2014 NDI 6WS – Fitzmier, Lundberg,
Abelkop
DO IT ELSEWHERE COUNTERPLANS
LAND-BASED DRILLING
Neg
1NC CP – Shorter
Text: The United States federal government should increase access and
streamline permitting on federal lands for oil and natural gas development.
CP solves aff – offshore development can’t meet energy needs – only onshore
solves
Platts 4/16 (McGraw Hill Financial sub-company - Platts is a leading global provider of energy, petrochemicals, metals and
agriculture information, and a premier source of benchmark price assessments for those commodity markets. “US federal gas output
lags that of private property: report”, 4/16/14, http://www.platts.com/latest-news/natural-gas/houston/us-federal-gas-output-lagsthat-of-private-property-21497888)//WL
Although overall US natural gas production has dramatically increased each year since 2009, production
on federal lands
has declined each year over the same period, with much of the decline attributed to a 50% drop in offshore gas
production, according to a Congressional Research Service report released Wednesday. "Federal natural gas production has
fluctuated from around 30% of total US production for much of the 1980s through the early 2000s (34% of U.S. total in 2003), after
which there began a steady decline through 2013," the report states. Although the US Energy Information predicts that the yearslong decline in offshore gas output will reverse itself in 2015, "any increase in production of natural gas on federal lands is likely to
be easily outpaced by increases on non-federal lands, particularly because shale plays are primarily situated on non-federal lands,"
the study finds. Industry advocates, however, point to more
stringent regulations for leasing and drilling on
federal lands as the chief reason why hydrocarbon production on those lands is trailing
behind that of private and state-owned lands. The CRS report found that as a result of the shale gas boom, annual
US natural gas production rose by about 10.96 Bcf/d, or 19%, between fiscal year 2009 and FY2013, while gas production on federal
lands (onshore and offshore) fell by about 28%, from 14.72 Bcf/d to 10.62 Bcf/d. This compares with a 33% increase in gas
production on non-federal lands over the same time period. "The big shale gas plays are primarily on non-federal lands and are
attracting a significant portion of investment for natural gas development," the report states. EIA estimates US
dry gas
proved reserves are about 334 Tcf, about a quarter of which lies beneath federal lands, and of that 69 Tcf is
onshore and 16 Tcf offshore . "Nearly all of the offshore proved reserves are located in the Central and Western Gulf of
Mexico," according to the report. "Offshore natural gas production is projected to reverse a years-long decline in 2015, with annual
production rising as high as 2.9 Tcf in 2040." Even with
these projected increases, offshore gas output
would only account for about a 7.7% share
of total US production in 2040, the report states. Currently, there are
113 million acres of onshore federal lands that are open and accessible for oil and gas development while about 166
million
federal acres are considered off-limits or inaccessible. The study also finds that in contrast with the gas output
picture, oil production on federal lands has fluctuated over the past five fiscal years. However, as with gas
production, oil output has increased dramatically on non-federal lands. Non-federal crude oil production increased by 2.1 million
barrels per day between FY2009 and FY2013, causing the federal
share of total US crude oil production to fall
by nearly 11%, the CRS says. The report shows that "federal land policies are artificially suppressing
production, putting Western communities that rely on oil and natural gas development at a disadvantage compared to other
areas of the country," Western Energy Alliance said in a statement. WEA President Tim Wigley placed the blame for the
lackluster energy production from federal lands on the land-use policies of the Obama
administration. "The huge success of the oil and natural gas industry increasing energy security and bringing the country out of
recession is despite, not because of, the policies of this administration," he said. "The CRS report clearly shows that where the
federal government has the most control, on federal lands, it is suppressing development of the energy that
all Americans own while preventing job creation and economic prosperity," Wigley said. Julia Bell, a spokeswoman for the
Independent Petroleum Association of America, said the CRS report "should be a wake-up call for those concerned with energy
development on federal lands." She added that independent
oil and gas producers "are struggling to
overcome immense bureaucratic confusion with a myriad of overlapping jurisdictions and
regulations ," and called on Congress "to increase access and streamline permitting on
federal lands ."
1NC CP – Longer
Text: The United States federal government should increase access and
streamline permitting on federal lands for oil and natural gas development.
CP solves aff – offshore development can’t meet energy needs – only onshore
solves
Platts 4/16 (McGraw Hill Financial sub-company - Platts is a leading global provider of energy, petrochemicals, metals and
agriculture information, and a premier source of benchmark price assessments for those commodity markets. “US federal gas output
lags that of private property: report”, 4/16/14, http://www.platts.com/latest-news/natural-gas/houston/us-federal-gas-output-lagsthat-of-private-property-21497888)//WL
Although overall US natural gas production has dramatically increased each year since 2009, production
on federal lands
has declined each year over the same period, with much of the decline attributed to a 50% drop in offshore gas
production, according to a Congressional Research Service report released Wednesday. "Federal natural gas production has
fluctuated from around 30% of total US production for much of the 1980s through the early 2000s (34% of U.S. total in 2003), after
which there began a steady decline through 2013," the report states. Although the US Energy Information predicts that the yearslong decline in offshore gas output will reverse itself in 2015, "any increase in production of natural gas on federal lands is likely to
be easily outpaced by increases on non-federal lands, particularly because shale plays are primarily situated on non-federal lands,"
the study finds. Industry advocates, however, point to more
stringent regulations for leasing and drilling on
federal lands as the chief reason why hydrocarbon production on those lands is trailing
behind that of private and state-owned lands. The CRS report found that as a result of the shale gas boom, annual
US natural gas production rose by about 10.96 Bcf/d, or 19%, between fiscal year 2009 and FY2013, while gas production on federal
lands (onshore and offshore) fell by about 28%, from 14.72 Bcf/d to 10.62 Bcf/d. This compares with a 33% increase in gas
production on non-federal lands over the same time period. "The big shale gas plays are primarily on non-federal lands and are
attracting a significant portion of investment for natural gas development," the report states. EIA estimates US
dry gas
proved reserves are about 334 Tcf, about a quarter of which lies beneath federal lands, and of that 69 Tcf is
onshore and 16 Tcf offshore . "Nearly all of the offshore proved reserves are located in the Central and Western Gulf of
Mexico," according to the report. "Offshore natural gas production is projected to reverse a years-long decline in 2015, with annual
production rising as high as 2.9 Tcf in 2040." Even with
these projected increases, offshore gas output
would only account for about a 7.7% share
of total US production in 2040, the report states. Currently, there are
113 million acres of onshore federal lands that are open and accessible for oil and gas development while about 166
million
federal acres are considered off-limits or inaccessible. The study also finds that in contrast with the gas output
picture, oil production on federal lands has fluctuated over the past five fiscal years. However, as with gas
production, oil output has increased dramatically on non-federal lands. Non-federal crude oil production increased by 2.1 million
barrels per day between FY2009 and FY2013, causing the federal
share of total US crude oil production to fall
by nearly 11%, the CRS says. The report shows that "federal land policies are artificially suppressing
production, putting Western communities that rely on oil and natural gas development at a disadvantage compared to other
areas of the country," Western Energy Alliance said in a statement. WEA President Tim Wigley placed the blame for the
lackluster energy production from federal lands on the land-use policies of the Obama
administration. "The huge success of the oil and natural gas industry increasing energy security and bringing the country out of
recession is despite, not because of, the policies of this administration," he said. "The CRS report clearly shows that where the
federal government has the most control, on federal lands, it is suppressing development of the energy that
all Americans own while preventing job creation and economic prosperity," Wigley said. Julia Bell, a spokeswoman for the
Independent Petroleum Association of America, said the CRS report "should be a wake-up call for those concerned with energy
development on federal lands." She added that independent
oil and gas producers "are struggling to
overcome immense bureaucratic confusion with a myriad of overlapping jurisdictions and
regulations ," and called on Congress "to increase access and streamline permitting on
federal lands ."
CP solves energy needs without triggering link to environment DA
Bailey 8 (Alan, Petroleum News Reporter, “BLM says 60 percent of land off limits”, 6/8/08,
http://www.petroleumnews.com/pntruncate/216890658.shtml)//WL
The U.S. Bureau of Land Management has published an updated version of its inventory of oil and gas resources in federal onshore
land. BLM says that the latest study has estimated that the federal
lands hold 31 billion barrels of oil and 231
trillion cubic feet of natural gas. But the inventory has also found that 60 percent of the onshore federal
land that has potential for oil and natural gas production is closed to oil and gas leasing, thus
rendering 62 percent of the oil and 41 percent of the gas inaccessible for development. The inventory report represents the third of
a series of studies mandated by Congress to document federal oil and gas resources and limitations on the development of those
resources. “America
has abundant energy resources,” said C. Stephen Allred, assistant secretary of the Interior for
available for
land and minerals management. “However, for a variety of reasons, many of these resources are not
development. At a time when energy prices have reached record levels and Americans are feeling the impact, we must find
ways to develop those key energy resources that are available to us right here at home on our public lands.” “Current
technology allows us to develop energy resources without adversely impacting the
environment
or permanently diminishing other non-energy resources found on public lands,” said BLM Director Jim Caswell.
2NC Solves – Onshore Reserves
Opening onshore reserves to drilling solves the aff
RDC 8 (Resource Development Council, “Report offers road map for energy relief”, 2008,
http://www.akrdc.org/newsletters/2008/june/roadmaptoenergyrelief.html)//WL
With soaring energy prices threatening the national economy and the standard of living for many Americans, the Bureau of Land
Management last month released a study that shows vast
untapped oil and natural gas resources beneath
public lands. “America has abundant energy resources,” said Assistant Secretary of the Interior for Land and
Minerals Management Stephen Allred. “However, for a variety of reasons, many of these resources are not
available for development. At a time when energy prices have reached record levels and Americans are feeling the
impact, we must find ways to develop those key energy resources that are available to us right here at home, on our public
lands.” The report is the third in a series of congressionally mandated scientific studies of U.S. onshore federal oil and natural gas
resources and limitations on their development. All onshore federal lands throughout the U.S. believed to
have energy potential are included in this latest study. These public lands are estimated to
contain 31 billion barrels of oil and 221 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. Alaska’s North Slope
accounts for well over half of the onshore oil potential, but most is inaccessible for
development, either as a result of land withdrawals or land use planning decisions. The inventory found that 60 percent
of the onshore lands that have potential as domestic sources for natural gas and oil are
presently closed to leasing, making 62 percent of the oil and 41 percent of the gas inaccessible
for development. An additional 30 percent of onshore oil and 49 percent of onshore gas may only be developed subject to
restrictions and above standard environmental lease terms. The study found that in the inventory areas, just 8 percent of
onshore federal oil and 10 percent of the gas are accessible under standard lease terms. In
addition, oil shale deposits in the U.S. represent potential reserves that may be twice as large as those in Saudi Arabia. Yet Congress
has prohibited BLM from taking the steps necessary to make this vast resource available for development.
2NC Solves – Arctic Presence
CP solves Arctic Presence – current onshore Alaskan Reserves are closed to
drilling
Bailey 8 (Alan, Petroleum News Reporter, “BLM says 60 percent of land off limits”, 6/8/08,
http://www.petroleumnews.com/pntruncate/216890658.shtml)//WL
Alaska resources In
Alaska, the inventory considered federal oil and gas resources in northern
Alaska, the Yukon Flats and southern Alaska. The northern Alaska region consists predominantly of the National
Petroleum Reserve-Alaska and the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. The southern region consists of federal land on the Alaska
Peninsula, the Kenai Peninsula and the Gulf of Alaska coastal region. The
inventory represents estimates of
technically recoverable undiscovered resources and the ultimate reserves growth in existing
oil and gas fields. In northern Alaska, the inventory estimated 17 billion barrels of oil and condensate, and 79
trillion cubic feet of gas in federal lands. The gas estimate includes a 2007 U.S. Geological Survey assessment of
coalbed methane. The inventory also says that almost none of the federal land in northern Alaska is accessible
under standard BLM lease terms, in part because of restrictions on when during the year exploration activities can occur.
Approximately 70 percent of the land is completely inaccessible for leasing at present, either as a result of land
withdrawals or as a result of land use planning decisions. The inventory estimated 149 million barrels of recoverable oil and
condensate and 2.7 tcf of natural gas in federal lands in the Yukon Flats, but 99 percent of that land is inaccessible for oil and gas
leasing. In
southern Alaska, 98 percent of the federal land is currently inaccessible for leasing.
BLM estimates 270 million barrels of recoverable oil and condensate and 394 billion cubic feet of recoverable gas in this region. The
preponderance of the oil is thought to exist on the Kenai Peninsula and in Southeast Alaska. The
gas resources appear
more widely distributed, although the Kenai Peninsula seems to be the most prospective area.
2NC AT: Links to Environment DA
Onshore oil and gas development is substantially safer than offshore drilling comparative evidence
Anderson 10 (Terry, president of PERC and the John and Jean De Nault Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford
University, “Why It's Safer to Drill in the 'Backyard'”, 6/25/10,
http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052748704050804575318591702015252)//WL
As oil continues to gush from BP's Macondo well and politicians posture, it
is time for us to ask why we are drilling
in such risky places when there is oil available elsewhere. The answer lies in the mantra NIMBY—"not in my
back yard." BP was drilling for oil in 5,000 feet of water in the Mississippi Trench, more than 40 miles off the
Louisiana coast. The site was leased in March 2008 from the Interior Department's Minerals Management Service. The area is one of
an increasingly limited number of places available for oil and gas development in the United States. Because
most private
lands have been explored, public lands offer the most potential for oil and gas development.
However, the NIMBY principle has significantly restricted development on those lands. According to
2008 Energy Department figures, nearly 80% of potentially oil-rich offshore lands are off limits to oil and gas
development, and 60% of onshore lands are. In my backyard, Sens. Max Baucus and Jon Tester have introduced a
bill aimed at halting oil and gas exploration in the Flathead River drainage area near Glacier National Park. They have already
pressured Chevron and ConocoPhillips to relinquish their exploration leases on the land, placing 75% of the leases off limits to
development. And of course, there is the perennially contentious issue of drilling in ANWR, the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. The
government estimates that the area could produce 750,000 barrels of oil per day. Whether more exploration on federal lands would
make the U.S. energy independent is debatable, but more
onshore development would certainly be safer . In
was a blowout in western Pennsylvania. Did you see it on the nightly news? No, because it was
capped in 16 hours . The Texas Railroad Commission, the state agency that regulates oil and gas production
there, recorded 102 blowouts of oil and gas wells since the start of 2006, resulting in 10 fires, 12
injuries, and two deaths. None of those made the nightly news either. The largest oil spill on
Alaska's North Slope in 2006 was from a pipeline leak. It dumped only 6,357 barrels and had
no disastrous impacts. Drilling can be done with greater environmental sensitivity onshore. For
early June there
many years the Audubon Society actually allowed oil companies to pump oil for its privately owned sanctuaries in Louisiana and
Michigan, but did so with strict requirements on the oil companies so that they would not disturb the bird habitat. Explaining the
process years ago, one sanctuary manager said, "when the cranes punched in, the hard hats have to punch out." Until the Gulf
blowout, Audubon was even considering leasing more land for development on the Louisiana coast under such strict terms. When
kids play baseball, there is a risk that windows will get broken. Playing on baseball fields rather than in sand lots, however, lowers
the risk considerably. Putting so much onshore land off limits to oil and gas development is like closing baseball parks. More
windows will be broken and more blowouts result where they are difficult to prevent and stop. The blowout at BP's well has
increased pressure from environmentalists and the Obama administration for greater emphasis on alternative energy sources. Even
if they are successful, this will have a trivial impact on our unquenchable thirst for fossil fuel. Enforcement of stricter safety
regulation on deepwater drilling may reduce disasters like the current one in the Gulf. But the
only real way to reduce
the risk of catastrophic spills is to say yes to drilling in our backyard.
CP solves the aff without triggering link to environment DA (in 1NC longer)
Bailey 8 (Alan, Petroleum News Reporter, “BLM says 60 percent of land off limits”, 6/8/08,
http://www.petroleumnews.com/pntruncate/216890658.shtml)//WL
The U.S. Bureau of Land Management has published an updated version of its inventory of oil and gas resources in federal onshore
land. BLM says that the latest study has estimated that the federal
lands hold 31 billion barrels of oil and 231
trillion cubic feet of natural gas. But the inventory has also found that 60 percent of the onshore federal
land that has potential for oil and natural gas production is closed to oil and gas leasing, thus
rendering 62 percent of the oil and 41 percent of the gas inaccessible for development. The inventory report represents the third of
a series of studies mandated by Congress to document federal oil and gas resources and limitations on the development of those
resources. “America
has abundant energy resources,” said C. Stephen Allred, assistant secretary of the Interior for
land and minerals management. “However, for a variety of reasons, many of these resources are not
available for
development. At a time when energy prices have reached record levels and Americans are feeling the impact, we must find
ways to develop those key energy resources that are available to us right here at home on our public lands.” “Current
technology allows us to develop energy resources without adversely impacting the
environment
or permanently diminishing other non-energy resources found on public lands,” said BLM Director Jim Caswell.
2NC Alaskan Specific Environment NB
Alaskan Spills are far safer onshore than offshore
Baker Institute 13 (John Baker Institute for Public Policy at Rice University, “Does Drilling in ANWR Make More Sense
than the Alaskan Offshore?”, 2013, http://bakerinstitutealaska.tumblr.com/post/28374130615/does-drilling-in-anwr-make-moresense-than-the-alaskan)//WL
Oil Spills An oil
spill is always possible and some experts argue that this would make drilling in
ANWR preferable to doing so offshore. While a large blowout would be serious anywhere, its impact offshore
could be catastrophic. Arctic Researcher Henry Huntington believes that “if you’re gonna spill oil, do it on
land… It’s containable and it’s sort of limited. The land doesn’t move.” (See video for more). In fact, the
thirteen largest oil spills in history have all occurred in water. The 2010 Deepwater Horizon blowout served
as a reminder of how devastating an offshore spill can be. Cleaning up an offshore spill in the Arctic would be
more difficult, as the climate and logistical concerns pose a series of unique challenges for oil
producers. A recent report by the GAO argues that despite improvements in technology in recent years, Arctic ice still presents
challenges for Shell or other offshore Arctic operators. The effects of a late season spill could be exacerbated by icy conditions that
would make containment more difficult. Equipment such as the capping stack placed underwater could be damaged by ice that
floats near the sea floor. Logistical concerns may also make cleanup more difficult . If a spill were to occur,
personnel would have to be moved to the site, which would take time and delay a response. The Arctic’s climate would make
transporting staff more difficult. Because of the lack of North Slope production, there is very little equipment available if a spill were
to occur. Shell has acknowledged these existing concerns and produced what it believes is an effective spill response plan. It has
shortened its drilling season so that there would be enough time to drill a relief well before surface ice develops. Shell placed much
of its equipment such as the wellhead and blowout preventer underwater to prevent collisions with sea ice. It also has its own
icebreakers and containment to make up for the absence of spill response material in the area. Lt. Governor Treadwell maintains
that Shell has “very strong prevention techniques” and has made “significant improvements in oil spill containment.” Still, some are
unsure if Shell’s plan is adequate if a spill were to occur. Many fear that the technology is not as effective one may expect. “The spill
response… just won’t work,” argues Arctic scientist Rick Steiner. (See video for more on Steiner’s concerns). Others
are
concerned that since the spill response equipment has not been tested in Arctic waters, we
cannot be sure that it would effectively work. Offshore drilling carries some inherent risks. And the Arctic itself,
as Sierra Club representative Lindsey Hadjuk explains, very well may be “the riskiest place you may possibly want
to drill.” (See video for more) Drilling in the Beaufort and Chukchi Seas will present unique offshore challenges.
OCS Drilling comparatively worse than onshore Alaskan Drilling
Medred and Burke 10 (Craig and Jill, Reporters at the Alaska Dispatch News, “FIRE AND ICE: Will the Gulf oil spill slow
offshore plans in Alaska's Arctic?”, 4/27/10, http://www.adn.com/article/fire-and-ice-will-gulf-oil-spill-slow-offshore-plans-alaskasarctic)//WL
That argument doesn't sell particularly well in Alaska's
North Slope Borough. It has backed onshore drilling
at Prudhoe Bay and in the National Petroleum Reserve Alaska and grown wealthy from taxes on the former. But borough
officials have big reservations about drilling on the outer continental shelf. " Don't drill in the
OCS . Drill onshore. Drill in ANWR (the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge). Drill in NPRA. Don't go offshore.
That has always been our position and it hasn't changed for 30 years," said Harold Curran, the borough's chief administrative officer.
The borough has fought offshore drilling in the Chukchi and Beaufort in every way it can, including taking the
government to court, but it recognizes the futility of trying to influence a Congress and White House under pressure from politically
influential environmentalists adamant that drilling in ANWR must never happen. The borough thinks onshore
drilling
anywhere is safer than offshore, but recognizes neither the Congress nor the White House appears to be listening to
its argument. Given that, Curran said, the borough will do all it can to try to shape offshore plans to protect the environment.
ANWR drilling is extremely safe compared to OCS drilling
Hopfinger 12 (Tony, editor and co-founder of Alaska Dispatch, “Arctic Ocean vs. ANWR: Was there ever a choice for oil
drillers?”, 9/9/12, http://www.adn.com/article/arctic-ocean-vs-anwr-was-there-ever-choice-oil-drillers)//WL
How did the wildcatters, the state, the environmentalists, Congress, and anybody
up drilling on land in the far north and instead head
dozens of miles into the Arctic Ocean to hunt for oil? Should there have been a choice between the two? In
far northern Alaska, there are no deepwater ports, no nearby pipelines to those offshore oil
prospects, no fully staffed offices for regulators to keep watch -- there’s nothing resembling the
oil-spill response infrastructure you’d find elsewhere in the United States. Meantime, on state land at
Prudhoe Bay and other North Slope oil fields, there is a maze of infrastructure, along with a 40-year-plus
history of managing onshore oil development. And not so far away from all of this sits an undeveloped oil patch
Which brings up an interesting question:
else who cares about oil and Arctic ecosystems decide to give
estimated to hold billions of barrels of crude. And it’s on land -- not 60 miles offshore. It is called the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge
and it’s managed by the feds, just like the waters where Shell is drilling in the Arctic Ocean. There
was a time when
drilling on ANWR’s coastal plain was among the biggest environmental debates of our time. It
spawned a cottage industry that grew around either protecting or developing that tundra. Americans were inundated, sometimes
deceptively, with images of the “last untouched wilderness,” caribou running free against the backdrop of snow-capped mountains.
There are actually no snow-capped mountains in the area where drilling would happen in ANWR. And the
caribou that
migrate where onshore drilling is currently taking place to the west have not seemed to be
hurting. Most important is that ANWR sits on solid ground (actually covered in snow a good part of the year) where
an oil spill would be comparatively easy to handle than out at sea. In contrast, a spill in the Arctic
Ocean would be a devastating mess, no matter what Shell executives say they’ve done to prevent such a disaster or
their plans to respond to such a scenario. Environmental groups have tried to prevent drilling in the Chukchi and Beaufort seas. But
compared to their decades-long ANWR battle, this fight has seemed anemic. Perhaps the groups knew that offshore Arctic drilling
was inevitable. Or perhaps the fight doesn’t provide for the kind of picturesque-fundraising that has done so well for them for so
many years in the ANWR battle. Or maybe they were too focused on ANWR and too late in waging an offshore war. The drill bit is
turning in the Chukchi Sea, so the question is probably just theoretical. But if we could roll back the clock, how would we manage
Arctic oil development today in a post-Deepwater Horizon world? If politicians, oil executives and environmentalists were asked
today to make a choice between drilling in ANWR or in the Arctic Ocean, which would they choose? Alaskans, which would you
choose? It's your back yard. Did anybody ever ask you?
Aff
2AC OCS deposits larger
OCS reserves are substantially larger than onshore ones
Lieberman 8 (Ben, NY Post reporter “OIL: OPEN UP FEDERAL LANDS”, 6/8/08, http://nypost.com/2008/06/08/oil-open-upfederal-lands/)//WL
The more we look for oil and natural gas in the United States, the more we find. If only we were allowed to go and get it. According
to the Department of the Interior (DOI), huge onshore deposits of energy can be found on federal lands. Yet much of this
energy is either explicitly off-limits or hampered by regulatory constraints that effectively make it so. Part of the solution to high oil
and natural gas prices lies right under our feet, but Congress won’t change the laws that keep this domestic energy locked up.
Federal lands are critical to the energy policy debate because most of America’s onshore energy is located in the West and in Alaska,
where more than half the land is under federal control. Such lands, DOI estimates, “contain 31
billion barrels of oil and
231 trillion cubic feet of natural gas.” Thirty-one billion barrels of oil represents 50 years of current imports from Saudi
Arabia and 231 trillion cubic feet of natural gas is enough to supply all of America’s households for 46 years. However, “just 8
percent of onshore Federal oil and 10 percent of onshore Federal gas are accessible under standards lease terms,” DOI notes. The
rest is either restricted outright or subject to considerable amounts of red tape. Among the former: Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife
Refuge, where an estimated 10 billion barrels of oil lies beneath a few thousand acres at the edge of this nearly 20 million acre
refuge. Granted, few Americans want unrestricted oil and natural gas wells in our treasured National Parks or other areas of scenic,
environmental or historical significance. However, the drilling restrictions on federal land far surpass such reasonable limits. This is
especially true given the advances in drilling technology that have dramatically reduced both the above-ground environmental
footprint and the risk of spills. Even
more energy lies offshore. Some 86 billion barrels of oil and 420
trillion cubic feet of natural gas are beneath America’s waters, DOI says. Of those amounts, 19.1 billion
barrels of oil and 83.9 trillion cubic feet of gas lie in federally-controlled territorial waters that are
completely off-limits to leasing and development . The actual volumes of onshore and
offshore energy could be far greater – DOI’s initial energy estimates tend to be low. This is
especially true of the off-limits areas, which haven’t been thoroughly explored. Many anti-energy
activists and politicians insist that America’s untapped oil and gas reserves are merely a “drop in the bucket” and therefore not
worth the bother. But these DOI estimates put the lie to this claim. As Congress once again addresses energy issues, it shouldn’t
ignore the significant amount of energy right here in America. It’s time to make this energy available to the American people.
2AC Doesn’t Solve
Decreasing regulations won’t solve – workforce shortages and industry leasing
practices
Bleizeffer 11 (Dustin, Executive Editor of Wyofile.com, Bleizeffer is a reporter with 12 years’ experience covering energy in
Wyoming, “Drilling to Energy Independence: Can the West Save Us from Foreign Oil Imports?” 12/6/11,
http://web.stanford.edu/group/ruralwest/cgi-bin/drupal/energy/drilling-to-energy-independence-can-the-west-save-us-fromforeign-oil-imports)//WL
But, clearly, it’s
not federal regulatory delays alone that impede efforts to drill all available leases
on public lands in the West. Sgamma concedes the industry is currently short on rigs and workers . The industry
has launched workforce training programs, but America just doesn’t have 30,666 workers qualified to go to
work in the industry in a short amount of time. Nevertheless, in the face of those problems, people in the
industry express confident optimism. “The drilling industry would meet it and exceed it,” said Patrick Hladky. And if all onshore rigs
are busy, “We’d just build new ones,” he said. Hladky, president of Gillette-based Cyclone Drilling, said in September that all 28 of
his rigs were in operation — most of them in North Dakota where the Bakken oil play is putting a strain on the U.S. rig fleet. If
you
called to move a rig to a new location in the West, you would have to wait at least six months,
he said. As for the skeptics, environmental groups often note the fact that thousands of applications for permit to
drill on federal minerals in the West are issued every year that are not drilled within the 2year permit term — and many are never drilled. Central to the energy development on public lands debate is this;
the industry nominates, and the BLM sells, oil and gas leases that companies never develop. According to the BLM, some 75,192
leases on 57.6 million acres of federal minerals have been leased since 1969. These lease totals are higher than the actual acreage
that BLM manages in Wyoming (BLM manages more than 17 million surface acres and 42 million mineral acres in Wyoming) because
the figures reflect the fact that many federal lands are leased over and over again. Yet only
6.5 percent of the leases
sold and 5.3 percent of the acreage was actually developed into production, according to a recent
BLM environmental assessment (page 8). Industry critics say it’s not regulation that holds the leasing-todevelopment ratio down so low, but rather operators historically lease more minerals than
they intend to develop in order to explore and hold a position in case the markets rise.
Opening public land won’t shift drilling habits – most accessible resources are
on private lands
Goad 13 (Jessica, Manager of Research and Outreach for the Public Lands Project at the Center for American Progress Action
Fund, “Despite Industry Efforts To Blame Administration, There’s A Geologic Reason Most Drilling Occurs On Nonfederal Lands”,
3/6/13, http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2013/03/06/1677051/geology-drilling-public-land/)//WL
The United States is in the midst of an energy boom, seen for example in the rise of U.S. oil production to its highest level in 20
years. But this hasn’t stopped the oil and gas industry from clamoring for more access to public lands for drilling, and from criticizing
the Obama administration for “[putting] in place more obstacles” and setting public lands “off-limits” to development. For example,
Senator David Vitter (R-LA), Ranking Member on the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, even went so far as to state,
“There’s no disputing the fact that our nation’s domestic energy production on federal lands has been stymied by this
administration.” But a
new report released today by the Denver-based Center for Western Priorities
called “Follow the Oil” shows that putting the blame on the president and his administration
is nothing more than conservative messaging . Much of today’s boom in oil and natural gas is
from unconventional shale “plays,” areas that have only recently been opened through new
technology. And, as the report notes: Nationwide, 90 percent of all current shale gas plays exist on
nonfederal lands, with only 10 percent located on federal lands. Even starker, almost all shale oil
resources exist on non-federal lands. Only 7 percent of current shale oil and mixed plays are found on federallyowned lands with the remaining 93 percent on nonfederal lands. This map shows what those findings look like across the country,
and where the industry is “following the oil”: Additionally, economics are playing a role in driving drilling from public lands to
nonfederal lands. As the report states, “rapid
development increased the supply of natural gas, driving
down prices, and sending companies searching for other drilling locations and revenue
sources.” In other words, the oil and gas industry has met the enemy, and it is itself. The release of
this report comes at a very opportune time, considering that Sally Jewell, nominee to be the next Secretary of the Interior, will have
her confirmation hearing in front of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee this week And as expected, key members
of the committee are preparing to ask her questions about how the administration is stifling drilling on public lands. For example,
Energy and Environment Daily reports that Senator John Barrasso (R-WY) will ask Jewell “where she stands on domestic energy
development, job creation and federal regulations.” Senator Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), the Ranking Member on the committee, said
she told Jewell in a meeting last week about “resource potential in Alaska, off-shore and in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska
and Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, and the limitations to access.” And Senator Mike Lee (R-UT) released a statement after Jewell’s
nomination announcement that “The [Interior Department’s] approach has hurt our economy, killed jobs, and prevented states like
Utah from generating critical revenue,” so questions about energy on public lands are also likely to come from him. The report
released today shows that, despite all of the questions Jewell may get on drilling on public lands, the
“following the oil” to nonfederal lands.
industry in the end is
2AC Links to NB
CP links to NB – Onshore drilling is just as bad as offshore drilling
Wilderness Society 10 (Organization dedicated to preserving the wilderness, “Onshore drilling is not the answer to offshore drilling spills” 6/15/10, http://wilderness.org/blog/onshore-drilling-not-answer-shore-drilling-spills)//WL
Following the Gulf spill, proponents of the fossil fuel status quo have called for more onshore drilling
as a safer alternative to offshore drilling. Don’t let them fool you. Drilling can have devastating
environmental impacts for both our waters and our lands. Take, for example, today’s Chevron oil
leak of 500 barrels (or about 17,000 gallons) into a Salt Lake City creek. At least 100 birds were covered in oil, and
water quality has certainly been affected. Oil is not the only fossil fuel that poses risks—so does the
supposedly safe fuel, natural gas. For example, just as there were few (or at least unenforced) regulations of
Deepwater Horizon’s drilling process, there are few regulations on hydro-fracking, a natural gas drilling process
that is unregulated by the Safe Drinking Water Act, despite regular and serious reports of it polluting drinking water in local
communities. Just earlier this month in Dish, Texas, a
study found that the groundwater contained high levels
of poisonous chemicals like arsenic and lead (up to 21 times above safe levels). Members of the
community attribute this to the many natural gas wells nearby, especially considering that their water quality changed visibly after
companies began to drill in their town. Because of a stipulation in the 2005 Energy Bill, drillers
do not need to disclose
which chemicals they use, nor do they need to comply with the Safe Drinking Water Act. This has
been named the Halliburton loophole (after the company that invented the process), which effectively strips the EPA of any
authority to regulate fracking. Fear of making natural gas uneconomical may have pushed the recent withdrawal of an amendment
to the Safe Drinking Water Act requiring disclosure of chemicals. The oil and gas industry has fought such initiatives, claiming that
the chemicals are proprietary secrets and that the process is safe. Yet recent
accidents show how unsafe drilling
can be. Toxic chemicals are not the only dangers. Take for example just last week when three fracking accidents
killed one person and injured at least 7 others in three different states. In West Virginia on June 7, seven workers were injured after
hitting a pocket of methane during natural gas drilling. A column of fire shot up into the air, just as it did later in the day at a Texas
natural gas line (where one person was killed). This is called a blowout, wherein pressurized oil or gas erupts, which is what
happened on June 3 in Pennsylvania. Interestingly, this same problem began the leak at BP’s Gulf of Mexico well. Hopefully,
lawmakers will wake up and regulate onshore oil and gas production. Proposed legislation, like the Fracturing Responsibility and
Awareness of Chemicals (FRAC) Act, which aims to close the Halliburton loophole, may gain in popularity in the wake of this series of
blowouts. You do not need to feel helpless, watching the numbers of gallons of oil leak into the Gulf of Mexico. You can tell your
representatives to support initiatives to regulate onshore drilling (or to increase renewable energy development to ease our
addiction to fossil fuels), and you can help stop other related disasters. Tighter
should not mean loosening them for onshore drilling.
restrictions on offshore drilling
2AC ANWR doesn’t solve
Drilling in ANWR doesn’t solve – it would be barely a drop in the bucket
Lavelle 8 (Marianne, US News and World Report Reporter, “Arctic Drilling Wouldn't Cool High Oil Prices”, 5/23/08,
http://www.usnews.com/news/national/articles/2008/05/23/arctic-drilling-wouldnt-cool-high-oil-prices)//WL
Drilling for oil beneath the pristine tundra of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge would do little to
ease world oil prices, the federal government's energy forecasters said in a new report issued in a week that saw oil surpass
$130 per barrel for the first time. Congress has fought bitterly for years over whether to allow oil companies access to the Alaska
refuge's 1.5 million-acre coastal plain, a habitat for seabirds, caribou, and polar bears. Oil company executives, called to Capitol Hill
for a grilling over high oil prices, pointed to the untapped resources of ANWR and off the U.S. coastlines as evidence that Congress
was as much to blame for the tight global supplies of crude as the petroleum industry. But the U.S. Energy Information
Administration, an independent statistical agency within the Department of Energy, concluded that new
oil from ANWR
would lower the world price of oil by no more than $1.44 per barrel—and possibly have as little effect as 41
cents per barrel—and would have its largest impact nearly 20 years from now if Congress voted to
open the refuge today. EIA produced the analysis in response to a request by Republican Sen. Ted Stevens of Alaska, who noted that
the last time the agency had taken a look at the economics of ANWR production was in 2000, when oil was $22.04 a barrel. Higher
world oil prices don't necessarily mean that oil companies could pull more crude out of ANWR, the EIA said. Some advanced
methods of extraction may be limited by the features of the Alaska North Slope; for example, steam injection could endanger some
of the permafrost, the EIA noted. The agency pointed out, however, that higher prices would make it more attractive to go after
small fields that are near the larger fields that would be the first targets for development, and some advanced, expensive techniques
of extraction could become more attractive in the later years if oil prices stay high. However, EIA predicted these high-tech
methods wouldn't have an impact until after 2030, beyond the horizon of the agency's forecast of the global
energy situation. So EIA assumed little change—and in fact, a slight decline—in ANWR's productive capacity since 2000, when it
projected that the production in the refuge could reach 650,000 to 1.9 million barrels per day. In the new analysis, EIA says that
production could range from 510,000 barrels to 1.45 million barrels per day. If Congress approved development in 2008, it would
take 10 years for oil production to commence, EIA said. With production starting, then, in 2018, EIA said the most likely scenario is
that oil would peak at 780,000 barrels per day in 2027 and decline to 710,000 barrels per day in 2030. Currently, the United States
consumes about 20 million barrels of oil per day. EIA said its projection is that ANWR
oil production would amount
to 0.4 percent to 1.2 percent of total world oil consumption in 2030. The figure is low enough that
OPEC could neutralize any price impact by decreasing supplies to match the additional production from Alaska, EIA
noted. New oil from Alaska would, however, reduce foreign oil dependence slightly, EIA said. With the United States currently on
track to get 54 percent of its oil from overseas by 2030, EIA said, if ANWR were opened, the share of oil from foreign countries
would drop to 48 percent in the best-case scenario or 52 percent if ANWR turns out to produce at the lower end of the range of
projections. That would mean that U.S. spending on foreign oil between 2018 and 2030 would be reduced by $135 billion to $327
billion. EIA noted the uncertainty in its predictions, which are based on the oil productivity of the geological formations elsewhere in
Alaska, including neighboring Prudhoe Bay, the largest oil field ever discovered in the United States. "There is little direct knowledge
regarding the petroleum geology of the ANWR region," said the report, titled "Analysis of Crude Oil Production in the Arctic National
Wildlife Refuge." The agency stuck with the U.S. Geological Survey's 1998 estimate that the amount of oil in the portion of ANWR
being considered for development is 10.4 billion barrels.
SPACE-BASED ENERGY
Neg
1NC
The United States federal government should increase its investment in space
based solar power.
Space Based Solar power is feasible
Wood 3/6/14 (Daniel Wood is the Data Visualization and Cartographic Specialist in the Office
of Public Affairs at the Department of Energy. He develops creative and interactive ways of
viewing the Energy Department’s vast array of data. “Space-Based Solar Power”
<http://energy.gov/articles/space-based-solar-power>)
You can’t collect solar power at night. Well, at least not on Earth. Since it’s Space Week, we
thought it'd be appropriate to look at one promising, but futuristic, idea that could change the
face of solar power generation: Space-Based Solar Power (SBSP). While the Energy Department
is not actively researching SBSP, we hope you’ll take a moment to learn about this far out
concept. The idea of capturing solar power in space for use as energy on Earth has been
around since the beginning of the space age. In the last few years, however, scientists around
the globe -- and several researchers at the Energy Department’s own Lawrence Livermore
National Laboratory (LLNL) -- have shown how recent technological developments could make
this concept a reality. On earth, solar power is greatly reduced by night, cloud cover,
atmosphere and seasonality. Some 30 percent of all incoming solar radiation never makes it to
ground level. In space the sun is always shining, the tilt of the Earth doesn't prevent the
collection of power and there’s no atmosphere to reduce the intensity of the sun’s rays . This
makes putting solar panels into space a tempting possibility. Additionally, SBSP can be used
to get reliable and clean energy to people in remote communities around the world, without
relying on the traditional grid to a large local power plant. How does it work? Self-assembling
satellites are launched into space, along with reflectors and a microwave or laser power
transmitter. Reflectors or inflatable mirrors spread over a vast swath of space, directing solar
radiation onto solar panels. These panels convert solar power into either a microwave or a
laser, and beam uninterrupted power down to Earth. On Earth, power-receiving stations collect
the beam and add it to the electric grid. The two most commonly discussed designs for SBSP are
a large, deeper space microwave transmitting satellite and a smaller, nearer laser transmitting
satellite. Microwave transmitting satellites orbit Earth in geostationary orbit (GEO), about
35,000 km above Earth’s surface. Designs for microwave transmitting satellites are massive,
with solar reflectors spanning up to 3 km and weighing over 80,000 metric tons. They would be
capable of generating multiple gigawatts of power, enough to power a major U.S. city. The
long wavelength of the microwave requires a long antenna, and allows power to be beamed
through the Earth’s atmosphere, rain or shine, at safe, low intensity levels hardly stronger than
the midday sun. Birds and planes wouldn’t notice much of anything flying across their paths.
The estimated cost of launching, assembling and operating a microwave-equipped GEO satellite
is in the tens of billions of dollars. It would likely require as many as 40 launches for all necessary
materials to reach space. On Earth, the rectenna used for collecting the microwave beam would
be anywhere between 3 and 10 km in diameter, a huge area of land, and a challenge to
purchase and develop. Laser transmitting satellites, as described by our friends at LLNL, orbit in
low Earth orbit (LEO) at about 400 km above the Earth’s surface. Weighing in in at less than 10
metric tons, this satellite is a fraction of the weight of its microwave counterpart. This design is
cheaper too; some predict that a laser-equipped SBSP satellite would cost nearly $500 million
to launch and operate. It would be possible to launch the entire self-assembling satellite in a
single rocket, drastically reducing the cost and time to production. Also, by using a laser
transmitter, the beam will only be about 2 meters in diameter, instead of several km, a drastic
and important reduction. To make this possible, the satellite’s solar power beaming system
employs a diode-pumped alkali laser. First demonstrated at LLNL in 2002 -- and currently still
under development there -- this laser would be about the size of a kitchen table, and powerful
enough to beam power to Earth at an extremely high efficiency, over 50 percent. While this
satellite is far lighter, cheaper and easier to deploy than its microwave counterpart, serious
challenges remain. The idea of high-powered lasers in space could draw on fears of the
militarization of space. This challenge could be remedied by limiting the direction that which the
laser system could transmit its power. At its smaller size, there is a correspondingly lower
capacity of about 1 to 10 megawatts per satellite. Therefore, this satellite would be best as part
of a fleet of similar satellites, used together. You could say SBSP is a long way off or pie in the
sky (puns intended) -- and you'd largely correct. But many technologies already exist to make
this feasible, and many aren't far behind. While the Energy Department isn't currently
developing any SBSP technologies specifically, many of the remaining technologies needed for
SBSP could be developed independently in the years to come. And while we don't know the
future of power harvested from space, we are excited to see ideas like this take flight (okay last
pun, I promise).
2NC: Feasible
SPS is feasible- capable of energy production
Mcduffee 3/17/14 (Allen McDuffee reports on national security for Wired and is currently
working on a book about the influence of think tanks in Washington. “The Navy’s Plan to Beam
Down Energy From Orbiting Solar Panels” < http://www.wired.com/2014/03/space-solar/>)
For decades, the Pentagon has been the world’s largest oil consumer, and as global petroleum
prices continue to rise, the military has been searching for feasible energy alternatives. Now
they’re looking in space. The U.S. Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) is building technology that
will allow the military to capture solar power in orbit and project it back down to Earth. Not only
would space solar potentially save the Pentagon buckets of cash, but it could simplify military
deployments. Fuel tankers would no longer have to reach remote or volatile areas, and
missions could run longer without having to return to base to refuel. So far, NRL has built and
tested two different prototypes of what they call a “sandwich” module, named for a design
innovation that packs all the electrical components between two square panels. The top side is a
photovoltaic panel that absorbs the Sun’s rays. An electronics system in the middle converts the
energy to a radio frequency, and the bottom is an antenna that transfers the power toward a
target on the ground. Ultimately, the idea is to assemble many of these modules in space by
robots — something the NRL’s Space Robotics Groups is already working on — to form a one
kilometer, very powerful satellite. A second design, a “step” module, modifies the sandwich
design by opening it up, which allows it to receive more sunlight without overheating, thereby
making it more efficient. “Launching mass into space is very expensive,” said Paul Jaffe, a
spacecraft engineer leading the Navy’s project, in a statement. It’s expected that space solar
will be able to produce more energy than ground-based collectors because it can soak up rays
around the clock, and regardless of the weather below. Private industry is interested in similar
technology. California utility company Pacific Gas & Electric has a contract to buy space solar
power from Solaren by 2016. And the Shimizu Corporation of Japan has recently proposed to
build a 11,000-mile solar strip across the Lunar equator to capture and transfer the sun’s energy.
Not everyone is so confident that such an ambitious project can be completed, but, as Jaffe put
it, “Hard to tell if it’s nuts until you’ve actually tried.”
“People might not associate radio waves with carrying energy, because they think of them for
communications, like radio, TV, or cell phones,” said Jaffe. “They don’t think about them as
carrying usable amounts of power.”
New innovations make low-cost and possible
Mirzadeh 3/20/14 (Farhad is a student from the University of North Texas where he is
pursuing a double major in political science and history with a focus in international relations
and Middle Eastern studies. He previously worked at the National Center for Policy Analysis
where he worked on their online publications and collaborated on various studies. “Space Based
Solar Power – A Promising Technology” <http://www.americansecurityproject.org/space-basedsolar-power-a-promising-technology/>)
The world’s largest consumer of fossil fuels is turning to alternative energies to meet its
demands. The Department of Defense spends billions of dollars a year on fuel costs. As
traditional sources of power have steadily increased in price, the military is forced to search for
new solutions to reduce dependence on fossil fuels. Renewable energy for military purposes is
nothing new. Solar, wind, geothermal, have all been used by the military in a variety of
capacities. However, a new method of collecting solar energy for military use is being
developed by the U.S Naval Research Laboratory (NRL). This method involves building
technology that sends a sandwich-like module into space with photovoltaic panels on one side
to collect energy from the sun’s rays. From there, an electronics system in the middle of the
module converts the energy into a radio frequency that is then transferred to an antenna on the
bottom of the module which then transfers the energy to earth. Otherwise known as spacebased solar power, this method of collecting energy can provide limitless military and civilian
applications. Such technology has long been talked about but the capital costs and technological
requirements to have a solar satellite rotating around earth have proven difficult barriers to
overcome. Current research is focused on reducing the weight of the modules so that the cost
of launching the modules into space is low cost. Furthermore, scientists are looking into the
logistics of how to turn multiple modules into an array of solar panels in space. Currently, the
International Space Station stretches about the size of a football field whereas an array of panels
would be about nine times that. One solution to this, which requires more research, is to send
the modules into space separately and then have them assembled by robots. There is still some
work to be done but current research looks promising. The International Academy of
Astronautics recently stated that space-based solar power would be viable within 30 years.
Moreover, private companies have been created to build space solar power. Solaren Corp, for
example, made an agreement in 2009 with California Utility Pacific Gas & Electric Co. to sell the
power generated from the space solar arrays to the electric company by 2016. Hopefully, these
types of private investments can create further incentives for the development and
deployment of space-based solar power technology. The benefits of this method over
traditional forms of solar power are readily apparent. For example, the satellites are constantly
collecting the sun’s rays whereas ground-based solar panels don’t collect as much of the sun’s
rays because of weather conditions. In November 2011, a proposal for Space Based Solar Power
was discussed at ASP. We know that the military would benefit immensely from this
technology. First, it would save billions in fuel costs since bases could easily be supplied with
energy collected from these satellites rather than conventional fuel sources. Second, it grant
the military ultimate flexibility because space-based solar power can be redirected anywhere
on the planet. It would allow for power in bases that are far off or secluded and eliminate the
need for long supply lines. The promise is there, but will the technology and costs meet the
challenge?
2NC: Energy
Key to stop climate change and oil conflicts
Berger 10/12/07 (Brian Berger is a space news staff writer. “Report Urges U.S. to Pursue
Space-Based Solar Power” <http://www.space.com/4478-report-urges-pursue-space-basedsolar-power.html>)
WASHINGTON – A Pentagon-chartered report urges the United States to take the lead in
developing space platforms capable of capturing sunlight and beaming electrical power to
Earth. Space-based solar power, according to the report, has the potential to help the United
States stave off climate change and avoid future conflicts over oil by harnessing the Sun's
power to provide an essentially inexhaustible supply of clean energy. The report, "Space-Based
Solar Power as an Opportunity for Strategic Security," was undertaken by the Pentagon's
National Security Space Office this spring as a collaborative effort that relied heavily on Internet
discussions by more than 170 scientific, legal, and business experts around the world. The Space
Frontier Foundation, an activist organization normally critical of government-led space
programs, hosted the website used to collect input for the report. Speaking at a press
conference held here Oct. 10 to unveil the report, U.S. Marine Corps Lt. Col. Paul Damphousse
of the National Space Security Space Office said the six-month study, while "done on the cheap,"
produced some very positive findings about the feasibility of space-based solar power and its
potential to strengthen U.S. national security. "One of the major findings was that space-based
solar power does present strategic opportunity for us in the 21st century," Damphousse said.
"It can advance our U.S. and partner security capability and freedom of action and merits
significant additional study and demonstration on the part of the United States so we can help
either the United State s develop this, or allow the commercial sector to step up." Specifically,
the report calls for the U.S. government to underwrite the development of space-based solar
power by funding a progressively bigger and more expensive technology demonstrations that
would culminate with building a platform in geosynchronous orbit bigger than the international
space station and capable of beaming 5-10 megawatthajts of power to a receiving station on the
ground. Nearer term, the U.S. government should fund in depth studies and some initial proofof-concept demonstrations to show that space-based solar power is a technically and
economically viable to solution to the world's growing energy needs . Aside from its potential
to defuse future energy wars and mitigate global warming , Damphousse said beaming power
down from space could also enable the U.S. military to operate forward bases in far flung,
hostile regions such as Iraq without relying on vulnerable convoys to truck in fossil fuels to run
the electrical generators needed to keep the lights on. As the report puts it, "beamed energy from space in quantities
greater than 5 megawatts has the potential to be a disruptive game changer on the battlefield. [Space-based solar power] and its enabling wireless
power transmission technology could facilitate extremely flexible 'energy on demand' for combat units and installations across and entire theater,
while significantly reducing dependence on over-land fuel deliveries." Although the U.S. military would reap tremendous benefits from space-based
solar power, Damphousse said the Pentagon is unlikely to fund development and demonstration of the technology. That role, he said, would be more
appropriate for NASA or the Department of Energy, both of which have studied space-based solar power in the past. The Pentagon would, however, be
a willing early adopter of the new technology, Damphousse said, and provide a potentially robust market for firms trying to build a business around
space-based solar power. "While challenges do remain and the business case does not necessarily close at this time from a financial sense, space-based
solar power is closer than ever," he said. "We are the day after next from being able to actually do this." Damphousse, however, cautioned that the
private sector will not invest in space-based solar power until the United States buys down some of the risk through a technology development and
demonstration effort at least on par with what the government spends on nuclear fusion research and perhaps as much as it is spending to construct
and operate the international space station. "Demonstrations are key here," he said. "If we can demonstrate this, the business case will close rapidly."
Charles Miller, one of the Space Frontier Foundation's directors, agreed public funding is vital to getting space-based solar power off the ground. Miller
told reporters here that the space-based solar power industry could take off within 10 years if the White House and Congress embrace the report's
recommendations by funding a robust demonstration program and provide the same kind of incentives it offers the nuclear power industry. Military
applications The Pentagon's interest is another important factor. Military officials involved in the report calculate that the United States is paying $1 per
kilowatt hour or more to supply power to its forward operating bases in Iraq. "The biggest issue with previous studies is they were trying to get five or
ten cents per kilowatt hour, so when you have a near term customer who's potentially willing to pay much more for power, it's much easier to close the
business case," Miller said. NASA first studied space-based solar power in the 1970s, concluding then that the concept was technically feasible but not
economically viable. Cost estimates produced at the time estimated the United States would have to spend $300 billion to $1 trillion to deliver the first
kilowatt hour of space-based power to the ground, said John Mankins, a former NASA technologist who led the agency's space-based solar power
research and now consults and runs the Space Power Association. Advances in computing, robotics, solar cell efficiency, and other technologies helped
drive that estimate down by the time NASA took a fresh look at space-based solar power in the mid-1990s, Mankins said, but still not enough justify the
upfront expense of such an undertaking at a time when oil was going for $15 a barrel. With oil currently trading today as high as $80 a barrel and the
U.S. military paying dearly to keep kerosene-powered generators humming in an oil-rich
region like Iraq, the economics have change significantly since NASA pulled the plug on spacebased solar power research in around 2002. On the technical front, solar cell efficiency has
improved faster than expected. Ten years ago, when solar cells were topping out around 15 percent efficiency, experts
predicted that 25 percent efficiency would not be achieved until close to 2020, Mankins said, yet Sylmar, Calif.-based Spectrolab – a
Boeing subsidiary – last year unveiled an advanced solar cell with a 40.7 percent conversion efficiency. One critical area that has not
made many advances since the 1990s or even the 1970s is the cost of launch. Mankins said commercially-viable space-based solar
power platforms will only become feasible with the kind of dramatically cheaper launch costs promised by fully reusable launch
vehicles flying dozens of times a year. "If somebody tries to sell you stock in a space solar power company today saying we are going
to start building immediately, you should probably call your broker and not take that at face value," Mankins said. "There's a lot of
challenges that need to be overcome." Mankins said the space station could be used to host some early technology validation
demonstrations, from testing appropriate materials to tapping into the station's solar-powered electrical grid to transmit a low level
of energy back to Earth. Worthwhile component tests could be accomplished for "a few million" dollars, Mankins estimated, while a
space station-based power-beaming experiment would cost "tens of millions" of dollars. Placing a free-flying space-based solar
power demonstrator in low-Earth orbit, he said, would cost $500 million to $1 billion. A geosynchronous system capable of
transmitting a sustained 5-10 megawatts of power down to the ground would cost around $10 billion, he said, and provide enough
electricity for a military base. Commercial platforms, likewise, would be very expensive to build. "These things are not going to be
small or cheap," Mankins said. "It's not like buying a jetliner. It's going to be like buying the Hoover Dam." While the upfront costs
are steep, Mankins and others said space-based solar power's potential to meet the world's future energy needs is huge. According
to the report, "a single kilometer-wide band of geosynchronous earth orbit experiences enough solar flux in one year to nearly equal
the amount of energy contained within all known recoverable conventional oil reserves on Earth today."
SBSP is key to future energy
Major 9/21/12 (James Major is a writer for Discovery News and an expert in solar energy.
“Space Energy: Is Space Solar Power Feasible?” <http://news.discovery.com/space/beamingdown-earths-energy-120921.htm>)
It’s always sunny in low-Earth orbit, so what better place to look for a source of solar energy?
With the end of “cheap oil” rumored to be rapidly approaching (if not already upon us), not to
mention the effects of fossil fuel use upon the environment and climate, sources of alternate,
clean and renewable energy appear to be the unavoidable wave of the future. But the key
factor in all these ventures is efficiency — how to get the most “bang for the buck” in the
harnessing, creation and distribution of energy. Oil and coal must be extracted, shipped,
refined and burnt, contributing greenhouse gases to the atmosphere. Wind needs to be 1)
present, and 2) converted to energy with turbines, and water requires the construction of
dams, which are not only expensive but also radically change the ecosystem of the river they
are built upon. Even ground-based solar panels are subject to weather and the Earth’s
day/night schedule . Enter the concept of space solar power — using orbiting solar panels that
constantly collect energy from the sun, unfiltered and uninterrupted, and “beam” it back
down to Earth where it can be sent along the grid for use by communities. The sun is
constantly putting out incredibly vast amounts of radiant energy in all directions. (About the
equivalent of 2 billion power plants’ worth of yearly energy every second!) Earth receives only a
fraction of this output, yet capturing it has the potential of providing renewable and virtually
pollution-free energy — especially in places where access to conventional power grids is limited
or impossible. The video below, created by Mafic Studios, Inc. for the National Space Society and
the National Security Space Office in Washington, D.C., shows how such an orbiting structure
would work. Basically, large sets of solar cells would gather the sun’s energy and send it
wirelessly down to ground-based receptor/transformer stations, which would then distribute
the electricity for use. The process would create no hazardous waste or emissions. Mark
Hopkins, Senior Vice President of the National Space Society, stated “As the United States
makes decisions now to answer the energy challenges of the next 50 years, space-based solar
power must be a part of the answer. The NSSO-led study charts the path forward. While the
technical challenges are real, significant investment now can build Space Solar Power into the
ultimate energy source: clean, green, renewable, and capable of providing the vast amounts of
power that the world will need. Congress, federal agencies and the business community should
begin that investment immediately.” Now, over four years later, we have yet to see any
significant development on the space solar power concept… meanwhile, the nations of the
world continue to discuss how best to combat the undeniable and increasing complications of
climate change. Although space solar power is currently far from ready, requiring plenty of
research and engineering (and thus funding) to become a reality anytime soon, the technology
is feasible… given the existence of affordable launch vehicles and in-orbit support operations.
Still, isn’t it best to start development and testing sooner rather than later, when we will be
under even more pressure to clean up our energy act? The future is coming, whether we’re
ready or not. We need to be prepared for the energy needs of an ever-growing population,
and even if space solar power won’t replace conventional energy anytime soon it may offer a
supplemental source of power — with little negative impact on the environment.
More power than all oil reserves
PHILIPKOSKI 10/11/07 (KRISTEN PHILIPKOSKI is a write for Wired.com, citing a credible
souce. “Report: Space-Based Solar Power Could Slow Climate Change, Ease Oil Dependence”
<http://www.wired.com/2007/10/report-space-ba/>)
A kilometer-wide geosynchronous solar panel could collect as much energy in one year as the
amount contained within all known recoverable conventional oil reserves on Earth today ,
according to a report commissoined by the Pentagon. Space.com’s Brian Berger has a thorough
article on the report, saying the cost of getting a solar power unit into space is likely the biggest
barrier: One critical area that has not made many advances since the 1990s or even the 1970s is
the cost of launch. Mankins said commercially-viable space-based solar power platforms will
only become feasible with the kind of dramatically cheaper launch costs promised by fully
reusable launch vehicles flying dozens of times a year. One source says it would cost between
$500,000 and $1 billion. That’s just a little more than one day’s worth of Iraq war
expenditures. I’m just sayin.
Possible and key to clean energy
Wood 5/30/13 ( Leet W. Wood is a PhD student in political science at George Mason
University in Fairfax, Virginia. “Projecting power: The security implications of space-based solar
power” http://thebulletin.org/2012/january/projecting-power-security-implications-spacebased-solar-power>)
Space-based solar power is a system for delivering a potentially limitless supply of clean
energy to a world desperately searching for alternatives to fossil fuels. However, while the
system offers the promise of unlimited, “green” electrical power, it also has immense
potential as a geopolitical tool. For example, t his new power source could be used to support
troops, rebels, or international aid workers virtually anywhere in the world . Space solar
power research has recently experienced something of a renaissance, but so far there has been
very little discussion about the security implications of this potentially transformative
technology. While it will be at least a decade, if not two, before the infrastructure for
deploying a full-scale system exists, developing policies and norms—international and
national—capable of effectively engaging such a technically and politically complex issue can
itself require years of work. Policy makers and political scientists should begin debating the
security impacts of space-based solar power now, lest technological development outpace the
ability of governments and international institutions to meaningfully assimilate it.
2NC: Best Energy
SBSP is the BEST form of alternative energy
Faure 11 (Jamie Faure is a writer for the Young Scientist Journal, and is from the King’s School
Canterbury. “Can space based solar power save the climate?”
<http://www.butrousfoundation.com/ysj/wp-content/uploads/Issue09/Can-space-based-solarpower-save-the-planet.pdf>)
Introduction
How shall we tackle climate change? This is still a unresolved question. Here, I will put forward
an idea and argue its case Burning fuels creates carbon dioxide, which thicken the atmosphere.
Consequently, an increasing amount of the Sun's heat is trapped. So, to tackle climate change,
we must stop burning fuels. However, fuel I needed for energy. Therefore, we need to find
other sources of energy that do not adversely impact the environment Space-based Solar
Power. What I think has the most potential in reducing global warming is Space-based Solar
Power (SBSP) [Figure 1 ]. This technology involves placing solar satellites in space, where their
energy production is unaffected by seasons, weather, the day and night cycle, and the filtering
effect of the Earth's atmosphere . The Sun's energy for us is virtually unlimited (around 5
billion years to go).''> In addition, the satellites are placed nearer to the Sun in space than to
the Earth, so they receive more of the Sun's energy. The satellite then transmits power to the
Earth using a laser or microwave beam.121 Transmission by microwaves has already been
tested by NASA, and proven possible. In space, solar irradiance is 144% higher than in the
Earth,'2' which means there is a lot more power available up there! Japan has already been working on this
idea for 30 years and invested over 20 billion dollars, hoping to finish their project by 2030.'3' The Americans and the Russians are also at the breach.
working on a similar idea. The problem with this solution is that we would need to make sure the laser or microwave beam is perfectly orientated
toward its receptor on Earth, and would not hit planes or other satellites. Further development is needed before this method is actually feasible. On 19
November 2009, two astronauts went into space to begin the installation of solar cells on the International Space Station (ISS). The two astronauts
were part of the crew of the shuttle Discovery. More outings like this are scheduled to take place in the next few years, providing the space station with
a greater supply of power. Soon, the station would be able to host not only three, but six astronauts permanently.'4| The Pacific Gas and Electric
(PG&E) wants to buy 200 MW of power in space from the firm Solaren. Solaren has been planning for 7 years to send a satellite to space, which is
designed to gather power. A PG&E representative says ,
"We are convinced this technology is to be taken very
seriously. It is astounding to see how much energy is available in space".'51 Another company
called Space Energy is also developing this technology. There is also the option of placing solar cells on our only
natural satellite, the Moon. This idea involves building a solar plant on the moon using resources found locally. The stations would
be built on the two quarters of the moon that are visible to us, as one of them is always facing the sun. Energy is retransmitted to
Earth using microwaves or laser, but this only works when the solar cells are in a direct line with the station on Earth.
AT: Nuclear
Better than nuclear energy
Faure 11 (Jamie Faure is a writer for the Young Scientist Journal, and is from the King’s School
Canterbury. “Can space based solar power save the climate?”
<http://www.butrousfoundation.com/ysj/wp-content/uploads/Issue09/Can-space-based-solarpower-save-the-planet.pdf>)
Nuclear Other "less good" options include nuclear energy, which provides a reliable source of
power that does not contribute to climate change and is relatively cheaper. However, it could
be dangerous if the plant is not properly run. The nuclear waste produced as a side product is
very radioactive but we have not found a way to safely dispose of this highly dangerous
material yet. Moreover, the waste can be used to make nuclear weapons. If terrorists targeted
nuclear power plants, catastrophic consequences would result. In addition, nuclear
energy is non-renewable and the "ingredient" for nuclear power, Uranium, would run out
sometime soon.
AT: Biofuels
Biofuels fail
Faure 11 (Jamie Faure is a writer for the Young Scientist Journal, and is from the King’s School
Canterbury. “Can space based solar power save the climate?”
<http://www.butrousfoundation.com/ysj/wp-content/uploads/Issue09/Can-space-based-solarpower-save-the-planet.pdf>)
Biofuels Biofuels are preferable to petroleum but they still emit harmful greenhouse gases,
though a lot less than petrol. In addition, there are too many petrol-only cars on the road to
switch to biofuels and there are not many petrol stations that have a pump suited to biofuels.
Biofuels have low energy efficiency as the level of energy they generate is much less than the
amount needed to grow the crops. Another problem is that switching 5% of the nation's petrol
needs to biofuels would involve diverting 60% of the existing crops for biofuels'
production.171
AT: Wind
Wind energy is unreliable and fails
Faure 11 (Jamie Faure is a writer for the Young Scientist Journal, and is from the King’s School
Canterbury. “Can space based solar power save the climate?”
<http://www.butrousfoundation.com/ysj/wp-content/uploads/Issue09/Can-space-based-solarpower-save-the-planet.pdf>)
Wind power has certain benefits. Resides the fact that it is a renewable source of energy, the
wind turbines can be built on farmland, leaving the land below available for farming, and they
can be used as tourist attractions. However, in my opinion, it does not help matters enough .
Wind power is unreliable as wind is not always available . Wind turbines are expensive to
ugly. They are usually noisy when operating and can
possibly affect television reception. Moreover, they can be harmful to
birds. New wind turbine projects include M.A.R.S. or the Magenn Air Rotor System [Figure 2]. This is an easily transportable
build and many people find them
helium-filled balloon placed at an altitude of 300 m. The contraption is a sort of cylinder, which spins under the influence of wind,
facilitated by the flaps on the sides.'8' There is no need to mention that the cables could be a nuisance, as the high-tension cables
would get tangled up easily. Storms or lightning could also be very dangerous for objects on the ground, as the wires connect the
balloon to the ground. Another idea is being developed by Makani Power and Kite Gen [Figure 3]. This involves a kite that collects
energy in three steps. Firstly, the kite rises, unraveling a cable that is connected to a generator on the ground. This process
generates electricity in the generator. Once the cable is fully unraveled, the kite tilts, so it no longer catches the wind. Lastly, the
cable is rewound, bringing the kite back to the ground. This step only uses up 12% of the power generated in step one. Like M.A.R.S.,
the cable could be dangerous, and storms are to be watched out for. Also, if more than one kite is flying
in a certain area, the cables may get mixed up and cause inconvenience. What is the craziest thing one can do with a wind turbine?
Sending the contraption into the jet stream. Although it seems unbelievable, it is being considered by Sky Wind Power. Four rotors,
connected to each other, make up the wind turbine. The device rises into the jet stream like a helicopter, where it tilts and starts
collecting energy. Electricity is conveyed back to the ground level via a 10 km cable.191 Along the same lines, Joby Energy has
developed the same sort of idea, but with 96 inter-connected rotors, 175 m long, and weighing 100 tonnes. It is estimated to be
capable of producing up to 30 MW of power.'10'These two projects are not developed yet and would definitely encounter some
problems like the immense tension the 10 km cable would have to withstand, especially when there are powerful storms in the jet
stream and wind speeds can reach 400 km/hour. Controlling the ascent would also be incredibly difficult.
the problem of cables getting tangled up and the danger of lightning.
Yes, there is also
AT: Hydroelectric
Hydroelectric is tooooooooooooooo risky
Faure 11 (Jamie Faure is a writer for the Young Scientist Journal, and is from the King’s School
Canterbury. “Can space based solar power save the climate?”
<http://www.butrousfoundation.com/ysj/wp-content/uploads/Issue09/Can-space-based-solarpower-save-the-planet.pdf>)
Hydroelectric Hydroelectric power is already producing over 20% of the world's electricity.'11'
The generators in the dams can produce electricity constanptly. No pollution is caused and
water can be stored above the dam, in wait for peaks in demand. The disadvantages of these
dams are the high construction costs and that they could flood large areas upstream which
would affect wildlife and the local population. Moreover, finding a suitable site to build a dam
can be difficult. If the dam breaks, floods can be very dangerous to the people living in
downstream areas.
AT: Tidal Power
Tidal power fails – SBSP is the only sufficient source
Faure 11 (Jamie Faure is a writer for the Young Scientist Journal, and is from the King’s School
Canterbury. “Can space based solar power save the climate?”
<http://www.butrousfoundation.com/ysj/wp-content/uploads/Issue09/Can-space-based-solarpower-save-the-planet.pdf>)
Tidal There are three main ways of harnessing tidal power: offshore turbines, tidal barrages and
tidal reefs. The advantages are that once a station is built, power is free and can be produced
reliably. Also, tides are easily predictable. Offshore turbines are underwater "propellers" out at
sea that rotate due to tides and subsequently generate power. The problems with these are
that the turbine has to be joined to the floor so that it does not move, and therefore, is only
suitable in shallow waters . In addition, they are expensive to build and may cause harm to
marine life. Tidal barrages are like hydroelectric dams, except that they are placed across an
estuary and harness tidal power instead of gravitational potential energy. The disadvantages
are that they are expensive to build, may disrupt the tides, and stop fish and boats passing
through. Tidal reefs are like tidal barrages, except that sections can be opened to allow ships
and fish to pass through. They affect the tides much less than tidal barrages. However, they
are more expensive than tidal barrages. Tides can only be harnessed for 10 hours each day,
when the tides are moving in or out.
Aff
2AC: Not feasible
Never feasible – too many technical problems and not cost effective
Nelder 09 (Chris Nelder is an Energy analyst, journalist, consultant, and investor. I have
written two books on investing and energy: Profit from the Peak and Investing in Renewable
Energy, both of which were published in 2008, and is a major contributer to the energy field.
“Outer Space Solar Power Is Pure Fantasy” < http://www.businessinsider.com/outer-spacesolar-power-is-pure-fantasy-2009-4>)
Wild Claims And Hard Realities
Then there are all the other niggling questions about how exactly the power transmission to earth works without, for example,
inadvertently frying a plane that happened across its path, or running the risk of destruction on the ground should anything go awry
with the system. Or how the company is so confident that we can deploy as-yet unproven technology at a scale far beyond man’s
most ambitious space program to date, and do it by 2016. Oh and I almost forgot to mention: Solaren’s director of energy services
Cal Boerman claims that after four rocket launches to place the equipment into space, it would not require assembly by astronauts,
but instead would unfold on its own. Anyone who has watched the evolution of cutting edge space projects like the Hubble
Telescope and indeed, the International Space Station itself, knows of the many problems they have faced with systems that didn’t
work according to plan.
Now Solaren wants us to believe that they can make something 240 times
bigger than the ISS with no astronauts needed? The best comment I found on the Solaren
project was from the Motley Fool: “As far as technology commercialization timelines go, spacebased solar is likely somewhat ahead of nuclear fusion powered by a rare fuel that’s mined on
the moon.” The whole plan is
pure fantasy as far as I’m concerned. But it’s
sexy space energy technology, so people just gobble it up. Those
inclined to excitement about such developments view PG&E’s proposed contract as verification
that there is something real about the project. But I have an alternate interpretation. PG&E is
desperate to contract for enough renewable energy to meet the state’s renewable portfolio
standard, which currently requires it to produce 20% of its electricity from clean sources by
2010, with a possible new standard of 33% by 2020 in the offing. However, the available supply
of renewable energy is nowhere close to that, nor is it growing nearly quickly enough to meet
such an ambitious target in an environment of tight credit. My guess is the utility would be
with space aliens in pink tutus
willing to sign a contract
at this point, if
they would guarantee in writing that they would deliver megawatt-hours of clean power
before 2020. Mark Toney, head of The Utility Reform Network watchdog group, called the
Solaren announcement “remote” and “an act of desperation,” preferring that PG&E spend
“more time on proven technologies closer to home that we can really count on.” For all the
doubts surrounding it, there are a few things about space based solar power that I can virtually
guarantee. One, if the Solaren project fails to round up financing, which is already a problem for
earth-based utility-scale systems, or is deployed but fails to meet expectations, no one will
publish its failure in big, bold headlines. Two, it will never scale or be cost-effective on par with
existing ground-based solar technology. Three, if it ever gets off the ground, it will be plagued
with technical problems, and in a post-fossil fuel world, it will become impossible to maintain.
Four, the net energy of the whole project will be ridiculously low, and the energy payback
period on it will be measured in decades. Five, it will consume a vast amount of gullible
techno-utopian capital. The Profitable Solar Reality While that capital is chasing pipe dreams
with visions of solar satellites dancing in their heads, the real money will be made by those who
have the savvy to invest in the most realistic, functional, scalable, cheap, and high net energy
systems on the ground today. I’m talking about companies like Phoenix Solar AG (FRA: PS4), an
international systems integrator of PV systems who builds and operates large solar plants and
wholesales specialized parts for power plants. Or Acciona SA (MCE: ANA), a Spanish holding
company whose subsidiary Acciona Energy deployed a 46-MW solar PV power plant in Portugal
last December for $348 million ($7,565 per kW). Or privately-held Ausra, Inc. of Palo Alto,
California, a pioneering provider of utility-scale CSP plants with operations in the US and
Australia. Companies like these will be the real contenders in our race against time to scale up
renewable energy and leave fossil fuels behind before they leave us. While the SBSP dreamers
are still working on their first hundred megawatts, these leaders will be working on their next
hundred gigawatts.
SBSP takes too long and too many problems
Bansal 11 (Gaurav Bansal is a correspondent for Ecofriend, “The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly:
Space Based Solar Energy” http://www.ecofriend.com/entry/the-good-the-bad-and-the-uglyspace-based-solar-energy/)
The Bad 1. High costs and long gestation period : Development cost for solar panels of that
magnitude would be very large and will also take long time to manufacture as even the first
space-based solar project passed California State also has gestation period of 7 long years.
Similarly, costs to operationalize even a single large panel is very high, which makes it even
more difficult for poor nations to do so. such pilot project by Japan also even runs into more
than 20 billions of dollars even before operationalization. 2 . Satellite traffic will increase : A
large number of such projects can lead to overcrowding of space in the geosynchronous orbit.
This may lead to a mishap like the one collision that happened between the Iridium Satellite
LLC-operated satellite and the Russian Cosmos-2251 military satellite occurred at about 485
miles above the Russian Arctic on Feb, 2009. The Ugly 1.Potential damage to Atmosphere: Till
now microwave and other transmission methods that are adopted for all over the world are
for communication and broadcast purposes only. However, for energy transmission, the
wavelength has to very high which can be potentially dangerous to our atmosphere and will
increase the risk of leukemia and cancer among humans. Suggested concentration and
intensity of such microwaves at their center would be of 23 mW/cm2 and at periphery would be
1 mW/cm2 , which compares to the current United States Occupational Safety and Health Act
(OSHA) workplace exposure limits for microwaves. Similarly very high frequency used for such
long distance propagation can be very dangerous and may lead to increase in radioactivity in
earth’s environment. 2.Laser beam penetration: Transmission of energy through atmosphere
has not yet been done at a large scale and its successful commercial utilization is still under
question. The ionosphere, the electrically charged portion of the atmosphere, will be a
significant barrier to transmission.
No technical viability in SBSP
Day 08 (Dwayne Day is a writer at the Space Review. “Knights in shining armor” <
http://www.thespacereview.com/article/1147/1>)
The reason that SSP has gained nearly religious fervor in the activist community can be
attributed to two things, neither having to do with technical viability. The first reason is
increased public and media attention on environmentalism and energy coupled with the high
price of gasoline. When even Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups are advertised with a global warming
message, it’s clear that the issue has reached the saturation point and everybody wants to link
their pet project to the global warming discussion. SSP, its advocates point out, is “green”
energy, with no emissions—other than the hundreds, or probably thousands, of rocket launches
needed to build solar power satellites. The second reason is a 2007 study produced by the
National Security Space Office (NSSO) on SSP. The space activist community has determined
that the Department of Defense is the knight in shining armor that will deliver them to their
shining castles in the sky. Space activists, who are motivated by the desire to personally
live and work in space, do not care about SSP per se. Although all of them are impacted by high
gasoline prices, many of them do not believe that global climate change is occurring; or if they
do believe it, they doubt that humans contribute to it. Instead, they have latched on to SSP
because it is expedient. Environmental and energy issues provide the general backdrop to their
new enthusiasm, and the NSSO study serves as their focal point. Many people now claim that
“the Department of Defense is interested in space solar power.” But it is not true. The NSSO
study is remarkably sensible and even-handed and states that we are nowhere near
developing practical SSP and that it is not a viable solution for even the military’s limited
requirements. It states that the technology to implement space solar power does not
currently exist… and is unlikely to exist for the next forty years. Substantial technology
development must occur before it is even feasible. Furthermore, the report makes clear that
the key technology requirement is cheap access to space, which no longer seems as
achievable as it did three decades ago (perhaps why SSP advocates tend to skip this part of the discussion
and hope others solve it for them). The activists have ignored the message and fallen in love with the messenger. But
in this case, the activists touting the NSSO study do not understand where the NSSO fits into the larger military space
bureaucracy. The National Security Space Office was created in 2004 and “facilitates the integration and coordination
of defense, intelligence, civil, and commercial space activities.” But any office that “facilitates” the activities of other
organizations has limited influence, especially when those other organizations are much bigger and have their own
interests and connections to the senior leadership. The NSSO has a minimal staff and budget and does
not command any assets—it does not fly any satellites, launch any rockets, or procure any
hardware, all of which are measures of power within the military space realm. Simply put, the
NSSO exists essentially as a policy shop that is readily ignored by the major military space actors
such as Strategic Command, Air Force Space Command, and the National Reconnaissance Office
whenever it suits them. As one former NSSO staffer explained, the office consists of many smart,
hardworking people who have no discernible influence on military space at all. In fact, for
several years there have been persistent rumors that the NSSO was about to be abolished as
unnecessary, irrelevant, and toothless. Add to this the way in which the NSSO’s solar power
satellite study was pursued—the study itself had no budget. In Washington, studies cost
money. If the Department of Defense wants advice on, say, options for space launch, they hire
an organization to conduct the study such as the RAND Corporation, or they employ one of
their existing advisory groups such as the Air Force Scientific Advisory Board. All of this
requires money to pay for the experts to perform the work. Even if the study is performed by a
committee of volunteers, there are still travel, printing, staff support, overhead, and other
expenses. Costs can vary widely, but at a minimum will start in the many tens of thousands of
dollars and could run to a few million dollars. In contrast, the NSSO study of space solar power
had no actual funding and relied entirely upon voluntary input and labor. This reflects the
seriousness by which the study was viewed by the Pentagon leadership. It is nonsensical for
members of the space activist community to claim that “the military supports space solar
power” based solely on a study that had no money, produced by an organization that has no
clout. If all this is true, why is the space activist community so excited about the NSSO study?
That is not hard to understand. They all know that the economic case for space solar power is
abysmal. The best estimates are that SSP will cost at least three times the cost per kilowatt
hour of even relatively expensive nuclear power. But the military wants to dramatically lower the cost of
delivering fuel to distant locations, which could possibly change the cost-benefit ratio. The military savior also theoretically solves
some other problems for SSP advocates. One is the need for deep pockets to foot the immense development costs. The other is an
institutional avatar—one of the persistent policy challenges for SSP has been the fact that responsibility for it supposedly “falls
through the cracks” because neither NASA nor the Department of Energy wants responsibility. If the military takes on the SSP
challenge, the mission will finally have a home.
But there’s also another factor at work: naïveté. Space
activists tend to have little understanding of military space, coupled with an idealistic
impression of its management compared to NASA, whom many space activists have come to
despise. For instance, they fail to realize that the military space program is currently in no better shape, and in
many cases worse shape, than NASA. The majority of large military space acquisition programs have experienced
major problems, in many cases cost growth in excess of 100%. Although NASA has a bad public record for cost
overruns, the DoD’s less-public record is far worse, and military space has a bad reputation in Congress, which would
never allow such a big, expensive new program to be started. Again, this is not to insult the fine work conducted by
those who produced the NSSO space solar power study. They accomplished an impressive amount of
work without any actual resources. But it is nonsensical for members of the space activist
community to claim that “the military supports space solar power” based solely on a study
that had no money, produced by an organization that has no clout.
2AC: No energy
SBSP won’t be viable in the energy market – too many other alternative
energies
Strauss 09 (Stephen Strauss is a science writer with over 30 years of experience in the
Canadian media. He covered science over a 25 year period for Globe and Mail and since leaving
there has written a regular column for the CBC’s website. Stephen is also an accomplished
author and speaker with numerous awards and fellowships. “Space-based solar power is a cool
idea, but it's out of reach” < http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/space-based-solar-power-isa-cool-idea-but-it-s-out-of-reach-1.832993>)
What the telegraph story says to me is that space-based power is increasingly more likely to
fail than to succeed. It's the market-timing paradox . When the telegraph line was put in, its
only competition was the transmission of information using ships. Sailing across the Atlantic
took the better part of two weeks and led to the newspapers of the time often featuring stories
with the attribution "a recently arrived boat passenger has reported." Conversely, once the
telegraph line was actually functional in the 1860s, it could transmit Morse-coded accounts of
events in minutes. What this leap in the speed of information transmission meant is that there
was effectively no competition for a telegraph. Accordingly, customers were charged $5 a word
for the initial transmissions. To put this in modern context for you, when inflation is taken into
consideration, that would translate into a 140-character internet tweet costing upwards of
$4,000. There in lies the fundamental problem with space-based solar power: it isn't different
from any other kind of electricity . Toasters or computers or the internet won't run faster or
smoother or better when powered by solar energy from space. And this means that space solar
power is — in price, reliability, availability and reduction of global warming — in competition
with every other form of alternative and conventional energy. It is as if laying telegraph cables
existed in a world where primitive forms of radio transmissions and cellphones and internet
signals were also developing. In this complex marketplace, price isn't set by a monopoly medium
but by all media in competition. The most optimistic of scenarios today has space-based solar
costing five to 10 times as much as traditional energy sources. Prohibitive cost The argument
that proponents make is that a variety of technological advances could bring this cost down.
However, there is a root problem in this. The same pressure to provide sustainable,
environmentally friendly energy sources is at work through out the power industry. And
Earth-based technologies have an intrinsic advantage in what is called "the learning curve."
Jonathan Koomey, who co-authored in 2007 an article called "The Risk of Surprise in Energy
Technology Costs," points out that when developing something like a better wind power
generator, errors teach you things. "You learn what went wrong, correct it and build another
one," Koomey said from Yale University, where he is a visiting professor. But space construction
bedevils any simple learning feedback. Simply getting to where the problem exists to determine
the problem and fix it is a huge issue. A single space shuttle flight costs about $1 billion. Even
cheap launch vehicles envisaged for the future are estimated to cost around $78 million a
flight. How can you be nimble and do quick redesigns with this kind of overhead? I don't think
you can. And thus the paradox: if SBSP gets better but its competitors do as well, space power
might never be good enough to compete in the energy marketplace. So, what the transatlantic
telegraph tells me is a great irony for proponents of space solar power. Despite all its recent
activity and advances, SBSP seems today more likely to fail because external circumstances
mean other energy alternatives are more likely to succeed.
SPACE-BASED EXPLORATION
Neg
Notes
Mix and match the evidence to your pleasing to solve aff exploration advantages – the net
benefit is any ocean/aff specific DA – be that environment or something else.
1NC CP Text
Text: The United States federal government should substantially increase its deep space
exploration.
CP Key
Current Deep Space budget is insufficient – hardly any projects are receiving
funding
Achenbach 13 (Joel, writes on science and politics for the Post's national desk, “To go boldly
(and on budget)”, 12/25/13, http://www.washingtonpost.com/sf/national/2013/12/25/to-goboldly-and-on-budget/)//WL
The Cassini spacecraft is in splendid shape as it circles Saturn. Conceived in the 1980s, launched
in 1997, Cassini arrived at the gas-giant planet in 2004 and has continued to deliver stunning
images of the jewel of the solar system. The unmanned probe scored a major discovery in 2005
when it found geysers erupting from what appears to be a subsurface sea on the moon
Enceladus that scientists believe could harbor some form of exotic life. Cassini also mapped the
surface of the huge moon Titan, which has a dense atmosphere, and lakes, and rivers, though
there’s no water — the liquid is made of hydrocarbons such as methane and ethane, as if the
place had been designed by the oil and gas industry. Fuel is running low on Cassini, but there’s
enough for another four years of maneuvering. Technicians at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory
(JPL) in Pasadena, Calif., have mastered the art of using Titan’s gravity to steer Cassini into new,
interesting orbits. NASA hopes to send the spacecraft diving inside the majestic rings of Saturn
to study their composition. The extended mission would cost about $60 million a year. But
that money has not materialized in the NASA budget. If there is no funding, NASA will have to
end the Cassini mission next year. For robotic spacecraft, the greatest hazard in the solar
system turns out to be the NASA budget. The mere possibility that such luxury-class missions
could be shut down reveals the budgetary stress at NASA and calls into question whether the
agency in coming years will be able to go forward with some of the big, ambitious exploratory
programs that scientists have made their top priority. NASA cannot simply abandon Cassini,
because it could crash someday into Enceladus and could contaminate the hypothetical
biosphere with Earth microbes that are lurking aboard it. Instead, the navigators at JPL would be
forced to aim the $3.5 billion spacecraft directly at Saturn, which is presumably lifeless, and let it
disintegrate as it enters the atmosphere. “I think it would be the height of folly to terminate
such a profoundly successful mission when we’re not done yet,” said Carolyn Porco, a planetary
scientist at the Space Science Institute in Boulder, Colo., and the leader of the imaging team for
Cassini. The bet within NASA is that the Obama administration and Congress will find a way to
keep Cassini flying. And it’s virtually certain that they will scrape together the money to extend
the operation of the Curiosity rover on Mars. But earlier this month, NASA Administrator
Charles Bolden popped into a meeting of a NASA science advisory committee and made an
unexpected announcement: There will be no new flagship-class missions. Those are projects
that cost $1 billion-plus. Flagships include Cassini, Curiosity, the Hubble Space Telescope and
such legendary spacecraft as Viking and Voyager. Bolden’s comments, first reported by space
policy reporter Marcia Smith, landed in a delicate period in which the agency’s fiscal 2015
budget is being drafted by the president’s Office of Management and Budget, in consultation
with NASA. Will Cassini get funding? Will other high-priority programs? The scientists who
depend on this funding are anxious. They have made their to-do list for the coming decade,
and it includes some multibillion-dollar proposals. For example, scientists are eager to send a
probe to Jupiter’s icy moon Europa, another potential abode of extraterrestrial life. NASA
officials tried to settle everyone down a few days later by disseminating a new statement from
Bolden saying that “NASA remains committed to planning, launching and operating flagship
missions.” The gist is that NASA cannot start a new flagship mission right now, but perhaps the
fiscal situation will improve in the future. The Obama administration argues that NASA is being
forced to fit 20 pounds of programs into a 10-pound bag. Officials note that Congress began
squeezing NASA’s budget in 2010, and then the sequester trimmed it further, leaving the
agency about $2 billion short of where it had been in 2009. NASA had to find a way to absorb
those cuts, even as cost overruns on certain science missions made officials wary of the
jumbo, multibillion-dollar projects. The administration essentially wants to go back to the
“faster, better, cheaper” philosophy that had been the NASA mantra in the 1990s. Agency
officials emphasize that they continue to push forward with a long list of science missions, most
of them costing less than a billion dollars. They include the Maven probe that is on its way to
study the atmosphere of Mars and the Osiris REx spacecraft that is supposed to fly to an
asteroid, grab a tiny sample and bring it back to Earth. Among already approved flagships are
the James Webb Space Telescope, scheduled for a 2018 launch, and a 2020 Mars rover that will
be a virtual duplicate of Curiosity. But the space science community, which includes
astrophysicists and Earth scientists, feels it is facing a new era of limits even as the universe
itself is screaming to be explored. One of the biggest space stories of the year was the
announcement in November, based on an extrapolation from observations by NASA’s Kepler
space telescope, that our Milky Way galaxy alone is likely to have about 40 billion planets that
are roughly the size of the Earth and in orbits that could potentially allow water to exist at the
surface. But even as scientists feel optimistic that the galaxy hosts a multitude of habitable
worlds, NASA is struggling to come up with the money for exploration, whether through
telescopes, robotic probes or human spaceflight. Space beckons, but it is a hostile and
unforgiving environment, with fierce head winds.
STEM
Increased space exploration is key to building future interest in NASA
NRC 11 [National Research Council for the National Academy of Sciences, Recapturing a Future
for Space Exploration: Life and Physical Sciences Research for a New Era, 2011,
http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=13048]
During its more than 50-year history, NASA’s success in human space exploration has
depended on the agency’s ability to effectively address a wide range of biomedical,
engineering, physical science, and related obstacles—an achievement made possible by
NASA’s strong and productive commitments to life and physical sciences research for human
space exploration, and by its use of human space exploration infrastructures for scientific
discovery. This partnership of NASA with the research community reflects the original mandate
from Congress in 1958 to promote science and technology, an endeavor that requires an active
and vibrant research program.* The committee acknowledges the many achievements of NASA,
which are all the more remarkable given budgetary challenges and changing directions within
the agency. In the past decade, however, a consequence of those challenges has been a life
and physical sciences research program that was dramatically reduced in both scale and scope,
with the result that the agency is poorly positioned to take full advantage of the scientific
opportunities offered by the now fully equipped and staffed ISS laboratory, or to effectively
pursue the scientific research needed to support the development of advanced human
exploration capabilities. Although its review has left it deeply concerned about the current state
of NASA’s life and physical sciences research, the Committee for the Decadal Survey on
Biological and Physical Sciences in Space is nevertheless convinced that a focused science and
engineering program can achieve successes that will bring the space community, the U.S.
public, and policymakers to an understanding that we are ready for the next significant phase
of human space exploration. The goal of this report is to lay out steps whereby NASA can
reinvigorate its partnership with the life and physical sciences research community and
develop a forward-looking portfolio of research that will provide the basis for recapturing the
excitement and value of human spaceflight—thereby enabling the U.S. space program to
deliver on new exploration initiatives that serve the nation, excite the public, and place the
United States again at the forefront of space exploration for the global good. This report
examines the fundamental science and as the following examples illustrate: • An effective
countermeasures program to attenuate the adverse effects of the space environment on the
health and performance capabilities of astronauts, a development that will make it possible to
conduct prolonged human space exploration missions.
We can’t train the next generation of scientists and engineers without that
AIAA 09 [American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Inc., “Recapturing American
Leadership in Space Life and Physical Sciences,” An AIAA Information Paper,
pg.
http://pdf.aiaa.org/downloads/publicpolicypositionpapers//LifeandPhysicalSciencesWhitePaper
.pdf]
The American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) and the American Society for
Gravitational and Space Biology (ASGSB) are working jointly to restore a program of
fundamental life and physical sciences in NASA. Without restoration, the U.S. will not realize
the gains in economic and health issues from the 100 billion dollar investment in the
International Space Station. We are a diverse group of scientists, engineers and students from
universities, government, and industry who exchange ideas that bridge basic and applied
research in space and gravitational sciences. This research is conducted on the ground in US
laboratories, analog environments and specialized facilities such as centrifuges and in flight in
parabolic aircraft, sounding rockets, suborbital vehicles and low Earth orbit in the Space Shuttle,
Russian biosatellites, U.S. free flyers and the International Space Station. This community
generates and disseminates fundamental knowledge about how physical elements and living
organisms respond to gravity and the spaceflight environment. This knowledge provides
understanding into physical and physiological processes that cannot be derived using
traditional experimental approaches on Earth. Microgravity is a tool for innovative
technological and biomedical discoveries to enable human exploration of space and improve
the quality of life for the general public. Our goals include education and outreach to the
public, students and teachers, Congress, NASA and other governmental agencies and industry.
We encourage students to pursue careers in the life and physical sciences, technology,
engineering and mathematics. Our research environments provide the venues for training the
next generation of engineers and scientists. Today, these activities have essentially stopped
due to a lack of a fundamental life and physical sciences program in NASA’s portfolio. The
community of life and physical scientists advocated and provided the science justification for
the ISS platform to enable research on long term exposure to microgravity and the spaceflight
environment. Funding authorized by Congress to outfit ISS for research and to support ground
and flight programs was siphoned off into spacecraft engineering under the guise of redirecting
it to higher priority research directed toward implementing the "Vision for Space Exploration".
This action crippled participation of the biological and physical space sciences research
community and generated lingering mistrust of NASA to follow through on its commitments. In
the 2005 timeframe, nearly $1B annually was devoted to Biological and Physical Science
Research. NASA is asking other federal science agencies to support this research, but no
transition plan, budget and agency have been identified to continue stewardship. Years of U.S.
invested research and intellectual capital are being abandoned without proper vetting. Now is
not the time to abandon the investment in fundamental gravitation and space biology
research and miss the opportunity to utilize the ISS for its intended purpose. Other nations are
capitalizing on US investment in the ISS, including over 3,000 European Space Agency (ESA)
scientists as well as Canadian, Japanese, Russian and Malaysian scientists who have both access
and funding to conduct ISS experiments. Due to the lack of funds and flight equipment, U.S.
scientists are being forced to beg time and specimens from their international colleagues or
turn their scientific interests away from space.
STEM Solves Economy
Science and tech are the building blocks for US economic leadership. Once lost,
they can never be regained
COSEPUP 07 – Joint unit of the National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering,
and the Institute of Medicine that conducts studies by special interdisciplinary panels
comprising the nation's best scientific and engineering expertise.. [Committee on Science,
Engineering, and Public Policy, Rising above the gathering storm : energizing and employing
America for a brighter economic future, 2007]
Having reviewed trends in the United States and abroad, the committee is deeply concerned
that the scientific and technological building blocks critical to our economic leadership are
eroding at a time when many other nations are gathering strength. We strongly believe that a
worldwide strengthening will benefit the world’s economy—particularly in the creation of jobs
in countries that are far less well-off than the United States. But we are worried about the
future prosperity of the United States. Although many people assume that the United States
will always be a world leader in science and technology, this may not continue to be the case
inasmuch as great minds and ideas exist throughout the world. We fear the abruptness with
which a lead in science and technology can be lost—and the difficulty of recovering a lead
once lost, if indeed it can be regained at all. The committee found that multinational
companies use such criteria3 as the following in determining where to locate their facilities and
the jobs that result: • Cost of labor (professional and general workforce). • Availability and cost
of capital. • Availability and quality of research and innovation talent. • Availability of qualified
workforce. • Taxation environment. • Indirect costs (litigation, employee benefits such as
healthcare, pensions, vacations). • Quality of research universities. • Convenience of
transportation and communication (including language). • Fraction of national research and
development supported by government. • Legal-judicial system (business integrity, property
rights, contract sanctity, patent protection). • Current and potential growth of domestic market.
• Attractiveness as place to live for employees. • Effectiveness of national economic system.
Although the US economy is doing well today, current trends in each of those criteria indicate
that the United States may not fare as well in the future without government intervention.
This nation must prepare with great urgency to preserve its strategic and economic security.
Because other nations have, and probably will continue to have, the competitive advantage of
a low wage structure, the United States must compete by optimizing its knowledge-based
resources, particularly in science and technology, and by sustaining the most fertile
environment for new and revitalized industries and the well-paying jobs they bring. We have
already seen that capital, factories, and laboratories readily move wherever they are thought
to have the greatest promise of return to investors
Sci Dip
Certainty of NASA investment necessary to restore US science credibility
Sabathier and Faith 8 (Vincent G. Sabathier, senior associate with the CSIS Technology and
Public Policy Program, G. Ryan Faith, research analyst for the Space Foundation, “Smart Power
Through Space,” Center for Strategic and International Studies, 2008,
http://csis.org/files/media/csis/pubs/080220_smart_power_through_space.pdf)
In much the same way that the Apollo program and Vietnam War era were then the two most
visible displays of soft and hard power, we are now faced with a similar situation. Throughout
the entire Cold War, support for soft and hard power use of space was carefully balanced. We
must now signal to the world that we are not a nation that lives by use of military force alone.
We must increase our support of civil space utilization and exploration to bring it back in line
with spending on military and intelligence applications of space. Public opinion is mixed about
the prospect of increasing space program funding. An April 2007 Harris poll showed almost half
of respondents supported cutting the space program to reduce the deficit; yet in a March 2007
Zogby poll, 71 percent of respondents opposed any cut in NASA funding. Opposition to
increased funding must be considered in light of widespread confusion about the current levels
of funding for civil space applications versus the historical highs seen during space race. At its
height, NASA funding amounted to approximately 0.8 percent of GDP (and this was in the
budgetary context of the Vietnam War) as opposed to the current amount of less than oneeighth of 1 percent. Only one in five Americans correctly estimates NASA spending at less than 1
percent of the budget, while a plurality believes that NASA funding accounts for 1 percent to 5
percent of the budget, and roughly one-third believes that NASA consumes more than 10
percent of the total budget. While a simple increase in the level of national support is a clear
signal of our interest in broader engagement and a commitment to a rational balance between
all of our soft and hard power activities, it also creates an opportunity for a compelling display
of U.S. global leadership. A highly visible commitment to civil space exploration and utilization
will restore U.S. credibility and allow the United States to assume its traditional global
leadership role. More generally, space exploration is a high-payoff, low-risk opportunity for U.S.
leadership—in no case has a significant expenditure of political capital in support of civil space
activities failed to provide high returns on investment. The most spectacular returns from space
exploration have been cases where the initial engagement, and consequently the visibility of
U.S. leadership, has been the greatest. Yet even in cases where a given space initiative fell short
of expectations, virtually no penalty was incurred. As we approach the 35th anniversary of the
retreat from the lunar surface we must carefully balance our priorities—neither neglecting
pressing problems at home nor forgetting future generations. A stable balance between the
short and long term and between hard and soft power is contingent in large measure on
increased support for civil space operations. Over the longer term, we should strongly consider
supporting our civil space activities at a minimum of 1 percent of the federal budget, with a
long-term goal of supporting our space program at the rate of 25 cents per American per day.
NASA exploration programs solve science diplomacy – cooperative research
Krige 7 (Professor of the history and philosophy of science @ Georgia Tech, “NASA as an
Instrument of U.S. Foreign Policy,” in The Societal Impact of Spaceflight, Edited By: Steven J. Dick
and Roger D. Launius, 2007)
This paper briefly considers one small, but i think important and often overlooked, corner of this
vast panorama: the place of spaceflight in American foreign policy. I do not simply want to insist
that NASA’s international programs have had an important impact as instruments of foreign
policy. I also want to suggest that today they have a particularly significant political and cultural
role to play in projecting a positive image of American power and American democracy abroad.
In a world increasingly torn apart by conflicts over values—conflicts which history teaches us
can seldom be resolved by force—I believe we overlook the potential of NASA as an
instrument for American foreign policy at our peril. International cooperation for peaceful
purposes was one of NASA’s important missions from its inception, and those who drafted the
Space act that created the organization in 1958 gave it considerable prominence. The range of
international activities covered by NASA is truly vast.1 These are partly a response to the nature
of space exploration itself, which transcends national boundaries; whether they are launching
sounding rockets or astronauts, communicating with satellites or space shuttles, or measuring
the properties of the ionosphere or the trajectory of storms, NASA and its sister agencies have
to think globally. However, those who implemented NASA’s mandate had a far broader vision
of international cooperation than one that was simply subservient to America’s national space
needs. From its inception, NASA saw its role as fostering the development of space science
and technology in other countries. Its officers, in cosultation with other parts of the
administration (notably the State department and the department of defense), sought to use
American scientific and technological preeminence to kick-start and even mould space activities
in other countries, notably those of the Western alliance. NASA’s international programs were
intended to build a world community dedicated to the peaceful exploration of space with
American help, under American leadership, and in line with the general objectives of American
foreign policy. in brief,as a naSatask force put it in 1987,“[i]nternational cooperation in space
from the outset has been motivated primarily by foreign policy objectives.”2 In what follows I
shall substantiate these claims by focusing on three space science programs in which U.S.
foreign policy has been interwoven, more or less explicitly, with NASA’s international initiatives.
What makes these cases interesting is that, a priori, many people tend to believe that science is
above politics and that international science is conducted independently of foreign policy
concerns. This paper will not simply challenge such views but, by picking what is arguably the
most difficult case, scientific collaboration, will alert us to the range of areas—some obvious,
some less evident—in which NASA has served as a vector of U.S. foreign policy. My aim is to
illustrate NASA’s impact on strengthening the Western alliance not simply by promoting
international scientific collaboration, but also by using it as a platform to consolidate the
political and cultural solidarity of the free world. And although my examples are drawn from the
cold war and its immediate aftermath, the lessons of history apply just as much today, when
new and even more fundamental divisions threaten to tear apart the fragile fabric of Western
democracy.
Colonization
Budget restoration for deep space exploration key to colonization and survival
as a species
Dolan 4/22/14 (Eric W. Dolan has served as an editor for Raw Story since August 2010, and is
based out of Sacramento, California. He grew up in the suburbs of Chicago and received a
Bachelor of Science from Bradley University. *Article cites NASA president “NASA chief touts
deep space exploration: We can only survive if we are a multi-planet species” <
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/04/22/nasa-chief-touts-deep-space-exploration-we-canonly-survive-if-we-are-a-multi-planet-species/>)
NASA administrator Charles Bolden said Tuesday that humanity faced certain extinction
unless it developed the technology to colonize other planets. “We today are Earth-reliant,” he
said at the Humans to Mars Summit 2 014, held at George Washington University in
Washington. “We are dependent on being on this planet. We are not a multi-planet species
yet. I don’t know whether Buzz [Aldrin] is going to talk about it later, but Buzz and I agree on a
number of things — one of them is that only multi-planet species survive for long periods of
time.” “Here in the Western world, we think very short-sighted. We think about the time in
which we are going to be on this Earth, or in which are kids or grandkids are going to be on this
Earth. Many other civilizations think much longer than that, and we need to start thinking that
way.” He warned the Sun — like all stars — had a finite lifespan. “If this species is to survive
indefinitely we need to become a multi-planet species,” he continued. “One reason we need
to go to Mars is so we can learn a little about living on another planet, so that when Mikaley
my granddaughter is ready to move out of the solar system we will know a lot more about living
away from this planet than we know today. Mars is a stepping stone in the approach to other
solar systems and other galaxies and things that people have always dreamed of but frequently
don’t talk about.” The NASA chief said a manned mission to Mars was possible if Congress
restored the space agency’s budget. NASA plans to send a manned spacecraft to an asteroid
by 2025 and then travel to the red planet in the 2030s.
Aff
Squo Solves Deep Space Exploration
SLS rocket development solves deep space exploration
Hennigan 14 (WJ, LA times reporter, “NASA approves rocket for deep-space travel”, 7/3/14,
http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-boeing-mars-rocket-20140703-story.html)//WL
NASA gave the go-ahead to start full production on the most powerful rocket ever. The rocket,
known as Space Launch System, is set to blast beyond low-Earth orbit this decade to explore
the deep reaches of space, including near-Earth asteroids, the moon and, ultimately, Mars.
Boeing Co., prime contractor on the rocket, announced Wednesday that it had completed a
critical design review and finalized a $2.8-billion contract with NASA. The last time the space
agency made such an assessment of a deep-space rocket was the mighty Saturn V, which took
astronauts to the moon. We're ready to move forward. This program has the potential to be
inspiring for generations. - Frank McCall, Boeing's Space Launch System deputy program
manager If all goes well, the rocket's initial test flight from Cape Canaveral, Fla., is expected in
2017. "We're ready to move forward," said Frank McCall, Boeing's Space Launch System deputy
program manager. "This program has the potential to be inspiring for generations." The Space
Launch System has been the subject of criticism that its goals and timeline are too vague. It also
faces additional funding questions from Congress in the years ahead. "We're not operating on
the budgets of Apollo missions anymore," McCall said. "But we're not operating on a shoestring
budget either." Reaching this milestone has been four years in the making. In 2010, President
Obama laid out a new vision for the nation's space ambitions, focusing on future deep-space
missions and scrapping a manned moon mission called Constellation. Space Launch System's
design called for the integration of existing hardware, spurring criticism that it's a "Frankenstein
rocket," with much of it assembled from already developed technology. For instance, its two
rocket boosters are advanced versions of the Space Shuttle boosters, and a cryogenic propulsion
stage is based on the motor of a rocket often used by the Air Force. The Space Frontier
Foundation, an advocacy group and frequent NASA critic, said Space Launch System was "built
from rotting remnants of left over congressional pork. And its budgetary footprints will stamp
out all the missions it is supposed to carry, kill our astronaut program and destroy science and
technology projects throughout NASA." Currently NASA has no way to get its astronauts to the
International Space Station other than paying $71 million to Russia for a ride. NASA ultimately
wants private companies to take astronauts to the station, but that hardware isn't yet ready.
Instead, the space agency wants to focus its attention on deep-space missions aboard Space
Launch System, including a mission to land on an asteroid by the mid-2020s. But that plan has
failed to gain widespread support, reflecting serious concerns about the billions of federal
dollars needed and a lack of detail about the most difficult aspects of the mission. The total cost
of the program and which asteroid NASA would visit remain unknown. The Government
Accountability Office said in a study of the program that funding remains a top risk. NASA plans
to spend about $6.8 billion to develop the rocket in fiscal years 2014 through 2018. Boeing says
the advantage of building Space Launch System is that it can carry out a "menu of missions"
that include shooting astronauts to the moon and Mars, in addition to far-flung asteroids. The
Planetary Society in Pasadena, another space advocacy group, initially came out against the plan
to build the rocket because it lacked one specific mission. Now the group says Space Launch
System will play an important role because of its versatility. "It has a lot of potential not only
for human missions but robotic missions as well," said Casey Dreier, the group's director of
advocacy. Work on the 321-foot Space Launch System is spread throughout Southern California,
including Boeing's avionics team in Huntington Beach. The rocket's core stage will get its power
from four modified space shuttle main engines built by Aerojet Rocketdyne in Canoga Park.
There are two versions of the rocket being designed. One will carry up to 154,000 pounds and a
later version will carry up to 286,000 pounds. The rocket is also being designed to carry the
capsule-shaped spacecraft Orion, which is built by Lockheed Martin Corp. It can lug up to four
astronauts beyond low-Earth orbit on long-duration missions. The first Space Launch System
mission in 2017 will launch an empty Orion spacecraft. The second mission is targeted for 2021
and will launch Orion and a crew of NASA astronauts.
Science Diplomacy
Space exploration won’t bolster US leadership – it doesn’t have the
international support
Sabathier and Faith 6 (Vincent G. Sabathier is a senior fellow and director of the Human Space
Exploration Initiative at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) in Washington,
D.C, a senior associate with the CSIS Technology and Public Policy Program, from 2004-2009 he
was senior fellow and director for space initiatives at CSIS. He is also senior adviser to the
SAFRAN group and consults internationally on aerospace and telecommunications. Ryan Faith is
program manager for the Human Space Exploration Initiative at CSIS. “U.S. Leadership,
International Cooperation, and Space Exploration” 4/26 Published by the CSIS
csis.org/files/media/csis/pubs/060426_us_space_leadership.pdf)
U.S. Civil Space The United States, of course, remains the dominant player if only in terms of its
budget allocated to space, in general, and to civil space, in particular. Further, the United States
has a clear mandate to implement the presidential Vision for Space Exploration. Whether or not
the United States will be able to attract and lead other nations to return to the moon remains
uncertain and is the real question of leadership. For being first without having any followers is
not leadership, it is merely being alone What is certain is that the implementation of the Vision
for Space Exploration is generating difficulties nationally and internationally. The Western Allies
There is the issue of the old allies, Europe and Japan. The traditional relationship between the
Western partners of the ISS has changed. The transatlantic relationship, for example, although
recovering fast in light of the Iran crisis, is still perceived as weak. Further, in matters of space
exploration, it has never been weaker. The trade limitations associated with International
Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR) and the uncertainty surrounding the future of the space
shuttle and its impact on the ISS have been eroding U.S. leadership in civil space. The recent
cuts in the science programs meant to fund the vision, appearing in the FY 2007 budget, are
amplifying the trend. It is essential to note that many things have been learned from the ISS. The
main lesson is that no one can rely anymore on a single national space transportation vehicle,
even less so when this vehicle exists only on paper.
Obama’s current plan solves – it invests in necessary components of US
leadership
Mace 11 (Frank, online columnist for Harvard Political Review, 4/7/11 “In Defense of the Obama
Space Exploration Plan” http://hpronline.org/united-states/in-defense-of-the-obama-spaceexploration-plan/)
When the shuttle Endeavour lifts off from central Florida later this month, it will mark the near
conclusion of the space shuttle era. Under the command of Mark Kelly, husband of recently
wounded Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, Endeavour will embark on the second-to-last
shuttle mission. It is therefore a ripe time to examine what’s next for NASA. Obama's new flight
plan for NASA is the best course for the country. Last April, President Obama unveiled a
comprehensive overhaul of NASA’s future and cancelled much of the Bush-era Constellation
plan to return to the moon. Obama’s plan looked to add $6 billion to the NASA budget over
the next five years, renew the focus on scientific discovery, lengthen the lifespan of the
International Space Station, and most importantly, dramatically increase the role of private
contractors in NASA missions. Obama rightly prioritized jobs, science, and national inspiration
with his new direction for NASA. This plan drew immediate criticism from, among others, Apollo
11 Commander Neil Armstrong, Apollo 13 Commander James Lovell, and Apollo 17 Commander
Eugene Cernan, who jointly wrote in a letter to President Obama: “It appears that we will have
wasted our current $10-plus billion investment in Constellation and, equally importantly, we will
have lost the many years required to recreate the equivalent of what we will have discarded. For
The United States, the leading space faring nation for nearly half a century, to be without
carriage to low Earth orbit and with no human exploration capability to go beyond Earth orbit
for an indeterminate time into the future, destines our nation to become one second or even
third rate stature.” The three commanders, however, overvalue pure nationalism at the expense
of the NASA roles in job creation, science, and national inspiration. In today’s economic climate,
our first consideration should be jobs. The Obama Plan would add 2,500 more jobs to the
American economy than the Bush-era plan. Additionally, the increased private sector
involvement in the space program could generate upwards of 10,000 jobs. Conservative critics
of Obama’s plan should take note of this increased reliance on the private sector for
innovation—after all, a belief in the efficiency of the private sector is a central Republican tenet.
Secondly, Obama’s attention to scientific discoveries with tangible benefits is apt. He
endorses exploration of the solar system by robots and a new telescope to succeed Hubble
and calls for fresh climate and environmental studies. An extended commitment to the
International Space Station further displays Obama’s respect for the scientific discoveries
being made onboard. His vision of the role for space exploration is based on science, not
nationalism. Finally, Obama’s plan deftly prioritizes national inspiration over simple
nationalism. He argues “exploration will once more inspire wonder in a new generation—
sparking passions and launching careers . . . because, ultimately, if we fail to press forward in the
pursuit of discovery, we are ceding our future and we are ceding that essential element of the
American character.” And this plan is not lacking in inspiration capability. It calls for innovation
to build a rocket at least two years earlier than under the Constellation program. This point
alone negates the three astronauts’ criticism that many years will be “required to recreate the
equivalent of what we will have discarded.” Crewed missions into deep space by 2025. Crewed
missions to asteroids. Crewed missions into Mars orbit by the 2030s. A landing on mars to
follow. This plan will truly continue NASA’s history of inspiring the people, especially the
youth, of the United States. Armstrong, Lovell, and Cernon assert that the Obama plan will
sacrifice American leadership in space. Worthy recipients of the status of national hero, these
astronauts nonetheless hail from the space race era. Obama, however, points out that “what
was once a global competition has long since become a global collaboration.” I agree with the
president that the ambitious nature of his plan will do nothing but “ensure that our leadership
in space is even stronger in this new century than it was in the last” as well as “strengthen
America’s leadership here on earth.” Obama’s space exploration plan will create jobs, advance
science, and inspire a nation, and it will do so not by sacrificing American dominance in space,
but by extending that dominance into new areas of research and exploration.
STEM
Space policies won’t inspire students to go into STEM fields
Delgado 11 (Laura, Space Policy Institute, George Washington University, “When inspiration fails
to inspire: A change of strategy for the US space program,” Space Policy 27 (2011) 94e98,
Science Direct)
If only we could answer the “why space?” question. If only we could come up with a catchy
phrase to light up people’s eyes and compel the masses. If only we could inspire the young
generations just as the Apollo generation was inspired. Then the space program would see a
bigger budget and a more vocal and populous following, the aerospace sector would be fed to
satiety with a skilled and passionate workforce for decades to come and US leadership in space,
even in the context of a growing number of space actors, would be a sure thing. If only. So the
logic goes for those who see the most pressing issues of the US space program as a result of
endemic emotional detachment. For these stakeholders, the compelling reasons that drove the
country to glory in the most visible “battle” of the Cold War have been either forgotten or
ignored. In their wake, the country has implemented space policies that have failed to attach
themselves to the minds and hearts of the younger generations, threatening the very survival of
the program they were meant to support. To solve this situation, the inspiration argument has
been highlighted often in the past couple of years, to the point of predictability. Yet despite its
widespread defense, inspiration alone has not reinvigorated support for the space program as
proponents argue it would. At the root of the problem is that this logic, constructed out of a
memory of the cold war era, is sharply at odds with the interests and sensibilities of the
generations it is supposed to reel in. The unpopular but potentially fruitful alternative is to
draw attention to the pragmatic aspects of space, and to move away from concepts that made
sense decades ago but which may prove counterproductive in the years to come. 1. Looking
back: the Apollo myth A number of blue-ribbon panels, Congressional committees, and experts
have said that the crucial element lacking not only to sustain US efforts in space but to see them
take off again, enlarged and reinvigorated, is that of an inspiring vision. The quotation from the
Book of Proverbs in the House Science & Technology Committee room – “where there is no
vision, the people perish” – as well as the opening words of President Kennedy’s 1961 “Moon
speech” are often cited to support this claim. The thrust of it is that the Apollo program was
sustained by that vision, a vision that President Kennedy held and propagated, and that was
shared by the American people. This vision rests on the demand not only for a longterm strategy
of human expansion to the cosmos, but of one led by the USA, dependent “upon the
adventurousness of the American people” [1], and so an ideal of American exceptionalism and
Manifest Destiny. Simply put: “space is what the Americans do” [2]. While powerful enough, this
vision is context-specific and more complex than some proponents seem to think. To begin with,
this image of President Kennedy “as a visionary leader committed to expanding the human
presence throughout the Solar System” has been repeatedly discredited [3]. As Roger Launius
further points out, “there is not a shred of evidence to support this interpretation”. The truth is
that President Kennedy was initially unsure about committing to the Space Race; the Apollo
decision was all about timing. The impact of the Gagarin flight in 1961 and the embarrassment
of the USA in the Bay of Pigs fiasco forced the president to look for ways to uphold the US image
internationally. Influential documents circulated at the time linked space activities to national
prestige,1and it was in this context that, after being assured of its technical feasibility, President
Kennedy was presented with the option of the Moon landing. In contrast to the image of one
committed to a long-term vision in space, we find instead a president who saw in a specific
space policy a resource: away to counter the Soviet threat in a public manner that would
assuage both national and international concerns over suspected US disadvantage. It was, as
John Logsdon writes, “a politically driven response” and “not motivated by a belief in the longterm importance of space exploration” [4]. President Kennedy could not have put it more clearly
than when he told NASA Administrator James Webb, “I don’t care about space” [5]. For him, and
for the other key players that drew the plan to its fruition, space was seen as an answer to a
series of often disparate concerns that had little to do with an active agenda of inspiration.
While the inspiring vision certainly helped sell the program, it was not enough to sustain it for
long. Behind the scenes, the process was more tumultuous than it seems. While the president’s
oft quoted speech successfully won congressional and public support and consolidated what
efforts NASA and others had accumulated to make the program a reality, “the Apollo
honeymoon ended in 1962” [6]. As the costs of the program escalated (to a total which would
be around $150 billion in current dollars) many began to question the wisdom of the
commitment. For the first time there arose the ever recurring question of whether it was right
for the nation to commit funds in a space program when there were other “more pressing”
needs [7]. In the post-Apollo period there have been no more compelling reasons to justify a
comparable commitment of resources. Total government space spending, which in 1964 was
5%, has been less than 2% in the past 20 years.2 In retrospect, Apollo was not the beginning of a
space program that would from then on indulge in a wealth of resources and seemingly
unquestioned commitment. It was instead the outcome of a specific set of circumstances that
gave the initial push to a program that would from then on have to fight for its own share of
attention and budget.
Public already perceives there is large scale space program
Launius 3 (Roger D. Launius "Public Opinion Polls and Perceptions of US Human Spaceflight."
Published in "Space Policy" 19 (2003) pgs 173-174. Online at
http://si.academia.edu/RogerLaunius/Papers/93299/_Public_Opinion_Polls_and_Perceptions_o
f_US_Human_Spaceflight_)
One final observation from this review of polling data relates to the level of spending for NASA
programs. With the exception of a few years during the Apollo era, the NASA budget has
hovered at about one percent to fall money expended by the US treasury. As shown in Fig. 14,
with the exception of a few years in the mid-1960s as NASA prepared for Apollo flights to the
Moon, stability has been the norm as the annual NASA budget has incrementally gone up or
down in relation to that 1-percent benchmark. But the public's perception of this is quite
different, as shown in Fig. 15. For example, in 1997 the average estimate of NASA's share of the
federal budget by those polled was 20 percent. Had this been true, NASA's budget in 1997
would have been $328 billion. If NASA had that amount of money it would have been able to
undertake a program to send humans to Mars. It seems obvious that most Americans have
little conception of the amount of funding available to NASA. At a fundamental level, all
federal programs face this challenge as Americans are notoriously uninformed about how much
and what the federal government spends on its programs. As a result there is a general lack of
understanding that NASA has less than one percent of the Federal budget each year, and that
its share of the budget has been shrinking since the early 1990s. Most Americans seem to
believe that NASA has a lot of money, much more than it annually receives. Turning around
those false perceptions of funding is perhaps the most serious challenge facing those who
wish to gain public support for space exploration.
Replicating Apollo is impossible – prevents solvency
Bormanis 10 (B.S. in Physics from the University of Arizona, and an M.A. in Science, Technology
and Public Policy, earned under a NASA Space Grant Fellowship at George Washington
University, 10 July 19, Andres, “Critical partnerships for the future of human space exploration”,
“The Space Review”, http://www.thespacereview.com/article/1667/1)
Constellation has been described as “Apollo on steroids.” It replicates many of the systems
developed over forty years ago for the first manned Moon landings, with the intention of
returning astronauts to the Moon sometime in the next decade. On the face of it, this sounds
encouraging for those of us who want to see astronauts resume the journeys beyond Earth orbit
that ended so abruptly with Apollo 17. But as NASA Deputy Administrator Lori Garver has noted,
various presidents and congressional leaders have tried to “re-do” Apollo for the last forty
years. Clearly they have not succeeded. Understandably, the Apollo program is deeply
ingrained in the public psyche, the glorious victory of a bygone era that many wish we could
aspire to again. But today’s space advocates often forget that Apollo was a unique program
designed to achieve a specific political goal in the 1960s: to demonstrate the social and
technological superiority of the American political system over its chief rival, the Soviet Union.
The convergence of social, political, and technological forces that made Apollo possible no
longer exists, and never will again. Those who decry the Obama Administration’s decision to
cancel the Constellation program seem to ignore this fundamental fact. Trying to replicate the
Apollo program makes about as much sense as trying to rebuild the pyramids. The emerging
Obama space policy offers a new approach that acknowledges the substantial changes that
have taken place in the world in the decades since Apollo. Those changes are reflected in three
critical partnerships: I. Public/Private Since its inception, NASA has depended on the resources
of the private sector to develop the hardware that makes space travel possible. Building on
military ICBM technology developed by General Dynamics, Lockheed, Boeing, and others, the
Mercury and Gemini programs lofted American astronauts into Earth orbit. The Apollo Saturn V
rocket was built, under NASA guidance, by a variety of military contractors for the purely civilian
purpose of sending men to the Moon.
Colonization
Long term colonization is infeasible – CP can’t solve
Launius 10 (2010, Roger, PhD, Curator, Planetary Exploration Programs, National Air and
Space Museum, expert on Aerospace history, fellow and board member of the American
Astronautical Society, “Can we colonize the solar system? Human biology and survival in the
extreme space environment,” Endeavour Volume 34, Issue 3, September 2010, Pages 122-129,
science direct)
Although microbial life might survive the extreme conditions of space, for Homo sapien sapiens
the space environment remains remarkably dangerous to life. One space life scientist, Vadim
Rygalov, remarked that ensuring human life during spaceflight was largely about providing the
basics of human physiological needs. From the most critical – meaning that its absence would
cause immediate death, to the least critical – these include such constants available here on
Earth of atmospheric pressure, breathable oxygen, temperature, drinking water, food,
gravitational pull on physical systems, radiation mitigation, and others of a less immediate
nature. As technologies, and knowledge about them, stand at this time, humans are able to
venture into space for short periods of less than a year only by supplying all of these needs
either by taking everything with them (oxygen, food, air, etc.) or creating them artificially
(pressurized vehicles, centrifugal force to substitute for gravity, etc.).10 Spaceflight would be
much easier if humans could go into hibernation during the extremes of spaceflight, as did the
Streptococcus mitis bacteria.
Resolving these issues has proven difficult but not insurmountable for such basic spaceflight
activities as those undertaken during the heroic age of space exploration when the United
States and the Soviet Union raced to the Moon. Overcoming the technological hurdles
encountered during the Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo programs were child's play in
comparison to the threat to human life posed by long duration, deep space missions to such
places as Mars. Even the most sophisticated of those, the lunar landings of Project Apollo, were
relatively short camping trips on an exceptionally close body in the solar system, and like
many camping trips undertaken by Americans the astronauts took with them everything they
would need to use while there. This approach will continue to work well until the destination is
so far away that resupply from Earth becomes highly problematic if not impossible if the
length of time to be gone is so great that resupply proves infeasible. There is no question that
the U.S. could return to the Moon in a more dynamic and robust version of Apollo; it could
also build a research station there and resupply it from Earth while rotating crews and
resupplying from Earth on a regular basis. In this instance, the lunar research station might look
something like a more sophisticated and difficult to support version of the Antarctic research
stations. A difficult challenge, yes; but certainly it is something that could be accomplished with
presently envisioned technologies.11 The real difficulty is that at the point a lunar research
station becomes a colony profound changes to the manner in which humans interact with the
environment beyond Earth must take place. Countermeasures for core challenges – gravity,
radiation, particulates, and ancillary effects – provide serious challenges for humans engaged in
space colonization (Figure 4).