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Jun

2017

Seven million and a half kg of gold in orbit

Thanks to Stefano Antonetti, Bernard Farkin and Manuel Perez for commenting and editing this article.

As of 1957, it is estimated that on average 132 orbital launches have been made per year, leading to a total of about eight thousand. 4256 satellites were traced by UNOOSA in August 2016, of which only 1419 (33%) are operating. About 18,000 are orbital scrap large enough (more than 10 cm.) to be traced. About 64% of traceable objects are fragments resulting from destructive events such as explosions or collisions. A much larger population of debris can not be monitored operationally. In the space between low orbit (LEO, 300 km) and geostationary orbit(GEO, 36 thousand km) travel – at orbital velocity – an estimated number of 700,000 objects larger than 1 cm and 170 million objects of dimensions greater than 1 mm. Which means that the near Earth space region becomes more and more dangerous. But this is not the aspect I want to talk about today. Those who know me for my predominantly philosophical works may be surprised by this article, which includes a number of economic and social considerations. In fact, I want to demonstrate the convenience — today, and not in a distant future — of investing in orbital industrial activities conducted by human technicians, with respect to fully robotic operations. Moreover, without offending all those who continue to oppose and fear civilian expansion into outer space, it is enough to analyse the environment we are talking about, to understand that the most promising activities are simply unworkable without the presence of human operators. This is a presentist vision rather than a futurist one: Space Renaissance, the international association that i am honored to preside, promotes civil expansion in outer space, we aim to stimulate investments, revive the economy and develop millions of new jobs today, and not in the near future …

Space debris: do we need an orbital car crusher?

So let’s start from scrap, or space waste, or debris… I.e. objects that, according to a very common opinion, no longer have any useful purpose. But is it true? Let’s make some calculations.

The total weight of space scrap is about 7,500 tons, or 7.5 million kilograms. The cost of ground-to-orbit transport has remained steady over the last 50 years, around $ 20,000 per kilo, kept high by a cartel made up of large builders of expendable rockets, grouped in the North American ULA (United Launch Alliance). Recent history sees China and India positioning their payload price between $ 10 and $ 25,000 per kilo. But the monopoly of spendable rockets was broken only by the advent of Space X’s reusable launchers, which triggered a Renaissance process of which we have seen so far only the first steps. How much did it cost to send 7.5 Million Kilos of terrestrial artifacts? At $ 20,000 per kilo, about $ 300 billion. If we then add the costs of design, construction and management, it is not difficult to get a total cost of close to 1 $ trillion. Considering that the current price of gold is around $ 41,000 per kilo, it is like saying that we have a heritage comparable to 7.5 million pounds of gold orbiting over our heads, if we like to see it from an economic point of view. If, like me, you want to see it from the civilisation ethical and evolutionary point of view as well, it is aaas if we wanted to lock ourselves in a golden cage, but without taking care, so far, to develop systems capable of remedying this disaster.

We can even smile, although it’s a bitter smile. Do we bear in mind the case of big citiy waste? The situation is not different, indeed: waste constitutes an environmental tragedy only for those who have not yet decided to use it. For those who own good recycling facilities, waste is worth gold! In addition, for the plant owners, the profit is made twice, as it not only produces energy and materials of various use, but they are paid to receive the waste from those who are not equipped to use them as well! We can well imagine how those who have invested in the recycling industry have a cynical but understandable smile on their face, when considering the still large array of suckers who pay to dispose of their wealth!
Did you get the picture, looking down at the ground? Well, now look up. We immediately realize that, with regard to so-called space waste, the whole world is blind, and no companies have yet emerged capable of investing in the facilities needed for the collection, processing and reuse of this immense orbital wealth. By developing orbiting modular workshops – the experience with the International Space Station is fundamental – we can begin to capture scrap, separate metals from plastic, grind the various components and extract dust, the “raw” material for 3d printing. What are we waiting for?

New space industry is taking first steps on this roadmap. D-ORBIT, a small Italian company, develops a system for satellite decommissioning at the end of their life cycle. A first step, aimed at not producing new waste. But all travel begins with a first step. And the fact that there are those who reason and operate at this level is quite comforting, indeed.

Disposing of new satellites by means of special on board subsystems, causing them to burn up in the atmosphere, is a necessary precautionary measure, aimed at limiting the production of new waste. Capturing existing scrap, and throwing it in the same way into the “incinerator” of reentering the atmosphere, would solve the problem of orbital remediation. However, in the medium to long term, these are “losing” investments, since they are not aimed at using the wealth of space scrap, but rather adds costs to the terrestrial community. Economically speaking, the destruction of waste, both on the ground and in space, is equivalent in value to destroying a great value. Not to mention that, however, in order to capture orbital scrap, we will already need machines capable of interorbital maneuvers, piloted and operated by human beings. Therefore, it is worth dealing with a more ambitious program at the outset, and at the same time develop both collection and process-reuse facilities.

It is clear that, with such a wider range of views, we are including a much larger number of stakeholders: the security of orbital flights — any mission or freight or passengers transportation for anywhere in space must pass through Earth orbit–, whatever their motivation and destination, exploration or tourism, low orbit or Jupiter moons, industrial research or settlement, etc …; short / medium term investment return; global industrial and economic development; social benefits, employment, the development of new markets.

Workshops, service stations and orbital factories

And here we come to the second great and promising presentist challenge. Space scrap recovery and recycling connects fluidly, seamlessly with another major industrial activity. Our orbital workshops, already set up on site with the aim of collecting and processing space scrap, are enriched and differentiated by another feature: the in-orbit assembly of satellites. Supported by robotic mechanisms, our workshop starts to become an orbital satellite factory. Do you like using some retro terms, like “factory”? Although strongly projected onto Renaissance innovation, we are also extremely conscious of how much we owe to our parents and grandparents … who have given their sweat and often their lives, building industrial civilization 1.0. And we like to continue to use certain terms as a tribute to that civilization that they had built with hope in a better future… at the dawn of the Renaissance of Industrial Civilization 2.0, hoping and struggling so that this was the end of the pre-space-age recession.

So, for investors, assembling satellites in orbit by human technicians will lead to a substantial reduction in many sources of expenditure. Firstly, we should bear in mind that every ground-assembled satellite needs expensive automation for the deployment of photovoltaic panels and communication antennas. Such automated mechanisms are also very expensive, since they must be robust enough to withstand the great vibrations and huge accelerations of the launch. If the assembly of the satellite will be in orbit, we can get rid of such mechanisms. And the weight to be dispatched to orbit will be less. Secondly, consider that, with the exception of orbital telescopes, any satellite maintenance is very expensive in the present paradigm, and therefore unfeasible. The components are thus very costly, since they shall be resistant to cosmic hard radiation, and responsive to the most restrictive fault tolerance and fault avoidance requirements. Our orbital workshops could take care of the satellites’ location as well as of their periodic maintenance and repair, which would allow the use of commercial components at a much lower cost. Finally, orbital workshops could take care of the satellites de-commissioning at the end of their lifecycle, so they would also save automated decommissioning systems, at least for larger machines. The decommissioning subsystems of the smaller satellites could be programmed to return to the nearest collection station at the end of their life. It goes without saying that the periodic maintenance of the satellites would lengthen their life, resulting in a further reduction in overall costs and parallel increase in profitability.

Summarizing: any automation that we can avoid onboard the satellite reduces the cost of design, components, development, testing, integration and launch. But it’s not over here: we talked about recycling. And here we close a first circle: with the material output of the scrap processing plants we will feed the orbital factories, which can produce parts of satellites in orbit, by means of 3d printing, further reducing the development and launch costs! Here, the frontier begins to produce on its own, and then to start a real exo-economy, though still tied to Earth by a robust umbilical cord …

So far, we have only talked about two orbital industrial threads, space scrap recycling and in-orbit satellites assembly. But urgently need to start get the ball rolling! A myriad of jobs and trades will be born around and supporting civil industrial activities in space. Just think only of the vast constellation of jobs that were born following the development of the web and the development of renewable energy sources … scared about artificial intelligence? It does not make sense! The world is so varied, and the environment of outer space even more so, that we can not do without human intelligence, creativity and flexibility – provided that it was convenient to do without, and we saw that it is not. Above all, we can never ask for a machine, apart from seeing a danger for which it was not programmed, to have insight into the potentials that become evident in the most inscrutable ways to human mind, often re-emerging after a day of depression and pessimism … or in front of a spectacular rise of blue Earth from the lunar horizon …
So let’s list here in bulk, but we’ll come back soon with more details, a series of industrial activities that can all be done on a 20-year horizon, thanks to new enabling technologies such as reusable launch systems, and additive manufacturing: large orbital solar energy collection facilities, fueling stations for geo-lunar and interplanetary transports, lunar and asteroid raw material processing plants, orbital, lunar and lunar orbital hotels, orbital yards for construction and assembly of spacecraft for various destinations, low and zero gravity hospitals, lunar and asteroid minerals mining, spinning orbital villages, lunar research, exploration, and industrial infrastructures.

All this opens another chapter that also needs to be urgently addressed: space law, which is firmly bound to the Treaty on the Peaceful Use of the Outer Space, which is the 50th anniversary this year. We will talk about this soon.

In 2017 Space Renaissance will develop, or contribute to, several initiatives as part of the Space Renaissance Tour:

– Nigeria, 18-21 October 2017 – Lead City University, Ibadan, hosts the first event of the Space Renaissance Tour:
The Event’s home page on the Space Renaissance website
The Event on Facebook
The Space Renaissance Nigeria Facebook page

– USA, USIP, October 10th, Outer Space Treaty, 50 Years Anniversary, news will be given on:
the Space Renaissance USA, Inc website. and
the Space Renaissance USA Facebook page

– Italia, Outer Space Treaty, 50 Years Anniversary: an opportunity to boost the adoption of a true space law system, to rule and support civil activities in space, news will be given on:
the Space Renaissance Italia website and
the Space Renaissance Italia Facebook page

– UK, Space Renaissance Tour events will take place in Glasgow and Edinbourgh, stay tuned on:
the Space Renaissance UK Facebook page

Please also don’t forget, to develop all of the above, and more, we do need money… donate to the Space Renaissance Tour Crowdfunding campaign
And join us, registering as a member of the Space Renaissance

May

2017

World wide call: support the Space Renaissance!

Dear SRI Friends and Supporters,

2017 is a wonderful opportunity, being the 50th anniversary of the Outer Space Treaty, to bring to the public attention the theme of the expansion of civilian activities and expanding civilian rights into the Outer Space.

Trying to be coherent with the commitments we took in our last congress, a few months ago, we are developing several projects, in different countries, naming just some of these initiatives:
– a primary Space Renaissance Tour in Nigeria, next October
– an event at USIP, in the USA, to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Outer Space Treaty, and solicit a revision and further implementation of it
– a similar event in Italy, in collaboration with ASI and ESA
– conferences in the UK, with universities in Glasgow and Edinbourgh
– developing Space Renaissance Academy, an high profile Institute for education and outreach.

Besides, the SR International is strongly committed to sustain our supporters in all countries where they are working to create a Space Renaissance Chapter: India, Nigeria, UK, and other ones.

In this respect, i’d like to communicate here what is our spirit and setup, promoting local chapters of SR International.
Local chapters are very important, for us: without local chapters no international organization would exist.
Only local chapters allow people to work together in the real life, and not only on the web. To see each other face to face, and not only via electronic means. A real solidarity and practical sharing of goals and activities can ve developed only by human direct contact. The network is important, of course: just think about how it was hard, for international organizations to develop, 50 years ago, without the world wide web…
The network is a necessary but not sufficient condition, for an international to develop, national groups of activists need to meet, to agree their agendas, to work in their own country reality, political environment, people’s cultural perception level…

SR International is not a political party, we don’t claim to create a world wide political leadership.
The aims of the International are to develop the philosophy, to understand the current status of civilization, by means of our social analysis, and this is what we make in our international congresses.
We give general indications, about priority industrial developments.
We suggest equally cooperation and fair competition, among nations, for the opening of the space frontier, for the extension of civilian rights in outer space. In this respect the International acts like FIFA (Fédération Internationale de Football Association).
So we encourage peaceful and fair competition, and the generous sharing of know how and experience, achieved by the already space-faring Countries, with the Countries that are initiating their journey into space.

Should a SRI local chapter publically work for the primacy of its Country, for the leadership in the conquer of space? Yes, of course! Any real progress in the human expansion in outer space will be however for the benefit of the whole humanity!
Yes, history will always remember who was first in Earth Orbit, who was first on the Moon, who will be first on Mars, who will be the first capturing and asteroid and transforming it in a geo-lunar habitat…
But noting will prevent others, after the first, to do the same! And the acquired know how will be precious.

So, dear friends and supporters, be patriots, and be earthling citizen, at the same time, and give birth to Space Renaissance local Chapters!

However, i am here today also to ask you for money, to support all what we do.
Your contribute is precious: without your registration fees, we could sustain our websites, our newsletters, our tax duties, nor provide a small support for kicking-off new chapters.

Please register as a member.

If you register to a local chapter, you will be however also a member of the International.
Please also consider a donation.

Also, you can donate to our crowdfunding campaign for the Space Renaissance Tour, if you like so.

If you live in the UK, you might like to contact Ryan J. Curtis, to help him creating the SRI UK chapter.
And, if you live in India, you could write to Sourav Karmakar.

Choose your preferred way, but please support the Space Renaissance!

Ad Astra!

Apr

2017

Elon Musk, Leonardo da Vinci and Wernher Von Braun

It’s been over three months since our last newsletter, and we won’t deny that this break was mainly due to a necessary reflection. Renaissance years are never easy, as history teaches us, and this historical phase is manifesting more and more hectic and contradictory, if not chaotic, events. Political turmoil and movements came about centuries ago, and are doing so again, dividing countries, and offering simplistic answers to complex problems, pushing for change. In fact, today our world looks like a bubbling cauldron, where the global communication network allows the diffusion in real time of information on everything that happens. But the true cultural contribution of the network is a general awareness of the great similarity of all peoples in the world: we share feelings, expectations, aims and desires while simultaneously chasing vastly different goals. This is what the 21^st Century Renaissance looks like, and what we assume the 15^th Century Renaissance was like to the people of that era, with a big difference: thanks to the global network, now we know that all of us humans have the same hopes and fears.

Space Renaissance is both a goal and an astronautical humanist association (and not a political party). Our mission is to accelerate the kickoff of the expansion of civilization into space. Sadly, history tells us that undesirable violence and injustice seem to inevitably accompany all advances the renaissance might bring to humanity, but that does not mean we must stand quietly by when this happens. The first rocket to fly in space, V2, was developed by the Von Braun team at the German Peenemunde base, Hitler’s space research center. The first man to fly in orbit was Yuri Gagarin, in 1961, during the Stalinist dictatorship. Leonardo Da Vinci designed war engines while simultaneously promoting human scientific development. We do not agree with the violence and so promote peaceful, collaborative civilian space development as an alternative to military interests.

What does militarism in space development mean? Is our civilization still so immature that we need to promote control and centralized power in order to rediscover a healthy boost to development? We cannot think (only) this way: humanity has demonstrated maturity in other areas of development and we trust will continue to do so in those that are still devoted to violence. The Renaissance we see is composed of progress-oriented vectors in technology, politics, economics, culture, education, civil rights, etc.

In this turmoil, believing the promises of one politician or another is a mistake: Renaissance is a historical process that goes beyond any individual speech. Actions speak louder than words. Elon Musk, for example, is a leader in space technology development and other innovations, but he is not alone. As we see it, Musk sums up the attitude of astronautical humanists: our priority, our imperative, is to open the outer space to civil activities, expanding human rights over there, and considering outer space an arena where human rights can develop very much further.

The dream of Von Braun was to fly the first rockets in space: should he have spurned the Nazi funds, and faced a firing squad? Wasn’t it better, for all of us, that he chose to pursue his astronautic dream, while pretending to develop a weapon? Historians report the poor combat effectiveness of v2, just because it was too technologically advanced, and was constructed of hard to get metals.

It makes sense, to ask ourselves another question: will land conflicts extend to outer space? Even this is possible. We believe that the opening of the space frontier, and the expansion of civil activities in outer space, can put an end to the global crisis and create a new long Renaissance age, gradually mitigating all social problems, conflicts, making resource wars obsolet, bringing peace and ethical evolution everywhere. It will be a long and complex process, but we think that the symptoms of strong economic recovery will be seen soon, and will be of enormous encouragement, even if, quite hypothetical, some spark of war were initially spread into Earth orbit.

In summary, if our priority is the opening of the space frontier, why should we refuse to work with anyone willing to allocate funds, facilities and patronage in support of this great epoch-making process? If we can even give a positive opinion on the decision taken by Von Braun, and later by the Soviet scientists, working under Hitler and Stalin, why shouldn’t we allow modern innovators to do the same? Should we change our mission, and to strive for a progressive enlightened democracy to be affirmed worldwide before resuming the journey into space? We believe not, because such a goal could never be reached without opening the space frontier. Collaborative efforts involve everyone, just as democratic processes do. Good, bad, friendly or offensive, this is a process for all humanity to participate in. That’s the foundation on which our ideological priorities have been built. This does not change the criticisms that, as humanists, we must make on Hitler, Stalin, and any other promoter of murders and genocide. Therefore we are waiting, but not passively, for the first decisive moves of Earth’s political leaders, for moving forward with the civilian expansion of humanity into outer space.

In 2017 Space Renaissance will develop, or contribute to, several initiatives as part of the Space Renaissance Tour:

Nigeria, 18-21 October 2017 – Lead City University, Ibadan, hosts the first event of the Space Renaissance Tour:

USA, USIP, October 10th, Outer Space Treaty, 50 Years Anniversary, – news will be given on:

Italia, Outer Space Treaty, 50 Years Anniversary, an opportunity to boost the adoption of a true space law system, to rule and support civil activities in space – news will be given on:

UK, Space Renaissance Tour events will take place in Glasgow and Edinbourgh, stay tuned on:

https://www.facebook.com/SpaceRenaissanceUK/

Please also don’t forget, to develop all of the above, and more, we do need money… donate to the Space Renaissance Tour Crowdfunding campaign.

And join us, registering as a member of the Space Renaissance.

Dec

2016

Crowdfunding for a Space Renaissance Tour, to support the Renaissance vs. new Middle Ages

Dear friends,

we are living in a very critical age. The Renaissance, which began more than 500 years ago, has developed through several scientific and industrial revolutions, and is now aiming directly towards outer space. Should this step be misunderstood, misinterpreted or set-aside, the Renaissance will be defeated and mankind may enter into yet another dark age. The risks are real, should the current global crisis win over the Renaissance, or if continuing global conflicts emerge with unpredictable consequences. Our duty is to support the Renaissance everywhere, with all of our pacific and positive means.

Two months ago, the Space Renaissance International (SRI) 2nd World Congress updated its analysis of the status of civilization, and defined our program for the next four years, working towards 2020. We have identified three essential developments, which SRI will support with outreach actions: establishing Low Cost Access to Earth Orbit, addressing the issues of the Protection of Civilian Life and Health in Space, and advocating for a suitable set of Laws for the global governance of activities in Outer Space, i.e. to collate, and extend international civilian rights in space.

Some key technological advances, including fully reusable rockets and additive manufacturing, will allow the inception of comprehensive manned activities in Earth orbit, and the first steps for industrialization of the space surrounding the Earth and Moon region.

SRI will promote and support such an ongoing process. Nothing will be easy or discounted. We have a wonderful opportunity, next year, to focus public attention on the civilian space development: the 50th anniversary of the Outer Space Treaty, signed in 1967. While, in 2018, the UN will convene the fourth International Conference on the peaceful uses of outer space UNISPACE+50 which will define outer space development for the 50 years which lie ahead. It is paramount that the public at large fully understands what is at stake within this few years: extending civilian rights in outer space, in order to allow civilian passengers and settlers to travel, live and work in space. Something that, so far, has been definitely missing, within any space program. Travel in space, for the few private astronauts who have visited the International Space Station, was obtained under military rules: very low protection for human life and health, no warranties, no responsibility from the agencies for possible injuries or health damages, and a long military training needed. Within the perspective of the geo-lunar space civilian development and industrialization, we need a full commitment, both by the scientific community and by governments worldwide, to solve the main life protection issues — cosmic radiations and zero or low gravity — and to define a proper outer space law system.

Our congress approved a very effective program for next four years, including a world wide Space Renaissance Tour, prizes for young artists and scientists, and to develop the Space Renaissance Academy, a wide philosophical, scientific and cultural education project.

But then not make long turns of phrase: we need funds.

In 2016 we made several meaningful steps forward. SRI is now present in almost twenty countries world-wide. In two countries — USA and Italy — we have formally incorporated local non-profit chapters. In two countries — UK and India – chapters will be incorporated in few months. In many other countries our members are working to aggregate supporters for local chapter activities. Everywhere we’ll take public initiatives.

Even so everything we plan to do, basing on volunteer effort, also implies hiring specialized services: web marketing and events management, just to name two. So the very first very urgent step is to create a seed fund, enough to hire the needed services for at least one year.

We have started a crowdfunding campaign, and we are asking you very seriously to help us, in one or both of two ways:

DONATE WHAT YOU CAN, FOR OUR STARTER FUND, at https://www.gofundme.com/space-renaissance-tour
join us as a registered member of Space Renaissance International

Ad Astra!

Adriano V. Autino, SRI, President

also download the pdf version of this article

Oct

2016

The space frontier is opening! The outcomes of the SRI 2nd World Congress

The Space Renaissance International 2nd World Congress took place on Skype, from September 30th until October 2^nd, 2016, and it was a great event, with participants from all continents. During the three days, five thesis documents and a final resolution were discussed, amended and voted upon. The SRI Board was renewed, to represent the active and collaborative international team that is now leading SRI, and that signed important results. These include, the incorporation of the Space Renaissance USA chapter, in April 2016, the more than doubled SRI presence on social networks and the application to the MacArthur 100&CHANGE prize (link at the bottom of this page).

The SRI first World Congress was held five years ago, in 2011. Since then, many things have changed and finally the space frontier has initiated the opening process. Fully reusable rockets have had their first successful experimentation this year and the obsolete monopoly of expendable rockets is now finally broken. This is also a good time for assessing SRI’s capabilities to understand and foresee the social processes, since this is one of the conditions that justify the existence of an organization like ours. The result is the Final Resolution of our recent Congress that we agreed to. Below is a large excerpt from the resolution. The complete acta of the Congress will be available soon.

Fully reusable rockets are now a reality thanks to a collaboration between the NewSpace industry — Elon Musk’s SpaceX — and NASA. Space tourism is a growing and meaningful part of the Newspace segment, endowed with a high capability to develop on its own capital: Virgin Galactic, Blue Origin, Sierra Nevada, Skylon, XCOR, and many other space companies are working hard to initiate commercial flights. The paradigm change has finally arrived: reusable rockets reduce the cost of launching into Earth Orbit. So we were right, when we said that the NewSpace industry, in order to meet this unprecedented evolutionary challenge, needed, and still needs, the support of public money as well as a positive public opinion. If this awareness was more largely shared, maybe the history would have been different. However we are working restlessly for the space frontier to be opened in time.

The experience of SpaceX demonstrates that private industry, working with government agencies contracts, can in fact reach the goal of lowering the cost of the Earth-Orbit transportation by several magnitudes. As such, many other objectives can now be targeted, including a substantial industrialization of the geo-lunar region. Space tourism and other civilian space activities, such as orbital manned services, asteroid mining, advanced research settlement and space based solar power will all benefit from the reduction of the Earth-Orbit launch costs. That’s why our main commitment, during next four years, will be to work towards a general extension of such a method: a broad collaboration among the government agencies and the NewSpace private industry.

If most people continue thinking that the world is closed, it will remain so. Instead of this, if we are able to build on these recent achievements and extend these into a meaningful vanguard, then the space-enabled future can become a reality. The first essential step on such road is to accelerate the development and the marketing of technologies that enable low cost civilian passenger transportation into space.

We are not working for a revolution, but for a renaissance of civilization. A revolution is violent, while a renaissance is fundamentally joyous and peaceful. The true conflict nowadays is between those who aspire to growth and change (the Renaissance), and those who want de-growth, de-industrialization, cultural involution, which will eventually lead to the implosion of civilization. The global crisis of the closed world has worsened, but the renaissance is going ahead and aiming to reach space. We do not fear robots: humans do it better, are more efficient and more cost effective in the space environment.

The next 10 or 15 years will see the technical and social opportunities brought about by the renaissance of the last 500 years to balance the threats, the conflicts, the huge risk of a World War III, that could be the last global war that humanity wages, since the next wars will be fought with sticks. A peaceful expansion of civilization into outer space via a peaceful development of civilian space activities, will be the core of our celebration of the 1967 Outer Space Treaty which will have its 50th anniversary in 2017. We will bring our proposals of principles for a space law, which development is urgent, to the United Nations in order to provide democratic rules for commercial and industrial activities to be conducted by private entities in outer space.

SRI will develop a narrative of our near future, of our possible present civilian life in space, requiring artists to represent what cannot yet be photographed because it doesn’t exist, yet. Elon Musk announced his Interplanetary Transport System, to carry passengers to Mars for a relatively modest ticket price in few years. Jeff Bezos announced his plan to start migrating heavy industries into outer space, making of Earth a beautiful garden. Jeff Greason is working to develop manned activities in Earth orbit. All of these great space programs are not very well known by the general public. They are not yet part of educational programs in schools and colleges. SRI wants to raise such awareness and push the urgent narrative in throughout society.

SRI entered its 2.0 phase, going over the mere “propaganda”, toward a concrete engagement in the social reality. We will be open and collaborative in order to be able to listen to all of the voices which can be available to work for the renaissance. We shall reach out to many renaissance persons, creative minds which can contribute to the renaissance, if given the proper tools and channels.

During next four years, towards 2020, we shall bring the awareness of the extreme urgency to open the space frontier to civilian and industrial activities to the broad general public. We will support the quick development of low cost launch vehicles, promote public support for the NewSpace industry, promote a space industrial political platform, promote space based solar power, contribute to space law and promote a “presentist” vision and narrative of our immediate future life in space. We begin by lobbying governments, space agencies and international institutions. We will try to create collaborations with all the renaissance initiatives, which are not limited to the Space Renaissance’s ones. In order to realize such an ambitious program, SRI will initiate a major world-wide program:

The Space Renaissance Tour

We want to bring the space renaissance message to all five continents in the next 2 to 3 years. This will be achieved with public conferences having their focus on few key themes, namely: accelerating the development of low cost Earth-Orbit passenger and cargo transport vehicles, promoting civilian space development as an alternative to conflicts and the risk of a World War III; celebrating the 50th anniversary of the 1967 Outer Space Treaty and to reaffirm the Human Right to Development as stated by United Nations in 1986. To lead such a grand tour which we will call the true renaissance vanguard of our time: we salute all of the NewSpace industries making the Space Renaissance happen!

Now, to realize all of the above we must rely upon the help of all the renaissance persons in the world. By registering as a member of SRI, you will help us by creating a seed fund, by which we can hire proper services and build up our very ambitious but urgently needed program. We need your financial contribution as well as your ideas and your projects, but mostly we need your activist volunteer commitment.

please join us, join the renaissance,

JOIN THE SPACE RENAISSANCE INTERNATIONAL!

The SRI participation to the MacArthur 100&CHANGE prize

Also download the pdf version of this article.

Sep

2016

DEVELOPMENT IS A HUMAN RIGHT – AN OPEN LETTER TO UNITED NATIONS

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DEVELOPMENT IS A HUMAN RIGHT – AN OPEN LETTER TO UNITED NATIONS

SRI News #05.2016 – September 17th 2016, by A. V. Autino, with contributes by M. Perez, A. Sinclair, A. Woods

In our incoming Congress we will discuss the program for next four years, including initiatives towards United Nations, concerning the Human Right to Development and the 50th Anniversary of the 1967 Outer Space Treaty.
On the above subjects we sent an open letter to UN, while they are meeting in New York. Our analysis says that only expanding our industrial and commercial activities in space the human right to development can have a chance.
We think that a broad international collaboration is needed.

What is your opinion? Share it with us, during the Space Renaissance congress:

“FROM SPACE EXPLORATION TO SPACE SETTLEMENT”
The Space Renaissance International 2nd World Congress will be held from September 30th to October 2nd,
on skype chat, three hours per day, starting at 15.00pm, GMT

REGISTER TO PARTICIPATE TO THE CONGRESS!
(participation is free)
see the Congress Theses

In the framework of the 2nd Space Renaissance International World Congress
September 20 – October 2, 2016

OPEN LETTER TO THE UNITED NATIONS

Distinguished Participants to the 71st Session of the UN General Assembly (UNGA 71),
Distinguished Participants to the High-level segment of the General Assembly to commemorate the thirtieth anniversary of the Declaration on the Right to Development[1],

please accept our greetings and sincere wishes for a successful and productive conference!

Thirty years after the Declaration on the Right to Development[2], we have to acknowledge that many analysts paint a dismal picture of the status of civilization in spite of meaningful advances in education, longevity, civil rights, malnourishment, poverty and in other critical societal areas.

Though there are places and situations that world’s media highlight as examples of worsening conditions and inequalities and obstacles to development, UN statistics show clear and gradual improvements. Yet, there exists new threats to human development that must be dealt with, such as serious environmental issues, increasing scarcity of material and energy sources, that are becoming more and more evident and serve to enhance conflicts, terrorism and migration fluxes.

We identify the problem of a growing human population within the closed system of planet Earth as the main cause for the worsening of all the well-known global problems which concern the UN and national governments across the world. There will soon be 8 billion humans on our home planet who are facing resource shortages, mass migrations, economic and political disenfranchisement, and widespread civil unrest exacerbated by this population pressure, not to mention the huge environmental issues, general pollution and the decay of the oceans. The global financial crisis initiated in 2008, is devastating society and jeopardizing its industrial capabilities that are necessary for development.

Paragraph14. of the UN 2030 agenda[3] well summarizes such a situation, and par. 15. recalls the opportunities of this historical age: “It is also, however, a time of immense opportunity. Significant progress has been made in meeting many development challenges. Within the past generation, hundreds of millions of people have emerged from extreme poverty. Access to education has greatly increased for both boys and girls. The spread of information and communications technology and global interconnectedness has great potential to accelerate human progress, to bridge the digital divide and to develop knowledge societies, as does scientific and technological innovation across areas as diverse as medicine and energy.” This paragraph describes the great impulse to the progress of civilization that was provided by the industrial revolution, that we can see as the last act of the renaissance, initiated in 1500. Today’s industrial capabilities are under attack, by the current global crisis, and it is dramatically urgent to contrast and reverse such a crisis by relaunching industrial development, fully profiting from the fantastic new technologies that have raised in recent years.

The Declaration on the Right to Development well summarizes the humanist concept that growth -economic and cultural growth – is essential for the progress of ethics, freedom, democracy and well-being. With almost eight billion intelligent human beings, our species was never so rich, provided that we will be able to allow such a huge patrimony to realize its full value by investing in itself and continuing its progress. Enduring cultural and economic growth decreases social fear and progressively reduces the causes of conflicts.

At this moment there are two major forces fighting in the world:

A multifaceted global crisis which is devastating our culture and paving the way to a general decadence of civilization accompanied by the emergence of populist and new feudal authoritarian regimes, as warned by Prince Zeid Ra’ad Zeid Al-Hussein[4], the current United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, in a recent address to the Peace, Justice and Security Foundation Gala, in The Hague.
The forces of the renaissance – the courageous entrepreneurs who are betting their lives on new technologies and methodologies. With a trust in scientific research, and with a new pragmatism, they refuse to look too far into the future. They do not stop dreaming, but do what they can with available technologies and with technologies that are expected to appear soon.

We believe that space development is the simplest measure available to humanity that can mitigate and progressively resolve the main global risks our civilization is currently facing. When a species is close to saturating the ecological niche where it was born and evolved, there are only two choices: to expand into a greater ecological niche by utilizing the available technologies or to condemn itself to limitation, decadence and extinction. On our home planet we see a growing scarcity of basic resources and useable spaces for the development of all its citizens, whereas the expansion of humankind into the solar system will provide space and resources enough for the future development of perhaps trillions of human beings in the coming millennia. The expansion of human industrial and commercial activities in the geo-lunar space region should be kicked off between now and the year 2025 – a date that many forecasters see as the beginning of a very critical period, in which the danger of a global conflict will escalate, bringing with it unpredictable consequences. The opening of the space frontier to human development will relaunch the global economy at unprecedented rate, and will be the key element to defuse a potential World War III.

The first essential step on such road is to accelerate the development and marketing of technologies for civilian passenger transportation in space. We advocate a change of paradigm from space exploration dealt by military trained astronauts, to civilian space flight, which will allow anyone to travel into space and as convenient as taking a normal airline flight. When low cost space transportation vehicles will become available, a season of great innovation (renaissance) will be triggered and new answers to human needs will create new self-sustaining markets. History shows examples of new routes, created by explorers, followed by merchants and then used by many others. Searching for and discovering new lands are essential aspects of human nature. The exploration and discovery of the solar system represents the exciting historical age that is now before us, one that is far greater and transformative than any previous age. Opening the new frontier of extraterrestrial space is now an urgent necessity for humanity, but, until now, this process has been restricted and delayed by monopolistic interests and governmental control.

In a problem solving perspective national and international communities will expand human presence in Earth orbit, working together in peaceful cooperation and collaboration. Innovative services can be provided for space debris recovery and reuse, fueling stations, spacecraft assembly and maintenance and for global communication and educational satellite networks. Space development can quickly achieve both the near term and long term goals of exploration and settlement, while supporting the sustainability and prosperity of our global communities on Earth.
However, time is of essence: supporting the forces of the renaissance to relaunch global development for all people of Earth before the year 2025 is the duty of all persons and institutions caring for the survival and continued progress of human civilization. This giant evolutionary step requires a broad international cooperation and we invite UN to provide the necessary framework for such an unprecedented promotional action, to encourage (as we have written in our SRI 2nd World Congress Thesis 1 [5]):

To propose that the main space agencies increase their activities in space and procure their transportation needs in an open, competitive marketplace, establishing a “free trade zone” in launch opportunities among all partners, so that the market will expand in a way that supports lower cost solutions such as reusable launch vehicles that are being developed by the private sector.
To propose that the main space agencies become customers for space resources – for example, by buying propellant, water, or mass for radiation shielding in space and by providing a market for those resources to stimulate the private sector to supply them.
To motivate governmental space agencies to prioritize research and technology for the unsolved problems needed for humans to live in space, on the Moon and on other celestial bodies indefinitely, such as protection from cosmic radiation, studying effects of Martian and Lunar gravity, effective artificial gravity for living in open space, faster and more economical transportation techniques, and in-situ resource extraction and utilization for the Moon, Near Earth Objects and Mars.
To motivate governments to support — through tax discounts, grants and a friendly fiscal policy — the civilian space industry, the development of space tourism (suborbital, orbital, Moon), near Earth asteroid mining and using asteroids as space urban infrastructures, the validation of new technologies for low cost and safe access to Earth’s orbit, and the development of technological systems and new methodologies for human spaceflight.
To convince the larger public that expanding civilization into space and giving birth to a true space renaissance is possible, convenient and urgent; and that passenger space travel will, like air travel did, create tens of millions of new jobs around the world.
To create space renaissance investment funds to allow all savers to direct their savings into astronautical industrial enterprises.
To limit military activities in Earth orbit to a purely surveillance operations while forbidding and preventing any lethal militarization of the space environment, as any major war is perceived to be the biggest threat to the future of human civilization, and space development is seen as the most optimistic alternative to war. Therefore, ongoing legal efforts such as the proposed Treaty on the Prevention of the Placement of Weapons in Outer Space and the Threat or Use of Force against Outer Space Objects (PPWT) and the Prevention of an Arms Race in Outer Space (PAROS) resolution deserve immediate attention and further elaboration. Any and all efforts at the international level that insure and enforce this aspect should be given the highest priority. The space environment has already proven to be an effective arena for international cooperation and, as such, it holds much promise and economic opportunity for emerging nations to collaborate with the current spacefaring nations. As economic development leads to peace and prosperity, further international cooperation and collaboration in the space arena needs to be encouraged and supported.

The 50th anniversary of the 1967 Outer Space Treaty presents the United Nations with a timely opportunity for these actions and endeavors to be given the highest consideration. We, at Space Renaissance International, are available to help with our network of experts. During the upcoming anniversary year, we are also planning events and activities that foster public discussion of these critical issues which have relevance for every citizen on planet Earth.

September, 17th 2016
Sincerely,

Adriano V. Autino, SRI, President
The Space Renaissance International Executive Committee
Space Renaissance Australia
Space Renaissance Bosnia Herzegovina
Space Renaissance Brasil
Space Renaissance Canada
Space Renaissance Espana
Space Renaissance France
Space Renaissance Germany
Space Renaissance India
Space Renaissance Italia
Space Renaissance Mexico
Space Renaissance Morocco
Space Renaissance Nederland
Space Renaissance Nepal
Space Renaissance Poland
Space Renaissance Russia
Space Renaissance Switzerland
Space Renaissance UK
Space Renaissance USA

[English language editing by Arthur Woods]

The Space Renaissance International 2nd World Congress will be held from September 30th to October 2nd, on skype chat, three hours per day, starting at 15.00p, GMT

REGISTER TO PARTICIPATE TO THE CONGRESS!

(participation is free)

see the Congress Theses

Also download this letter in pdf format.

[1] https://www.ohchr.org/EN/Issues/Development/Pages/DevelopmentIndex.aspx
[2] https://www.ohchr.org/Documents/Issues/Development/DeclarationRightDevelopment_en.pdf
[3] the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development
[4] https://www.ohchr.org/EN/NewsEvents/Pages/ZeidwarnsagainstdemagoguesinEuropeandUS.aspx
[5] https://spacerenaissance.space/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/Our-Committment-to-Astronautics-SRI-2nd-Congress-Theses-1.pdf

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Sep

2016

We will not be astronauts!

Dear SRI Members, Supporters and Friends, Renaissance People,

As you might already know, Space Renaissance International will hold its 2nd World Congress from September 30th to October 2nd. The Congress will be held online, via SKYPE chat, 3 hours per day starting at 15:00 GMT.

Though SRI needs to increase its public visibility, we chose not to hold a live congress this time. Our main goal is to update our analysis and strategy, and to share this discussion with the highest number of renaissance men and women, that we are sure greatly outnumber SRI supporters, worldwide! Holding an online chat congress, participants will be allowed to register for free, avoid any travel expenses and be able to comment and participate even when everyone else is offline. During the three days of the congress we will discuss five “theses” or thought documents, covering what we understand to be the key issues during next four years, up to the SRI 3rd world Congress, in 2020.

The title of the congress is “From Space Exploration to Space Settlement”.

We propose that world leaders need to understand that humanity urgently requires a change in direction from exploring space to developing civilian activities in space, finding ways to create human space settlements. A global renaissance is fighting the global crisis, producing social, technological and scientific transformations: in order to win, it needs to be taken off planet, to be a space renaissance!

“Thesis 1 – Our Committment to Astronautics” is an update of our analysis, about the current status of the civilization, faced to the challenges of nurturing the needs and industrial development of seven and half billion humans, avoiding further deterioration of the planetary environment, addressing the ever-increasing shortages of raw materials and energy sources. We will compare the history of the last five years, to the forecasts we made during the 1st SRI World Congress, held via SKYPE in 2011, especially as far as the development of civilian astronautics is concerned. We ask: “How can we influence global public opinion, demonstrating the extreme need for humanity to expand beyond Earth’s limits?” “Which are the most promising social and industrial processes, to be supported and further expanded?” And, “Is the science fiction scenario we used to love during the past century nothing more than a nostalgic dream, characterized by a romantic, vaguely retro, flavor?”

It is likely the term “astronaut” doesn’t apply to the civilian space passengers: Astronauts were sci-fi heroes, and are now military trained individuals who are carefully chosen and prepared for their missions. What we are talking about is our dream of taking a space vehicle as if we were taking a normal air flight, flying to the Moon or a Lagrange city whenever we desired. During such travels, one would not expect to go outside the vehicle in a space suit, just as we are not likely to sit on the wings of a jumbo jet during a flight from Milano to NewYork. We will not be “astronauts” at all, not even when we will reach our destination in space, where we will mostly live in closed environments.

Does a proper narrative exist, already, to stimulate people’s curiosity and make them feeling interested in space life? Do we need a new “futuristic” art movement? Perhaps we had enough futuristic visions, that always postponed to a more or less distant future the human expansion into space. A new art movement is deeply missed, but it should talk about our possible civilian life in space now, more than about future. An avant-garde awareness that we are late, from all points of view, and we have nomore time to waste. A word for defining such a movement doesn’t exist, yet. Usually, movements have birth before definitions.

Our duties, as awakened and conscious renaissance people, are enormous, and we could be terrified by the challenge… but we will not surrender. When looking up in the night sky and see the majesty of the Milky Way we know the possibilities waiting there … Looking at the sky is our power, the stars are our evolutionary destination. Like the first hominids who strained to stand up in upright position, we strive to think ourselves among the stars, in a 3d environment, limitless in every direction and degree of the space sphere.

“Thesis 2 – Space for Peace” discusses the rise in global conflicts that constitutes the biggest threat to the future of civilization. The underlying causes for these conflicts are numerous but most have to do with exerting control over natural resources and territories and the populations living in these regions by financial and geopolitical interests. Any major war that may occur in the next few years would have unpredictable consequences. As an alternative to the possibility of global war, we propose a civilian space development program that expands human activities into geo-lunar space, as the only valid counter measure to mitigate the risk of a global conflict and avoid an implosion of civilization. This theme will be a key part of our next four years program having a key place in all of our public events.

“Thesis 3 – Building the Space Renaissance” defines our program for next 4 years, including a primary initiative that will touch the five continents, distributing our space renaissance proposal around the world by lobbying the governments, collaborating with space agencies, trying to reproduce the exemplary experience of SpaceX to the entire “NewSpace” industrial segment. And, in addition, developing our proposals in the area of space law in the context of the 50th anniversary of the Outer Space Treaty – the Treaty on Principles Governing the Activities of States in the Exploration and Use of Outer Space, including the Moon and Other Celestial Bodies – which entered into force in October 1967 and provides the basic framework on international space law.

“Theses 4 – A New Communication Strategy” defines how we plan to multiply our out-reach, making a growing number of people aware of our proposals and initiatives, and encouraging them to join SRI and work with us, to wake up other renaissance people.

With “Theses 5 – Space Renaissance Academy” we will describe and set up our education program, that in its first phase will see the development of webinars (soon to be available online).

Please register to attend the congress for free, if you want to be sure you will be part of the SKYPE chat.

Registration only takes a few seconds, and will allow us to optimize the organizational process.

We also want to invite you to check out the theses documents, and feel free to propose a paper of your own or amendments to what you read:

An online form is available to upload your proposals to the congress.

Should you like to add any contribution/proposed amendments to the theses documents, please follow this procedure:

read the theses documents (the above link)
identify which theses document(s) your proposal(s) apply
in case you want to submit a paper, use the proper template
upload your text or paper

Are you a renaissance person? Do you think what we do is useful? Please also consider joining the Space Renaissance!

Download a pdf version of this article.

Jun

2016

Our interview with Jeff Greason – Are the major space agencies supporting the development of civilian astronautics?

Space Renaissance International has kicked-off the discussion leading towards its second world congress, mainly targeted to update our analysis of the status of civilization and development of civilian astronautics. Our first reflection is a self-critical one, about the forecast we made during our first congress held in 2011 when we anticipated the kickoff of civilian astronautics that would be catalyzed by space tourism. Following the general expectations, we had no doubt that Virgin Galactic, XCOR or perhaps some other entity would have initiated commercial suborbital flights before 2016. It was a logical perception: space tourism is the only (or at least the first) private initiative that could develop in a self-sustaining manner by selling tickets to private passengers – initially for suborbital flights, then to orbit, to the Moon, and so on. The growing market would work as a positive feedback scenario, decreasing the cost of tickets and boosting the investments for further improvement of technologies.
There is no doubt that the space frontier will be opened by private enterprise and our focus remains on the private sector. But it hasn’t happened so far. The long promised start of commercial suborbital flights did not occur as expected. However, in the meantime, SpaceX has become a key part of the revolution by developing reusable rockets obtaining NASA contracts. Reducing the cost to orbit objectively supports the civilian astronautics development which allows more private enterprises to enter the market. Robert Bigelow is also taking key steps in the area of civilian astronautics with the first experimental inflatable module deployed on the ISS and by working with NASA as well.Jeff Greason, who recently joined the Space Renaissance USA Chapter, says that there is more work to be done between LEO and GEO than what we expect. So attention students, both young and less young specialists, please take good note that: “one thread that people don’t seem to emphasize” said Jeff “is that the number one problem in the space economy right now is … a shortage of labor! There are many, many activities which cannot be conducted economically because there is an insufficient source of labor in the space industry to do the jobs that need doing.”

Q. So, Jeff, let’s start with this quite interesting point. Could you tell us something more about the activities you are talking about?

R. Today, the bulk of activity in space is satellites. Most of the expense of satellites isn’t directly in the launch cost – though indirectly, the constraints of launch being expensive and hard to schedule are a big driver. But satellites have a lot of mechanisms to unfold solar arrays and antennas, and the components which might be quite affordable for a terrestrial application are expensive because they have to withstand a very rough ride on launch, and then last for ten years or more without maintenance or repair. Now imagine there was a facility for doing some very simple assembly work on orbit, and transportation from LEO to GEO. Satellites are very modular – so many transponders, so big an antenna array, so much solar panel. You could send those elements up, plug the modules together, and build quite large satellites ‘by the meter’ so to speak. It would be a simple task for a technician – if only you had technicians. A lot of money has been spent on research to service and repair GEO comsats. If instead you brought them to a technician, again, most of that could be done. And we know there are materials on the Moon of tremendous economic interest – water for propellant for one example. What’s missing isn’t the machines to do the mining and processing; they’re relatively simple and could be launched if there were need. But they need to be set up, maintained, and repaired – a small base could provide that labor, if economic activity were its focus rather than scientific research. Energy harvesting in space is a definite possibility, but again, the requirement to make the entire architecture 100.00% self-assembling is a big driver of cost; it doesn’t take much to plug pieces together.

Q. On the bad side of the news, we observe that Virgin Galactic was forced to build a new SpaceShipTwo after the tragic accident in 2014 and is still on ground, and that XCOR seems to have suspended the Lynx program, in favor of projects that are bringing in revenue.
Is that only due to difficulties in fundraising and finding investors or are we also witnessing a strong resistance by military lobbies and governments to release their control on outer space enabling private commercial ventures? If so, how could SRI’s lobbying action in favor of paradigm changing measures be effective?

R. There’s been absolutely no resistance from military lobbies that I have seen – if anything, there is friendly interest in the developments of frequent, reliable, affordable space transportation. The space environment is changing – it is no longer a place where military assets are safe from interference by hostile powers. So the best way to peacefully maintain space as a place for the use of all nations is to make satellites not worthy targets to attack. Making them easy and cheap to replace is an excellent way to do that. So there is a lot of beneficial overlap between commercial and military interests in space.
All space endeavors have, until recently, been very difficult to finance. What’s changed that is that small satellites have shortened the development cycle for commercial satellites so that new applications can be tried and show their economic value – or fail – within a few years, which is the time horizon of interest to institutional investors. The reason I’m working on the business plan at Agile Aero is to try and do the same thing for space vehicles – shorten their development cycle. But until we, or someone, does that, investment in space transportation is going to remain a challenge. That’s why right now the bulk of the investment in that area is from high net worth individuals investing in their own projects – which is a very welcome development, but not enough of a foundation for a healthy industry.

Q. Today, Space Renaissance International is making a qualitative and quantitative step, as we say, towards SRI 2.0. Since the end of 2008, our first years of activities, SRI was mainly a philosophical association, a think tank dedicated to developing the advanced concepts of a space age philosophy and to indicate the main strategic direction for our civilization. Recently , SRI more than doubled its presence on social networks, with almost twenty national Facebook pages world wide. SRI USA was incorporated as a 501(c)4 non profit association by Manuel Perez, with a quite focused strategic plan which includes lobbying the US Congress and collaboration with government agencies. Thus, SRI will now develop political goals and not only philosophical ones, by working with national and international institutions and striving to unify as much as possible the space advocacy movement on a platform of a few shared goals. Each national chapter will be encouraged to develop its own proper plan tuned to the national environment and social climate where they are located.
In such perspective, some questions become relevant for SRI as well as for the broader space advocacy movement from a strategic point of view.
Elon Musk has invested much of his previously accumulated fortune – made by brilliant great inventions, such e.g. PayPal — in his SpaceX enterprise and few other futuristic industrial ventures, e.g. the Tesla electric car and the very high speed vacuum tube train. It appears however evident that, with regards to Richard Branson and other new space entrepreneurs, Musk has something extra that allows him to produce many rockets and to recover from accidents in just a few months. The availability of substantial capital is due to the contracts that NASA is assigning to SpaceX for the use of Falcon 9 rockets and Dragon capsules to serve the ISS. It is likely that this momentum is also attracting further investments to SpaceX which now appears to be a successful corporation.
NASA already named the first four astronauts who will fly on the first U.S. commercial spaceflights in private crew transportation vehicles being built by Boeing and SpaceX, as soon as mid-2017, if all goes well. (Gizmodo).
NASA, by supporting SpaceX with lucrative contracts, is de facto supporting the development of fully reusable launch vehicles which is something that space advocates have been promoting for at least thirty years as the essential key factor for the downsizing of the cost of transportation from Earth to orbit. Consequently, the development of a private commercial space industry and market is being supported as well.
But this is not the only good news. On the other side of Atlantic, ESA’s new director Johann-Dietrich Woerner from the German DLR was selected in 2015. During his first interview, he challenged ESA with a grand goal: to build a first village on the Moon during the 2020-2030 decade! Such strategic address was initially announced in a symposium – Moon 2020-2030 – that was held at ESTEC, in Noordwijk in December 2015. If realized, this would be a key step on a path of settlement of outer space.
How do you see this process? Is NASA supporting the development of civilian astronautics by giving contracts to Elon Musk? Is that within the frame of a strategic plan? Or is it just the basis of a pragmatic orientation, because lower launch costs is however convenient?

R. Talking about “NASA” and “strategic plan” together probably overstates the case. NASA is a collection of dissimilar interests flying in formation. I would love to see an overall strategic plan for NASA but so far I haven’t. Certainly, however, national policymakers and some farsighted people within NASA have seen the value of adding NASA’s demand to commercial and military demand to stimulate the overall launch market – and of course so the taxpayer can derive the benefits of lower prices that come from a more competitive launch industry. It’s been a slow process dating back to the decision in 1986 to withdraw the Space Shuttle from the commercial launch market. Not everyone realizes that all the military launches in the U.S. and all NASA science missions are already launched on commercial rockets and have been for some time. NASA is providing the critical early customer support for SpaceX and ATK rockets by purchasing commercial cargo service to the Space Station and is doing the same for crew transport on Boeing and SpaceX capsules. I think that is all positive. There are some enormous missed opportunities, however. NASA is still spending about $2 billion a year on a large heavy lift booster that will start with 75 ton and eventually lift 125 ton payloads to orbit and fly every other year. That same price would pay to put up over 300 tons per year on the existing commercial market – and if an additional 300 tons per year of launch were purchased, the price would certainly come down. It’s really a mistake to think of this in terms of one provider; thanks to the efforts of both military and NASA launch the U.S. is now the only country with internal competition for launch and that competition is really improving the performance of ALL of the providers.

Q. Whatever the rationales behind this new orientation of the major space agencies, there seems that a new phase is opening in which many new space enterprises, having civilian astronautics in their mission, can hope to get contracts and to work with space agencies in order to develop technologies that will favor the growth of the commercial astronautic industry. There is, not yet, a big private space travelers market, but it is however a serious development vs. the old exploration paradigm. So, in your opinion, which are the themes upon which a new space enterprise may consider working with NASA, while being coherent with its own civilian astronautic mission?

R. I think the real opportunities are ahead of us. For decades, ambitious human spaceflight goals have been discussed by NASA and other space agencies. Expeditions to Mars, bases on the Moon, visits to near-earth asteroids. The private sector is talking seriously about private robotic missions to the Moon, or human missions to Mars orbit, and providing resources from the Moon and near-earth asteroids. The opportunity for NASA and other space agencies is that if they planned such ambitious missions, NOT as the agency that would perform the mission but simply as customers for those missions, leaving most of the execution to private sector firms to do in the most cost-effective manner, then they could actually afford to DO the things we’ve dreamt of. For example I’ve little doubt that a human return to the Moon, even with a permanent base could be done privately for something on the order or $10-$20 billion. No space agency is likely to do that so cheaply, and it is very difficult for the private sector to justify spending that money. But if space agencies really wanted a return to the moon – they can afford it, if they just buy it. And of course the space agencies have relevant expertise – but that expertise can be made available to private actors where there is need. All these efforts feed each other – the more things are being done in space, the easier it is to do more. For example, if there were some kind of transportation node in cislunar space – say at L1 or L2, it would be easy to stage components for a Mars mission from there, eliminating the need for very heavy lift launch beyond what other customers demand. But sadly, there are still too many in national space efforts who view ambitious space goals not as ends to be achieved, but as justifications for ongoing programs that will be funded year after year, with little incentive to reach the goal and move to the next one.

Q. We have always in mind your historical slides presented at the ISDC 2011, when you were talking about the missing 2nd step of the NASA strategic vision: “step 1 = exploration / step 2 = ? / step 3 = settlement”. We at SRI represent step 2 as a coherent plan for a progressive industrial expansion beyond Earth’s atmosphere based on humanist concepts, starting from LEO, recovering and reusing space debris, developing interorbital maneuverability, improving re-entry technologies, then developing infrastructure in the cislunar space, L4 and L5, on the Moon, using Near Earth Asteroids as raw materials and possible habitats.
What is your vision of a coherent plan for colonization of the Geo-Lunar space region?

R. The missing element right now is extraterrestrial sources of propellant. We know they’re out there, we know how to get them, but we haven’t developed those resources. Once we have that, moving from LEO to GEO, or from LEO to destinations beyond LEO, becomes much more cost effective. I personally think we will need humans to maintain and operate some of that equipment, which implies a transportation capability for people as well as cargo and a logistics resupply ability to bring cargo where we need it to be. Whether that material comes from Lunar or asteroidal sources or (as I suspect) from both doesn’t really matter – once we start to disconnect our umbilical to Earth and supply a big part of what we need to do things in space from resources IN space, we’ll be well on our way to a virtuous cycle where more and more of that becomes the norm. Once you start extracting resources, your next need is energy – it takes a lot of energy to extract and process that material. And of course there’s no shortage of demand for energy on Earth either; we’re 10-15 Terawatts short of what it would take to bring the whole world up to a modern standard of living. So the same infrastructure we need to collect industrial quantities of energy from the Sun, in space, for space-based customers can over time extend to supplying our needs here on Earth.

Q. From our humanist point of view, the overdue change of paradigm – from space exploration to space settlement – a few key areas of scientific research should have an high priority. If it is foreseen that the number of civilian passengers and settlers will increase in space, especially beyond the protective Van Allen Belt, the issues of protection from cosmic radiations and artificial gravity should be addressed, in order the migrants will not be subject to fundamental physiological changes in a few years. These type of research should be better developed by public money, as well as scientific research for a single stage to orbit vehicle, and exobiology, selecting the best vegetables to be cultivated in space, for food and for oxygen regeneration. Do you think a lobbying action may have a chance to orient governments and agencies in such a direction?

R. I hope so, but I’m not counting on it. The idea that the goal of government action in space shouldn’t be to visit it, but to develop it as an economic arena and frontier for human settlement is one that has been growing slowly and not always steadily. Clearly, that is not yet motivating our investments in space research because these problems remain unsolved. It is unpardonable neglect of our research priorities that more than 50 years in to the space age, we still have NO idea what the long term health implications of 1/6 or 1/3 gravity are on human beings. If national space agencies have a purpose, this is the kind of problem they should be solving. And again, how they solve it matters. If they think it’s too expensive – then put out a contract to buy that data. A lot of smart people have been thinking of cheap ways to get that data – surely there is SOME price at which NASA or ESA could afford to answer this question.

[English language editing by Arthur Woods]

OTHER LANGUAGES VERSIONS OF THIS ARTICLE:

version française, grâce à Catherine Laplace-Buhle

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May

2016

The Space Renaissance is blooming everywhere!

Perhaps you’ve wondered why an entity like Space Renaissance International was born, and its practical use may be… But, as Americans say, there is a logic to our madness! (:-)

There are space agencies, governmental and organizational bodies and corporate entities, working in space, across Europe, United States, Asia and many locations. There are also many public associations engaged in interchange, dissemination and educational activities, promoting space exploration and human activities in space. In Europe several original communities have emerged in recent years, enabling the spread of modern astronautic objectives through their mission. The huge success of SpaceX which has privately developed a low cost orbital launch vehicle and returned all of the stages to the ground, ready to be reused, is an remarkable example. However, it is shameful that traditional media in many countries provided little or marginal news about such a remarkable and very recent achievement. And this touches upon the logic behind our original question: what is Space Renaissance for?

Space Renaissance International (SRI for friends) is an association that promotes the human expansion into space, and that is common ground with other associations. But let’s go ahead: Space Renaissance International is a philosophical association, developing a space age philosophy, that is direly needed. And here the field becomes meaningfully narrowed, in fact we might count on the fingers of one hand the associations, or rather the institutes, that are dealing with such disciplines. In the United States, Kepler Space Institute publishes, more or less yearly, the Journal of Space Philosophy, compiling the writings of approximately thirty authors. The Astrosociology Research Institute studies the interaction between space exploration and society, both as behavior and for development, with the additional Journal of Astrosociology publication. Other philosophical and humanistic manifestos might be found through exemplary communities such as the 100 year starship and Icarus International and the SETI program (Search for Extra Terrestrial Intelligence). But outlooks in these areas are more often bounded towards the advanced technologies and not the immediate and motivating philosophies of space. Stephen Ashworth, an English astro-humanist philosopher, has drawn up several fundamental concepts outlining the purpose of astronautic humanism, and distributes a regular newsletter, analyzing space usage and related events, from a socio-evolutionary point of view. Even so one can see that resources are limited and that the field of space philosophy is only recently beginning to emerge.

The Space Renaissance International platform can certainly be considered as an early pioneer in these efforts. We aim to propose and integrate an essential philosophical ideas that arise into concrete steps, suggesting autonomous and highly personal reflection to persons who will accept to look at reality by means of a new perception of the world, about the critical issues of our time: the future of civilization, the enormous risks that we are facing, and the choices we have before us; what is not yet done and should have been done already; and what types of implementations are therefore now extremely overdue. In this sense, the specificity and usefulness of Space Renaissance is coming to light, at this point. Why do we propose these concepts that are not said elsewhere? This is because only we are looking at the technological and humanistic renaissance of humanity that blossomed in the last 100 years. That in and of itself allows us to step back from the details of different projects to analyze the state of civilization from our humanist point of view, including the primary responsibility each generation has towards our species – seven billion and a half persons –, as well as towards other sentient species, with less intellectual and cultural means but much potential for the future.

But today we’ll not develop the philosophical discourse, only draw your attention to some of the intellectual peculiarities, which are most often neglected. Our humanist concept, moving from the interests and inherent rights of all living humans and their offspring, leads us to propose the argument that humanity desperately needs to expand its world view into space, and not just to tentatively explore it, if we are to avoid, and have a positive alternative to, a holocaust of gigantic proportions. The equitable space based worldview is not isolated against itself; it includes many propositions, features and issues. Space based IT, within low earth and geo stationary orbit, gave its essential contribute to the world wide network, for global social and environmental problems solving, in support of wide scale global development. In another issue of our newsletters we’ll discuss about the overdue evolution of the unmanned commercial orbital infrastructure to a manned one, capable of the necessary maintenance, recovery and reuse of the enormous orbital space debris. Our humanist vision, a driven purpose to get nearer towards the concrete things, the substantial elements, leads us to formulate a “soft” expansion rationale, one that will allow terrestrial migrants to become inhabitants of space avoiding major physiological changes within a few generations.

This means to seriously address two problems: artificial gravity, and protection from harsh space radiation. Solving these problems would allow us to invest us in space outside of the protective shield of the Earth’s atmosphere and the Van Allen belt, which protects astronauts in low orbit, where the ISS travels. But going to the Moon, even for short term durations, let alone Mars, implies the need for much more robust types of protective shield. After all, why, fifty five years after the first human flight in orbit, have so many of these fundamental problems not been addressed? The answer is perhaps quite simple: because no one has yet seriously faced the issues of transporting civilian passengers in space. A hopeful outlook towards space agencies research and development suggest that they continue to make inquiry, and that if many problems have not yet been solved, it means that our science has not yet reached to that point. But is this statement altogether true? This question does not mean to denigrate the work of many honest researchers, who are dedicated with love and devotion to their work, achieving excellent results. Those scientists are being committed, through their directors and institutions, to develop specific fields and areas of studies and research rather than other ones. So we might ask ourselves: is the strategic vision of the agencies, and of governments establishing, sufficiently based on a humanist conception? The answer, unfortunately, might yet be: only partially.

Current spacecraft are still designed primarily bearing in mind military trained astronauts. You and we might not travel today on the Soyuz, yesterday on the Space Shuttle, as if we were taking a normal flight. We might not bear the accelerations, the on-board living conditions, and the many stresses, which we are not prepared for. Denis Tito and the other few civilian tourists who flew to the ISS have undergone the same training, which lasts several months, made by the military pilots. But, most important, they had also signed a waver, a letter of total release from liability to the agencies, after paying 30 million for a ticket! Fortunately, today a number of space tourism companies are addressing this issue and when their commercial flights will begin, initially only to suborbital altitude, passengers will fly in comfortable conditions, and with legal liabilities, similar to those of a normal commercial flight. Of course, at 100 km altitude the problem of radiation exposure is quite low, and being in weightlessness for a few minutes is a funny thing that does no physiological harm.

However these first attempts of a suborbital tourism industry represent the beginning of the needed change in paradigm, from military to civilian space flight. Even the cost of space missions has represented a determining factor, until today, keeping the high frontier firmly subject to an exclusive government control, and closed to private enterprises. Leading forward on this edge, Elon Musk is creating a true revolution: bringing ashore all the stages of the new generation launchers allows the fast reclaim and reuse of high powered engines, with a drastic reduction in the cost of ground-orbit transportation.

Back to the main issue from a humanist perspective: the protection of life and human health in space, outside the Earth’s protective shield. We need to obtain gravity conditions of 1 G, equivalent to the Earth environment, and being totally shielded from the harsh space radiation, both coming from the Sun and the cosmic sources (from supernovae). Even in the context of what we will presently call the expansionist movement, we might listen to debate about the priorities of colonizing the Moon rather than Mars. But both of these assumptions for future development do not take into account the mentioned problems. On the Moon we could protect ourselves from radiation by living underground, perhaps using the lava tubes, caves ready to be equipped and inhabited. But it still leaves the problem of gravity, equal to one sixth that of Earth. Mars has a gravity equal to one third of the Earth’s still significantly less than what we are used to. On both worlds earthling migrants would be supermen, for a few years, but then they would no longer be able to walk on Earth’s surface, and thus condemned to never return home, except for short “holidays”… on a wheelchair!

Since the first international congress of SRI, in 2011, we began working on a humanistic solution for human life in space. Gerard O’Neill had already written about and designed many of these basic concepts in the 70s of last century: large rotating toroidal colonies, placed in stable Lagrange points, where objects can reside permanently, without the need of asset or orbital correction. This concept was taken up in the movie Elysium, by Neill Blomkamp, in 2013. But if this design solves the problem of artificial gravity, it does not solve the issue of protection from radiation. Another possibility would be to capture an asteroid, among those whose orbit (unsettlingly!) passes near our planet, and to transfer it to a Langrange location, for excavation. Among other developments, we could obtain huge amounts of raw materials, oxygen, and building materials in this way. Then the asteroid could be “terraformed” inside, providing long term, radiation proof living accommodation. Certainly this is a futuristic and multi-generational enterprise involving scientific and technological knowledge within vast ranges, in addition to the formative space sciences: and extraordinary developments in the fields of architecture, civil engineering, sociology, economics, psychology, biology, agriculture, … All disciplines where we will eventually add the “exo” prefix.

On these topics, of vital importance for humanity and for all nations, while continuing the search for new industrial development lines, a public discussion should presently arise. Governments should discuss such types of forward looking dynamics, adopting policies to support the new civil astronautics industry, hold international summits, similar to the gatherings recently held for the climate change mitigation. The environmental issues took 45 years, since the first publication of the Club of Rome’s “Limits to Growth”, to gain the attention of the political leadership… but we don’t have 40 years! Civilization needs to kick off a genuine international expansion into space before 2025, if we are to avoid economic implosion and further generations of confrontation and aggression. Therefore we need the pro-space movement to develop cooperation worldwide, and political and lobbying activities and to spread these vital proposals to the Earthlings!

The Space Renaissance is blooming everywhere!

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The springtime of 2016 is seeing an incredible growth of the SRI presence on the social media, Facebook mainly. Join the SRI springtime!

Do you believe in the space renaissance? Then Join the Space Renaissance Initative!

If your country does not have a national SRI chapter already, you can register as a member of Space Renaissance International, here:
https://spacerenaissance.space/build-sri-with-us/membership-2/membership/.

If you like to keep on receiving our analysis, newsletters and updates about our initiatives, please subscribe to the SRI newsletter here:
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If you have already subscribed once, there is no need to subscribe again.

[English editing by Arthur Woods]

Voir aussi la version française (pdf)

Apr

2016

Do you believe in a space renaissance? Then join the Space Renaissance!

Do you believe in a space renaissance? Then join the Space Renaissance!

Collapse of Western civilization – Nowadays many economic and international relations experts talk openly about the collapse of the Western civilization and also attempt to predict the date of such a collapse with the five-year period from 2025 to 2030 considered to be “very critical”. One such example: “ Global Trends 2025: A Transformed World” was recently published by the US National Intelligence Council. (See link below).

This comprehensive document covers various topics including the development of a multipolar society, continuing population growth, limiting resources at all levels and the considerable risk of conflict proliferation including significant concerns about the spread of nuclear weapons. Within such a period, a number of crucial attributes will emerge and global conflict may erupt with long term and destructive consequences. After the fall of the Berlin wall during the last quarter of 20th century, no concrete plan for a newer world order was implemented. The West now appears to be incapable of facing declining security, the threat of terrorism, the deficits of a so called postmodern era and is unable to protect its citizens and its newer generations from the threat of violence. After witnessing the recent disruption of many national societies including those in the Middle East and North Africa, the West, however, has failed so far to propose any further reiteration of the democratic social model which could feasibly contribute towards global stability, development and world peace.

War, “hygiene of the world”? – Looking at the past, it is often assumed that when a civilization finds itself in an implausible, stagnant or declining state, progress is “awakened” by crisis and warfare: shock and trauma are regenerators or even the “hygiene of the world”, as was defined by Marinetti’s futurism in 1909.

The current expectations of our many global societies could be summarized by future historians within the expression “the decline of Western civilization”, and it could find its epilogue in what may be large and highly generalized conflicts. Such a decline could be partly balanced trhough the collaborative development of the emerging Eastern countries including China, Asia and Russia as well. Even so, the potential of these entities will be considerably slowed by a lack of resources and greatly hampered by the still ruling philosophy that sees our planet as a closed environment. Even if warfare were still considered to be ethically acceptable, if indeed it ever was, for a number of reasons it does not seem to be a very useful “tool” in the world of today.

The wars of the past are extinct prospects: they were declared among nation states, were fought between armies which destroyed multiple resources, endured and ended while triggering and ushering in territories and newer political phases. Today’s hybrid wars are more likely to be eternal and exhausting guerrilla wars, wars of long term attritions that are comprised of ethnic and cultural unrest, political adventurism, terrorism, and the suppression of civilian populations. They are also endemic and depressing, quickly affecting essential business, travel, tourism, the economy, and development in general. At this stage we find ourselves in an immanent and vertical crisis, both economically and militarily, in that global society should certainly contemplate the final prospect, i.e. this situation could lead to a tragic end game implosion of civilization. Such a threat would comprise the first time that a (globalized!) civilization might break down without another civilization ready to pick up the baton. That is why we cannot resign ourselves to a supposed “necessary evil” or having to accept “bitter medicine”, as a prelude to healing, because most probably there would be no possible compensation, or any realistic resurgence and our species might plausibly regress to an insufficient pre-cultural anthropology or, far more tragically, to an hopeless post-cultural status.

On a purely economic level, considering the desperate need to allocate immense resources to essential and large scale development projects, civilization at large can no longer afford to spend a majority of its national budgets per year on weapons and on highly unproductive and unusable rearmament. Last but not least, the destructive potential of modern weapons, especially nuclear, has greatly increased the danger of total self-destruction of civilization, though this subject might nowadays be out of fashion.

So, in a nutshell: humanity cannot tolerate war. It cannot afford it as it is useless for any purpose. Indeed, it is 100% counterproductive and regressive. Therefore, a marked change in strategies is urgent than ever before. When it is noted that the direction in which we are going may lead towards disaster, we need to change direction as soon as possible, and to set off for a new era of vigorous development, one which raises and restores hopes of social growth – a new renaissance.

A disruptive shock of new global concepts – To trigger a new renaissance we need the disruptive shock of new global concepts, but we have already seen that these cannot take the shape of warfare. Given the choice, and we do not see why we should not be able to make such choices, would we happily opt for a positive shock that brings excitement, joy and opportunity rather than death and destruction? We prefer to propose a new perspective and a new human understanding, with far reaching horizons, as opposed to providing cannon fodder for tyrannies while avoiding the squalor and the mud of misery. It would be useless to invoke stability, democracy, freedom, development and well-being, without the dignity that comes from jobs: as without offering a new type of industrial development, nothing can stand in the way of Armageddon. The most fruitful revolutions were in fact, the industrial ones. The most promising industrial revolution now currently possible, is found through the global development in the fields of innovative civilian astronautics – from Low Earth Orbit to the cislunar region of space. All the harbingers of progress now point upwards.

There is little remaining potential for new land transport industries and, although improvements will be made, we have resigned ourselves already to the decline of the oil civilization, to which we are still tied. It is not difficult to see, in fact, that the crisis which began in 2008 with skyrocketing oil prices, is now finding a fresh outbreak with the decline in oil prices, the deflation factor and hence a global economic slump. Given the pace of original technological advancement, the new urbanism is thus forced to take inspiration from the work of our most forward thinkers and original scientists. In particular we continue to reiterate enlightened 20^th century thinkers such as Gerard O’Neill and Krafft Ehricke, aiming humanity towards Earth’s orbit, to the Moon, into cislunar space, and towards the Near Earth Asteroids. With science and technology humanity will look to the stars – not as a distant sky to be observed – but as an immediate three dimensional framework within which we are immersed, and through which we will need to learn how to navigate and to live. Will our children and grandchildren dwell among the stars or in the teeming wastes of urban blight and the shacks of shanty towns? The outcome depends on us today, we, seven and a half billion citizens of planet Earth. We must decide, while we still have the power to do so, whether to dedicate our energies, our governments, our taxes and our investments for warfare, death and destruction, or apply these towards the opportunities inherent in opening space frontier and the forthcoming Renaissance.

The plan to capture an asteroid, and bring it to L5 – Considering positive shocks to society, like the many major and historic projects – ideas that are comparable in scope to the construction of the Egyptian pyramids – will illustrate our case. Some examples: the plan to capture an asteroid, bring it to stable lunar orbit at L5, and creating a large rotating habitat endowed with artificial gravity; which represents just one of many remarkable concepts; or the possibility to achieve within the next 20 or 50 years a comprehensive manned lunar settlement and then subsequent trips to Mars undertaken by astronauts of all nations; or to achieve an unfolding space based information networks in LEO, accessible to all peoples in all places which can accurately investigate, describe and create the comprehensive infrastructures of a sustainable future world.

The focus on international space development will bring an impetus to the comprehensive global agenda, helping it to endow an equitable world-view and to avert the many critical threats we currently face. Amongst many innovative prospects, tax policies which are favorable to the companies in the civil astronautics will contribute to the preparation of low cost earth-orbit fully reusable vehicles leading to the development of orbital infrastructure and lunar tourism.

We will face the problem of a instable political direction. New leadership with a highly scientific, technological and cultural profile is needed. We can see a glimpse of this on the horizon, yet, unfortunately, only a beginning. But let’s do it! It depends on us!

The Space Renaissance International and its national chapters have several initiatives and public events in agenda, a possible workshop on Lagrange City at L5, and for cislunar architectures in October 2016 in Rome, and in 2017 the Space, Not War! Congress.

https://www.spacenotwar.space

Want to help? Do you believe in a space renaissance? Then Join the Space Renaissance Initative!

We are looking for membership from all walks of life and all persuasions. Please join us in creating the new paradigm for the 21^st century.

If your country does not have a national SRI chapter already, you can register as a member of Space Renaissance International, here:

https://spacerenaissance.space/build-sri-with-us/membership-2/membership/.

IMPORTANT: you received this newsletter as an invitation. To deliver a newsletter entails some overhead and administration, and we do not intend to send our communications to persons who are not interested, and which would therefore remain unread.

Therefore, if you like to keep on receiving our analysis, newsletters and updates about our initiatives, please subscribe to the SRI newsletter here:

https://spacerenaissance.space/build-sri-with-us/space-renaissance-newsletter-registration/.

If you have already subscribed once, there is no need to subscribe again.

Link to: “Global Trends 2025: A Transformed World”

https://www.dni.gov/files/documents/Newsroom/Reports%20and%20Pubs/2025_Global_Trends_Final_Report.pdf

[English editing by Amalie Sinclair & Arthur Woods]

Download the pdf English version:

https://spacerenaissance.space/media/SRI_Newsletter_17042016.pdf

Télécharger la version française, en pdf:

https://spacerenaissance.space/media/SRI_Newsletter_17042016-fr.pdf

[Edition française par Catherine Laplace-Builhe & Philippe Blanc]