develop “Customizable, Recyclable ISS Packaging” (CRISSP). CRISSP is a suite of recyclable packaging materials, such as bags, bubble-wrap, and 3D-printed containers that are designed to cushion and protect equipment and supplies during launch to the International Space Station (ISS) and then be processed into 3D printer feedstock to support in-space manufacturing of tools, satellite components, and replacement parts.

TUI creates its patent-pending CRISSP materials using high-performance plastics that are chosen based upon their safety for use in space missions, their ease of recycling, and their suitability for use in 3D printing. “One really exciting aspect of the project is that 3D printing has enabled us to build novel vibration damping features into CRISSP,” said Dr. Rachel Muhlbauer, Principal Investigator on the SBIR effort. “Our Phase I effort demonstrated the ability of the CRISSP materials to absorb launch vibrations up to ten times better than traditional foam packaging materials, and the Phase II effort will develop and qualify a process for rapidly designing and manufacturing protective packaging that is customized for each payload.” To recycle CRISSP materials aboard the ISS, NASA will use TUI’s Positrusion™ Recycler, a suitcase-sized system that safely and automatically processes plastic waste into very high-quality filament for 3D printers.

“We are very excited to continue collaborating with NASA Marshall Space Flight Center’s In-space Manufacturing Project to develop a sustainable in-space manufacturing ecosystem for the ISS and future manned missions,” said Dr. Rob Hoyt, TUI’s CEO and Chief Scientist. “A typical cargo mission to the ISS carries about 25 pounds of packaging material. Currently, that’s 25 pounds of waste they have to dispose of. But with launch costs around $10,000 per pound, that material is worth roughly a quarter million dollars. The combination of CRISSP packaging materials and our Positrusion Recycler will enable NASA to transform this waste on the ISS into valuable feedstock to help manufacture and operate the next generation of exploration systems.”

Just think if the money being wasted on the giant rocket was going to more of this sort of thing.

Business, Economics, Space, Technology and Society

ULA Versus SpaceX

15 Comments

An interesting report by Peter Selding of a talk by one of ULA’s execs. It seems remarkably candid. Tory has really brought big changes to the company. But I don’t get this thinking:

“Don’t get me wrong: SpaceX has done some amazing stuff,” Tobey said. “The landing [in December] of that [Falcon 9] first stage at the Cape was nothing short of amazing. My wife and I were at Best Buy and watching it on my iPhone and I just got goose bumps. It was cool.

“Watching them smash it into the barge was fun, too,” he said of previous, and a subsequent, SpaceX attempts at landing the first stage.

“It’s getting tons of press. It’s extraordinarily, engineeringly cool – but it’s dumb,” Tobey said. “I mean: Really? You carried 100,000 pounds of fuel after deployment of the SES satellite [SpaceX’s March launch of the commercial SES-9 telecommunications satellite, to geostationary-transfer orbit] just to try to land on the barge.”

Let’s see. Propellant costs less than a buck a pound. So for less than a hundred grand, you get an entire stage, worth tens of millions, back intact. Doesn’t sound dumb to me.

[Update a few minutes later]

Some discussion on Twitter, including with Jeff Foust, indicating that perhaps he didn’t intend for that talk to be on the record. If so, that would account for the unusual candor.

[Update a few more minutes later]

OK, majority of upset on Twitter seems to be the analogy of having two fiances. And I can’t imagine that Eileen will be happy about that talk.

[Update a while later]

Oops.

[Afternoon update]

Tory has to clean up the mess.

[Thursday-morning update]

Aaaaaaand, he’s outta there.

Apparently, he’d only been in the job since September. He’d come there from Lockmart. Not sure if we should draw any conclusions from that.

[Update a few minutes later]

More from Peter Selding. Tobey was canned for a Kinsleyan gaffe — accidentally telling the truth in public. It’s the first time (and probably last) that I’ve ever seen anyone from ULA call the parents “dysfunctional.” But everyone in the business knows it’s true.

[Mid-morning update]

And now McCain is sticking his idiot nose in.

[Update a while later]

Here‘s Tim Fernholz’s take.

Business, Economics, Mathematics, Media Criticism, Political Commentary

The Pension Crisis

7 Comments

It keeps getting worse.

As I’ve said in the past, if the federal government bails out a state, it should be under the conditions that it revert to territory status until it has demonstrated fiscal responsibility over a long period of time. And in the case of California, it should not be allowed to come back in as a single state. If this requires a constitutional amendment, I’ll bet you could slam one through enough of the more fiscally prudent states pretty quickly.

Business, Culinary, Economics, Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Popular Culture, Science And Society, Social Commentary, Technology and Society

The Cloud People

30 Comments

…versus the Ground People.

I totally get the anger that has created Trump. I share it. But I will never understand why they don’t see that he’s a false vessel for it.

Also, this is funny but sad, about Whole Foods customers.

[Update a while later]

This seems related: The new WASPs are Asians in Silicon Valley.