Neg to SPS
Novice
Space Based Solar Power Negative
SPACE BASED SOLAR POWER NEGATIVE .......................................................................................................1
SUMMARY ..................................................................................................................................................................2
GLOSSARY .................................................................................................................................................................3
WARMING 1NC [1/3].................................................................................................................................................4
WARMING 1NC [2/3].................................................................................................................................................5
WARMING 1NC [3/3].................................................................................................................................................6
LEADERSHIP 1NC [1/3] ............................................................................................................................................7
LEADERSHIP 1NC [2/3] ............................................................................................................................................8
LEADERSHIP 1NC [3/3] ............................................................................................................................................9
SOLVENCY 1NC [1/2] ............................................................................................................................................. 10
SOLVENCY 1NC [2/2] ............................................................................................................................................. 11
2NC/1NR SOLVENCY EXTENSIONS ................................................................................................................... 12
ANSWERS TO: NSSO STUDIES ............................................................................................................................ 13
SPACE MILITARIZATION DISADVANTAGE LINKS ..................................................................................... 14
SPENDING DISADVANTAGE LINKS .................................................................................................................. 15
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Neg to SPS
Novice
Summary
This file argues that the solar powered satellites plan is a bad idea (or maybe just not
necessary). You can use this file with the other files in your core set to argue against the
SPS affirmative. This file contains the following arguments:
1. The ‘Global Warming 1NC’ generally makes the argument that global warming is
either not a problem or that the affirmative plan cannot fix the problem. The
evidence that global warming is not a problem makes two arguments.
2. First, the Beisner evidence argues that global warming is not caused by humans but
rather is a natural cycle that the earth goes through every once in awhile. This
evidence also uses sea temperature and ice data to argue that the earth’s
temperature is starting to regulate itself.
3. Second, the McShane evidence talks about something called a ‘negative feedback
cycle.’ A ‘negative feedback cycle’ occurs when carbon dioxide in the atmosphere
builds up at a rate that is not continuous. That is, more carbon in the atmosphere
does not necessarily produce more warming but may actually produce less over
time.
4. The rest of the warming evidence simply says that global warming either cannot be
fixed (NPR evidence) or that it will take so long to happen that humans will figure
out a solution before anything really bad happens.
5. The solvency evidence makes two claims: first, that SPS technology is not ready to
be developed and second, that this same technology would cost too much money.
6. The argument that SPS costs too much money is important because the affirmative
argues that SPS is so great that everyone will want to use it and that this will solve
global warming. If the negative team wins that SPS is too expensive for any reason,
no one will want to use it and we will keep using fossil fuels.
The hegemony portion of this file makes 2 arguments: That hegemony is in trouble for
other reasons (the recession, etc.) and that hegemony does not really prevent wars. The
Conry evidence is really great to say that no one single country can influence all global
events.
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Glossary
IPCC – Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. This is an international scientific panel
that investigates the progress of global warming.
Negative feedback cycle – Negative feedback of CO2 means that CO2 will never build up in the
atmosphere. You can think about this like a blindfold and sunglasses. If you put on a blindfold,
then the sunlight is already blocked from your eyes. If you put on sunglasses, it does not matter
because you can’t see anything. Negative feedback is a theory that argues that the carbon in the
atmosphere is like a blindfold. Once the atmosphere has a certain amount, the rest is just like the
sunglasses – it doesn’t make any difference that it’s there. Therefore, more carbon dioxide does
not mean more warming.
NSSO – National Space Security Office. This is the study group that released one of the most indepth studies on the advantages and disadvantages of SPS.
Runaway Warming – Refers to the point at which warming has progressed so far that it speeds
up and is impossible to stop.
Tech Advances – New technologies that could be used to solve warming in the future.
3
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Warming 1NC [1/3]
1. No warming – not human caused and it is getting better now.
Beisner 10 — former associate professor of interdisciplinary studies in economics, government, and public
policy, Covenant. PhD, University of St. Andrews (Calvin, Forget Global Warming Mini Ice Age May Be on Its
Way, 12 January 2010, http://www.rightsidenews.com/201001128144/energy-and-environment/forget-globalwarming-mini-ice-age-may-be-on-its-way.html) Note – graph omitted
The UK's MailOnline did just that this week under the headline The mini ice age starts here. Lead paragraph? "The bitter winter afflicting
much of the Northern Hemisphere is only the start of a global trend towards cooler weather that is likely to last for 20 or 30
years, say some of the world's most eminent climate scientists." Right. MailOnline reporter David Rose doesn't call them "the
world's leading climate skeptics." He calls them "some of the world's most eminent climate scientists"--and he goes on to cite "Mojib Latif, a
leading member of the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)," "Anastasios Tsonis, head of the
University of Wisconsin Atmospheric Sciences Group," and "William Gray, emeritus Professor of Atmospheric
Sciences at Colorado State University." Contrary to fears of inexorably diminishing Arctic sea ice, Rose cites the U.S. National
Snow and Ice Data Center as reporting that "Arctic summer sea ice has increased by 409,000 square miles, or 26
per cent, since 2007." Though snow's been unusual for most of the southern half of the United Kingdom in recent decades, the Mail published
the accompanying satellite photo of Great Britain during the recent cold snap. The island is essentially all covered with snow. Rose reported
record lows as far south as Cuba--something I can attest to, living near Miami in south Florida, where we experienced sub-freezing weather
over the weekend. He quoted Tsonis as saying that last week 56% of the United States was covered by snow--something that hasn't happened
in several decades. And the "'Arctic oscillation'--a weather pattern that sees the development of huge 'blocking' areas of high pressure in
northern latitudes, driving polar winds far to the south . . . is at its strongest for at least 60 years. As a result, the jetstream-the high-altitude wind that circles the globe from west to east and normally pushes a series of wet but mild Atlantic lows across
Britain--is currently running not over the English Channel but the Strait of Gibraltar." Consequently, most of the Northern
Hemisphere is much colder this winter than it's been in decades--and the Southern Hemisphere is cooler, too. According to Rose, Latif,
Tsonis, and other scientists attribute the cold shift primarily to a shift in the world's dominant ocean
circulations--the Pacific Decadal Oscillation and the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation--from a warm phase to a cool phase,
something that happens about every 20 to 30 years. "The scientists' predictions also undermine the
standard climate computer models, which assert that the warming of the Earth since 1900 has been driven
solely by man-made greenhouse gas emissions and will continue as long as carbon dioxide levels rise. They say that their research
shows that much of the warming was caused by oceanic cycles when they were in a 'warm mode' as opposed to the present 'cold
mode'." That's a point made by Dr. Roy W. Spencer in the science chapter of the Cornwall Alliance's new document A Renewed Call to Truth,
Prudence, and Protection of the Poor: An Evangelical Examination of the Theology, Science, and Economics of Global Warming and
illustrated in the graph below. "A significant share of the warming we saw from 1980 to 2000 and at earlier periods in the 20th
Century was due to these cycles," said Latif, "perhaps as much as 50 per cent. They have now gone into reverse, so winters like
this one will become much more likely. Summers will also probably be cooler, and all this may well last two decades or longer. The extreme
retreats that we have seen in glaciers and sea ice will come to a halt. For the time being, global warming has paused, and there may
well be some cooling." Tsonis also believes that the ocean current cycles dominated global climate change in the 20th century, including the
post-1970s, the period many point to as driven by human greenhouse gas emissions, but he doesn't venture to attribute specific percentages to
the natural and human causes. "I do not believe in catastrophe theories," Rose quoted him as saying. "Man-made warming is
balanced by the natural cycles, and I do not trust the computer models which state that if CO2 reaches a particular level then
temperatures and sea levels will rise by a given amount. These models cannot be trusted to predict the weather for a week,
yet they are running them to give readings for 100 years." Gray went farther: "Most of the rise in temperature
from the Seventies to the Nineties was natural. Very little was down to CO2--in my view, as little as five to ten per cent."
Gray, Tsonis, and Latif all agreed that the findings about the ocean currents undermined the credibility of
the computer climate models on which the IPCC and other alarmists rely.
2. Double bind – Either warming will happen soon and they can’t solve it in time because
SPS takes a long time to build or it does not happen soon and we can solve it with other
things in the future.
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Warming 1NC [2/3]
3. New satellite studies prove net negative feedbacks – no “runaway” warming.
McShane 8—Owen, chairman of the policy panel of the New Zealand Climate Science Coalition and director of
the Centre for Resource Management Studies, April 4, 2008 (Cites Roy Spencer, principal research scientist for U of
Alabama in Huntsville and recipient of NASA's Medal for Exceptional Scientific Achievement, “Climate change
confirmed but global warming is cancelled”, The National Business Review (New Zealand), Lexis)
Atmospheric scientists generally agree that as carbon dioxide levels increase there is a law of "diminishing
returns" - or more properly "diminishing effects" - and that ongoing increases in CO2 concentration do not generate
proportional increases in temperature. The common analogy is painting over window glass. The first layers
of paint cut out lots of light but subsequent layers have diminishing impact. So, you might be asking, why the panic?
Why does Al Gore talk about temperatures spiraling out of control, causing mass extinctions and catastrophic rises in sea-level, and all his
other disastrous outcomes when there is no evidence to support it? The alarmists argue that increased CO2 leads to more water vapour - the
main greenhouse gas - and this provides positive feedback and hence makes the overall climate highly sensitive to small increases in the
concentration of CO2. Consequently, the IPCC argues that while carbon dioxide may well "run out of puff" the consequent evaporation of
water vapour provides the positive feedback loop that will make anthropogenic global warming reach dangerous levels. This assumption
that water vapour provides positive feedback lies behind the famous "tipping point," which nourishes Al Gore's dreams of
destruction, and indeed all those calls for action now - "before it is too late!" But no climate models predict such a tipping
point. However, while the absence of hot spots has refuted one important aspect of the IPCC models we lack a mechanism that fully explains
these supposed outcomes. Hence the IPCC, and its supporters, have been able to ignore this "refutation." So by the end of last year, we were in
a similar situation to the 19th century astronomers, who had figured out that the sun could not be "burning" its fuel - or it would have turned to
ashes long ago - but could not explain where the energy was coming from. Then along came Einstein and E=mc2. Hard to explain Similarly,
the climate sceptics have had to explain why the hotspots are not where they should be - not just challenge the theory with their observations.
This is why I felt so lucky to be in the right place at the right time when I heard Roy Spencer speak at the New York conference on climate
change in March. At first I thought this was just another paper setting out observations against the forecasts, further confirming Evans' earlier
work. But as the argument unfolded I realised Spencer was drawing on observations and measurements from the new Aqua satellites to explain
the mechanism behind this anomaly between model forecasts and observation. You may have heard that the IPCC models cannot predict clouds
and rain with any accuracy. Their models assume water vapour goes up to the troposphere and hangs around to
cook us all in a greenhouse future. However, there is a mechanism at work that "washes out" the water vapour and
returns it to the oceans along with the extra CO2 and thus turns the added water vapour into a NEGATIVE
feedback mechanism. The newly discovered mechanism is a combination of clouds and rain (Spencer's mechanism
adds to the mechanism earlier identified by Professor Richard Lindzen called the Iris effect). The IPCC models assumed water vapour formed
clouds at high altitudes that lead to further warming. The Aqua satellite observations and Spencer's analysis show water vapour actually forms
clouds at low altitudes that lead to cooling. Furthermore, Spencer shows the extra rain that falls from these clouds cools the
underlying oceans, providing a second negative feedback to negate the CO2 warming. Alarmists' quandary This has struck the
alarmists like a thunderbolt, especially as the lead author of the IPCC chapter on feedback has written to Spencer agreeing that he is right!
There goes the alarmist neighbourhood! The climate is not highly sensitive to CO2 warming because water
vapour is a damper against the warming effect of CO2. That is why history is full of Ice Ages - where other effects, such as
increased reflection from the ice cover, do provide positive feedback - while we do not hear about Heat Ages. The Medieval Warm
Period, for example, is known for being benignly warm - not dangerously hot. We live on a benign planet - except when it occasionally gets
damned cold. While I have done my best to simplify these developments they remain highly technical and many people distrust their own
ability to assess competing scientific claims. However, in this case the tipping point theories are based on models that do not include the effects
of rain and clouds. The new Nasa Aqua satellite is the first to measure the effects of clouds and rainfall. Spencer's
interpretation of the new data means all previous models and forecasts are obsolete. Would anyone trust long-term forecasts of farm production
that were hopeless at forecasting rainfall? The implications of these breakthroughs in measurement and understanding are dramatic to say the
least. The responses will be fun to watch.
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Warming 1NC [3/3]
4. And, it’s a double bind – if there is a tipping point, we’re already past it.
NPR 9 (1/26, Global Warming Is Irreversible, Study Says, All Things Considered,
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=99888903)
Climate change is essentially irreversible, according to a sobering new scientific study . As carbon dioxide emissions
continue to rise, the world will experience more and more long-term environmental disruption. The damage will persist even when,
and if, emissions are brought under control, says study author Susan Solomon, who is among the world's top climate scientists.
"We're used to thinking about pollution problems as things that we can fix," Solomon says. "Smog, we just cut back and everything will be
better later. Or haze, you know, it'll go away pretty quickly." That's the case for some of the gases that contribute to climate change, such as
methane and nitrous oxide. But as Solomon and colleagues suggest in a new study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of
Sciences, it is not true for the most abundant greenhouse gas: carbon dioxide. Turning off the carbon dioxide emissions won't
stop global warming. "People have imagined that if we stopped emitting carbon dioxide that the climate would go back to normal in 100
years or 200 years. What we're showing here is that's not right . It's essentially an irreversible change that will last for more
than a thousand years," Solomon says. This is because the oceans are currently soaking up a lot of the planet's
excess heat — and a lot of the carbon dioxide put into the air. The carbon dioxide and heat will eventually start coming
out of the ocean. And that will take place for many hundreds of years. Solomon is a scientist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration. Her new study looked at the consequences of this long-term effect in terms of sea level rise and drought.
5. Warming takes a long time – by the time it’s a problem, we will have already fixed it.
Michaels 7 – Cato senior fellow (Patrick, 2/2, Live with Climate Change,
http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=7502)
Consequently, the best policy is to live with some modest climate change now and encourage economic
development, which will generate the capital necessary for investment in the more efficient technologies of the
future. Fortunately, we have more time than the alarmists suggest . The warming path of the planet falls at the lowest end of
today's U.N. projections. In aggregate, our computer models tell us that once warming is established, it tends to take place at a
constant, not an increasing, rate. Reassuringly, the rate has been remarkably constant, at 0.324 degrees F per decade, since warming
began around 1975. The notion that we must do "something in 10 years," repeated by a small but vocal band of
extremists, enjoys virtually no support in the truly peer reviewed scientific literature. Rather than burning our capital now for no
environmental gain (did someone say "ethanol?"), let's encourage economic development so people can invest and profit in our more efficient
future. People who invested in automobile companies that developed hybrid technology have been rewarded
handsomely in the past few years, and there's no reason to think environmental speculators won't be
rewarded in the future, too.
6. Any disadvantage turns the case – nuclear war would destroy the ozone layer and cause
more warming.
6
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Novice
Leadership 1NC [1/3]
1. Other things prevent us being a leader – like launcher shortages
Robert J. Stevens, 2007, Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer, Lockheed Martin Corporation,
04/10/2007 (Lockheed Martin, 23rd National Space Symposium, The Next 50 Years of U.S. Space Leadership,
http://www.lockheedmartin.com/news/speeches/Next50YearsOfUSSpaceLeadership.html)
NASA Administrator Michael Griffin warned last month that if the next generation of human spacecraft is
further delayed, and the four-year lag between the Space Shuttle and Orion grows, “we will be seen by many
as ceding our national leadership in human spaceflight at a time when Russia and China have such
capabilities and India is developing them.” As a businessman, I can’t imagine investing to develop a significant,
sustainable, defining core competency and differentiating strategic advantage only to abandon the position. As a
minimum, this could lead to a situation where other countries with space aspirations start looking for new
partners.
2. AND – lack of talent
Robert J. Stevens, 2007, Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer, Lockheed Martin Corporation,
04/10/2007 (Lockheed Martin, 23rd National Space Symposium, The Next 50 Years of U.S. Space Leadership,
http://www.lockheedmartin.com/news/speeches/Next50YearsOfUSSpaceLeadership.html)
Third, we need a sustained commitment to inspire and recruit our brightest minds. The space race inspired my
generation to pursue careers in science and engineering. Yet, today, U.S. colleges and universities are only
producing about 78,000 engineering undergraduates a year – and that figure hasn’t grown in a decade. This
has created a serious challenge for companies like Lockheed Martin, where one in three of our current
employees is over the age of 50 – and 47% of our workforce has earned the professional distinction of scientist or
engineer. Even as the U.S. aerospace sector struggles to replenish our workforce, there is no doubt that China
is racing ahead to build the technical wave of the future, with 50 percent of Chinese undergraduates getting
degrees in natural science or engineering. Of equal concern, this is taking place at a time of intense competition
for skilled technical employees. Today, the most innovative, ambitious young minds are being recruited by
firms like Google – a firm that didn’t exist a decade ago, which FORTUNE magazine lists as the Best Company to Work For in America.
3. US hegemony is strong and isn’t going down
Brian Carney, 3-5, editorial page editor of The Wall Street Journal Europe and the co-author of "Freedom, Inc.”,
March 5, 2011,(Wall Street Journal, Why America will stay on top,
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703559604576175881248268272.html)
In his best-selling history of the 20th century, "Modern Times," British historian Paul Johnson describes "a
significant turning-point in American history: the first time the Great Republic, the richest nation on earth, came up
against the limits of its financial resources." Until the 1960s, he writes in a chapter titled "America's Suicide
Attempt," "public finance was run in all essentials on conventional lines"—that is to say, with budgets more or less
in balance outside of exceptional circumstances. "The big change in principle came under Kennedy," Mr. Johnson
writes. "In the autumn of 1962 the Administration committed itself to a new and radical principle of creating budgetary deficits even when there
was no economic emergency." Removing this constraint on government spending allowed Kennedy to introduce "a new concept of 'big
government': the 'problem-eliminator.' Every area of human misery could be classified as a 'problem'; then the Federal government could be
armed to 'eliminate' it." Twenty-eight years after "Modern Times" first appeared, Mr. Johnson is perhaps the most
eminent living British historian, and big government as problem-eliminator is back with a vengeance—along with
trillion-dollar deficits as far as the eye can see. I visited the 82-year-old Mr. Johnson in his West London home this
week to ask him whether America has once again set off down the path to self-destruction. Is he worried about
America's future? "Of course I worry about America," he says. "The whole world depends on America ultimately,
particularly Britain. And also, I love America—a marvelous country. But in a sense I don't worry about America
because I think America has such huge strengths—particularly its freedom of thought and expression—that it's
going to survive as a top nation for the foreseeable future. And therefore take care of the world." Pessimists, he
points out, have been predicting America's decline "since the 18th century." But whenever things are looking bad,
America "suddenly produces these wonderful things—like the tea party movement. That's cheered me up no end. Because it's done
more for women in politics than anything else—all the feminists? Nuts! It's brought a lot of very clever and quite young women into mainstream
politics and got them elected. A very good little movement, that. I like it." Then he deepens his voice for effect and adds: "And I like that lady—
Sarah Palin. She's great. I like the cut of her jib." The former governor of Alaska, he says, "is in the good tradition of America, which this awful
political correctness business goes against." Plus: "She's got courage. That's very important in politics. You can have all the right ideas and the
ability to express them. But if you haven't got guts, if you haven't got courage the way Margaret Thatcher had courage—and [Ronald] Reagan,
come to think of it. Your last president had courage too—if you haven't got courage, all the other virtues are no good at all. It's the central virtue."
7
Neg to SPS
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Leadership 1NC [2/3]
4. Their evidence isn’t specific – it’s talking about longer term projects like Apollo. SPS is
not nearly as long-term and would have to be global to work, means the U.S. would have to
share it.
5. US leadership doesn’t solve war.
Conry ’97 (Barbara, Foreign Policy Analyst – Cato, Policy Analysis No. 267, 2-5, “U.S. ‘Global Leadership’: A
Euphemism for World Policeman,” http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa-267.html)
Other proponents of U.S. political and military leadership do not point to particular benefits; instead, they warn of
near-certain disaster if the United States relinquishes its leadership role. Christopher paints a bleak picture: Just
consider what the world would be like without American leadership in the last two years alone. We would have four
nuclear states in the former Soviet Union, instead of one, with Russian missiles still targeted at our homes. We
would have a full-throttled nuclear program in North Korea; no GATT agreement and no NAFTA; brutal dictators
still terrorizing Haiti; very likely, Iraqi troops back in Kuwait; and an unresolved Mexican economic crisis, which
would threaten stability at our border. [55] Gingrich has pronounced a future without American leadership "a big
mess." [56]And former British prime minister Margaret Thatcher has warned, What we are possibly looking at in
2095 [absent U.S. leadership] is an unstable world in which there are more than half a dozen "great powers," each
with its own clients, all vulnerable if they stand alone, all capable of increasing their power and influence if they
form the right kind of alliance, and all engaged willy-nilly in perpetual diplomatic maneuvers to ensure that their
relative positions improve rather than deteriorate. In other words, 2095 might look like 1914 played on a somewhat
larger stage. [57] In other words, if America abdicates its role as world leader, we are condemned to repeat the
biggest mistakes of the 20th century--or perhaps do something even worse. Such thinking is seriously flawed,
however. First, to assert that U.S. leadership can stave off otherwise inevitable global chaos vastly overestimates the
power of any single country to influence world events. The United States is powerful, but it still can claim only 5
percent of the world's population and 20 percent of world economic output. Moreover, regardless of the resources
Americans might be willing to devote to leading the world, today's problems often do not lend themselves well to
external solutions. As Maynes has pointed out, Today, the greatest fear of most states is not external aggression but
internal disorder. The United States can do little about the latter, whereas it used to be able to do a great deal about the former. In
other words, the coinage of U.S. power in the world has been devalued by the change in the international agenda. [58]
Indeed, many of the foreign policy problems that have confounded Washington since the demise of the Soviet Union are the kinds of problems
that are likely to trouble the world well into the next century. "Failed states," such as Somalia, may not be uncommon. But, as
the ill-fated U.S. and UN operations in that country showed, there is very little that outside powers can do about
such problems. External powers usually lack the means to prevent or end civil wars, such as those in Rwanda and the
former Yugoslavia, unless they are willing to make a tremendous effort to do so. Yet those types of internecine conflicts are likely to
be one of the primary sources of international disorder for the foreseeable future. Despite the doomsayers who prophesy global chaos
in the absence of U.S. leadership, however, Washington's limited ability to dampen such conflicts is not cause for panic. Instability is a
normal feature of an international system of sovereign states, which the United States can tolerate and has tolerated for more than two
centuries. If vital American interests are not at stake, instability itself becomes a serious problem only if the United States blunders into it, as it
did in Somalia and Bosnia. [59]
6. Their evidence is biased – Thayer writes radically outlandish claims that have been
empirically false. That evidence also assumes military power and not tech base.
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Neg to SPS
Novice
Leadership 1NC [3/3]
US Fed fails and getting SPS first doesn’t mean anything
Jerry Taylor, Diraector of National Resource studies at the Cato Institute, 5/16/ 95, “Restructuring the Department
of Energy”, Cato Instutute, http://www.cato.org/testimony/ct4-16-5.html
First, many of the imperfections noted by DOE in the private sector apply as much if not more so to federal
R&D. Long term government projects are difficult to sustain politically given the short time horizons of
legislators forced to face constant elections and thus quick results. Government finds that doing even simple
thinks like growing crops and delivering mail a constant challenge. It's record at accomplishing complex tasks
is even more spotty, as the record of NASA, the Strategic Defense Initiative, and various large-scale projects
like the Clinch River Breeder Reactor and the Superconducting Supercollider can attest. Federal employees
and contractors are scarcely the indentured servants DOE implies are necessary to make a market run
efficiently. Governmental undertakings are also plagued by duplication, fragmentation, contradictory efforts,
and lack of coordination to say the least. And finally, the technological "breakthroughs" achieved in any single
nation are quickly spread throughout the globe just as those breakthroughs can quickly be spread from one
corporate competitor to another. "Beating" the Japanese to new solar technology applications, for example,
would mean little when Japanese industry has demonstrated time and again its ability to be first in bringing to
market technological breakthroughs achieved elsewhere.
9
Neg to SPS
Novice
Solvency 1NC [1/2]
1. SPS costs too much, takes too long to develop, overcrowds space, and may not work.
Bansal 4/13/11 (Gaurav, “The Good, the bad and the ugly: Space based solar energy,” , 6/23/11)
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.
2. SPS timeframe is too long – 30 years at least.
Fan et. al 11 (William, Harold Martin, James Wu, Brian Mok, “SPACE BASED SOLAR POWER,” ,)
While hard to estimate, we believe currently that SBSP is not feasible for the next 30 years. There must first be a large
decrease in launch costs, and significant adoption of solar technology before SBSP would be a plausible large scale energy source.
Efficiency levels are still not yet at a level where the large added cost of a space launch can justify SBSP .
Furthermore, the difficulties in large scale wireless energy transmission is paramount , and have large scale
demonstrations have not yet occurred over significant distances. We have also not yet seen a large boom in large scale
wireless energy transmission that would allow us to project an efficiency trend for this technology. We conclude that it is still
too early for SBSP, barring any large scale technological disruptions within the next 30 years.
3. Lack of space launch services makes SPS impossible.
Mankins ‘08 - president of the Space Power Association, and former Manager, Advanced Concepts Studies,
Office of Space Flight at NASA (John, Ad Astra, “Inexhaustible Energy from Orbit” Spring 2008, pg. 20,
http://www.nss.org/adastra/AdAstra-SBSP-2008.pdf)
A major barrier to all space endeavors also applies to space solar power, and that is affordable access to
space. This barrier is one of compelling importance. The problem of space access includes both low-cost and highlyreliable Earth-to-orbit transportation, and in-space transportation. (Fortunately, one of the key ingredients in
overcoming this barrier is having a market that requires many flights. It’s hard to imagine how air travel between continents would be
affordable if the aircraft were used once or twice per year rather than once or twice per day!) Advances that drive down the cost of
space operations present significant hurdles, too. These hurdles involve a range of capabilities, most of which have never been
demonstrated in space—but all of which are entirely taken for granted here on Earth. The kinds of capabilities in question include the highlyautonomous assembly of large structures, the deployment and integration of modular electronic systems, refueling, and repair and maintenance.
(The key ingredient is to perform such operations without large numbers of operators and sustaining engineers on Earth—which drive the high
cost of contemporary space operations.)
4. Since the U.S. would have to depend on other countries to launch SPS, a lot of the money
from SPS satellites would go to them. This means they don’t solve their leadership
advantage.
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Novice
Solvency 1NC [2/2]
5. Costs and other issues make space solar too expensive to be widely used.
Ditto, 8 - Fellow, NASA Institute for Advanced Concepts (Thomas, reader comments on “Harvest the Sun —
From Space”, 7/23,
http://community.nytimes.com/article/comments/2008/07/23/opinion/23smith.html?permid=73#comment73)
O. Glenn Smith doesn't address the costs and complexity of maintaining solar panel farms in space. In fact, if
all the costs are factored in from manufacturing space-worthy solar arrays with their attendant radio wave beam
transmission systems, their launch and deployment, as well as the cost of maintenance, including the inevitable
decommissioning costs (something too often overlooked with satellites), and that cost is compared to ground-based
solar arrays with their relative inefficiency, the enterprise doesn't look practical. Smith ignores orbital
placement. This doesn't look like a low-earth orbit (LEO) installation where day/night issues are far worse
than on earth's surface. Moreover, at LEO steering the radio waves would be a very complex process. On the
other hand, humans have never worked at geostationary orbit where the transmission to fixed earth stations
makes sense.
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Neg to SPS
Novice
2NC/1NR Solvency Extensions
Launch costs aren’t enough – the technology for space solar power has yet to be developed.
Hsu, 11 - InnovationNewsDaily Senior Writer (Jeremy, “Military Scientists Look to Space to Power Bases,” 3/14,
Innovation News Daily, http://www.innovationnewsdaily.com/military-scientists-look-to-space-to-power-bases1800/)
Wise soldiers heed the modern military maxim: "Amateurs talk tactics, professionals talk logistics."
The need to resupply forward bases in the dangerous terrain of Afghanistan means that the U.S. military must risk vehicles and lives in
convoys that can fall prey to insurgent ambushes. But some military researchers have begun considering whether energy beamed from space
could offer a futuristic solution to that problem. According to a 2009 report by the Naval Research Laboratory in Washington, D.C., orbital
platforms could deliver energy to forward bases by way of microwave or laser and cut back on the amount
of fuel that convoys need to deliver. Space-based solar power would harness the full power of sunlight with
massive solar panel arrays orbiting above the Earth's atmosphere . That could reduce the fuel usage by
generators that typically supply electricity to a forward base , and was deemed the best defense application for space-based
solar power in the report. However, "despite their shortcomings, terrestrial solar, wind, nuclear and other possible alternatives enjoy decades
of heritage, whereas [space-based solar power] has yet to be demonstrated on any scale," said Paul Jaffe, electronics engineer and head of
systems integration at the Naval Research Laboratory. The report did not attempt to come up with a price tag for a militaryfocused application of space-based solar power. But it did include an early estimate that such military use would require more than
$10 billion and remains more than five years in the future. "It is currently quite unlikely" that the U.S.
military would try that approach before civilian projects get off the ground, Jaffe told InnovationNewsDaily. The latter
include European and Japanese project proposals, as well as a private effort by the California-based company Solaren Corp. Even if the
expensive cost of launching the necessary equipment into space fell to zero, Jaffe pointed to much
technological development that still needs to be done before a space-based solar power system could be
deployed. To his knowledge, the U.S. Department of Defense has not funded efforts that focus specifically on such systems.
Space solar power has no credibility within the energy industry
Day, 10 - space policy analyst and historian who lives in Northern Virginia (Dwayne, “Blinded by the light,” The
Space Review, 6/7,
http://www.thespacereview.com/article/1641/1
The more general reason that space solar power has reemerged is that just like in the 1970s, space solar power fills a cultural,
ideological, and yes, spiritual need among a certain type of person. It has nothing to do with the concept
suddenly becoming technically or economically feasible, or gaining any credibility within the energy
sector.Last month two groups held solar energy conferences separated by one week, 1700 miles, and a million light years. The first
was SOLAR 2010, the annual conference of the American Solar Energy Society held in Phoenix, Arizona. The second was the “First
National Space Society Space Solar Power Symposium” held at the International Space Development Conference in Chicago,
Illinois. The Space Solar Power Symposium featured approximately three dozen presentations on the subject, including individuals from Japan
and India. The presentation topics ranged from the mundane (“Prospects for microwave wireless power transmission”) to the polemic (“Why
Space Solar Power is the Answer and the ONLY Answer to Our Long Term Energy Needs”). But if you went to SOLAR 2010 a week earlier,
you would have noticed something rather striking. Despite the attendance of hundreds of people, numerous companies, and the presentation of
hundreds of technical papers; despite the presence of the United States’ best experts on energy policy, energy
transmission, energy generation, and solar power technology—there were no presentations on space solar
power. Think about that for a moment. What does it say about space solar power?What it says is that space solar power is a fringe
idea that is not even taken seriously within the niche field of solar power generation . What it also says is that the
space solar power community doesn’t play with the big boys. It’s a community that talks to itself, that seeks the comfort
of like-minded individuals, and doesn’t even try to sell its message to the audience most likely to give it a
fair hearing. If the space solar power community wants to be taken seriously, there is a good way it can start. Instead of holding the
“Second NSS Space Solar Power Symposium” at the International Space Development Conference next year, they should try to hold it at
SOLAR 2011. They should see if they can face the members of the American Solar Energy Society directly and hear what they think of the
idea of space solar power. It’s time for the space solar power advocates to decide if they want to be a social
organization, no different from a knitting circle or a model train club, or if they want to be an industry.
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Novice
Answers To: NSSO Studies
NSSO is wrong and biased – prefer our evidence.
Day ’08 [Dwayne A. Day, Writer for Space Review, 6-9-2008, “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
, 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
technology development must occur before it is even feasible. Furthermore
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.
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Novice
Space Militarization Disadvantage Links
**must be used as PART OF the space militarization shell, not alone.
SSP can be used as a space weapon and will cause space to become weaponized.
Ramos 2k – US Air Force Major, Thesis submitted for the AIR COMMAND AND STAFF COLL MAXWELL
Air Force Base (Kim, “Solar Power Constellations: Implications for the United States Air Force,” April,
http://handle.dtic.mil/100.2/ADA394928)
Force ApplicationUnited States Space Command developed four operational concepts to guide their vision.One of
those operational concepts is global engagement. The USSPACECOM Long Range Plan defines global
engagement as an “integrated focused surveillance and missile defense with a potential ability to apply force
from space.”27 This application of force from space involves holding at risk earth targets with force from
space.28 New World Vistas identifies several forceapplication technologies. One of the technological issues
associated with developing these space force application technologies is that they all require large amounts
of power generation. A solar power satellite can supply the required power. Two technologies in particular
would benefit from integration with a solar power satellite, directed energy weapons, such as lasers, and
jamming devices.The space-based lasers currently under study accomplish ground moving target indication,and air moving target indication, which would be part of missile
defense.29 The main difficultywith the laser is designing a power plant, which can produce the required energy in spacewithout the enormous solar arrays required. By using a solar power
. Another project, which would benefit from integration with a solar
power satellite, is a device, which would beam RF power to a particular geographic location to blind or
disable any unprotected ground communications, radar, optical, and infrared sensors.30 As with the laser
andother directed energy applications, the limiting factor right now is generating enough power in space to
energize the RF beam.
satellite to beam power tothe laser, this eliminates the problem
SPS can be used as a weapon.
Pop, 2k – PhD Student, University of Glasgow Law School (Virgiliu, “SECURITY IMPLICATIONS OF NONTERRESTRIAL RESOURCE EXPLOITATION”, http://www.geocities.com/virgiliu_pop/publications/security.pdf)
High power microwaves (HPM) are a new means of warfare. The use of microwaves asthe means of
transmission of energy betweenthe SPS and the ground based collecting rectenna may qualify them as
electromagnetic weapons. The most widely acknowledgedeffect of HPM is “disruption of electronic
systems”, able to “reset computers, causecomplete loss of stored data and/or causemicroprocessors to switch operating modes”7. This
would “produce substantial paralysis in any target system, thus providing a decisive advantage in the
conduct of Electronic Combat,Offensive Counter Air and Strategic AirAttack”8. In the same time, a HPM attackdirected at an aircraft
“could corrupt theplane’s control and navigation systems enoughto cause a crash”9.
Although of a non-lethal nature10, the effects ofelectromagnetic weapons are significant ,ranging from “nuisance to
catastrophic”11. Thisled experts to consider them as “Weapon[s] of Electrical Mass Destruction”12. Indeed, thereliance of today’s society on
electronic andcomputer systems makes it extremely fragile; aHPM attack would have far more catastrophiceffects than the Millennium
Bug13.SPS mirrors could be used to set cities on fire Pop, 2k – PhD Student, University of Glasgow Law School (Virgiliu, “SECURITY
IMPLICATIONS OF NON-TERRESTRIAL RESOURCE EXPLOITATION”,
http://www.geocities.com/virgiliu_pop/publications/security.pdf) Another “mass destruction-like” effect may be presented
by the SPS that would use lasersinstead of microwaves as means oftransmission of energy and that may also havethe capacity to cause
catastrophic fires onenemy territory. Gerrard and Barber note that “there is some debate as to whether nuclear-powered lasers are [weapons of
massdestruction]”14. The same may be true in thecase of use of orbiting solar mirrors: it may “become technically feasible
to concentrate solar energy in certain areas of the earth and thereby cause fires, scorch the earth, or cause
floods”15. Precedents of the use of solar raysas a weapon exist as far back as the 3rdCentury BC, when Archimedes is said to haveput fire to
the Roman fleet invading Syracuseby using solar rays concentrated by mirrors.
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Neg to SPS
Novice
Spending Disadvantage Links
***MUST BE READ AS PART OF THE SPENDING SHELL, NOT ON ITS OWN.
Satellites cost an enormous amount to build and launch.
Brown ’2k [Gary Brown, Energy Correspondent, “How Satellites Work”
http://science.howstuffworks.com/satellite8.htm]
Satellite launches don't always go well, as shown by this story on failed launches in 1999. There is a great deal at stake. For example,
this
hurricane-watch satellite mission cost $290 million. This missile-warning satellite cost $682 million. Another
important factor with satellites is the cost of the launch. According to this report, a satellite launch can cost anywhere
between $50 million and $400 million. A shuttle mission pushes toward half a billion dollars (a shuttle mission
could easily carry several satellites into orbit). You can see that building a satellite, getting it into orbit and then
maintaining it from the ground control facility is a major financial endeavor!
Plan would spend between 11 and 320 billion not including the heavy maintenance
required
QuestPoint Solar Solutions, 6/13/11. “Solar Satellites: The Key To Green Energy,”
http://www.solarfeeds.com/questpoint-solar-solutions/17185-solar-satellites-the-key-to-green-energy
Many governments claim there simply isn’t any money in the budget for launching satellites into space, but in
2010, amid an economic crisis, the United States managed to find $426 million for nuclear fusion research and
$18.7 billion for NASA, a five-per-cent increase from 2009. The most recent projections, made in the 1980s,
put the cost of launching an SPS at $5 billion, or around 8-10 cents/ kWh. Nuclear power plants cost a
minimum of $3 billion to $6 billion, not including cost overruns, which can make a plant cost as much as $15
billion. In the U.S., nuclear power costs about 4.9 cents/kWh, making SPS power supply only slightly more
expensive. But these estimates are over two decades old and the numbers likely need to be re-examined. The
idea for space-based solar energy has been around since the ’60s; given the technological advancements since
then, surely governments would have invested in making an SPS power supply more budget-friendly. That is
not the case. Governments and investors are rarely willing to devote funding to something that doesn’t have
quick cash returns. The projected cost of launching these satellites once ranged from $11 billion to $320 billion. These
figures have been adjusted for inflation, but the original estimates were made back in the 1970s, when solar
technology was in its infancy, and may have since become grossly inaccurate. How long an SPS would survive
in orbit is anybody’s guess, given the maintenance due to possible damage to solar panels from solar winds and
radiation. As for adding to the ever-expanding satellite graveyard in Earth’s orbit, most solutions to satellite
pollution remain theoretical.
SPS costs 100 times more than what would be economically feasible.
Collins 7 Dr. Patrick Collins professor of economics at Azabu University in Japan, and a Collaborating Researcher
with the Institute for Space & Astronautical Science November 1, 2007 ‘Department of Defense Feasibility Study’
<http://www.spacefuture.com/journal/journal.cgi?art=2007.11.01.DoD_feasibility_study_2>//DoeS
A recent report by the Department of Defense's National Security Space Office (DoD's NSSO), which
recognises that space-based solar power has great potential and urges the US federal government to
grant it $1 billion/year over 10 years, has stirred up much comment, such as in Avaiation Week and New
Scientist and also on Slashdot . (As always on Slash-Dot, readers respond with dozens of questions and
answers, so you can read a good survey of ideas pro and con delivering solar power from space to Earth using
microwaves or other means.) The sad thing about the subject of SPS is that it has been exhaustively
investigated numerous times...and the results are always the same. Yes, technically the system is feasible. Yes,
environmentally it would probably be very beneficial as a potentially massive source of CO2-free electricity.
But it could only be economically reasonable if launch costs are reduced greatly - to about 1% of what
they are today. What is perhaps surprising is that launch costs have not fallen at all over the last 50
years, because space agencies have spent the $1 trillion they received from taxpayers on anything except
making it cheaper to get to space. The Soyuz rocket is still the cheapest way to travel to space - as it has been
for 50 years.
15