December 8, 2024

Musk’s Martian Dreams are a Boon to the U.S. Military (Source: Washington Post)
Amused observers have long dismissed Elon Musk’s dream to colonize Mars as unserious science fiction. But in his pursuit of the Red Planet, Musk has managed to build a deadly serious business with vast military consequences. Security experts say SpaceX has leapfrogged so far ahead in several critical technologies that it could deter major rivals like China from engaging in a war with the United States — or tip the balance if one breaks out. Others worry that it could provoke an untimely response.

In recent days Musk has remarked on X that his ambition to send crews to Mars as soon as 2028 would result in “alien-level technology that is crushingly better than competitors,” along with making an oblique reference to averting a war against China. That prospect may not be imminent, but it has become the focus of U.S. defense preparations as China rises.

William Hartung, who has been a critic of arms sales, called the predictions that SpaceX could help the U.S. deter or win a war against China “wishful thinking” that is “typical of the techno-optimism of the Silicon Valley defense sector.” Such optimism exists outside the valley, too. Kari Bingen, a former deputy undersecretary of defense, likened today’s Mars dream to the 1960s race to the moon, which, despite criticism of Apollo’s extravagant costs, spurred technological advances like the miniaturization of computers. (12/7)

SpaceX and Palantir Now Have bigger Valuations Than Top Aerospace-Defense Stocks as the Military Eyes Transformation (Source: Forbes)
In a sign of the changing outlook for the defense industry, data-mining software company Palantir Technologies recently surpassed Pentagon contractor and aerospace supplier RTX in market cap. Shares of Palantir, which offers AI-powered platforms to military, civilian and corporate customers, have soared 345% this year, giving the company a valuation of $174 billion at Friday's market close.

That tops RTX, the parent company of Raytheon, Collins Aerospace, and Pratt & Whitney, which has climbed 40% this year and has a market cap of $157 billion. It's also bigger than Boeing's $115 billion as the planemaker has suffered setbacks at its passenger-jet and space businesses. Meanwhile, privately held SpaceX is poised to grow into an even bigger behemoth. According to Bloomberg, Elon Musk's rocket company is considering a tender offer that would value it at $350 billion. That's up from a $210 billion valuation after an earlier tender offer in June. (12/7)

The End of the ISS Will Usher In a More Commercialized Future in Space (Source: The Verge)
In its place, NASA envisions one or more commercial space stations, each run by a private company for profit and part of a thriving space economy, providing a more modern and efficient platform for humanity — including NASA astronauts — to inhabit low-Earth orbit.

But there isn’t much time. Companies are racing to get their space station concepts ready. If we want to maintain a continuous human presence in space, which we’ve had for over 20 years, the private sector only has a handful of years to get those designs built, tested, launched, and inhabited. There’s never been a commercial space station before, and the economic outlook is murky. In space, no one knows whether there’s money to be made or not. (12/7)

SpaceX Launches 23 Starlink Satellites on Falcon 9 Rocket From Cape Canaveral (Source: SpaceFlight Now)
SpaceX launched its latest Falcon 9 shortly after midnight on Sunday, adding 23 more Starlink satellites to its growing mega-constellation. The midnight hour launch featured 13 satellites which have Direct to Cell capabilities. Liftoff of the Starlink 12-5 mission from pad 40 at the Cape Canaveral Spaceport happened at 12:12:30 a.m. EST. (12/7)

Heliophysics Decadal Survey Recommends Two Flagship Missions for NASA (Source: Space News)
A new decadal survey for solar and space physics recommends that NASA’s heliophysics program pursue two billion-dollar missions even as the agency proposes to cancel a recommendation from the previous decadal. The National Academies released Dec. 5 the decadal survey for heliophysics from 2024 to 2033, advocating that NASA, the National Science Foundation and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration pursue an ambitious program of ground- and space-based facilities to study the sun and its interaction with the Earth.

Recommendations included, for NASA, two heliophysics flagship missions to begin work on in the next decade. One, called Links, features more than two dozen spacecraft in several orbits to study the magnetosphere and its dynamics. The report recommended starting development of Links in 2027 with launches no earlier than 2035, at an estimated cost of $1.86 billion.

The other flagship mission, Solar Polar Orbiter, would go into a high-inclination orbit around the sun’s polar regions, which cannot be seen from the Earth or most other missions. The spacecraft would require a Jupiter gravity assist and several Earth gravity assists to go into that orbit. The decadal estimated the cost of the mission to be $2.08 billion, with work starting in 2029 for a launch in 2037. (12/7)

Italy Begins Development of Nuclear Reactor for Lunar Settlements (Source: European Spaceflight)
Italy’s national space agency, ASI, has kicked off its Selene project, which aims to develop small nuclear fission reactors to power settlements on the Moon. In 2023, the Selene (Sistema Energetico Lunare con l’Energia Nucleare) project was among the winners of an ASI funding call aimed at developing alternative energy solutions for the Moon that overcome the limitations of traditional technologies. The project focuses on developing the Moon Energy Hub (MEnH), which would provide a stable energy source for future lunar settlements using small nuclear fission reactors called Surface Nuclear Reactors (SNRs). (12/7)