Guest: Dennis Wingo. Topics: Economic Development of the Moon. You are invited to comment, ask questions, and discuss the Space Show program/guest(s) on the Space Show blog, http://thespaceshow.wordpress.com. Comments, questions, and any discussion must be relevant and applicable to Space Show programming. Transcripts of Space Show programs are not permitted without prior written consent from The Space Show (even if for personal use) & are a violation of the Space Show copyright. We welcomed Dennis Wingo back to the program to discuss his July 16, 2012 blog article and concept, "Changing the Conversation about the Economic Development of the Moon." You can find his article at http://denniswingo.wordpress.com. We started our first segment of this nearly two hour program with a shout out to NASA, JPL, & the entire Curiosity team for an outstanding job with landing Curiosity on Mars. Dennis then pointed out that MSL and Curiosity cost about half of a Nimitz Super Carrier. Dennis then talked about heavy lift and the fact that modern technology, on orbit fuel depots, orbital dynamics, and ISRU usage all provide reasonable and cost-effective alternatives to the need for heavy lift. In this discussion, he also included the use of a lunar 3D printer. Dennis listed several new technologies and applications so don't miss this section. Dennis next outlined a plan to eventually have boots on the lunar surface at both poles for water and development. He would start of with robotics. He noted a preference for the north pole. We talked about our present day capability to get to either lunar pole. Doug called in from S. California to talk about telerobotics using telemedicine as an example. During this discussion, we learned that in the use of robotics, about 90% represents the robots while 10% represents the people operating, servicing, repairing, and maintaining the robots. In our second segment, listener Larry asked Dennis about timelines. Dennis suggested by 2020 we could be back on the Moon. He broke this down in stages to explain why it would take so long to undertake this mission. He then said we needed a mindset change to go back to the Moon. The mindset change enables seeing the Moon first for economic development and then science as a secondary objective. We talked about the international potential for such a lunar economic mission (private, not government), Another listener asked our guest if a Netscape Moment was essential for developing lunar commerce. Michael called in to talk about the potential legal & regulatory risks for lunar economic missions. This too was an interesting & challenging discussion, don't miss it. Tim called to ask about the use of space tugs and specific launch vehicles as well as new combinations of rocket fuel. Dennis offered us important closing comments about financing such missions, launch cost issues of concern, and allowing government to dictate our future. Please post your comments/questions on the blog. If you want to send an email to Dennis Wingo, you can do so through me & I will forward it to him.
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