July 8, 2016 • 46 mins
With the International Space Station orbiting on borrowed time, what's the future of space stations? Are private companies going to launch their own stations into orbit?
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Brought to you by Toyota. Let's go places. Welcome to
Forward Thinking. Hey there, and welcome to Forward Thinking, the
podcast that looks in the future and says I'll probably
be some kind of scientist building inventions in my space
(00:22):
lab in space. I'm Jonathan Strickland and I'm Joe McCormick.
And you know, if you listen to this podcast, you're
well aware that we love space. Yeah, if you don't
listen to this podcast, how are you hearing us? Now?
Some people might watch this podcast and not know why
it has no contact. Maybe the absorb it as as
(00:43):
a vibrations. It's like some sort of osmotic process. Uh. So,
in recent episodes, we've talked about all kinds of space
exploration projects. We've talked about Mars, We've talked about terraforming,
we've talked about the Moon. We've talked in the past
about space tourism, asteroid mine, asteroid mining, certainly. But today
we wanted to talk about space stations, and specifically because
(01:05):
we have talked about the I S S before, uh
and about public space stations, but we wanted to ask
the question today what about private space station? Yeah, well,
will we get to a future where you can find, uh,
you know, a space station brought to you by Home Depot,
the Home Depot station. Yeah, right up until it gets
bought by Smoothie King, and it will be the Smoothie
King station made out a particle board. I'm wondering how
(01:28):
hard it would be to find specific types of nails
floating in microgravity. Seems like that might be a poor choice.
But no, seriously, though, we really wanted to talk about
we're entering this era. We're in the era of private
space industry. We've got companies that are private companies that
are launching stuff into space. It is not going to
(01:52):
be that long from now when we start seeing private
space stations hypothetically maybe hypothetically because of course there aren't
any right now, but there are a lot of plans
for such a thing. So we want to kind of
explore that and talk about why that might very well
be a necessity in the not too distant future. Yeah,
(02:13):
because because the public space industry has been working pretty great,
little ish sometimes a little bit so far, but but yeah,
but there's so much promise in private companies getting to
this kind of thing, and uh, and we're not sure
what's going to happen to the I S S. Yeah,
I mean, eventually it's going to plummet in through orbit
(02:35):
into the ocean. It will be de orbited, yes, hopefully
on purpose. Fingers always crossed. But but you know first
of all that the I S was not designed to
last forever, right, Yeah, So until a couple of years ago,
the I S S uh, it had a funding lifetime, right,
So there's a certain amount of times people have committed
(02:55):
to funding missions and maintenance of the I S S.
And for a while that was set to expire in
the year twenty Then in January, NASA announced the Obama
administration had approved extension of the I S S that
would keep it running until at least so that's the
date as of now. Now. Ongoing research projects were cited
(03:17):
as a major reason for the extension, including research into
the effects of long term space flight on the human
body and also the role I the I S S
is going to play in helping advance the next phases
of NASA space exploration, like missions to Mars or asteroids,
and and the Twin study was kind of part of that, right.
It was that idea of studying the effects of space
(03:39):
on a human and then comparing that person to uh,
you know, their twin who had stayed here on Earth
for that duration, and to say like, well, this, this
is a way for us to better understand those effects
so that we can take that into account for missions
that would take people into space further and longer than
ever before. Right, But the station is kind of getting
(04:02):
up there in an age. It's going to be thirty
and are well, so it's starting to get up there.
It will have gotten up there in the future grammatically speaking,
And uh, and that's thirty years. It's about as long
as most of its structures were intended to last. And and
and sure the station is modular, but some of the
really important bits that are a little bit personickety, like
say the solar panels, might start blowing out a little
(04:24):
bit earlier than that. So so as it gets older,
it's going to be more expensive and more difficult to
keep it in orbit. Uh. And and yeah, ultimately its
fate is known, right right, And I mean there's no
surprise here, right. We cannot perpetually maintain and replace parts
(04:45):
on the space station eventually gets to a point where
it no longer makes financial sense, let alone a sense
on a technological or scientific level. Yeah, at some point
it's like you know, when you were in college and
you realize, like it would just be simpler to throw
my clothes away and go buy new clothes than to
try and do laundry at this point, yeah, like new
(05:05):
socks are cheaper than washing my socks. So so I
was thinking more along the lines of I'm spending more
per year trying to maintain this this limit of a
vehicle then it would cost me to go out and
buy even just a used car. Yeah. So ultimately, if
if all goes as planned, the I S S when
it reaches his expiration t it is going to come
(05:27):
down into Earth's atmosphere in a flaming ball of death,
but hopefully no real death because in the case of
the I S S, this will be a controlled re
entry exactly that takes place in the Southern Pacific Ocean
to a place known it is delightful. It's known as
the Spacecraft Cemetery. It's where we send all of our
dead space craft. Right well, and I mean it makes sense, right,
(05:47):
you want to be able to have a controlled de orbiting,
You want it to go to a place that is uninhabited,
to have the least impact for the you know, at
least impact on on the environment as you possibly can.
And the reason why you want to de orbit in
the first place is that you don't want to leave
stuff just in space. First of all, it's going to
de orbit eventually anyway, it'll it'll lose speed and it
(06:11):
will end up crashing to Earth, possibly over a populated
area if you haven't done it, you know, in a
controlled manner. Plus, you don't want to leave space junk
out there. It just means that it's going to be
another thing to avoid with future space missions. So this
is not something that is necessarily like a sad thing.
(06:33):
I mean, it's sad in the sense of seeing like
an era past, but it's it's something that we we
knew what we were getting into when we built the thing. Yeah,
and we've kind of been talking about it in terms
of of the United States funding. But of course a
large part of the three words in the title of
the space station is international. This this is a collaboration
(06:55):
between I believe sixteen countries right now, um, a bunch
of them at any rate. And uh and and it's
and it is a huge undertaking. I mean, it is
like nine hundred thousand pounds moving five miles a second,
enduring temperature swings of like five hundred degrees fahrenheit between
sunlight and shade. Uh. It's it takes a lot to
(07:18):
keep this thing in the air, including this wonderful international collaboration.
Takes a village to maintain a international space station, pretty
sure obtaining it well. It's often cited as the is
the most challenging engineering project in the history of humankind.
And and I think it would be challenging, not just
because of the technological aspect, but because you're talking about
international collaboration, which at times can be a little tricky. Yeah,
(07:41):
and even the different modules might end up going their
own way. There are reports that once the project comes
to an end, the Russian modules are going to be
removed and used to form an independent space station known
as the Russian Orbital Station or ross UH and the
it's so that this comes from the Russian Space contractor
r KK energy A. So they plan to detach the
(08:03):
forthcoming now CO module from the I S S and
use it as a basis to attach other modules and
build a fully functional Russian space station. Once the I
S S is decommissioned. Yeah, I like how how space
stations to me are are kind of like a real
world vultron where you know, other parts just kind of
dock on and you you do get these modules that
(08:25):
when you put them together, create something greater than than
the some of its parts. Right, So we we've got
this complicated um relationship between various nations that are collaborating
on the International Space Station. But that's not the only
player in the game. Like we were saying at the
beginning of the episode, private space industry is now a
(08:46):
real player too, who is delivering things to the space
station right now? Right? Yeah, that's a big one. Yeah.
Uh And and NASA is definitely increasingly interested in partnering
with private industry in order to get stuff done that
it can't afford to get done itself. Um and and
ostensibly to also grow the private space industry. But I
(09:07):
think it's kind of more the former. I could be wrong.
Um Boeing, for example, has been a really huge partner
in the I S S over over many many years,
providing hardware and software and docking systems and communications and
and all kinds of stuff. And uh, I haven't personally
heard about Boeing looking to get into the space and
space station industry itself. But uh, but this next company
(09:29):
that we're going to talk about definitely has Yeah. One
thing we should mention is that in most cases, I
would argue, in pretty much every case, the companies we're
talking about, just like the nations we've talked about, weren't
necessarily in charge of a big manufacturing system that just
created space stations all you know, in parts that then
(09:51):
could be assembled in space. Usually you're talking about entities
that are contracting with other companies to create various elements, right.
So I'm that's the way NASA has been forever. Every
NASA spacecraft has been the product of NASA partnering with
private industry to create those things. But in this case,
(10:12):
we're talking about actual private companies overseeing that process from
beginning to end, not trying to submit a proposal to
a government agency, get rewarded a contract, and then do it.
So now we're looking at a whole new world of
space stations, and we've even got a an example we
can look at is sort of a test run of
(10:35):
a private a privately built module or habitat if you prefer,
that is being tested right now as part of the
International Space Station. Yeah. In fact, we talked about inflatable
modules a little bit when we talked to a long
time ago about space tourism. Yeah, because we were trying
to say, Okay, so imagine you're you're trying to create
(10:58):
environments that can be inhabited it on the surface of
the Moon or in space at the lowest cost possible.
Getting all these materials into orbit that you would need
to assemble in order to make your rigid aluminum model
modules like in the I S is expensive. Yeah, so
what instead if you could just go blow up a
big balloon in space, right and then live in it. Yeah,
(11:20):
but now there actually is such a balloon. Yeah, that
was a hypothetical the last time we talked about it.
But Beam, the Bigelow expandable Activity module, has has been
sent up and inflated and people have hung out in it. Um.
I mean they haven't like thrown a party like that
I'm aware of now they have. The most they've done
has had people in space suits test the air inside
(11:41):
and then very coil like quietly go back into the
regular module the space station right less they upset the
balloon ghosts, No so so beam um. Okay, So it's
it's as we have been saying, this prototype inflatable space
habitat because traditional space habitats are a dragged cre eight honestly,
they require these heavy, rigid materials that are expensive to
(12:04):
send into space and difficult to maneuver once you get
them up there. So Bigelow Air Space designed Beam and
this this unit went up on a SpaceX Dragon resupply
mission in April and and packed in there it was
a cylinder that was like five point seven ft long
like that, very much like that, and and in about
(12:25):
seven point seven feet in diameter, which is a like
a like a smart car. Okay if you need a
visual and uh. It was installed on the aft part
of the Tranquility node by a robotic arm which was
controlled by an is S crew member, and it contains
a pressurization system with stored air. So in May, after
a failed attempt, um teams worked to expand the beam
(12:46):
to its full size over the course of seven hours.
So it is now a bubble that is thirteen feet
long and like ten and a half feet in diameter,
which is like a small room, which is what it is,
just a small room. You know may with teflon coated
glass fabric. When it comes to space stations, you don't
turn your nose up at any extra room. That's true, Yeah,
(13:07):
I mean rooms space and space oddly enough hard to
come by. You think it being like hypothetically infinite, but
it is. It is interesting now like as you were
as you were just about to say, Lauren, that the
size of the room itself is larger than the spacecraft
that was sent to carry it up there are larger
than the cargo larger than the cargo capacity because it
(13:30):
has expanded to its full size. Now it's beyond what
if it had been made out of rigid material it
would have had to take a couple of trips up
in a spacecraft of that size. Uh And and that's
one of the biggest advantages of this approach is the
idea that you can compress the full size of the
habitat down to its packed size, which is significantly smaller
(13:52):
than what it's unfurled sizes. And if you're talking about
rigid materials, it may not even be the a weight issue.
It may just that you can't pack them in snugly
enough for it to really make sense, which means you
have to send more missions up, which means it makes
it more expensive. If you've ever been embarrassed while trying
to move furniture and had to explain to somebody, no,
(14:13):
it's not that it's too heavy for me, it's just
awkward sized. I can't write a good grip on it,
or your or your you've ever had to move and
you are having your surprise at how many trips it
takes from your old place to your new place. Because
while your vehicle might be able to fit a lot
of stuff in it, your stuff does not magically conformed
to the inside of the vehicle. Yeah. Yeah, your Tetris
(14:33):
game is not strong enough. Uh so so yeah, so
they did open it up, check out the inside, collected
an air sample, uh and data from some of their
inflation sensors. They said it was cold, but you know,
otherwise pretty pretty cool. Yeah that was accidental. Uh and
and okay, it's it's not meant to stay up there forever,
(14:54):
and it's not meant to have people live in there
or do science in there. It's really a two year
um proof of concept of the technology. So so astronauts
that are aboard the station and engineer's Earth side, and
instruments in the module itself are going to be studying
just how it's doing, like from the structural integrity of
the thing to the leak rate of air to radiation
(15:15):
and temperature levels. Also that we can kind of compare
it back to the traditional rigid pain in the butt
modules and uh and and and see see see if
it stacks up right. Make sure that the claims that
Bigelow makes about their design hold up to reality, because
when you put real life people into that thing, you
(15:36):
want to make sure that it is in fact as
safe as the manufacturer believes it to be. You know,
when you introduce a sort of a skepticism there that
I think is going to be an important factor when
we start considering private companies getting into the space race.
We need to make sure that the advertising isn't leading
(15:57):
us astray. Like you can't always necessarily trust that some
one who's selling a product is telling you everything that
is true about it, particularly when you talk about companies
that are looking for funding. Right like then then it's like, well,
do we tell them we think it's going to work
and if it, if it does, it's going to be
or do you say no, this is gonna be the
most amazing thing ever you want to get in on
(16:18):
the ground floor. I mean yeah, And I don't think
it's going to be any kind of cases of of
you know, like like low radiation levels asterix like the
bottom of the page, like low compared to holding a
uranium core like that thing, not a fall out kind
of share. Like. I don't think anyone's gonna be trying
to to purposefully trick anyone, but there might be optimism
and uh and certainly regulation is going to be an
(16:40):
important part of all of this because traditionally speaking, we've
never had private industry doing this kind of stuff and
uh and governments have been picky about what they subject
to their most prized military flight personnel to right. So,
so at the end of this grand experiment, after they
have run these two tests and determined whether or not
(17:02):
in fact it is as safe as traditional uh spacecraft
material or space station material, what happens then it will
be destroyed and re entry. Man, we just can't make
stuff without breaking stuff. That no, but that's still I mean,
how would you get at home? I mean the engineers
(17:24):
that they just want to watch it all burn. That's
the whole reason they make these things just a bunch
of jokers coming back from space. Alright, But yeah, so
the whole pro the whole program is co sponsored by
NASA's Advanced Exploration Systems Program, which is which is the
part of NASA that it's particularly excited about fast tracking
(17:44):
affordable technology for human exploration of space. And uh so
the BEAM project is hoping, ultimately, I think, to develop
beyond Earth space habitats, not necessarily just an orbit um.
But Bigelow is certainly using this as an initial step
towards creating its own space station. Right, And you might wonder,
(18:05):
all right, well, we've talked a little bit about the
International Space Station and about a prototype approach to testing
a technology that could potentially be incorporated into a private
space station in the future. Why would any company be
interested in such a thing in the first place. Oh yeah,
it's such a huge undertaking. Subject yourself to that, and
it would cost millions of dollars in research and development
(18:28):
and construction and launching. I mean, what's the payoff? Well,
it's because there's money in space what not literally but
you know, figuratively speaking. So space stations one can serve
as a platform for satellite and spacecraft deployment and maintenance.
So with the privatization of space launches, more companies are
(18:48):
getting involved in creating and deploying satellites and other types
of spacecraft. They need a place sometimes to act as
kind of a launching ground, not like you would on Earth,
but place to deploy that technology that is already in
lower th orbit. Space stations often provide such a platform,
So that's one thing. So you you could become like
(19:09):
the truck stop to your spacecraft going out into either
another lower th orbit or beyond the most expensive cramps
truck stop you've ever experienced. Don't eat the egg scel
and sandwiches, uh, shrimp cocktails where it's at. We've talked
about that numerous times. Not for me, I couldn't have.
It would be very blended space. Probably that sounds to
(19:34):
me like a great tagline for a terrible science fiction movie. Also, manufacturing,
this is one of those things that seemed counterintuitive to
me at first, the idea of sending stuff out into
space for manufacturing purposes, because you would think the cost
of getting it into space would negate any advantage you
would have, especially if you want it back on Earth
(19:55):
for something right. I actually remember I watched a science
fiction film in which I criticized a bit of the
film specifically for this in which uh androids were being
um built in a space station in orbit around Earth
and then sent back down to Earth to act as
you know, workers and labors, and I thought, well, that
seems unnecessary and ridiculously expensive. It's actually one of the
(20:19):
production predictions that Elon Musk has for the future that
will will will off base all of our heavy industry
into into orbits. Well for one thing, you know, heavy
industry becomes practically weightless that way. Uh. It was a
terrible joke, but it's actually true. I mean, there's because
because of the nature of space, because you can work
in a vacuum, you can work in microgravity. It opens
(20:40):
up opportunities and manufacturing that are impossible to replicate here
on Earth. And in some cases it can be for
like really precise chemical types of manufacturing, not just not
just the sort of manufacturing we tend to think about,
like building cars and stuff, but actually designer chemicals, things
like medications or other chemical applications. So it's a very
(21:02):
real possibility that as we see the price tag come
down for launching stuff into space. We could see more
and more applications of manufacturing. I've seen a lot of
stuff about three D printing in space where it takes
on a much different dimension than it does here on Earth.
Another area where it could come in handy to have
a space station. We actually alluded to this a little
bit earlier. Asteroid mining. Um, the whole idea of of
(21:26):
of exploiting the asteroids that are in the Cellar system
to get at resources that may be very plentiful on
certain types of asteroids. It would be really helpful to
have a place in space where you would have your
your various uh whatever whatever units you have going out
to asteroids to mind them to come back as a
place to exchange stuff and go back out again. Um.
(21:48):
We've talked about using asteroids to mine water, which you
could then use to turn into rocket fuel. Uh. There's
a lot of stuff that could potentially come in really handy,
especially as you start talking about going further into our
Solar system, whether it's for exploration or a colonization or
whatever it may be. And then space tourism of course, Yeah,
(22:09):
to be able to create a cabinet space. Yeah, it's
the it's the ultimate adventure destination, right, Like it's the
idea of going into space and staying aboard a space
station looking back at the Earth. So far, only seven
private citizens have ever done this, and it wasn't for funzies.
(22:30):
I mean they were they were up there conducting research.
Well they were. It was for funzies for them, but
they also had the conductor research because they paid for
the privilege between twenty and forty million dollars for and
one of them went twice. And so there's only been
seven people who have gone up who have not been
part of an official cosmonaut or astronaut crew, but paid
(22:52):
for the privilege to go up aboard the International Space Station.
They did have to perform experiments and stuff while we
were they were there space. It's part of their buying. Yeah,
space and space like we said limited, so you gotta
you gotta work your shift. Yeah. Um, one of those
people actually know one of the seven people who have
been a private says an up in space, it would
(23:12):
be Richard Garriott, a lord British. Yeah. So um, it's
interesting that that has happened. But the cool thing about
the private the possibility of private space stations is that
opportunity might open up to a broader audience than just
super mega rich people, right, Like, Yeah, I don't think
(23:35):
most of us could afford a twenty million dollar ticket
for vacation. I know I couldn't, especially not another twenty
million for a return trip. Yeah, well you're here, but
guess what, You're gonna stay here until you cough up
another twenty million. Now, I think sponsored visits are going
to be a thing where where people like a company says,
you know, I will pay for your trip to the
(23:56):
space station if what you do is talk about how
great Eeto's taste in space, or or something like like
a vice being like hey like go up and get
like the scoop on all of the I don't know
if that's how people advice talk. That was probably a
really unflattering I kind of want to start a Kickstarter
noll that's just titled send Kanye to Space and just
(24:20):
raise that twenty million, not the I didn't say, so
he can tell us how Cheetos tastes. No, I mean,
I haven't worked out the entire detail of the Kickstarter campaign,
so just give me time. But no space tourism like
with the private Space industry. We're seeing the cost of
launch come down slowly over time, we might be able
(24:43):
to see it come to a point where more people
could afford that experience. I don't think it's ever going
to reach a point where the average person will be
able to afford it. I think it's still gonna be
certainly in that luxury category, but it will be less
than the twenty million that we've seen in the past,
forty million that we've seen in the past, And that
(25:06):
to me is really exciting to this idea that that potentially,
if you had enough money, you could go and visit
a space station and look back on the Earth. That's
something that you you know, they they haven't done that
for years now aboard the International Space Station, and that
those seven people pretty much got in before that was
shut down. So this would give that opportunity once again.
(25:30):
So anyway, the point being that there there are a
lot of different opportunities to make serious cash running a
private space station, assuming you can work out the incredibly
complicated details of building one, testing it, making sure it works,
and then launching it and deploying it. They've already done
it once. How how hard can it be? It only
(25:53):
only took more than a dozen countries collaborating with one
another billion dollars to say that space. But but the
nice thing is that we can build upon knowledge. Right,
we know already things that work, and we even are
seeing some really cool experiments. In fact, did you know
that before NASA designed and built the International Space Station,
(26:16):
they actually considered inflatable habitats as a possible UH method
of creating a space station. But at the time, their
materials were pretty flimsy. Good Year was providing the rubber
for them to test it, but it was because that's
they hadn't hadn't developed keval are yet, they hadn't developed
(26:38):
stronger materials yet, and they did determine they said, well,
it's not going to be sufficient for blocking radiation and
it's not very resistant to ballistic impact. So they said,
we can't do this. But now material science is caught
up to the point where we do have have flexible
materials that are incredibly resistant to ballistic impact and at
(27:03):
least from what we've heard, are as effective at protecting
against radiation as the traditional materials used. Speaking of hearing, though,
this is my pun transfer of the conversation topic. UH.
The the the Bigelow inflatable beam thing is it's hypothetically
a lot quieter on the inside than a traditional aluminum capsule.
(27:25):
Oh so acoustically, acoustically, it's nicer to hang out, I guess.
I guess that makes sense because it's not a hard surface,
so sound doesn't bounce off of it the same way
it would inside a traditional space capsule. I never thought
about that, but that is interesting. I guess it's like
being in a big pillow or a bouncy house, just
without the kids, which is my favorite way of being
(27:45):
in a bouncing house. Um. So, let t's talk about
some of the private space stations that are in various
forms of development. There is the Bigelow next generation commercial
space station, so Beam is kind of like that that
proof of concept to test the basic technology that would
be incorporated on a much larger scale for this particular approach.
(28:06):
The base unit of the the Bigelows space station, should
it actually become a thing, is the B three thirty,
which is an expandable habitat that Bigelow has developed that
will have three hundred thirty cubic meters of internal space. Now,
if you compare that to the International Space station's Destiny module,
(28:27):
which is the primary operating facility for the United States
research payloads, that has a one sixty cubic meters of
internal space, so it's much larger than the Destiny Module module.
But cuban mind, the Destiny Module is just one part
of the I S, it's not the whole thing. But
that means that Bigelow's habitat would have two more habitable
(28:48):
space inside of it than the Destiny module does. However,
it would only have an increase of thirty three in
mass because that inflatable design means that doesn't have to
have as much of that bulky material, So you get
two more space but only thirty three more mass. That's
a pretty pretty good you know trade. Yeah, not bad
(29:10):
at all. Uh Now, according to Bigelow, the B three
thirty will provide radiation protection that's at least as good,
if not better than the current I S S modules.
That's one of the things they are testing with Beam
to make sure that that actually is accurate. Uh And
they also say that the whole would be more resilienta
ballistic damage than the International Space Station currently is, So,
in other words, it would be an improvement in in
(29:33):
those specific ways, uh, which you definitely want to hear
that too, And it's modular design would allow for multiple
units to fit together. In fact, the space station would
consist of two B three thirty modules joined. They essentially
kind of lock docking stations have become a larger unit
that way. Bigelow has already partnered with United Launch Alliance
(29:56):
to provide launch services for the two modules. U l
A uses Atlas five rockets to launch payloads into space,
and right now they're looking at the possibility for launching
these things as early as One module, they said, is
already on schedule to be ready for launch by twenty nineteen,
and the other one is scheduled sometime in So that
(30:17):
means we could have our public space station still operating
at the time the private ones come start to come on.
That's right, that's right. Uh. To be fair, we don't
have any information about where the private space station would
orbit in relation to the International Space Station. That would
be a very important piece of information, but that has
not been If it is known by anyone, it has
(30:40):
not yet been publicly revealed. Um. But they said that
one of the things they might do before they actually
create the full private space station is DOC one of
the B three thirty units with the I S S,
which would actually increase the I S S is uh
capacity by or or volume I should say overall volume
(31:02):
by so at least for a while. They would They
would launch the first module up, it would dock with
the I S S presumably assuming that NASA would agree
to such a thing, They would launch the second one,
and then the two would meet and become the Bigelows
space Station. Uh, it's not the only one that is
being talked about. Bigelow is probably the one that the
(31:26):
more space enthusiasts have heard about. It's it's been around longer.
The idea has been around longer, sharing especially since they
are currently conducting an experiment to see how well their
technology works. It's it's got perhaps better street cred. Yeah,
at least they've got an active test going on right now,
so they have something to show for their plans. It's
(31:46):
not like it's not like when we were talking about
what is it is it Mars one? The the the
entity that's attempting to launch people into space to go
and colonize Mars before anyone thinks it would be quite ready. Uh,
it's not quite like that, right, that they actually have
stuff that they're showing that is beyond just just really idealistic.
(32:09):
It's not a fly by night. Yeah, it's not a
launch by night either. You launched in the daytime. Everyone
knows that anyway. So there's a there's a former NASA
manager of the International Space Station who has recently UH
started up a company called Axiom Space l l c.
(32:30):
That is Mike Suffredini, who announced on June twenty two,
two thousand and sixteen, just a few days before we
record this podcast, that he was going to start this
new company in order to develop a private space station.
Now it looks like this one is not going to
be going the same path as Bigelow in terms of
structural design. Yeah, according to UH. To Suffradini, he said
(32:53):
that in order to make money, we have to get
to orbit fast. I think it's going to take a
while to build a spacecraft out of inflatal a technology.
So what he's saying is it's not the Biggelows approach
is not going to work. He just thinks that it's
it's going to be slower in the long run. Slower.
He yeah, I think he believes that is way too
(33:13):
aggressive to get an an inflatable habitat space station into orbit.
I think that's essentially what he's saying here. But he
hopes also to be able to attach a private module
developed by Axiom Space to the International Space Station as
a prototype testing grounds. Would be kind of similar to
BEAM in that way, and once that that technology is
(33:36):
proven to be safe and effective and be able to
do all the things that the International Space Station is
currently used to do, then it would transition that into
creating it's you know, its own space station, that that
unit would become the core of the new space station.
And he hopes to have a final design for their
(33:59):
module by the end of this year, which you know,
he just announced the company on June twenty two. He
hopes by December to have a final design for the
module he helps by January of next year two get
a contractor to start building the thing. So incredibly aggressive
and a very tight deadline, and the company also plans
(34:21):
to launch by one So assuming the Bigelow's plans go
on the way that they have intended, we could see
two different private space station modules being launched into space
around the same time, with different design elements. Totally different
approaches to creating space stations. Does this one sound unrealistically aggressive?
(34:45):
Do you guys? It sounds crazy aggressive to me, Like
the design and building it. He's not talking about being
built by seen, but being ready to launch by when
he doesn't even have a final design yet. Seems really optimistic.
If it weren't the one of the former head Haunt
(35:06):
shows involved in the I S S, I would say
that it was ridiculously aggressive. Very fair point that that
thing puts it down onto a merely aggressive. That's that's fair.
I've done this before, like look before, I already know
what not to do, all right. Uh yeah, that's that's
(35:27):
that's totally that's totally valid. And uh it's interesting to
think about, you know, these two very different approaches and
whether or not, like it could very it could possibly
get to a point where we see both actually active
in lower th orbit simultaneously. Yeah, and that would be
amazing because now you're talking about a plethora of options
(35:52):
considering that right now, there is one which doesn't make
it an option. It's just your only choice. It's either
that or nothing. Yeah. But but this is the sort
of thing that would avoid having a space monopoly, which
is something I think we don't want to see, uh
and it could mean that we continue to see a
(36:14):
lot of innovation so that one company is always trying
to have an advantage over the other. We all stand
to benefit from. Yeah, the the private space race, I
kind of like this idea. Yeah, yeah, but there are
some challenges that we have to address. One of the
biggest ones is one we kind of talked about right now,
that timeline to be able to develop this private space
(36:37):
station technology and test it in a way where we
can use the International Space Station as as sort of
our our home base. That timeline is getting shorter and shorter,
assuming we don't see another extension uh for the funding
for the International Space Station. Right like, right this very moment,
we have approximately eight years left if anyone wants to
(36:58):
test their stuff on on the I S S. With
NASA's uh bene benefaction UM. Hypothetically, the longest we're going
to get is twelve years. And once the I S
S is decommissioned, it's gonna be a lot harder to
test your your technology because you won't have that base
to to lock onto and be able to you know,
(37:19):
remotely assess the feasibility and the and the efficiency of
your technology. You have to figure out some other way
of testing it that minimizes risk both to property and life,
so that that's going to be a real big challenge
once the I S s D commissions. And not only
is there a short amount of time to get in
that testing, but you also have to remember the International
(37:40):
Space Station doesn't have an infinite number of docking ports.
So if you want to if you want to dock
your your module to the International Space Station so that
you can do testing, yeah, you better you better start
building soon because well, I mean, it all depends on
how NASA decides who to partner with, right, We don't
(38:00):
We are not privy to that particular process. Um. I
would imagine that Bigelow has since it has the the
already existing relationship with NASA, is in pretty good shape.
And then the fact that you have a former manager
of the International Space Station heading the other company, it's
in pretty good shape too. So assuming Bride right, he
(38:23):
just flipped his desk and said, Sea it loses, I'm
out of here, and left the door open as he
left NASA. I'm assuming that didn't happen. I'm not don't know,
but I'm assuming, but that means that they you know,
NASA has to juggle while do we have the capability
of allowing more than one to dock at a time.
How how much do we want to keep these docking
(38:45):
ports open in case we need it for some other
unforeseen circumstances for our own stuff or Yeah, I mean,
can we just build a module that's nothing but docking points?
It's just it's just theahedron docking points. It's that connect there,
like any sort of building toy you have where you're like,
I just I just need something like a Lego that
(39:06):
has every every surface is Lego because I just needed
to hold everything together. Um. Yeah, I mean that it's
just a logistic issue at that point, but it's a
one that has a real impact. And when you're talking
about a short timeline, every little thing like that matters. Yeah.
And another potential hiccup or um or hold up in
(39:31):
all of this is something that we mentioned a little
bit earlier. Um there there aren't really regulations in place
for for private industry being out in space right right now,
and that is going to be a thing that will happen. Yeah.
I mean, this is a field known as space jurisdiction,
and you might say it's an underdeveloped field. Yeah, well
because until recently, the only entities that were at all
(39:55):
getting into space we're completely sponsored by nations. I mean,
they were government agencies. So the government international treaty right there, right,
the rules that we created, the space law that we
created it it specifically pertains to nations, not private organizations,
because at the time that we were drafting that legislation,
(40:19):
you didn't think about a private company blasting off into space.
That was beyond the capabilities that we had at the time. Yeah,
but as we all know, businesses, private corporations and companies
sometimes behave very well and sometimes behaved not so well
or sometimes can even uh be be criminally or civilly
(40:40):
liable even if nobody did anything really bad on purpose.
That's why we have corporations, because there are people and
we can hold them accountable. That never happens. Go ahead. So, yeah,
this whole thing of space jurisdiction, it's how laws are
applied and enforced in space, and it uh, it hasn't
been to big of an issue with the remarkably well
behaved public servants to have been part of the public
(41:01):
and private expeditions up until now. But let's entertain a
few weird scenarios. How about a few private companies put
privately owned space stations into orbit. One of these private
companies goes bankrupt, can't maintain its space station, nobody else
wants to buy it, its orbit decays, and because this
was unplanned, it turns out the station maybe entering the
(41:24):
atmosphere somewhere where there's a small risk of intact debris
from the station falling over a populated area. Who is
supposed to step in to prevent something like this from happening?
And can people be held legally accountable? And if so,
by whom? All I can imagine is is being like
a shareholder in that company and the guy just shows
(41:45):
up and says, hey, so you own stock in Space
co it went belly up, It's your responsibility to to
de orbit Space Coast space station over the Pacific. And
this is typically like the answer to this is usually
Superman right right? Or how about space collisions? Uh so
(42:09):
one space station crashes into another because of negligence or
you know, error, or or much simpler to imagine scenario.
I think businesses on Earth are often charged with illegal
dumping of waste. This is a common problem that that
you know, manufacturers get in trouble for Let's say a
private space station has a penchant for emptying some sort
(42:31):
of solid waste into high velocity orbit. Some of this
orbital waste damages another private company space station. How do
you sort that out? How do they how does one
get restitution from the other, and in what jurisdiction? And
we do have I mean, we have a lot of
space junk out there right now that like leftovers from
essentially dead satellites right so there there really is the
(42:55):
possibility that one company's dead satellite it eventually collide with
a private company's space station, and then you have these
very real questions about accountability and how do you handle this,
And that could even involve satellites from companies that are
no longer in business. It's it's this is a brand
(43:17):
new frontier. Yeah. So I'm not saying it's impossible to
figure this stuff out. I do think it's perfectly reasonable
to assume we will work out a framework for addressing
the laws it applies in space, just like we have
a framework for addressing the law as it applies in
international waters. But it's something to be thinking about. Yeah,
it's one of those things where it's it's good to
(43:39):
go ahead and ask the questions and try and come
up with some basic answers. Now when it's not entirely imperative,
like like it's it's not that something has already happened
and now we're trying to figure out how do we
deal with that, It's better to go be preemptive about
that sort of thing and say, let's ask some questions
of things, and you know, maybe maybe we assign each
(44:02):
question a probability score, like how likely is this to happen?
And the ones that are more likely they get priority
for us to figure out the answers too, and things like, well,
what happens if a an alien comes aboard my space
station and totally messes with it and ends up putting
pepsi logos all over my Coca Cola space station? Listen,
(44:24):
that goes at the bottom of the pile. All right,
we have some serious questions we want to answer first
before we get into brand confusion, like like why do
aliens prefer pepsi to Coca cola? Yeah, well, clearly they
didn't grow up in the South. Does Workman's comp cover
space madness, You're you're covering my ice cream bar. All right, Well,
(44:47):
this was kind of a fun preliminary discussion. The really
cool thing about this is that we don't have to
wait that long to see some real progress on this front. Now,
it may be that that twent any date that both
Axiom Space and and Bigelow have set could be too optimistic,
but even if that's the case, I suspect it won't
(45:09):
be that much later before we start seeing some real progress.
So hopefully they stay on track, because I would love
to see this, like like actual talk of launching private
space station components up into lower th orbit in just
four years. That's insane. I would love to see it happen.
So here's hoping it all works out. Um. We're really
(45:31):
excited to learn more about this and to kind of
explore both the possible positive elements of private space stations
as well as some of the concerns we might have
and again kind of address those in advance before it
becomes a problem. But we've got a lot of other
stuff we've got to talk about too, because it turns
out the future it's about everything. Did you guys know
(45:52):
that when you signed up for this. It's crazy. So
we have a lot more topics we're gonna be talking
about in future episodes of this podcast, but hey, we
get tired of choosing those all by ourselves. We love
it when you guys pipe up and give us ideas
and ask us questions like what will X be like
in the future? Uh, please continue to do that. You
(46:14):
can send us an email the addresses f W Thinking
at how Stuff Works dot com, or you can drop
us a line on Facebook or Twitter. On Facebook, you
can search f W thinking, We'll pop up, you can
leave a message there and we're just FW thinking. On Twitter,
you can just at reply us and we read all
of those. We look forward to hearing from you, and
we'll prop you again really soon. For more on this
(46:40):
topic in the future of technology, visit forward Thinking dot com,
brought to you by Toyota. Let's go Places,
Brought to you by Toyota. Let's go places. Welcome to
Forward Thinking. Hey there, and welcome to Forward Thinking, the
podcast that looks in the future and says I'll probably
be some kind of scientist building inventions in my space
(00:22):
lab in space. I'm Jonathan Strickland and I'm Joe McCormick.
And you know, if you listen to this podcast, you're
well aware that we love space. Yeah, if you don't
listen to this podcast, how are you hearing us? Now?
Some people might watch this podcast and not know why
it has no contact. Maybe the absorb it as as
(00:43):
a vibrations. It's like some sort of osmotic process. Uh. So,
in recent episodes, we've talked about all kinds of space
exploration projects. We've talked about Mars, We've talked about terraforming,
we've talked about the Moon. We've talked in the past
about space tourism, asteroid mine, asteroid mining, certainly. But today
we wanted to talk about space stations, and specifically because
(01:05):
we have talked about the I S S before, uh
and about public space stations, but we wanted to ask
the question today what about private space station? Yeah, well,
will we get to a future where you can find, uh,
you know, a space station brought to you by Home Depot,
the Home Depot station. Yeah, right up until it gets
bought by Smoothie King, and it will be the Smoothie
King station made out a particle board. I'm wondering how
(01:28):
hard it would be to find specific types of nails
floating in microgravity. Seems like that might be a poor choice.
But no, seriously, though, we really wanted to talk about
we're entering this era. We're in the era of private
space industry. We've got companies that are private companies that
are launching stuff into space. It is not going to
(01:52):
be that long from now when we start seeing private
space stations hypothetically maybe hypothetically because of course there aren't
any right now, but there are a lot of plans
for such a thing. So we want to kind of
explore that and talk about why that might very well
be a necessity in the not too distant future. Yeah,
(02:13):
because because the public space industry has been working pretty great,
little ish sometimes a little bit so far, but but yeah,
but there's so much promise in private companies getting to
this kind of thing, and uh, and we're not sure
what's going to happen to the I S S. Yeah,
I mean, eventually it's going to plummet in through orbit
(02:35):
into the ocean. It will be de orbited, yes, hopefully
on purpose. Fingers always crossed. But but you know first
of all that the I S was not designed to
last forever, right, Yeah, So until a couple of years ago,
the I S S uh, it had a funding lifetime, right,
So there's a certain amount of times people have committed
(02:55):
to funding missions and maintenance of the I S S.
And for a while that was set to expire in
the year twenty Then in January, NASA announced the Obama
administration had approved extension of the I S S that
would keep it running until at least so that's the
date as of now. Now. Ongoing research projects were cited
(03:17):
as a major reason for the extension, including research into
the effects of long term space flight on the human
body and also the role I the I S S
is going to play in helping advance the next phases
of NASA space exploration, like missions to Mars or asteroids,
and and the Twin study was kind of part of that, right.
It was that idea of studying the effects of space
(03:39):
on a human and then comparing that person to uh,
you know, their twin who had stayed here on Earth
for that duration, and to say like, well, this, this
is a way for us to better understand those effects
so that we can take that into account for missions
that would take people into space further and longer than
ever before. Right, But the station is kind of getting
(04:02):
up there in an age. It's going to be thirty
and are well, so it's starting to get up there.
It will have gotten up there in the future grammatically speaking,
And uh, and that's thirty years. It's about as long
as most of its structures were intended to last. And and
and sure the station is modular, but some of the
really important bits that are a little bit personickety, like
say the solar panels, might start blowing out a little
(04:24):
bit earlier than that. So so as it gets older,
it's going to be more expensive and more difficult to
keep it in orbit. Uh. And and yeah, ultimately its
fate is known, right right, And I mean there's no
surprise here, right. We cannot perpetually maintain and replace parts
(04:45):
on the space station eventually gets to a point where
it no longer makes financial sense, let alone a sense
on a technological or scientific level. Yeah, at some point
it's like you know, when you were in college and
you realize, like it would just be simpler to throw
my clothes away and go buy new clothes than to
try and do laundry at this point, yeah, like new
(05:05):
socks are cheaper than washing my socks. So so I
was thinking more along the lines of I'm spending more
per year trying to maintain this this limit of a
vehicle then it would cost me to go out and
buy even just a used car. Yeah. So ultimately, if
if all goes as planned, the I S S when
it reaches his expiration t it is going to come
(05:27):
down into Earth's atmosphere in a flaming ball of death,
but hopefully no real death because in the case of
the I S S, this will be a controlled re
entry exactly that takes place in the Southern Pacific Ocean
to a place known it is delightful. It's known as
the Spacecraft Cemetery. It's where we send all of our
dead space craft. Right well, and I mean it makes sense, right,
(05:47):
you want to be able to have a controlled de orbiting,
You want it to go to a place that is uninhabited,
to have the least impact for the you know, at
least impact on on the environment as you possibly can.
And the reason why you want to de orbit in
the first place is that you don't want to leave
stuff just in space. First of all, it's going to
de orbit eventually anyway, it'll it'll lose speed and it
(06:11):
will end up crashing to Earth, possibly over a populated
area if you haven't done it, you know, in a
controlled manner. Plus, you don't want to leave space junk
out there. It just means that it's going to be
another thing to avoid with future space missions. So this
is not something that is necessarily like a sad thing.
(06:33):
I mean, it's sad in the sense of seeing like
an era past, but it's it's something that we we
knew what we were getting into when we built the thing. Yeah,
and we've kind of been talking about it in terms
of of the United States funding. But of course a
large part of the three words in the title of
the space station is international. This this is a collaboration
(06:55):
between I believe sixteen countries right now, um, a bunch
of them at any rate. And uh and and it's
and it is a huge undertaking. I mean, it is
like nine hundred thousand pounds moving five miles a second,
enduring temperature swings of like five hundred degrees fahrenheit between
sunlight and shade. Uh. It's it takes a lot to
(07:18):
keep this thing in the air, including this wonderful international collaboration.
Takes a village to maintain a international space station, pretty
sure obtaining it well. It's often cited as the is
the most challenging engineering project in the history of humankind.
And and I think it would be challenging, not just
because of the technological aspect, but because you're talking about
international collaboration, which at times can be a little tricky. Yeah,
(07:41):
and even the different modules might end up going their
own way. There are reports that once the project comes
to an end, the Russian modules are going to be
removed and used to form an independent space station known
as the Russian Orbital Station or ross UH and the
it's so that this comes from the Russian Space contractor
r KK energy A. So they plan to detach the
(08:03):
forthcoming now CO module from the I S S and
use it as a basis to attach other modules and
build a fully functional Russian space station. Once the I
S S is decommissioned. Yeah, I like how how space
stations to me are are kind of like a real
world vultron where you know, other parts just kind of
dock on and you you do get these modules that
(08:25):
when you put them together, create something greater than than
the some of its parts. Right, So we we've got
this complicated um relationship between various nations that are collaborating
on the International Space Station. But that's not the only
player in the game. Like we were saying at the
beginning of the episode, private space industry is now a
(08:46):
real player too, who is delivering things to the space
station right now? Right? Yeah, that's a big one. Yeah.
Uh And and NASA is definitely increasingly interested in partnering
with private industry in order to get stuff done that
it can't afford to get done itself. Um and and
ostensibly to also grow the private space industry. But I
(09:07):
think it's kind of more the former. I could be wrong.
Um Boeing, for example, has been a really huge partner
in the I S S over over many many years,
providing hardware and software and docking systems and communications and
and all kinds of stuff. And uh, I haven't personally
heard about Boeing looking to get into the space and
space station industry itself. But uh, but this next company
(09:29):
that we're going to talk about definitely has Yeah. One
thing we should mention is that in most cases, I
would argue, in pretty much every case, the companies we're
talking about, just like the nations we've talked about, weren't
necessarily in charge of a big manufacturing system that just
created space stations all you know, in parts that then
(09:51):
could be assembled in space. Usually you're talking about entities
that are contracting with other companies to create various elements, right.
So I'm that's the way NASA has been forever. Every
NASA spacecraft has been the product of NASA partnering with
private industry to create those things. But in this case,
(10:12):
we're talking about actual private companies overseeing that process from
beginning to end, not trying to submit a proposal to
a government agency, get rewarded a contract, and then do it.
So now we're looking at a whole new world of
space stations, and we've even got a an example we
can look at is sort of a test run of
(10:35):
a private a privately built module or habitat if you prefer,
that is being tested right now as part of the
International Space Station. Yeah. In fact, we talked about inflatable
modules a little bit when we talked to a long
time ago about space tourism. Yeah, because we were trying
to say, Okay, so imagine you're you're trying to create
(10:58):
environments that can be inhabited it on the surface of
the Moon or in space at the lowest cost possible.
Getting all these materials into orbit that you would need
to assemble in order to make your rigid aluminum model
modules like in the I S is expensive. Yeah, so
what instead if you could just go blow up a
big balloon in space, right and then live in it. Yeah,
(11:20):
but now there actually is such a balloon. Yeah, that
was a hypothetical the last time we talked about it.
But Beam, the Bigelow expandable Activity module, has has been
sent up and inflated and people have hung out in it. Um.
I mean they haven't like thrown a party like that
I'm aware of now they have. The most they've done
has had people in space suits test the air inside
(11:41):
and then very coil like quietly go back into the
regular module the space station right less they upset the
balloon ghosts, No so so beam um. Okay, So it's
it's as we have been saying, this prototype inflatable space
habitat because traditional space habitats are a dragged cre eight honestly,
they require these heavy, rigid materials that are expensive to
(12:04):
send into space and difficult to maneuver once you get
them up there. So Bigelow Air Space designed Beam and
this this unit went up on a SpaceX Dragon resupply
mission in April and and packed in there it was
a cylinder that was like five point seven ft long
like that, very much like that, and and in about
(12:25):
seven point seven feet in diameter, which is a like
a like a smart car. Okay if you need a
visual and uh. It was installed on the aft part
of the Tranquility node by a robotic arm which was
controlled by an is S crew member, and it contains
a pressurization system with stored air. So in May, after
a failed attempt, um teams worked to expand the beam
(12:46):
to its full size over the course of seven hours.
So it is now a bubble that is thirteen feet
long and like ten and a half feet in diameter,
which is like a small room, which is what it is,
just a small room. You know may with teflon coated
glass fabric. When it comes to space stations, you don't
turn your nose up at any extra room. That's true, Yeah,
(13:07):
I mean rooms space and space oddly enough hard to
come by. You think it being like hypothetically infinite, but
it is. It is interesting now like as you were
as you were just about to say, Lauren, that the
size of the room itself is larger than the spacecraft
that was sent to carry it up there are larger
than the cargo larger than the cargo capacity because it
(13:30):
has expanded to its full size. Now it's beyond what
if it had been made out of rigid material it
would have had to take a couple of trips up
in a spacecraft of that size. Uh And and that's
one of the biggest advantages of this approach is the
idea that you can compress the full size of the
habitat down to its packed size, which is significantly smaller
(13:52):
than what it's unfurled sizes. And if you're talking about
rigid materials, it may not even be the a weight issue.
It may just that you can't pack them in snugly
enough for it to really make sense, which means you
have to send more missions up, which means it makes
it more expensive. If you've ever been embarrassed while trying
to move furniture and had to explain to somebody, no,
(14:13):
it's not that it's too heavy for me, it's just
awkward sized. I can't write a good grip on it,
or your or your you've ever had to move and
you are having your surprise at how many trips it
takes from your old place to your new place. Because
while your vehicle might be able to fit a lot
of stuff in it, your stuff does not magically conformed
to the inside of the vehicle. Yeah. Yeah, your Tetris
(14:33):
game is not strong enough. Uh so so yeah, so
they did open it up, check out the inside, collected
an air sample, uh and data from some of their
inflation sensors. They said it was cold, but you know,
otherwise pretty pretty cool. Yeah that was accidental. Uh and
and okay, it's it's not meant to stay up there forever,
(14:54):
and it's not meant to have people live in there
or do science in there. It's really a two year
um proof of concept of the technology. So so astronauts
that are aboard the station and engineer's Earth side, and
instruments in the module itself are going to be studying
just how it's doing, like from the structural integrity of
the thing to the leak rate of air to radiation
(15:15):
and temperature levels. Also that we can kind of compare
it back to the traditional rigid pain in the butt
modules and uh and and and see see see if
it stacks up right. Make sure that the claims that
Bigelow makes about their design hold up to reality, because
when you put real life people into that thing, you
(15:36):
want to make sure that it is in fact as
safe as the manufacturer believes it to be. You know,
when you introduce a sort of a skepticism there that
I think is going to be an important factor when
we start considering private companies getting into the space race.
We need to make sure that the advertising isn't leading
(15:57):
us astray. Like you can't always necessarily trust that some
one who's selling a product is telling you everything that
is true about it, particularly when you talk about companies
that are looking for funding. Right like then then it's like, well,
do we tell them we think it's going to work
and if it, if it does, it's going to be
or do you say no, this is gonna be the
most amazing thing ever you want to get in on
(16:18):
the ground floor. I mean yeah, And I don't think
it's going to be any kind of cases of of
you know, like like low radiation levels asterix like the
bottom of the page, like low compared to holding a
uranium core like that thing, not a fall out kind
of share. Like. I don't think anyone's gonna be trying
to to purposefully trick anyone, but there might be optimism
and uh and certainly regulation is going to be an
(16:40):
important part of all of this because traditionally speaking, we've
never had private industry doing this kind of stuff and
uh and governments have been picky about what they subject
to their most prized military flight personnel to right. So,
so at the end of this grand experiment, after they
have run these two tests and determined whether or not
(17:02):
in fact it is as safe as traditional uh spacecraft
material or space station material, what happens then it will
be destroyed and re entry. Man, we just can't make
stuff without breaking stuff. That no, but that's still I mean,
how would you get at home? I mean the engineers
(17:24):
that they just want to watch it all burn. That's
the whole reason they make these things just a bunch
of jokers coming back from space. Alright, But yeah, so
the whole pro the whole program is co sponsored by
NASA's Advanced Exploration Systems Program, which is which is the
part of NASA that it's particularly excited about fast tracking
(17:44):
affordable technology for human exploration of space. And uh so
the BEAM project is hoping, ultimately, I think, to develop
beyond Earth space habitats, not necessarily just an orbit um.
But Bigelow is certainly using this as an initial step
towards creating its own space station. Right, And you might wonder,
(18:05):
all right, well, we've talked a little bit about the
International Space Station and about a prototype approach to testing
a technology that could potentially be incorporated into a private
space station in the future. Why would any company be
interested in such a thing in the first place. Oh yeah,
it's such a huge undertaking. Subject yourself to that, and
it would cost millions of dollars in research and development
(18:28):
and construction and launching. I mean, what's the payoff? Well,
it's because there's money in space what not literally but
you know, figuratively speaking. So space stations one can serve
as a platform for satellite and spacecraft deployment and maintenance.
So with the privatization of space launches, more companies are
(18:48):
getting involved in creating and deploying satellites and other types
of spacecraft. They need a place sometimes to act as
kind of a launching ground, not like you would on Earth,
but place to deploy that technology that is already in
lower th orbit. Space stations often provide such a platform,
So that's one thing. So you you could become like
(19:09):
the truck stop to your spacecraft going out into either
another lower th orbit or beyond the most expensive cramps
truck stop you've ever experienced. Don't eat the egg scel
and sandwiches, uh, shrimp cocktails where it's at. We've talked
about that numerous times. Not for me, I couldn't have.
It would be very blended space. Probably that sounds to
(19:34):
me like a great tagline for a terrible science fiction movie. Also, manufacturing,
this is one of those things that seemed counterintuitive to
me at first, the idea of sending stuff out into
space for manufacturing purposes, because you would think the cost
of getting it into space would negate any advantage you
would have, especially if you want it back on Earth
(19:55):
for something right. I actually remember I watched a science
fiction film in which I criticized a bit of the
film specifically for this in which uh androids were being
um built in a space station in orbit around Earth
and then sent back down to Earth to act as
you know, workers and labors, and I thought, well, that
seems unnecessary and ridiculously expensive. It's actually one of the
(20:19):
production predictions that Elon Musk has for the future that
will will will off base all of our heavy industry
into into orbits. Well for one thing, you know, heavy
industry becomes practically weightless that way. Uh. It was a
terrible joke, but it's actually true. I mean, there's because
because of the nature of space, because you can work
in a vacuum, you can work in microgravity. It opens
(20:40):
up opportunities and manufacturing that are impossible to replicate here
on Earth. And in some cases it can be for
like really precise chemical types of manufacturing, not just not
just the sort of manufacturing we tend to think about,
like building cars and stuff, but actually designer chemicals, things
like medications or other chemical applications. So it's a very
(21:02):
real possibility that as we see the price tag come
down for launching stuff into space. We could see more
and more applications of manufacturing. I've seen a lot of
stuff about three D printing in space where it takes
on a much different dimension than it does here on Earth.
Another area where it could come in handy to have
a space station. We actually alluded to this a little
bit earlier. Asteroid mining. Um, the whole idea of of
(21:26):
of exploiting the asteroids that are in the Cellar system
to get at resources that may be very plentiful on
certain types of asteroids. It would be really helpful to
have a place in space where you would have your
your various uh whatever whatever units you have going out
to asteroids to mind them to come back as a
place to exchange stuff and go back out again. Um.
(21:48):
We've talked about using asteroids to mine water, which you
could then use to turn into rocket fuel. Uh. There's
a lot of stuff that could potentially come in really handy,
especially as you start talking about going further into our
Solar system, whether it's for exploration or a colonization or
whatever it may be. And then space tourism of course, Yeah,
(22:09):
to be able to create a cabinet space. Yeah, it's
the it's the ultimate adventure destination, right, Like it's the
idea of going into space and staying aboard a space
station looking back at the Earth. So far, only seven
private citizens have ever done this, and it wasn't for funzies.
(22:30):
I mean they were they were up there conducting research.
Well they were. It was for funzies for them, but
they also had the conductor research because they paid for
the privilege between twenty and forty million dollars for and
one of them went twice. And so there's only been
seven people who have gone up who have not been
part of an official cosmonaut or astronaut crew, but paid
(22:52):
for the privilege to go up aboard the International Space Station.
They did have to perform experiments and stuff while we
were they were there space. It's part of their buying. Yeah,
space and space like we said limited, so you gotta
you gotta work your shift. Yeah. Um, one of those
people actually know one of the seven people who have
been a private says an up in space, it would
(23:12):
be Richard Garriott, a lord British. Yeah. So um, it's
interesting that that has happened. But the cool thing about
the private the possibility of private space stations is that
opportunity might open up to a broader audience than just
super mega rich people, right, Like, Yeah, I don't think
(23:35):
most of us could afford a twenty million dollar ticket
for vacation. I know I couldn't, especially not another twenty
million for a return trip. Yeah, well you're here, but
guess what, You're gonna stay here until you cough up
another twenty million. Now, I think sponsored visits are going
to be a thing where where people like a company says,
you know, I will pay for your trip to the
(23:56):
space station if what you do is talk about how
great Eeto's taste in space, or or something like like
a vice being like hey like go up and get
like the scoop on all of the I don't know
if that's how people advice talk. That was probably a
really unflattering I kind of want to start a Kickstarter
noll that's just titled send Kanye to Space and just
(24:20):
raise that twenty million, not the I didn't say, so
he can tell us how Cheetos tastes. No, I mean,
I haven't worked out the entire detail of the Kickstarter campaign,
so just give me time. But no space tourism like
with the private Space industry. We're seeing the cost of
launch come down slowly over time, we might be able
(24:43):
to see it come to a point where more people
could afford that experience. I don't think it's ever going
to reach a point where the average person will be
able to afford it. I think it's still gonna be
certainly in that luxury category, but it will be less
than the twenty million that we've seen in the past,
forty million that we've seen in the past, And that
(25:06):
to me is really exciting to this idea that that potentially,
if you had enough money, you could go and visit
a space station and look back on the Earth. That's
something that you you know, they they haven't done that
for years now aboard the International Space Station, and that
those seven people pretty much got in before that was
shut down. So this would give that opportunity once again.
(25:30):
So anyway, the point being that there there are a
lot of different opportunities to make serious cash running a
private space station, assuming you can work out the incredibly
complicated details of building one, testing it, making sure it works,
and then launching it and deploying it. They've already done
it once. How how hard can it be? It only
(25:53):
only took more than a dozen countries collaborating with one
another billion dollars to say that space. But but the
nice thing is that we can build upon knowledge. Right,
we know already things that work, and we even are
seeing some really cool experiments. In fact, did you know
that before NASA designed and built the International Space Station,
(26:16):
they actually considered inflatable habitats as a possible UH method
of creating a space station. But at the time, their
materials were pretty flimsy. Good Year was providing the rubber
for them to test it, but it was because that's
they hadn't hadn't developed keval are yet, they hadn't developed
(26:38):
stronger materials yet, and they did determine they said, well,
it's not going to be sufficient for blocking radiation and
it's not very resistant to ballistic impact. So they said,
we can't do this. But now material science is caught
up to the point where we do have have flexible
materials that are incredibly resistant to ballistic impact and at
(27:03):
least from what we've heard, are as effective at protecting
against radiation as the traditional materials used. Speaking of hearing, though,
this is my pun transfer of the conversation topic. UH.
The the the Bigelow inflatable beam thing is it's hypothetically
a lot quieter on the inside than a traditional aluminum capsule.
(27:25):
Oh so acoustically, acoustically, it's nicer to hang out, I guess.
I guess that makes sense because it's not a hard surface,
so sound doesn't bounce off of it the same way
it would inside a traditional space capsule. I never thought
about that, but that is interesting. I guess it's like
being in a big pillow or a bouncy house, just
without the kids, which is my favorite way of being
(27:45):
in a bouncing house. Um. So, let t's talk about
some of the private space stations that are in various
forms of development. There is the Bigelow next generation commercial
space station, so Beam is kind of like that that
proof of concept to test the basic technology that would
be incorporated on a much larger scale for this particular approach.
(28:06):
The base unit of the the Bigelows space station, should
it actually become a thing, is the B three thirty,
which is an expandable habitat that Bigelow has developed that
will have three hundred thirty cubic meters of internal space. Now,
if you compare that to the International Space station's Destiny module,
(28:27):
which is the primary operating facility for the United States
research payloads, that has a one sixty cubic meters of
internal space, so it's much larger than the Destiny Module module.
But cuban mind, the Destiny Module is just one part
of the I S, it's not the whole thing. But
that means that Bigelow's habitat would have two more habitable
(28:48):
space inside of it than the Destiny module does. However,
it would only have an increase of thirty three in
mass because that inflatable design means that doesn't have to
have as much of that bulky material, So you get
two more space but only thirty three more mass. That's
a pretty pretty good you know trade. Yeah, not bad
(29:10):
at all. Uh Now, according to Bigelow, the B three
thirty will provide radiation protection that's at least as good,
if not better than the current I S S modules.
That's one of the things they are testing with Beam
to make sure that that actually is accurate. Uh And
they also say that the whole would be more resilienta
ballistic damage than the International Space Station currently is, So,
in other words, it would be an improvement in in
(29:33):
those specific ways, uh, which you definitely want to hear
that too, And it's modular design would allow for multiple
units to fit together. In fact, the space station would
consist of two B three thirty modules joined. They essentially
kind of lock docking stations have become a larger unit
that way. Bigelow has already partnered with United Launch Alliance
(29:56):
to provide launch services for the two modules. U l
A uses Atlas five rockets to launch payloads into space,
and right now they're looking at the possibility for launching
these things as early as One module, they said, is
already on schedule to be ready for launch by twenty nineteen,
and the other one is scheduled sometime in So that
(30:17):
means we could have our public space station still operating
at the time the private ones come start to come on.
That's right, that's right. Uh. To be fair, we don't
have any information about where the private space station would
orbit in relation to the International Space Station. That would
be a very important piece of information, but that has
not been If it is known by anyone, it has
(30:40):
not yet been publicly revealed. Um. But they said that
one of the things they might do before they actually
create the full private space station is DOC one of
the B three thirty units with the I S S,
which would actually increase the I S S is uh
capacity by or or volume I should say overall volume
(31:02):
by so at least for a while. They would They
would launch the first module up, it would dock with
the I S S presumably assuming that NASA would agree
to such a thing, They would launch the second one,
and then the two would meet and become the Bigelows
space Station. Uh, it's not the only one that is
being talked about. Bigelow is probably the one that the
(31:26):
more space enthusiasts have heard about. It's it's been around longer.
The idea has been around longer, sharing especially since they
are currently conducting an experiment to see how well their
technology works. It's it's got perhaps better street cred. Yeah,
at least they've got an active test going on right now,
so they have something to show for their plans. It's
(31:46):
not like it's not like when we were talking about
what is it is it Mars one? The the the
entity that's attempting to launch people into space to go
and colonize Mars before anyone thinks it would be quite ready. Uh,
it's not quite like that, right, that they actually have
stuff that they're showing that is beyond just just really idealistic.
(32:09):
It's not a fly by night. Yeah, it's not a
launch by night either. You launched in the daytime. Everyone
knows that anyway. So there's a there's a former NASA
manager of the International Space Station who has recently UH
started up a company called Axiom Space l l c.
(32:30):
That is Mike Suffredini, who announced on June twenty two,
two thousand and sixteen, just a few days before we
record this podcast, that he was going to start this
new company in order to develop a private space station.
Now it looks like this one is not going to
be going the same path as Bigelow in terms of
structural design. Yeah, according to UH. To Suffradini, he said
(32:53):
that in order to make money, we have to get
to orbit fast. I think it's going to take a
while to build a spacecraft out of inflatal a technology.
So what he's saying is it's not the Biggelows approach
is not going to work. He just thinks that it's
it's going to be slower in the long run. Slower.
He yeah, I think he believes that is way too
(33:13):
aggressive to get an an inflatable habitat space station into orbit.
I think that's essentially what he's saying here. But he
hopes also to be able to attach a private module
developed by Axiom Space to the International Space Station as
a prototype testing grounds. Would be kind of similar to
BEAM in that way, and once that that technology is
(33:36):
proven to be safe and effective and be able to
do all the things that the International Space Station is
currently used to do, then it would transition that into
creating it's you know, its own space station, that that
unit would become the core of the new space station.
And he hopes to have a final design for their
(33:59):
module by the end of this year, which you know,
he just announced the company on June twenty two. He
hopes by December to have a final design for the
module he helps by January of next year two get
a contractor to start building the thing. So incredibly aggressive
and a very tight deadline, and the company also plans
(34:21):
to launch by one So assuming the Bigelow's plans go
on the way that they have intended, we could see
two different private space station modules being launched into space
around the same time, with different design elements. Totally different
approaches to creating space stations. Does this one sound unrealistically aggressive?
(34:45):
Do you guys? It sounds crazy aggressive to me, Like
the design and building it. He's not talking about being
built by seen, but being ready to launch by when
he doesn't even have a final design yet. Seems really optimistic.
If it weren't the one of the former head Haunt
(35:06):
shows involved in the I S S, I would say
that it was ridiculously aggressive. Very fair point that that
thing puts it down onto a merely aggressive. That's that's fair.
I've done this before, like look before, I already know
what not to do, all right. Uh yeah, that's that's
(35:27):
that's totally that's totally valid. And uh it's interesting to
think about, you know, these two very different approaches and
whether or not, like it could very it could possibly
get to a point where we see both actually active
in lower th orbit simultaneously. Yeah, and that would be
amazing because now you're talking about a plethora of options
(35:52):
considering that right now, there is one which doesn't make
it an option. It's just your only choice. It's either
that or nothing. Yeah. But but this is the sort
of thing that would avoid having a space monopoly, which
is something I think we don't want to see, uh
and it could mean that we continue to see a
(36:14):
lot of innovation so that one company is always trying
to have an advantage over the other. We all stand
to benefit from. Yeah, the the private space race, I
kind of like this idea. Yeah, yeah, but there are
some challenges that we have to address. One of the
biggest ones is one we kind of talked about right now,
that timeline to be able to develop this private space
(36:37):
station technology and test it in a way where we
can use the International Space Station as as sort of
our our home base. That timeline is getting shorter and shorter,
assuming we don't see another extension uh for the funding
for the International Space Station. Right like, right this very moment,
we have approximately eight years left if anyone wants to
(36:58):
test their stuff on on the I S S. With
NASA's uh bene benefaction UM. Hypothetically, the longest we're going
to get is twelve years. And once the I S
S is decommissioned, it's gonna be a lot harder to
test your your technology because you won't have that base
to to lock onto and be able to you know,
(37:19):
remotely assess the feasibility and the and the efficiency of
your technology. You have to figure out some other way
of testing it that minimizes risk both to property and life,
so that that's going to be a real big challenge
once the I S s D commissions. And not only
is there a short amount of time to get in
that testing, but you also have to remember the International
(37:40):
Space Station doesn't have an infinite number of docking ports.
So if you want to if you want to dock
your your module to the International Space Station so that
you can do testing, yeah, you better you better start
building soon because well, I mean, it all depends on
how NASA decides who to partner with, right, We don't
(38:00):
We are not privy to that particular process. Um. I
would imagine that Bigelow has since it has the the
already existing relationship with NASA, is in pretty good shape.
And then the fact that you have a former manager
of the International Space Station heading the other company, it's
in pretty good shape too. So assuming Bride right, he
(38:23):
just flipped his desk and said, Sea it loses, I'm
out of here, and left the door open as he
left NASA. I'm assuming that didn't happen. I'm not don't know,
but I'm assuming, but that means that they you know,
NASA has to juggle while do we have the capability
of allowing more than one to dock at a time.
How how much do we want to keep these docking
(38:45):
ports open in case we need it for some other
unforeseen circumstances for our own stuff or Yeah, I mean,
can we just build a module that's nothing but docking points?
It's just it's just theahedron docking points. It's that connect there,
like any sort of building toy you have where you're like,
I just I just need something like a Lego that
(39:06):
has every every surface is Lego because I just needed
to hold everything together. Um. Yeah, I mean that it's
just a logistic issue at that point, but it's a
one that has a real impact. And when you're talking
about a short timeline, every little thing like that matters. Yeah.
And another potential hiccup or um or hold up in
(39:31):
all of this is something that we mentioned a little
bit earlier. Um there there aren't really regulations in place
for for private industry being out in space right right now,
and that is going to be a thing that will happen. Yeah.
I mean, this is a field known as space jurisdiction,
and you might say it's an underdeveloped field. Yeah, well
because until recently, the only entities that were at all
(39:55):
getting into space we're completely sponsored by nations. I mean,
they were government agencies. So the government international treaty right there, right,
the rules that we created, the space law that we
created it it specifically pertains to nations, not private organizations,
because at the time that we were drafting that legislation,
(40:19):
you didn't think about a private company blasting off into space.
That was beyond the capabilities that we had at the time. Yeah,
but as we all know, businesses, private corporations and companies
sometimes behave very well and sometimes behaved not so well
or sometimes can even uh be be criminally or civilly
(40:40):
liable even if nobody did anything really bad on purpose.
That's why we have corporations, because there are people and
we can hold them accountable. That never happens. Go ahead. So, yeah,
this whole thing of space jurisdiction, it's how laws are
applied and enforced in space, and it uh, it hasn't
been to big of an issue with the remarkably well
behaved public servants to have been part of the public
(41:01):
and private expeditions up until now. But let's entertain a
few weird scenarios. How about a few private companies put
privately owned space stations into orbit. One of these private
companies goes bankrupt, can't maintain its space station, nobody else
wants to buy it, its orbit decays, and because this
was unplanned, it turns out the station maybe entering the
(41:24):
atmosphere somewhere where there's a small risk of intact debris
from the station falling over a populated area. Who is
supposed to step in to prevent something like this from happening?
And can people be held legally accountable? And if so,
by whom? All I can imagine is is being like
a shareholder in that company and the guy just shows
(41:45):
up and says, hey, so you own stock in Space
co it went belly up, It's your responsibility to to
de orbit Space Coast space station over the Pacific. And
this is typically like the answer to this is usually
Superman right right? Or how about space collisions? Uh so
(42:09):
one space station crashes into another because of negligence or
you know, error, or or much simpler to imagine scenario.
I think businesses on Earth are often charged with illegal
dumping of waste. This is a common problem that that
you know, manufacturers get in trouble for Let's say a
private space station has a penchant for emptying some sort
(42:31):
of solid waste into high velocity orbit. Some of this
orbital waste damages another private company space station. How do
you sort that out? How do they how does one
get restitution from the other, and in what jurisdiction? And
we do have I mean, we have a lot of
space junk out there right now that like leftovers from
essentially dead satellites right so there there really is the
(42:55):
possibility that one company's dead satellite it eventually collide with
a private company's space station, and then you have these
very real questions about accountability and how do you handle this,
And that could even involve satellites from companies that are
no longer in business. It's it's this is a brand
(43:17):
new frontier. Yeah. So I'm not saying it's impossible to
figure this stuff out. I do think it's perfectly reasonable
to assume we will work out a framework for addressing
the laws it applies in space, just like we have
a framework for addressing the law as it applies in
international waters. But it's something to be thinking about. Yeah,
it's one of those things where it's it's good to
(43:39):
go ahead and ask the questions and try and come
up with some basic answers. Now when it's not entirely imperative,
like like it's it's not that something has already happened
and now we're trying to figure out how do we
deal with that, It's better to go be preemptive about
that sort of thing and say, let's ask some questions
of things, and you know, maybe maybe we assign each
(44:02):
question a probability score, like how likely is this to happen?
And the ones that are more likely they get priority
for us to figure out the answers too, and things like, well,
what happens if a an alien comes aboard my space
station and totally messes with it and ends up putting
pepsi logos all over my Coca Cola space station? Listen,
(44:24):
that goes at the bottom of the pile. All right,
we have some serious questions we want to answer first
before we get into brand confusion, like like why do
aliens prefer pepsi to Coca cola? Yeah, well, clearly they
didn't grow up in the South. Does Workman's comp cover
space madness, You're you're covering my ice cream bar. All right, Well,
(44:47):
this was kind of a fun preliminary discussion. The really
cool thing about this is that we don't have to
wait that long to see some real progress on this front. Now,
it may be that that twent any date that both
Axiom Space and and Bigelow have set could be too optimistic,
but even if that's the case, I suspect it won't
(45:09):
be that much later before we start seeing some real progress.
So hopefully they stay on track, because I would love
to see this, like like actual talk of launching private
space station components up into lower th orbit in just
four years. That's insane. I would love to see it happen.
So here's hoping it all works out. Um. We're really
(45:31):
excited to learn more about this and to kind of
explore both the possible positive elements of private space stations
as well as some of the concerns we might have
and again kind of address those in advance before it
becomes a problem. But we've got a lot of other
stuff we've got to talk about too, because it turns
out the future it's about everything. Did you guys know
(45:52):
that when you signed up for this. It's crazy. So
we have a lot more topics we're gonna be talking
about in future episodes of this podcast, but hey, we
get tired of choosing those all by ourselves. We love
it when you guys pipe up and give us ideas
and ask us questions like what will X be like
in the future? Uh, please continue to do that. You
(46:14):
can send us an email the addresses f W Thinking
at how Stuff Works dot com, or you can drop
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of those. We look forward to hearing from you, and
we'll prop you again really soon. For more on this
(46:40):
topic in the future of technology, visit forward Thinking dot com,
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If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
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The official podcast of comedian Joe Rogan.
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The latest news in 4 minutes updated every hour, every day.