Private Enterprise

[Gail Leatherwood]

Here is an excerpt from an ongoing discussion on the Europa discussion group site ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) that I think is worth more distribution. (The Europa group is supposed to be devoted exclusively to Jupiter's moon, but sometimes we stray, and have to be shepherded back to the fold.) "For one thing, I am not as upbeat as some of you as to the power of private enterprise to provide a robotic and human presence in space. If business enterprises saw lucrative economic opportunities in space, they would have already been there, and *way* ahead of any government-sponsored ventures. Just what is stopping them? Where are the orbital hotels and pharmaceutical factories? Where are the hypersonic transports? Why did Lockheed drop development of the VentureStar single-stage-to-orbit transport like a hot potato after NASA was no longer able to continue providing "seed money"? Why, with a $10 million incentive dangling in front of them for years, have no private ventures claimed the "X Prize" which involves sending a 3-person ship to an altitude of 100 Km. and doing it again within two weeks? As technological optimists, I think we would all agree that none of these visions presents huge technological obstacles; they are merely judged "uneconomical". Private enterprises inevitably have to answer to the bottom line, and rarely see beyond the next quarterly report or two. Under these circumstances, it is perhaps unreasonable to expect the private sector to bankroll the exploration of Mars or of the oceans of Europa." Really good questions. Where are all these marvels that serious writers have been discussing for the past 20 years or so? I think one answer has to be that some of the things, like the pharmaceutical laboratories, have turned out to be not so useful after all. If I understand it correctly, nothing has been produced in the experimentation phase that can't be done just as easily here on Earth without the cost of transportation. In short, just not economically feasible. For some of the other issues, I think it's just taken, to quote management guru Peter Drucker, "...oh, so much longer than we thought it would." The labyrinthine convolutions of the passenger certification process is enough to discourage anyone but the most dedicated. In their "Roadmap to the Stars", the National Space Society ("Ad Astra, Special Issue, Jan/Feb 2001) has identified "Lack of Public Interest" (Ibid., Charles D. Walker, pp. 29-31) as one of the major roadblocks on the way to the settlement of space. If there is no discernable market for their goods and services, the entrepreneurs just won't be interested, quarterly return on investment or not. So--does that say private industry isn't the way to go? I don't think so. I think what it says is that we shouldn't be in too much of a hurry to scamper back to the governments of the world, caps in hand, with our hands out expecting the taxpayers to fund all the activities. In reality, a "public/private partnership" may be the only realistic approach, at least for the present. It is possible that a space hotel can be built, launched, and operated strictly with private funds, and someone will claim the X-Prize to transport paying guests to it. This year? Next year? In the lifetime of anyone alive today? Don't know, but I advocate keeping the interest alive in as much privatization as possible. Just because it hasn't been done yet doesn't mean it can't and won't. Gail the Guy Spring Creek, Nevada, USA