White House Seeks Ideas For Building a 'Solar System Civilization'

   While the rise of the barbarous Islamic State and the spread of the modern day plague of Ebola has many concerned about the state of civilization here on earth, some at the White House are turning their attention beyond our planet. A Tuesday entry on the White House blog Tuesday solicits ideas for "massless exploration and bootstrapping a Solar System civilization" and "how the [Obama] Administration, the private sector, philanthropists, the research community, and storytellers can further these goals."
    "Bootstrapping" is a term employed by Dr. Phillip Metzger, former NASA research physicist now on the University of Central Florida faculty. Metzger explains:

If we want to want to create a robust civilization in our solar system, more of the energy, raw materials, and equipment that we use in space has to come from space.  Launching everything we need from Earth is too expensive.  It would also be too expensive to send all of the factories required to manufacture everything necessary to support a solar system civilization. 

Ultimately what we need to do is to evolve a complete supply chain in space, utilizing the energy and resources of space along the way. We are calling this approach “bootstrapping” because of the old saying that you have to pull yourself up by your own bootstraps.  Industry in space can start small then pull itself up to more advanced levels through its own productivity, minimizing the cost of launching things from Earth in the meantime.  Obviously, this isn’t going to happen overnight, but I think that it is the right long-term goal.

    Tom Kali, Deputy Director for Technology and Innovation at the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy and author of the White House blog post, says that NASA is already experimenting with 3D printing with the ultimate goal of printing replacement parts for spacecraft on long voyages, and even "self-replicating large structures" in future missions to Mars. The next rover to be sent to explore Mars will attempt to demonstrate something called "In-Situ Resource Utilization," which converts carbon dioxide in the atmosphere on Mars to oxygen to provide fuel and air for future manned missions.
    Anyone with ideas is invited to email the White House's Office of Science and Technology Policy.

Note: A version of this post first appeared at The Weekly Standard.

Gov't Shutdown Didn't Stop the Energy Department's Solar Decathlon

    The past two weeks have been filled with stories of government offices, agencies, services, workers, monuments, websites, memorials and parks that have been closed, suspended, furloughed and even barricaded.  Perhaps the most notorious of the actions taken has been the barricading of the open-air World War II memorial in Washington DC, where veterans, some in wheelchairs, who had flown in on "Honor Flights" were denied access.  But one government sponsored-event that was spared the impact of the shutdown was the Department of Energy's 2013 Solar Decathlon, last held in 2011.  The event's website (a .gov site) describes the competition:

The U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon challenges collegiate teams to design, build, and operate solar-powered houses that are cost-effective, energy-efficient, and attractive. The winner of the competition is the team that best blends affordability, consumer appeal, and design excellence with optimal energy production and maximum efficiency.

    There was some concern at the outset of the government shutdown that the event, scheduled for October 3-13, would be affected, but a post dated October 1 on the event's blog allayed such fears.  And not only would the event continue, but federal employees would be allowed to participate [emphasis added]:

Despite the government shutdown, the U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon 2013 competition will continue as planned. 

The Solar Decathlon is funded by a mix of last year’s federal funding and at least 30 private-sector sponsors. Student teams from across the country and around the world have worked for two years to design and build their solar-powered, energy-efficient houses and have been working onsite for the past week to prepare for this highly-anticipated event. Federal employee participation is limited to personnel necessary to allow the show to proceed.

    Not all activities of the Department of Energy (DOE) escaped the effects of the shut down.  The main website of the DOE currently contains the following notice:

    The website for the Solar Decathlon, run by the DOE, however, was updated more than a dozen times during the last two weeks, as recently as Monday, October 14:

    Posts during that time covered topics from Dinner Parties Show Team Hospitality to Cool Houses, Cool Energy, Cool Science to For Solar Decathletes, Watching a Movie Is All in a Night’s Work.

    With the National Park Service trying to cut off access to even privately owned and run facilities such as Mt. Vernon and the Claude Moore Colonial Farm due to tenuous government connections, it is difficult to see how a non-essential government competition such as the Solar Decathlon, even with its partial private funding, managed to be carried off and even include limited federal government employee participation.  The Obama administration's commitment to its environmental agenda is strong indeed if a solar-energy competition is elevated above veterans' access to war memorials.  In this case, it appears "green" trumped red, white and blue.


Note: A version of this article first appeared at The Weekly Standard.