Fwd: [SpaceRenaissance-775] Fwd: Moon Society endorses Aldrin Proposal

[Bryan Bishop]

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Charles Radley <cha...@stratowave.com>
Date: Tue, Oct 13, 2009 at 2:54 PM
Subject: [SpaceRenaissance-775] Fwd: Moon Society endorses Aldrin Proposal
To: space-renaissa...@googlegroups.com, "Artemis-List@Asi.
Org" <artemi...@asi.org>



It is already on the internet

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/buzz-aldrin/a-different-kind-of-moon_b_317786.html


---------- Forwarded message ----------
From:  <pres...@moonsociety.org>
Date: Tue, Oct 13, 2009 at 10:07 AM
Subject: Moon Society endorses Aldrin Proposal
To: Charles Frank Radley <cha...@stratowave.com>


Moon Society Endorses Aldrin's Proposal for a
Lunar Infrastructure Development Corporation

"A Different Kind of Moon Race"
From Moon Society President, Peter Kokh kok...@aol.com

October 12, 2009 - Moon Society Vice-President Charles F. Radley and
President Peter Kokh received a personal request from Buzz Aldrin to
endorse his proposal for a public/private/international plan to open
the Moon for exploration and development.
The proposal was subsequently published in the Huffington Post
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/buzz-aldrin/a-different-kind-of-moon_b_317786.html

Below are key excerpts:

   * “I propose instead America call the world to the Moon. In a new
global effort to use the Moon to establish a global space consortium
with a lunar surface facility as its epicenter,  “
   * “... competition, in an Apollo-style race back to the Moon, would
be a fruitless exercise in national hubris whose rewards, if we “won”
again, would prove fleeting”
   * “I am proposing a different way back to the Moon: international
collaboration.  “
   * “... the goal of creating a new public-private partnership to
develop the Moon. I call it the Lunar Infrastructure Development
Corporation (LIDC). The purpose of the LIDC would be to enable the
nations of the Earth to join together and return to the Moon as an
international cooperative venture.  The LIDC will pool the financial,
technical and human resources of its member nations to build the lunar
communication, navigation and transportation systems needed for human
exploration of the Moon. It would be a public/private global
partnership to make the Moon accessible to all humanity. The LIDC will
build the communication and navigation satellites needed by future
lunar travelers, develop fuel depots using lunar LOX – perhaps derived
from the recently discovered lunar water-and construct habitats that
will shelter space travelers while on the surface. It will enable a
sustainable human presence on the Moon that will be accessible to all
the nations on Earth. “
   * “Unlike the International Space Station (ISS), which is governed
by complex treaties, the LIDC will have the same flexibility as an NGO
in working with different nations and private entities to finance
build and operate the facilities and equipment needed for lunar
exploration. “
   * “To do so [i.e., honoring the astronauts of the Apollo Era
Missions] doesn’t require rerunning a long-ago Cold War race in which
America plays the role of a space-going Colonial power.

We immediately notified all Moon Society Officers and Directors, who
collectively make up the Management Committee who would decide whether
or not to give the Moon Society's official endorsement.

The email vote was unanimous. As Ben Nault, Director from Tucson, put it:

   “Probably the main reason the ISS is still "alive" and supported by
Congress is that it is part of a number of international agreements.
Backing out of these agreement would have financial, political and
diplomatic repercussions on the US. Therefore, having an international
component helps large complex programs survive the transition to
different administrations and different congressional moods. The
international angle gives long-term "sustainability" to the Lunar
Infrastructure Development Corporation. “
In asking for Committee member support, we pointed out significant
similarities with our own proposal, also strongly endorsed by
Committee members, for an International Lunar Research Park. Both
proposals are for public/private/international collaboration.
There are, of course, those who would prefer a NASA-stand alone
effort, and those who would prefer a purely private enterprise
approach. But a reality check shows that the
public/private/international approach will be much more robust, and
stand a much greater chance of becoming a permanent beachhead on the
Moon. It is also much more likely to lead to the first civilian
industrial settlement.
And that is precisely the Vision of the Moon Society.

While Buzz Aldrin has close ties to the Planetary Society and to the
Mars Society, the support of those groups may be harder to pin down.
The Moon Society strongly supports both the human exploration of Mars
and the opening of the Martian Frontier, apace with the further manned
exploration and development of the Moon.  Why? because both frontiers
stand a much greater chance of becoming economically sustainable as
mutual trading partners,  than either frontier does on its own.
International acceptance of Aldrin's plan for the Moon could soon lead
to a similar approach to Mars. While Mars catches the public fancy,
selling a Martian Frontier without any Economic Case for Mars having
been outlined, is simply not going to fly. And the foundation for an
economic case for Mars starts with mutual trade with the Moon, for
products and services that will be more inexpensively sourced from
each other than from Earth.

To realize either concept, Aldrin's LIDC and our own ILRP, a
revolution in space transportation needs to occur.
We are not talking exclusively, or mainly about new cheaper rocket
technologies, but about putting aside the true but absolutely
irrelevant strictures of the mass-fraction rule about the size of
payloads in relation to the size of rocket.
What makes this "rule" irrelevant is that it silently (and to that
extent dishonestly) excludes the mass of the rocket minus fuel as part
of the payload.
If all rocket components reaching low Earth orbit were parked there
awaiting salvage and or cannibalization for the construction of in
orbit facilities that made launching from LEO towards the Moon more
economical, and if all rocket components reaching the Earth-Moon
Lagrange 1 point where the gravities of Earth and Moon cancel out,
were similarly parked there awaiting cannibalization for the
construction of an L1 Depot from which payloads could be more
economically delivered to the Moon's surface, the economics of a lunar
build-up would change significantly.
The difference is similar to an effort to drive from New York to Los
Angeles carrying all your fuel with you, as opposed to refueling at
gas stations along the way. NASA has never wanted to be distracted by
the common sense plan of deploying fuel stations, repair facilities,
etc. along the way.  The reason, of course, is that is not a good use
of money for a one-time or time-limited lunar deployment. But we are
looking long range, at a significant and permanent lunar buildout, and
the NASA approach makes no sense at all in that context.
The proposed Lunar Infrastructure development Corporation will begin
by addressing that very issue.
Doing so, laying infrastructure at key points along the way, will make
all the difference in the world economically.

The Moon Society urges other pro-space organizations, the public, and
the media to support Buzz Aldrin's proposal.

For more on the Moon Society International Lunar Research Park proposal, see:
http://www.moonsociety.org/reports/beyond_nasa.html

Thank you for your support
http://www.moonsociety.org





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- Bryan
http://heybryan.org/
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