Inter-Department/Agency Guidelines: Within the U.S. government, many areas overlap, creating a need for interagency cooperation. Thus, the U.S. government must provide specific guidance to manage the areas of overlapping responsibility within U.S. government control. Commercial Space Guidelines All departments and agencies, to whom commercial space activities pertain, will construct a joint commission made up of representatives from each organize to provide ad hoc regulation of space operations for activities beyond the atmosphere and operations in direct support of such activities when these activities are not directly controlled by a specific branch of government, such as, but not limited to, asteroid mining and space tourism. This commission …show more content…
will be a stopgap for space developments which occur and change too quickly for legislative processes to keep pace and provide provisional guidance for commercial entities. The commission will, by consensus, determine the lead organization for each activity. If the commission does not reach a consensus, the NASA representative will be assigned as the lead by default. All departments and agencies will pursue and share, where possible, services procured from commercial entities to capitalize on fiscal benefits from such acquisitions.
Preserving the Space Environment and the Responsible Use of Space The space environment is sensitive to the accumulation of orbital debris. Orbital debris originates from many sources, including leftover pieces of launch vehicles, pieces broken off of orbital spacecraft, and even simple trash among others (Tate). Thus, all space organizations need to protect space operations from orbital debris to safely execute their missions Space Environment Preservation. The U.S. government, along with other space entities, needs to work toward minimizing the creation of future orbital debris. This will create an environment of safe and responsible use of space for all users. To do this the U.S. government will: • Continue to follow the United States Government Orbital Debris Mitigation Standard Practices (U.S. Government), to minimize the increase of orbital debris from U.S. launches and operations. • Develop new technologies, techniques, and procedures for launch vehicle and spacecraft development and construction to minimize the creation of orbital …show more content…
debris. • Foster space partnerships to disperse current and future orbital debris mitigation methods to all space entities to the largest extent possible. The intention of the effort is collaboration to share methods to, from, and within the U.S. government. • Conduct research and development of removal technologies for debris already in orbit. Specific agencies will be designated to deploy these technologies in the future whenever they have matured to an effective level of operation. • Enhance, sustain, and employ all available space situational awareness (SSA) technology and equipment to improve current databases concerning orbital debris. The primary space operations departments and agencies will use these databases to monitor space environment changes for the purpose of observing other nation’s adherence to orbital debris minimizing practices and to assist with space collision warnings for operational spacecraft. Foster the Development of Space Collision Warning Measures. To increase the safety of space operations across the nation and the world, the U.S. government will continue to enhance the quality of space object databases to help prevent space collisions. The Secretary of Defense (SoD) will take the lead in all SSA operations in close collaboration with the primary U.S. government space users as well as all other departments and agencies involved in space activities. Department/Agency Guidelines: Within the U.S. space programs each department and agency has a distinct set of responsibilities assigned to its area of control. Civil Space Guidelines Space Science, Exploration, and Discovery The Administrator of NASA shall: • Continue current progress toward the human exploration milestone of sending a crewed mission beyond the Moon by 2025 and associated programs • Push toward continuing International Space Station (ISS) operations continuing up to and beyond 2028 (Achenbach) to foster more international space science partnerships. • Develop two parallel, yet distinct, exploration initiatives based on human and robotic spaceflight. NASA will operate and fund each initiative along separate lines to prevent one initiative detracting the momentum of the other. But, each exploration initiative must have enough flexibility to provide support to the other for missions implicit to both initiatives. • Commission a series of studies to determine the current value of study for all known targets and destinations potentially available for exploration and discovery. Space Based Earth Observation The ability to monitor environmental events at the global level in near real time has revolutionized how much of the world functions. It behooves the U.S. to continue and expand upon the capabilities of environmental monitoring through satellite observation. • The Administrator of NASA shall conduct research and development into enhancing environmental observation technologies for the purpose of monitoring and researching global events, such as natural weather disasters, climate change. NASA will coordinate the research and development with the appropriate department or agency for whom the technology is being developed. Coordination, development, and testing will remain the purview of NASA until technology maturation reaches to an operational state. NASA will then shift control to the final department or agency. • Weather and Oceanic Sensing o The Secretary of Commerce (SoC), through the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Administrator, will act as the lead for the U.S. operational observation mission of Earth’s weather and oceans. Thus, the SoC will perform the following functions: Coordinate with the Administrator of NASA for the acquisition, testing, maturing, and transition of new Earth observation satellites for weather and ocean observation. Pursue international partnerships to increase clarity and timeliness of weather and ocean observational data by diversifying available resources among partner entities. Provide fiscal and operational sustainment of operational and new systems developed specifically for use by NOAA and other civilian Departments and agencies requiring similar capabilities. o The SoC, through the NOAA Administrator, the SoD, through the Secretary of the Air Force (SAF), and the Administrator of NASA shall coordinate Earth observation efforts to provide continuous data concerning the real-time state of the planet to all departments and agencies that require it.
Where possible, NOAA, the DoD, and NASA will attempt to share data with international partners to increase available data. The Department of Commerce (DoC) and the Department of Defense (DoD) will share responsibility of control for the satellites and ground control stations ensure personnel from both departments can maintain the systems separately, if needed. • Land Remote Sensing o The Secretary of the Interior (SoI), through the Director of the United States Geological Survey (USGS), will act as the lead for the civil land observation mission of the U.S.. Thus, the SoI will perform the following functions: Mirror all the functions of the SoC as they relate to coordination with the Administrator of NASA for systems and observational data pertaining to civilian land
observations. Work in coordination with the SoD, the Secretary of Homeland Security (SoHS), and the Director of National Intelligence to ensure national security preservation when sharing land observational data for environmental studies and/or natural disaster events to other civil government agencies or any non-U.S. government entities. This is especially critical when sharing data acquired from national security space systems. • The NASA and NOAA Administrators and the Director of the USGS shall: o Coordinate civil development, acquisition, and operations of space-based Earth observation systems to enhance cross utilization of satellites and minimize duplication efforts between both the land and ocean observation missions. o Work to enhance preexisting systems for dissemination of Earth observational data to the general public by updating, upgrading, or developing new systems. These systems include, but are not limited to: web-based applications, other digital information, and hard-copy maps. • The SoC, through the Administrator of NOAA will be the lead regulation and licensing official for all commercially-owned Earth observation satellite systems.
At the moment there is a ton of traffic in space and it is only building as more nations join the space faring ranks.14 This is a concern for every nation in space, as space forces are a foundational part to all military operations.15 Space Command is already a Major Command and it includes cyberspace which shows that it is important.16 With new technologies being developed and space travel becoming popular before the first public trip, it is only a matter of time till something happens and tensions rise.17 It is best to not wait for this to happen to make a change, and create the Space Force sooner rather than later.18 It is time just like when the Air Force was created from the Army Air Core as air power was the future, now space power is the future and it is time for the Space Force.19
2) Maintain critical infrastructure centers (telegraph, bridges, hospitals) that provide a situational awareness capability, actionable information about emerging trends, imminent threats, and the status of any incidents that involve
The Orbiter Vehicle (OV) is "the brains and heart of the Space Transportation System" ("The Orbiter," par. 1). Also called the fuselage, it has a cabin for the crew, a large cargo bay and three Space Shuttle Main Engines (SSMEs). The forward part of the orbiter is the crew cabin; it is where the cockpit and living quarters can be found and where mission experiments are performed. The middle part of the orbiter is large open bay and it i...
Chairman, Joint Chiefs of Staff, Mission Command White Paper (Washington, DC: U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, 3 April 2012),pg 3
NSSS states a few current trends in space as being “congested and contested” (NSSS, 8), which is shaping our space strategic environment as well as fueling debates for space weapons. “Congested” trend refers to the current “60 nations and government consortia that own and operate satellites and the expectation to have 9000 satellite communication transponders in orbit by 2015.
This essay is being written to prove that NASA spending has a negative impact on American society. Continuing NASA and the programs run by it is harmful to American society and Government. NASA harms the economy. NASA also harms the environment in which we live. And the money that NASA spends could be used to help solve problems in our country, not on another planet.
“Space, the final frontier….” These are the words that stirred the imaginations of millions of men, women and children with the debut of “Star Trek” in 1966. The show has arguably one of the most loyal followings of any production, and has inspired scores of people to consider the stars and wonder if we as a people will ever travel outside of our own solar system. The idea of space travel and exploration was not new when “Star Trek” hit the airwaves though. The United States was at odds with the Soviet Union, and both powers were locked in a battle that would come to be known as “The Space Race” during the height of the cold war. It was in 1961 that President John Kennedy made his famous appeal to the American people, challenging us as a nation to put a man on the moon before the decade was out. On July 20, 1969, that challenge was achieved when the astronauts of Apollo 11 made the first manned landing on the moon, and returned safely to earth. This, the highest achievement in the United States space program, will turn 45 years old this year. After 45 years, and a technological explosion over the past 25 years, the greatest achievement in the space program has been a manned lunar landing. Countless billions of American tax payer dollars have been spent on the space program over the decades, and there have been no achievements to match that of the moon landings. Though the budget for NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) is but a tiny fraction of the entire annual budget for the country, many of those billions that are allotted in the NASA budget for space exploration would better serve the country if they were re-directed to other areas. De-funding the space exploration portion of the NASA programs could create a “...
A successful space program is needed in America, and here’s why: we are losing our grip on the title of the world superpower and a new age of economics and politics is coming faster than we are prepared for. To be prepared for this new age we need the funds, which can be found in our space. The most deadly of those threats: asteroids. Don Yeoman, an employee at the Jet Propulsion Lab, a NASA facility, tracks over 600,000 asteroids every day.
The National Space Policy has undergone changes throughout its new creation on August 31, 2006, under both the Obama administration and the Bush administration. The act originally was established for overarching national policies that governed the conduct of U.S space activities. President Dwight Eisenhower said “More than by any other imaginative concept, the mind of man is aroused by the thought of exploring the mysteries of outer space. Through such exploration, man hopes to broaden his horizons, add to his knowledge, improve his way of living on Earth.” With that statement, is where our time in space begins.
Orbital debris is all sorts of materials that are human made and these objects are orbiting around the earth’s orbit but are no longer usable1. In other words, Orbital debris, also known as Space debris are all sorts of waste materials in space, which are in a state where various problems can trigger. Researchers and scientists are all concerned about the impacts these debris can leave and they are trying to determine any sorts of solution that may destroy the orbital debris causing no harms on the earth’s surface. This research paper primarily focuses on, the total number of orbital debris for years, the causes and problems due to the space junks and solutions to get rid of those waste space materials.
Carl Sagan once said “every planetary civilization will be endangered by impacts from space, every surviving civilization is obliged to become spacefaring—not because of exploratory or romantic zeal, but for the most practical reason imaginable: staying alive. If our long-term survival is at stake, we have a basic responsibility to our species to venture to other worlds.” The National Aeronautics and Space Administration, or NASA, is executing Sagan’s words every day. President Dwight D. Eisenhower created NASA in 1958 with the purpose of peaceful rather than military space exploration and research to contribute to society. Just 11 years after the creation, NASA put Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin on the moon, the first humans to accomplish this feat.
I would like to add that as the contamination of space continues to grow it will increase the risk of collisions that cause damage to the spacecraft. With the existing technologies it is a difficult task of improving the state of the space environment but any reasonable step to preserve space for the future generations will involve steps to reduce pollution.
Measures to mitigate the risks of space debris, including spacecraft design and measures to protect against space debris.
It is a wonder to marvel about how much debris man has created over the span of approximately 50 years. Sadly, this is nothing new on our planet. However, little is known, or at least in regards to public awareness, about the celestial landfill that man has created since the early days of the Space Race involving the Russian launching of Sputnik. Ever since then, the repercussions of the US versus Russia mechanized frenzy have snowballed into an estimated 6,600 satellites being launched, in addition to 1,000 that are still active now.
Most people think that the costly downside to funding space exploration is a reason to avoid spending money on sciences and instead spend it on problems here on earth, but such funding for space exploration actually promotes economical as well as scientific benefits. Space exploration is an important expenditure for the high cost because of the potential for numerous benefits such as the possibility to find useful resources to cultivate, space exploration and satellites produce many thousands of jobs in our economy, and it creates and discovers newer and better technologies through research and development.