[Senate Hearing 115-68]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
S. Hrg. 115-68
REOPENING THE AMERICAN FRONTIER: REDUCING
REGULATORY BARRIERS AND EXPANDING AMERICAN FREE ENTERPRISE IN SPACE
=======================================================================
HEARING
before the
SUBCOMMITTEE ON SPACE, SCIENCE,
AND COMPETITIVENESS
of the
COMMITTEE ON COMMERCE,
SCIENCE, AND TRANSPORTATION
UNITED STATES SENATE
ONE HUNDRED FIFTEENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
APRIL 26, 2017
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Commerce, Science, and
Transportation
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SENATE COMMITTEE ON COMMERCE, SCIENCE, AND TRANSPORTATION
ONE HUNDRED FIFTEENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
JOHN THUNE, South Dakota, Chairman
ROGER F. WICKER, Mississippi BILL NELSON, Florida, Ranking
ROY BLUNT, Missouri MARIA CANTWELL, Washington
TED CRUZ, Texas AMY KLOBUCHAR, Minnesota
DEB FISCHER, Nebraska RICHARD BLUMENTHAL, Connecticut
JERRY MORAN, Kansas BRIAN SCHATZ, Hawaii
DAN SULLIVAN, Alaska EDWARD MARKEY, Massachusetts
DEAN HELLER, Nevada CORY BOOKER, New Jersey
JAMES INHOFE, Oklahoma TOM UDALL, New Mexico
MIKE LEE, Utah GARY PETERS, Michigan
RON JOHNSON, Wisconsin TAMMY BALDWIN, Wisconsin
SHELLEY MOORE CAPITO, West Virginia TAMMY DUCKWORTH, Illinois
CORY GARDNER, Colorado MAGGIE HASSAN, New Hampshire
TODD YOUNG, Indiana CATHERINE CORTEZ MASTO, Nevada
Nick Rossi, Staff Director
Adrian Arnakis, Deputy Staff Director
Jason Van Beek, General Counsel
Kim Lipsky, Democratic Staff Director
Chris Day, Democratic Deputy Staff Director
Renae Black, Senior Counsel
------
SUBCOMMITTEE ON SPACE, SCIENCE, AND COMPETITIVENESS
TED CRUZ, Texas, Chairman EDWARD MARKEY, Massachusetts,
JERRY MORAN, Kansas Ranking
DAN SULLIVAN, Alaska BRIAN SCHATZ, Hawaii
MIKE LEE, Utah TOM UDALL, New Mexico
RON JOHNSON, Wisconsin GARY PETERS, Michigan
SHELLEY MOORE CAPITO, West Virginia TAMMY BALDWIN, Wisconsin
CORY GARDNER, Colorado MAGGIE HASSAN, New Hampshire
C O N T E N T S
----------
Page
Hearing held on April 26, 2017................................... 1
Statement of Senator Cruz........................................ 1
Statement of Senator Markey...................................... 3
Statement of Senator Nelson...................................... 4
Letter dated April 21, 2017 to Senator Cruz, Senator Markey
and Members of the Subcommittee from Michael J. Listner,
Space Law & Policy Solutions............................... 37
Statement of Senator Udall....................................... 38
Statement of Senator Peters...................................... 42
Witnesses
Robert T. Bigelow, Founder and President, Bigelow Aerospace, LLC. 6
Prepared statement........................................... 8
Robert Meyerson, President, Blue Origin.......................... 11
Prepared statement........................................... 13
George Whitesides, CEO, Galactic Ventures........................ 17
Prepared statement........................................... 18
Andrew Rush, CEO, Made In Space, Inc............................. 26
Prepared statement........................................... 27
Appendix
Response to written questions submitted to Robert T. Bigelow by:
Hon. Maggie Hassan........................................... 45
Response to written questions submitted to Robert Meyerson by:
Hon. Bill Nelson............................................. 46
Hon. Maggie Hassan........................................... 47
Response to written questions submitted to George Whitesides by:
Hon. Bill Nelson............................................. 48
Hon. Maggie Hassan........................................... 48
Response to written questions submitted to Andrew Rush by:
Hon. Maggie Hassan........................................... 50
REOPENING THE AMERICAN FRONTIER:
REDUCING REGULATORY BARRIERS AND
EXPANDING AMERICAN FREE ENTERPRISE
IN SPACE
----------
WEDNESDAY, APRIL 26, 2017
U.S. Senate,
Subcommittee on Space, Science, and Competitiveness,
Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation,
Washington, DC.
The Subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:05 a.m. in
room SR-253, Russell Senate Office Building, Hon. Ted Cruz,
Chairman of the Subcommittee, presiding.
Present: Senators Cruz [presiding], Gardner, Nelson,
Markey, Udall, Peters, and Hassan.
OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. TED CRUZ,
U.S. SENATOR FROM TEXAS
The Chairman. This hearing will come to order. Good
morning.
In 1890, the Superintendent of the Census declared the end
to the American frontier by stating, ``Up to and including
1880, the country had a frontier of settlement, but at present,
the unsettled area has been so broken into isolated bodies of
settlement that there can hardly be said to be a frontier line.
In the discussion of its extent, its westward movement, et
cetera, it cannot, therefore, any longer have a place in the
census reports.''
The American vision of westward expansion that had been
initiated 86 years earlier through the Lewis & Clark Expedition
had been successful in leading to the expansion of American
commerce and settlement in a new territory that had not
previously been chartered by American pioneers.
Today, this committee embarks on a series of hearings
looking at reopening the American frontier with our sights set
on the heavens, which President Kennedy referred to as the New
Frontier. It is only fitting that the Nation born on the last
frontier should continue to lead the way in the new frontier.
America must expand commerce and, ultimately, settlement
into space, and we must do it first. This is an issue that not
only impacts our global competitiveness, but also our national
security. The world is much safer with America as the global
leader on this planet, and the world will similarly be safer
and stronger if the United States and our ideals of free
enterprise and free speech are the driving force of commerce
and settlement throughout the galaxy.
For nearly 60 years, NASA has granted the United States
access to space and has made human spaceflight a reality. In
recent years, commercial space companies have made enormous
strides in technological advancements and the scope of their
business activities that are leading to a new and dynamic
renaissance in spaceflight. This is creating the real
possibility that in the not too distant future, American
private citizens will be able to reach space, hopefully, from a
launch pad or a runway in the great state of Texas.
However, to ensure that this remains within the realm of
the possible, Congress needs to continue to work to ensure that
investment and innovation within the commercial space sector
isn't chilled by obsolete regulations or overly burdensome
requirements that may not naturally apply to new business
models.
As we look to the future of American free enterprise and
settlement in space, we should also thoroughly review the
United Nations Outer Space Treaty, which was written and
enacted in a very different time and era in 1967. It's
important that Congress evaluate how that Treaty, enacted 50
years ago, will impact new and innovative activity within space
as well as potential settlement throughout the galaxy.
Finally, we would be remiss if this committee did not also
explore ways that the commercial space sector, academia, and
NASA can look to build upon current partnerships and create new
ones that can advance human spaceflight, research, and
discovery. As we embark together on this series of hearings and
potential legislation, I look forward to continuing to work in
the same strong bipartisan manner that this subcommittee has
always worked, working with Chairman Thune, with Ranking Member
Nelson, with our Subcommittee's previous Ranking Member,
Senator Peters, and, also, I want to welcome the new Ranking
Member of this Subcommittee, Senator Markey. Welcome to this
Subcommittee.
I will say at a time of significant partisan division on a
great many issues, this subcommittee has been remarkable, under
a Democratic Senate and Republican Senate, for being able to
produce bipartisan legislation. We have produced not one, but
two bills in the last couple of years, the Commercial Space
Launch Competitiveness Act, which was signed into law by
President Obama, and the NASA authorization legislation, which
was signed into law by President Trump. In both instances, this
committee was able to work together across party lines to
achieve consensus and to move the ball forward.
I look forward to our working together to continue to do so
and to continue working on new legislation to nurture, to
create, and to expand a vibrant commercial space sector and a
strong NASA so that America continues to lead the world in
space exploration.
And with that, I'll recognize Ranking Member Nelson for an
opening statement.
Senator Nelson. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman, but I want
to defer to the Ranking Member of the Subcommittee, and then
I'll make some appropriate comments.
STATEMENT OF HON. EDWARD MARKEY,
U.S. SENATOR FROM MASSACHUSETTS
Senator Markey. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, very much, and I
am thrilled here today as I launch into my new role as the
Ranking Member on this very important subcommittee.
Investment in science and space has helped drive the
American economy since World War II. It has unleashed American
innovators and entrepreneurs to develop new technologies that
have changed the world, and it has helped us understand the
changes in the world caused by human activities that alter the
environment and the climate. This subcommittee has an important
role to play in ensuring that science and space activities
continue to help America thrive.
Today's hearing title invokes the frontier. Next month,
we'll celebrate the centennial of John F. Kennedy's birth.
Science and space were an integral part of the new frontier
that he saw in 1960. His challenge to land a man on the Moon
opened up a new era, one in which humans travel and live beyond
the Earth.
Now, there are few arenas of modern life in which space
does not play a role. From satellite navigation to
telecommunications to monitoring storms, we rely upon space.
But in the next few years, there will be even more activity in
space than we have ever seen in our history. In less than a
lifetime, we have gone from one man circling the globe to
contemplating settlement on Mars. Now, as space exploration and
activities evolve, it is vital that we use the lessons of our
past to guide us as we navigate this expanding territory.
Prior to major settlement of the American West in the 19th
century, Congress funded a number of scientific expeditions to
explore and understand the western territories. This government
investment helped identify productive agricultural land and
initiated a transportation revolution with the transcontinental
railroads that allowed individuals and companies to succeed in
the space age.
Government investment in science has gotten us to the Moon
and has put a Rover on Mars, a satellite orbiting Saturn, and
has gazed into the depths of the universe. The Cassini
spacecraft just began its grand finale this week and is in the
first of its orbits around Saturn right now. The James Webb
Space Telescope is set to be launched next year.
Government investment in science has led the way for the
private investment that is now flowing into space activities.
Congress has a critical role to play to ensure that public and
private investment is driving innovation and responsible
development in space. And even as private companies expand
their space activities, there is still an important role for
public investment.
Today, the International Space Station serves as a national
laboratory, which has dedicated space for science experiments
from universities, Federal scientists, and small private
research firms that could not otherwise be attempted. These
experiments are varied and diverse and have the potential to
solve some of the biggest problems humanity struggles with
today, including improving the quality and quantity of our
global food supply, finding new cures for cancer, understanding
antibiotic resistance, and so much more.
We all stand to gain from supporting basic science research
in space. We must also remember that space exploration and
development is a global endeavor. It requires international
cooperation and global standards, even as the space industry
becomes more competitive.
So I look forward to hearing from our witnesses today on
our growing American commercial space enterprise so that all of
our country can begin to understand this incredible future that
is about to unfold.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Thank you, Senator Markey. I would note that
as we launch or relaunch a focus on the new frontier, it is
altogether fitting that our new Ranking Member would evoke
memories of President John F. Kennedy with that unique Boston
brogue returning to this subcommittee.
Senator Markey. I will say this about my accent. It is not
a Kennedy accent. That is a distinct and separate way of using
the English language one family had that one privileged use of.
[Laughter.]
The Chairman. Well, and, thankfully, in my home state of
Texas, none of us have accents in any way, shape, or form.
[Laughter.]
The Chairman. And with that, Senator Nelson.
STATEMENT OF HON. BILL NELSON,
U.S. SENATOR FROM FLORIDA
Senator Nelson. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and, indeed, it's
fitting that the new Ranking Member of the Subcommittee is from
Massachusetts, because it was the vision and the leadership of
President Kennedy that picked a goal, and that goal was rather
striking, that we were going to the Moon and back within a
period of 9 years. The Nation marshaled the resources and met
that goal. As a result of that ``can-do spirit'' of NASA and as
a result of all of the spinoffs that came out of that
technological revolution, particularly the
microminiaturization, going to the Moon has dramatically
improved the quality of our lives here on Earth.
I am looking forward to that happening again now that we
passed the NASA authorization bill. The bill sets as its goal,
going to Mars in the decade of the 2030s, and it builds on past
NASA authorization bills. You talk about bipartisanship, that's
exactly what happened with your predecessor, Senator Kay Bailey
Hutchison, and this Senator in putting together the bill that
set NASA off on the course that you see on the manned program.
It's a dual course of the commercial as well as NASA and then
getting out of low Earth orbit and going to explore the
heavens.
I might say as a personal comment, Mr. Chairman, to your
fitting remarks starting off about the frontier, that that
frontier was always westward. That frontier is now upward, and
it's inward, and as a part of that frontier, even though the
official that you quoted in 1890 said the frontier had been
achieved, that Homestead Act was still used for several years
thereafter, and so it was with my grandparents.
In 1913, if you worked the land for four continuous years
and could prove it, the Government would deed you 160 acres of
land. I have a copy of the deed signed by Woodrow Wilson in
1917. That 160 acres of land today is at the north end of the
space shuttle runway at the Kennedy Space Center. So, needless
to say, it was not lost on me that the first morning that we
went to the launch pad, and as it turned out, we did several
trips--five, after four scrubs--but that first morning, I just
couldn't believe it.
I was the last crew member to crawl in and strap in, and as
they were getting in, I wandered off on that launch tower by
myself, looked in the direction of three miles away where the
old homestead was, and just was overwhelmed, realizing that my
grandparents, who I did not know, would have never believed
that a grandson was going to literally leave the face of the
Earth almost from the old homestead. So thank you for evoking
the memories of the new frontier and that continuing frontier.
I'll just make a couple of other comments. As I have shared
as I've visited with our witnesses, this Senator is so excited
to see the abandoned launch pads at Cape Canaveral, which were
alive with activity a half a century ago, coming back to life
as a result of a lot of the activities represented in the panel
that you have. It took getting agencies of the Government, who
had been in stovepipes, to finally come together. There had to
be a little prayer session, and we had to drag them to the
altar to have that prayer session, but between the Air Force
and NASA and the FAA, they got their acts together, and the
proof is in the pudding, and we see what is happening.
And, now, in this recently completed NASA authorization
bill, the standards were set. It brings that cooperation of all
those agencies together in the commercial space sector, living
alongside the necessary government launches plus the NASA
launches that will be from Pad 39B. So it's going to be an
exciting future.
The transformation of the Cape is illustrative of the
broader impacts that the space industry has to offer this
country, and we're just getting going. Both of you happened to
mention the telescopes. I have behind my desk in our office
here, a compendium of 5 years of photographs taken by the
Hubble Space Telescope, which is millions and millions of light
years away, showing the birth and death of stars. With the new
Hubble that we're going to launch next year, we're going to
look back further in time, almost to the beginning. That's
going to bring new discoveries in addition to the excitement
that we've already seen of other suns that actually have
planets revolving around them.
So the challenges are there and we're ready to meet those
challenges. The key to success is continuing a balanced space
program, one that does not neglect science nor aeronautics, and
along with the private space endeavors, balanced between
cooperation and competition, as well as between risks and
public safety. And for that, I think we're going to have a very
exciting future.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Thank you, Senator Nelson, and I thank you
also for sharing the story of your grandparents and
homesteading. And just as your grandparents could not imagine
their grandson being launched into space, perhaps sometime in
the future, your grandkids will be homesteading 160 acres on
the Moon or on Mars.
Senator Nelson. Well, Mr. Chairman, I still have two
children that are not married, and----
The Chairman. I can't help you there.
[Laughter.]
Senator Nelson. And my wife and I are worried that we're
going to be on oxygen before we have grandchildren.
The Chairman. Well, that gives us time to get back to the
Moon and get to Mars.
[Laughter.]
The Chairman. With that, I want to welcome this
distinguished panel of witnesses today. Thank you, gentlemen,
for being with us this morning.
Our first witness is Mr. Robert Bigelow, who is the Founder
and President of Bigelow Aerospace, which manufactures and
develops expandable space station modules. Bigelow Aerospace
has designed BEAM, the first ever expandable space station
module to occupy humans while in space. Prior to founding
Bigelow Aerospace, Mr. Bigelow founded the hotel chain, Budget
Suites of America.
Our second witness, Mr. Rob Meyerson, is President of Blue
Origin, where he has overseen the steady growth of the company
since 2003. Prior to Blue Origin, Mr. Meyerson worked at
Kistler Aerospace and as an aerospace engineer at NASA's
Johnson Space Center. Mr. Meyerson earned a B.S. in aerospace
engineering from the University of Michigan and a Master's
degree in engineering management from the University of
Houston. It's always good to see someone who has been a
Houstonian.
Mr. George Whitesides is the CEO of Galactic Ventures,
which is developing a fleet of commercial space vehicles as
well as a small satellite launch capability. Prior to joining
Galactic Ventures, Mr. Whitesides served as Chief of Staff at
NASA, where he provided policy and staff support to the
agency's administrator and received the Distinguished Service
Medal, the highest award the agency confers. Mr. Whitesides is
an honor graduate of my alma mater, Princeton University's
Woodrow Wilson School, and holds a Master's degree from the
University of Cambridge in England.
Mr. Andrew Rush is President and CEO of Silicon Valley-
based Made in Space, which specializes in the engineering and
manufacturing of three dimensional printers for use in
microgravity. Made in Space's 3D printer, the Zero-G printer,
was the first manufacturing device in space. Prior to joining
Made in Space, Mr. Rush was a partner at the PCT Law Group.
Thank each of you for joining us.
Mr. Bigelow, you're the first witness.
STATEMENT OF ROBERT T. BIGELOW, FOUNDER AND PRESIDENT, BIGELOW
AEROSPACE, LLC
Mr. Bigelow. Mr. Chairman and members of the Subcommittee,
thank you for the opportunity to speak to you today and present
my views on the subject of this hearing: Reopening the American
Frontier for Free Enterprise in Space. First, let me thank the
Committee for the work it has done to support the commercial
space industry.
For over 17 years, I have personally funded the development
of space habitat stations at Bigelow Aerospace, and I have
spent, personally, over about $350 million in that endeavor.
Commercializing space habitat systems will dramatically lower
costs to NASA and other customers.
To date, we have successfully launched three habitat
station prototypes. These new technologies comprise the basis
for the structure of our spacecraft and in full scale provide
superior radiation, debris, and micrometeorite protection, as
compared to the modules of the ISS.
In 2006 and 2007, we launched the Genesis I and Genesis II
prototype spacecraft from the Yasny missile base in Siberia,
Russia. The Genesis program was the first test of these new
technologies in the space environment. Both spacecraft exceeded
our expectations. In April 2016, the Bigelow Expandable
Activity Module, or BEAM for short, was launched to the
International Space Station under a partnership agreement with
NASA and has undergone continuous testing attached to the
Tranquility module of the ISS.
Today, we are focused on our primary goal, which is to
provide customers with an affordable and safe station that can
be augmented and outfitted for almost any type of mission, to
almost any practical destination. Bigelow's primary spacecraft,
the B330, offers 330 cubic meters of pressurized volume, volume
that traditional metallic structures, including the ISS, cannot
match in terms of total up mass per launch and at significantly
less cost. A single fully deployed 330 expandable habitat
provides approximately one-third of the current pressurized
volume of the International Space Station.
Bigelow Aerospace's business model is built on time sharing
volume and other assets. We should view future low Earth orbit
locations and businesses as a wellspring for deep space
capabilities. Commercially available habitat stations like the
B330 provide affordability and potential access to space that
otherwise has been out of the reach for most all nations and
companies of the world.
NASA took the first step to address its destination deficit
recently when it instituted the NextSTEPs program. Part of the
NextSTEPs program is to develop the necessary technology for
NASA to transition to deep space activities. This is achieved
through cost savings by partnering with commercial entities to
assist NASA's efforts to get out of low Earth orbit, return to
the Moon, and open up other new American frontiers across the
solar system. We at Bigelow have worked hard to keep production
on schedule so that we can produce two flight-ready B330s by
the end of 2020. While I hope that Congress and President Trump
will work together to provide NASA the necessary financial
resources it needs to succeed, I am moving ahead with the B330
program.
Now let me briefly describe some of the risks and threats I
see. First, I believe that the United States is quickly
approaching a crossroad. There are no destinations for American
transportation systems besides the ISS. Where shall NASA and
this Nation go once the ISS is no longer available?
NASA will always need training and testing facilities in
low Earth orbit and beyond. Commercially affordable facilities
where the customer is king is the practical answer. To that
end, NASA needs to be a strong and diverse customer of the
commercial space industry. Bigelow Aerospace continues to
develop partnerships with launch providers and other companies
to ensure that NASA and other potential customers have
alternative choices for the utilization of affordable habitat
stations.
But in order to achieve a truly free enterprise in space,
NASA is too vital a customer to ignore. NASA needs the
necessary funding and policy direction to transition from the
ISS to supporting space missions based on utilization of
commercially supplied space habitats and other transportation
assets.
China has created in their quest to develop their own
national space program, a program that is not disconnected from
its military. The Chinese government has made it known that it
wants to offer free access to other countries to utilize their
national space station in the near future. To that end, the
Chinese and ISS partner states have discussed international
space cooperation and partnerships. While our allies consider
partnering with China, we should be mindful of strategic
consequences that an engaged China could have on the future of
American enterprise in space.
I have had innumerable discussions about the future of
space exploration with many people. One thing I think is clear
is that NASA is too focused on just transportation systems to
the ISS. Everyone wants to know what are NASA's plans to
transition out of the ISS. Whether the ISS continues or not,
additional destinations besides the ISS are vital to sustain a
viable space crew and cargo enterprise with new markets that
eventually replace the ISS.
Moreover, I believe that if initiated soon, Bigelow
Aerospace and other companies could provide a lunar depot using
a B330 habitat station that would enable NASA and commercial
entities access to the Moon and cislunar space in a 4-year
program. If we truly commit to an initial destination in low
Earth orbit, then following quickly to cislunar space, I
believe that expandable habitats can offer NASA and others the
ability to test and gain experience for future missions to the
Moon and Mars.
That concludes my written remarks. Thank you, and I look
forward to your questions.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Bigelow follows:]
Prepared Statement of Robert T. Bigelow, Founder and President,
Bigelow Aerospace, LLC
Mr. Chairman and Members of the Subcommittee, thank you for the
opportunity to speak to you today and to present my views on the
subject of this hearing: Reopening the American Frontier for Free
Enterprise in Space. First, let me thank the Committee for the work it
has done to support the commercial space industry. The Committee has
been an invaluable leader in providing coherent space policy and
supporting the private sector's ability to compete to make America a
leader in human spaceflight once again. However, over the next two
years, Congress will need to address a variety of risks and threats to
free enterprise in space. Congress has the important role to establish
the business and regulatory environment necessary for the viability of
low Earth orbit and cislunar economies to develop. Much work is left to
do.
For over seventeen years, I have personally funded the development
of space habitat stations at Bigelow Aerospace. I am proud of the
accomplishments my company has made in the development of expandable
habitat systems, architecture that Congress forced NASA to abandon in
the 1990s. I personally have spent over $350 million designing,
manufacturing, testing, and launching hardware because commercializing
expandable habitat systems will dramatically lower costs to NASA and
other customers, providing affordable destinations, and thereby
enabling the growth of new markets in space.
To date, we have successfully launched three habitat station
prototypes. These new technologies comprise the basis for the structure
of our spacecraft and in full-scale provide superior radiation, debris
and micro-meteorite protection as compared to the modules of the ISS.
In 2006 and 2007, respectively, we launched the Genesis I and II
prototype spacecraft from the Yasny missile base in Siberia, Russia.
The Genesis program was the first test of these new technologies in the
space environment. Both spacecraft exceeded our expectations and we
achieved invaluable data from those test flights. In April of 2016, the
Bigelow Expandable Activity Module, or BEAM, was launched to the
International Space Station (``ISS'') in the trunk of the SpaceX Dragon
cargo vehicle under a partnership agreement with NASA. BEAM was
expanded in May of 2016 and has undergone continuous testing attached
to the Tranquility module of the ISS. The BEAM program helps NASA and
Bigelow Aerospace understand and demonstrate the strong viability of
these new technologies that make up the base architecture of expandable
habitats. And I would like to note that the BEAM exemplifies the first
time the ISS has been augmented with habitable volume since the end of
the shuttle program in 2011.
Today, I am focused on our primary goal, which is to provide
customers with an affordable and safe station that can be augmented and
outfitted for almost any type of mission to almost any practical
destination in space. Bigelow's primary spacecraft, the B330, offers
330 cubic meters of pressurized volume; volume that traditional
metallic structures--including the ISS--cannot match in terms of total
up mass per launch at significantly less cost. A single, fully deployed
B330 expandable habitat provides approximately one third of the current
usable volume of the ISS. We have the ability to dramatically increase
the usable volume in space, to double and triple that of the ISS, with
single digit launch rates. This illustrates the advantages that Bigelow
Aerospace's habitat technology provides to the market and to NASA. The
opportunities my company can enable through our habitat architecture
will help revolutionize the commercial space industry provided that the
regulatory environment remains minimal, transparent, and clear.
What Bigelow Aerospace seeks to achieve is to offer the market
affordable, safe, and robust habitat technology. While NASA early on
envisioned the original architecture of expandable habitat technologies
through the Transhab program in the 1990s, Bigelow Aerospace has
created many innovations and is now marketing the concept. The Bigelow
Aerospace business model is built on time sharing volume and other
assets. As a long-time real estate developer in the United States
southwest, I know something about selling volume and time. We should
view future low Earth orbit locations and businesses as the wellspring
for deep space capabilities because it makes affordable the operational
experience, increases performance efficiencies, provides for more
robust technologies, and supports novel applications necessary for deep
space missions. Commercially available habitat stations like the B330
provide affordability and potential access to space that otherwise has
been out of reach for almost all nations and companies of the world.
Whether the volume and time are used for traditional science,
manufacturing, on-orbit servicing, or tourism, to list a few uses, we
cannot get the necessary economies for free enterprise unless we start
to address some of the existential and near-term issues that will
affect America's future in space.
NASA took the first step to address its destination deficit
recently when it instituted the Next Space Technology for Exploration
Partnerships program, also known as NextSTEPs. Part of the NextSTEPs
program is to develop the necessary technology for NASA to transition
to deep space activities. This is achieved through cost-savings by
partnering with commercial entities to assist NASA's efforts to get out
of low Earth orbit, return to the Moon and open up other new American
frontiers across the Solar System. As a Phase I and II awardee of the
NextSTEPs habitation program, we have worked hard to keep production on
schedule so that we can produce two flight-ready B330s by the end of
2020.
While I hope that the Congress and President Trump will work
together to provide NASA the financial resources it needs to succeed, I
am moving ahead with the B330 program. As noted, we are on schedule to
have two flight-ready B330s completed by the end of 2020 for any
customer. Therefore, as this Committee deliberates over the creation of
a new commercial space bill, I believe that the Congress should concern
itself with the necessary business and regulatory environment for
habitats to serve as the backbone for all activities in space.
Commercial space station development is underway now. I do not believe
that we need more reports on space activities. What we need is forward-
thinking on how to ensure that America is leading the way to commercial
space stations as well as the means by which to permit our customers to
achieve the full value of space. The Congress has already enacted the
right for Americans to obtain space resources. Now it is time to
consider how to give life to those rights. Not only in the form of
title, but laying out the conditions for space commercialization in the
ways that Americans have always substantiated their rights to
commerce--through registry and notice of business activities. This will
be essential to provide operational safety, integrity of revenue
streams, and evidence in future litigation regarding commercial rights
to operate and use space resources in situ. I believe addressing the
issue of registry and notice will help grow investor confidence in
space activities enabling the large capital investments needed to
provide certainty in the market as it develops over time.
Now let me briefly describe some of the risks and threats I see the
Congress needing to address. First, I believe that the United States is
quickly approaching a cross-road where opportunities will rapidly arise
from the innovative space technologies Bigelow Aerospace and other
companies are currently developing. There are no destinations for
American transportation systems besides the ISS. Where shall NASA and
this Nation go once the ISS is no longer available? NASA will always
need training and testing facilities in LEO and beyond. Commercially
affordable facilities, where the customer is king, is the practical
answer. We should not repeat the mistakes of the past to move on
without a plan. We should not move ahead by allowing others to lead.
This nation should recommit itself to returning to the Moon and then on
to Mars because it is the only practical way to guarantee that future
space activities will have a foundational infrastructure capable of
growing and maintaining stable economies to ensure NASA and American
enterprise can continue to explore and utilize space. To that end, NASA
needs to be a strong and diverse customer of the commercial space
industry.
Second, Bigelow Aerospace is committed to playing a vital role to
ensure that there is no ``space station'' gap like there was a
``shuttle gap'' that cut-off American independence in human
spaceflight. Bigelow Aerospace continues to develop partnerships with
launch providers and other companies to ensure that NASA and other
potential customers have alternatives and choices for the utilization
of affordable habitats. My company is ready to provide the means to
achieve the twin goals of exploration and the development of a
sustainable space economy. Bigelow Aerospace is ready to take the next
step in human spaceflight to ensure that America regains its leadership
role in the exploration of space. But in order to achieve a truly free
enterprise in space, NASA is too vital a customer to ignore. NASA needs
the necessary funding and policy direction to transition from the ISS
to supporting space missions based on utilization of commercially
supplied space habitats and other transportation assets.
Third, regulatory processes should be streamlined, transparent,
fair, and appealable. The proliferation of commercial activities in
space has led to many challenges for the industry and government. That
is why in 2013 Bigelow Aerospace asked the Federal Aviation
Administration's Office of Space Transportation (FAA AST) if there
would be any regulatory obstacles to launching and landing a Bigelow
habitat on the surface of the Moon. As a result of this trailblazing
effort, FAA AST, in consultation with the Department of State (DOS),
NASA, and several other relevant Federal entities, adopted a major
policy change regarding how to evaluate private sector missions to the
Moon. Through FAA AST leadership, the Federal government has begun to
understand that the commercial space industry needs a workable
framework to enable and support innovative commercial space activities
in space and on planetary bodies. I especially applaud the tremendous
efforts of FAA AST Associate Administrator George Neild, DOS Director
of the Office of Space and Advanced Technology Ken Hodgkins, and DOS
Attorney-Advisor Brian Israel in achieving this most productive policy
change. I know that Congressmen Brian Babin and Jim Bridenstine are
working hard to achieve the regulatory balance of liberty, safety, and
international obligations. We are grateful for all their efforts
because American leadership in space policy will be essential to expand
the American principles of free enterprise and self-determination into
space, enabling the same successes in space that these principles have
realized domestically.
Fourth, the Committee should take note of the strong international
competition China has created in their quest to develop their own
national space program--a program that is not disconnected from its own
military. As I understand it, the Chinese seek to develop their own
commercial space industry--I assume commercial with Chinese
characteristics. The Chinese government has made it known that it wants
to offer ``free access'' to other countries to utilize their national
space station in the near future. To that end, the Chinese and ISS
partner states have discussed international space cooperation and
partnerships. Among others, I am aware that the governments of China
and Italy have signed a memorandum of understanding regarding space
cooperation, and that many pressurized space modules are manufactured
in Italy. As a successful businessman, I know nothing is free. And
while our allies consider partnering with China, we should be mindful
of the strategic consequences that an engaged China could have on the
future of American enterprise in space. I urge the Committee to
consider the disruptive strategic role China will likely play as NASA
and the commercial space sector expand beyond low Earth orbit
especially in light of the Chinese launch of its first cargo spacecraft
to its unmanned space station to conduct a refueling mission last week.
I have had innumerable discussions about the future of space
exploration with many Americans, foreign officials, and business
people. One thing I think is clear, is that NASA is too focused on just
transportation systems to the ISS. Everyone wants to know: what are
NASA's plans to transition out of the ISS? Whether the ISS continues or
not, additional destinations besides the ISS are vital to sustain a
viable space crew and cargo enterprise with new markets that eventually
replace the ISS. NASA must transition out of low Earth orbit and into
deep space. I therefore urge the Committee to acknowledge that
developing new habitat systems that can carry humans, experiments,
cargo, and other technologies for the exploration of the Moon, Mars,
and other destinations must begin in low Earth orbit and then proceed
to cislunar space. Moreover, I believe that if initiated soon, Bigelow
Aerospace and other companies could provide a lunar depot using a B330
habitat station that would enable NASA and commercial entities access
to the Moon and cislunar space in a four year program. If we truly
commit to an initial destination in low Earth orbit then following
quickly to cislunar space, I believe that expandable habitats can offer
NASA and others the ability to test and gain experience for future
missions to the Moon and Mars.
I believe that this country has an opportunity in the very near
term to re-inspire our citizens and begin developing and marketing new
innovative space products and services to the American people and the
world. I believe that the next five years will be consequential to the
future success and health of a commercial space industry in LEO and
beyond LEO. I am eager to work with the Congress to find ways in which
we can ensure cost-effective, robust, and safe habitation systems that
will enable America to lead space exploration and commercialization to
make America great again in space!
This concludes my written remarks. Thank you and I look forward to
your questions.
The Chairman. Thank you, Mr. Bigelow.
Mr. Meyerson.
STATEMENT OF ROBERT MEYERSON, PRESIDENT,
BLUE ORIGIN
Mr. Meyerson. Chairman Cruz, Ranking Member Markey, Ranking
Member Nelson, and members of the Subcommittee, thank you for
the opportunity to speak with you today about reopening the
American frontier and Blue Origin's place in this future.
Blue Origin was founded to bring about a future where
millions of people are living and working in space, which would
certainly equate to a large expansion of the American frontier.
We believe that the backbone of this vision is to achieve full
operational reusability to lower the cost of access to space
and increase safety and reliability. We've recently made great
progress flying our fully reusable New Shepard vehicle to space
and back five times in less than 12 months and are now building
New Glenn which will launch people and payloads to low Earth
orbit and beyond.
The passage of the Commercial Space Launch Competitiveness
Act in 2015 helped lay the groundwork for much of what we plan
to do in the coming years, and for that, I would like to thank
you for your leadership. As you prepare to take the next step,
we would like to offer a few suggestions.
The FAA Office of Commercial Space Transportation, or AST,
does a good job of balancing its requirement to protect the
uninvolved public with its statutory mandate to promote the
commercial spaceflight industry. AST's budget has remained flat
for several years while the number of launches has continuously
increased. We join the rest of the commercial spaceflight
industry in urging Congress to increase funding for AST to
allow the office to operate as a responsive and effective
agency.
That said, we encourage Congress to ensure that AST is
prioritizing its resources on its current statutory mission. We
believe AST's resources are insufficient to meet its existing
obligations and do not believe AST should take on new
authorities now, such as on-orbit authority, space situational
awareness, or space traffic management. We want to work with
AST on the impending licensing traffic jam before they start
taking on orbital traffic jams.
As Blue Origin initiates the application to license our New
Glenn reusable launch vehicle, we are encountering conflicting
expectations on the regulatory process between FAA and the Air
Force. This conflict stems from the lack of a Federal
adaptation to the market, which is transitioning from
expendable rockets to reusable rockets. In contrast to those
for expendable rockets, the Air Force and AST licensing
requirements for reusable rockets are completely different from
each other.
While pursuing an FAA launch license for our New Glenn
launch at a Federal range, we simultaneously have an entirely
different but equally rigorous set of deliverables for the Air
Force, all for the exact same vehicle. This is duplicative and
onerous and will increase costs, delays, and uncertainty. In
his previous role as Commander of Air Force Space Command,
General Hyten wrote a Commander's Intent Memorandum in March
2016 which highlights the necessity for the Air Force to work
with the FAA to eliminate duplicative requirements and
approvals.
The leadership of the 45th Space Wing understands the need
to transition to a commercial model and has begun working with
Blue Origin and the rest of the industry to adapt processes to
facilitate these partnerships. That said, the leadership's
vision has not yet been fully adopted at all levels of the Air
Force. As a result, the Air Force has not yet realized its full
potential to move at the velocity required to support
commercial operators. We are hopeful that with continued
leadership from the Air Force, FAA, and this subcommittee, this
issue will be fully addressed in the near term.
Ultimately, we want AST to be the single point of contact
within the Government for all commercial launches. We would
like AST to have sole authority over launches and re-entries
without regard to location or type of launch. At Federal
ranges, commercial launches now require duplicative government
approvals, delaying launch activity and burdening launch
providers. This area is primed for increased efficiency in
government operators.
Finally, I'd like to express our strong support for NASA's
use of Other Transaction Authority Agreements and other
innovative contracting mechanisms, such as those used in
Commercial Crew and Cargo and the NextSTEP programs. Public-
private partnerships allow government and industry to work
toward common goals in a more efficient, agile, and cost-
effective manner and expands the resources available for space
exploration.
In March of this year, we announced the Blue Moon Lunar
Lander to land large amounts of payload on the lunar surface.
Blue Origin is willing to significantly invest in this
development as part of a public-private partnership with NASA
in the interest of achieving a return to the Moon, which we
believe to be a worthy national goal.
Thank you for the opportunity to testify before you today.
I look forward to working with you on an updated Commercial
Space Launch Act this Congress, and I look forward to answering
your questions.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Meyerson follows:]
Prepared Statement of Robert Meyerson, President, Blue Origin
Chairman Cruz, Ranking Member Markey, Chairman Thune, Ranking
Member Nelson, and members of the Subcommittee, thank you for the
opportunity to speak before you today about reopening the American
frontier, and Blue Origin's place in this future.
Lewis and Clark's preliminary exploration of the Pacific Coast in
1805 initiated 85 years of exploration and discovery of the American
Frontier. Following in their footsteps, settlers spread throughout the
Western territories, expanding American opportunity and realizing the
region's potential up until the Frontier's ``declared'' closure in
1890. Much like that 19th century expedition, NASA has been
trailblazing the space frontier for nearly 60 years, yet the same
expansion of American opportunity seen in the 1800s has not been fully
realized in space.
Jeff Bezos founded Blue Origin to bring about a future where
millions of people are living and working in space, which would
certainly equate to quite a large expansion of the American frontier.
As the company's president, it is my job to make this vision a reality
for humanity, our customers, and our now more than 1,000 people working
tirelessly for Blue Origin across the Nation. We believe that the
backbone of this vision is to achieve full operational reusability with
our launch vehicles which will lower the cost of access to space, at
higher flight rates and higher levels of safety and reliability. We
will get there through practice, and we've recently made great progress
flying our fully reusable New Shepard vehicle to space and back five
times in less than 12 months. We are now building New Glenn, our next-
generation reusable rocket which will launch people and payloads to low
Earth orbit and beyond.
Our near-term goal is to compete in the commercial market--whether
suborbital, orbital, or beyond--selling launch services and
technologies. We are building the next generation of transportation
infrastructure: reliable, affordable, frequent rides to space for
everything from suborbital tourism to long-range exploration, from
resource mining to microgravity manufacturing.
We recently entered into agreements with our first two commercial
satellite launch customers for our New Glenn vehicle. We are prepared
to partner with NASA for crewed and uncrewed space missions, including
a return to the Moon within the next four years. We are ready to help
end the military's reliance on Russian engines for our national
security launches. What makes us most excited about building this
infrastructure--this backbone--is the American entrepreneurialism that
will undoubtedly flourish in space.
The passage of the Commercial Space Launch Competitiveness Act in
2015 helped lay the groundwork for much of what we plan to do in the
coming years, and for that I would like to thank Chairman Cruz,
Chairman Thune, Senator Peters, Ranking Member Nelson, Senator Udall,
and the other members of this Subcommittee in the previous Congress for
your leadership. As you prepare to take the next step, we would like to
offer a few suggestions.
AST Focus/Resources
The FAA Office of Commercial Space Transportation, or AST, does a
good job of balancing its requirement to protect the uninvolved public
with its statutory mandate to promote the commercial spaceflight
industry in the United States. AST's budget has remained essentially
flat for several years, while the number of launches has continually
increased, and is likely to continue growing. We join the rest of the
commercial spaceflight industry in urging Congress to increase funding
for AST to allow the office to operate as a responsive and effective
agency.
That said, we encourage Congress to ensure that AST is prioritizing
its existing, and any new resources, on its current statutory mission.
As discussions continue on authorities that may be granted to AST in
the future, we believe that AST's resources are already insufficient to
meet its existing obligations; licensing launches, reentries and
spaceports. We recommend that AST not attempt to handle on-orbit
authority, space situational awareness, or space traffic management at
this time. We do not believe that AST should take on these new
authorities now, but we take no position here on whether any of these
roles may be appropriate for AST in the future.
Furthermore, Blue Origin strongly supports the continuation of both
the current launch indemnification regime and the learning period on
human spaceflight regulations. We encourage permanent indemnification
as well as ongoing Congressional advocacy and extensions of the
learning period. These policies allow the industry to focus on
continued maturation of innovative technologies without unnecessary
burdens.
Expendable v. Reusable and the Need for Streamlining
One specific example of the need for a single point of access and a
streamlined regulatory process is the transition from expendable
rockets to reusable rockets. Blue Origin is a leader of this
transition, having launched and landed the same rocket five times.
The licensing requirements for reusable rockets differ from those
for expendable rockets. In the case of expendable rockets, the Air
Force's requirements match AST's requirements almost word for word.
This means that a company can create a set of deliverables for the Air
Force and essentially provide the same information to AST to satisfy
launch license requirements. It is duplicative, but not onerous.
In contrast, the Air Force and AST licensing requirements for
reusable rockets are completely different from each other. Blue Origin
is seeking an AST reusable launch vehicle license for an orbital class
booster operating at a Federal Range. While pursing our FAA launch
license, we simultaneously have an entirely different but equally
rigorous set of deliverables for Air Force certification--all for the
exact same vehicle. This is duplicative and onerous.
The government is placing a requirement on Blue Origin and other
commercial companies that will increase costs, delays, and uncertainty.
Instead of encouraging and rewarding companies that are innovating and
driving launch costs down, the current process is punishing those
companies with red tape, and creating excessive barriers to launch.
In his previous role as Commander of U.S. Space Command, General
Hyten wrote a memorandum in March of 2016 on ``Commander's Intent on
Range Support to Commercial Space Launch.'' The memo highlights the
necessity for the Air Force to work with the FAA to eliminate
duplicative requirements and approvals in order to support ``a more
stable, predictable and efficient interaction with commercial space
activities.'' To effectively accomplish this mission, General Hyten
recognized the need to ``actively seek opportunities to adapt range
operations, processes and policy to flexibly accommodate all users.''
The leadership of the 45th Space Wing at Patrick Air Force Base in
Florida understands the need to transition to a commercial model, and
has begun working with Blue Origin and the rest of the industry to
adapt processes to facilitate these partnerships. That said, the
leadership's vision has not yet been fully adopted at all levels of the
Air Force. As a result, the Air Force has not yet realized its full
potential to move at the velocity required to support commercial
operators. We are hopeful that with continued leadership from the Air
Force, FAA, and this Subcommittee, this issue will be fully addressed
in the near term.
AST Licensing
Ultimately, we seek streamlined deliverables, irrespective of
vehicle type, in alignment with the structure of 14 C.F.R. Part 431,
``Launch and Reentry of a Reusable Launch Vehicle''. This means we want
AST as the single point of contact for any commercial spaceflight
company interactions with the government. We would like AST to have
sole authority over launches and reentries, without regard to location
or type of launch, consistent with the National Space Transportation
Policy. When operating our New Shepard reusable launch vehicle at our
private launch site in West Texas, the licensing process is much more
efficient since we deal only with the FAA. At Federal ranges, however,
licensing the same commercial launches requires duplicative government
approvals delaying launch activity and burdening launch providers--this
area is primed for increased efficiency in government operations.
Government Overreach
Recently Blue Origin and a number of other companies in the
industry received a notification from the U.S. Department of Commerce,
Bureau of Industry and Security that they are conducting a ``survey and
assessment of organizations responsible for the research, design,
engineering, development, manufacture, test, and integration of rocket
propulsion-related products and services.'' The survey is intended to
assess the health and competitiveness of the rocket propulsion
industrial base, and is apparently being shared with 400 propulsion
related organizations. The survey contains several hundred extremely
detailed questions, and we have some concerns with sharing our
proprietary and confidential information. Blue Origin is a private
company that is currently not participating in major government
contracts, and we are hoping to work with Congress and the Department
of Commerce to identify a reasonable path forward to share information.
NASA Public-Private Partnerships
The U.S. Government seeks to become more efficient, agile and cost-
effective through public-private partnerships. NASA's use of Other
Transaction Authority, Space Act Agreements, and other innovative
contracting mechanisms has produced incredible results while reducing
government spending. The unique risk-and-cost-sharing regimes, such as
those seen in the Commercial Crew, Cargo, and NextSTEP Programs, enable
true collaboration toward national space priorities.
We believe that the national goal should be to return to the Moon,
this time to stay. NASA has identified cislunar space as the strategic
high ground, an enabler of grander exploration into our solar system,
and a source of critical resources. In March of this year we announced
our Blue Moon Lunar Lander Mission, the capability to precisely soft-
land large amounts of payload on the lunar surface. Such capability is
a necessity for future lunar settlement and exploration. Blue Origin is
willing to significantly invest in this development as part of a
public-private partnership with NASA, in the interest of achieving this
ambitious national priority.
NASA Enhanced Use Leasing/In-Kind Consideration
NASA's Enhanced Use Leasing (EUL) authority allows NASA Centers to
lease underutilized NASA real property to private sector entities,
academic institutions, and state and local governments. The authority
helps preserve unique assets that NASA may want to use in the future,
rather than allowing them to fall into disrepair. EUL authority also
allows for a more productive use of the land that NASA must retain as a
``buffer zone'' around its launch and test sites. Revenues received
under EULs cover NASA's full costs in connection with the leases. Any
remaining proceeds must be used for maintenance, capital
revitalization, and improvement, thereby positioning the Agency to
reduce operating costs, incrementally improve facility conditions, and
improve mission effectiveness. The NASA Transition Authorization Act of
2017 extended NASA's EUL authority to the end of 2018.
We support extending EUL authority an additional five years, and
expanding the agency's authority to accept ``in-kind'' contributions
toward the lease. This will help NASA cultivate public-private
partnerships to transform underutilized real property, including launch
and test infrastructure remaining from the Apollo and Space Shuttle
eras, to serve broader science, exploration, defense, and commercial
interests. As an example this authority has been critical in helping
NASA's Kennedy Space Center create a multi-user spaceport environment
that is drawing commercial launch and satellite enterprises to
efficiently use once vacant buffer space while creating a thriving
commercial space nexus. Of course, any expansion of the authority
should protect against possible abuses, particularly for leases
involving in-kind contributions.
New Shepard Suborbital Research & NASA Flight Opportunities
Starting in 2016, Blue Origin began flying research payloads on our
New Shepard vehicle, allowing university researchers, corporate
technology developers, and even K-12 STEM programs to access the space
environment at lower cost and with lower barriers than ever before. The
results from these studies are changing the way we understand fields as
varied as fluid physics, spaceflight medicine, and planetary science.
Examples of payloads flying on New Shepard include:
Purdue University in Indiana, characterizing effective tank
geometries for in-space propellant management
Orbital Medicine, Inc. of Virginia, developing devices for
critical spaceflight medical care
A collaboration between the University of Central Florida,
Southwest Research Institute in Colorado, and the University of
Braunschweig in Germany to examine rock and particle collisions
in low-g environments, such as asteroids and the early solar
system
High school students in Washington State, studying the ways
that liquids of different densities behave in microgravity
NASA centers in both Ohio and Texas, characterizing
suborbital flight environments to support the agency's broader
research portfolio.
Today, the majority of Blue Origin's payloads are funded by NASA's
Flight Opportunities Program within the Space Technology Mission
Directorate (STMD). They serve to develop technologies for Earth-based
applications, orbital satellite missions, and ISS investigations. This
program has been critical in facilitating the use of emerging
suborbital commercial vehicles, like New Shepard, and we support full
funding for the Flight Opportunities line item in future NASA
appropriations. Additionally, we strongly encourage NASA's efforts to
widen this aperture beyond STMD to include the broader agency's science
and education objectives.
As we enter the era of frequent private human spaceflight, Blue
Origin looks forward to taking both tourists and researchers aboard New
Shepard. We ask that Congress direct NASA to remove the barriers that
exist today for experts seeking to conduct hands-on research aboard
suborbital vehicles. Furthermore, we advocate for human-tended
suborbital research to be treated in the same manner as other
challenging laboratory environments, such as undersea and Antarctic
outposts, and not as equivalent to commercial orbital crew.
Ultimately, as the cost and frequency of space access dramatically
improves with vehicles like New Shepard, spaceflight R&D is growing
beyond its cradle at NASA. We are entering an era where every
Congressional district and every Federal agency should evaluate how it
can take advantage of the space environment for discovery-based
science, technology breakthroughs, inspiring STEM learners, and
catalyzing American business innovation. We hope Congress will join us
in this broader view, and will consider how this new era supports not
only NASA's objectives, but those of the wider government and the
entire nation.
National Security
Air University recently published a report that highlights the
necessity for the Department of Defense to take advantage of commercial
spaceflight capabilities to increase Air Force resiliency in space and
extend the service's reach. Doing so will allow the government to
leverage fast, low-cost access to space. While we recognize that it may
be many years before the Air Force is prepared to use a flown rocket,
Blue Origin has stepped in to assist the Air Force in assuring access
to space with our BE-4 rocket engine. A 550,000lbf thrust liquid
oxygen, liquefied natural gas engine, the BE-4 is in full-scale testing
and is the fastest path and lowest cost option to end American reliance
on Russian rocket engines.
Conclusions
Blue Origin was founded to bring about a future where millions of
people are living and working in space. With low-cost, safe, and
frequent access--achieved through reusable launch technology--an
entrepreneurial explosion can begin in space, irreversibly expanding
the American Frontier.
Addressing the below recommendations will allow the government and
industry to interact more efficiently, develop stronger partnerships
towards shared goals, and work toward America's full potential in
space.
AST Focus/Resources--Increasing funding for FAA AST and
encouraging prioritization of their current mandates will allow
the office to continue operating as a responsive and effective
agency.
AST Licensing--Designating AST as the single point of
contact for commercial space companies will eliminate
duplicative approvals and streamline the launch process.
Expendable vs. Reusable--Embracing and readying for the next
generation of reusable vehicles will allow the government to
fully realize a new era of low-cost launch for its most
valuable payloads.
Public-Private Partnerships--Increasing the pursuit of
innovative public-private partnerships, like the proposed Blue
Moon lunar lander mission, will allow us to collectively
achieve ambitious national priorities at the lowest cost.
NASA Enhanced Use Leasing (EUL)--A five-year extension of
NASA's EUL authority and ``in-kind consideration'' will
reinvigorate and preserve underutilized property, often of vast
historical national significance.
Suborbital Research--Renewed and ongoing support for
suborbital research will not only change the way we understand
fields like science and medicine, but will also grant students
unprecedented, low-cost access to space.
National Security--The Blue Origin BE-4 American made engine
is the fastest path and lowest cost option to end American
reliance on Russian rocket engines.
Thank you for the opportunity to testify before you today. I look
forward to working with you on an updated Commercial Space Launch Act
this Congress.
The Chairman. Thank you.
Mr. Whitesides.
STATEMENT OF GEORGE WHITESIDES, CEO,
GALACTIC VENTURES
Mr. Whitesides. Chairman Cruz, Ranking Member Markey,
Ranking Member Nelson, and members of the Subcommittee, thank
you for the opportunity to testify today about how our
companies can help reopen the American frontier in space.
Space represents the best of America: discovery,
inspiration, cooperation, but also courage, competitiveness,
and resolute determination. The women and men in our company,
as in others, I consider among the American explorers of the
21st century.
I'm the CEO of Virgin's Galactic Ventures, and I'm here to
represent our human spaceflight program as well as our small
satellite launch capability. We have three commercial space
companies within the Virgin space portfolio: Virgin Galactic,
Virgin Orbit, and The Spaceship Company. Together, our team
employs over 800 direct staff and many more contractors and
suppliers across virtually every state in the nation, and we
look forward to commercial operations in Senator Udall's state
soon.
Virgin Galactic will operate SpaceShipTwo, a suborbital
spaceflight system that is manufactured and tested by The
Spaceship Company. SpaceShipTwo is a rocket plane that is
deployed from a carrier aircraft called WhiteKnightTwo and is
designed to safely transport people and payloads to space on a
frequent basis. Ultimately, we aspire to evolve this technology
to provide high-speed, point-to-point transportation services
between continents.
Galactic's sister company, Virgin Orbit, is developing and
manufacturing a dedicated orbital rocket for small satellites
called LauncherOne. LauncherOne is a two-stage, liquid
propulsion rocket deployed from a Boeing 747 that we ultimately
plan to operate weekly.
Today, hundreds of companies around the world as well as
many important parts of the U.S. Government are developing
small satellites for everything from communications to remote
sensing applications. LauncherOne will offer a flexible and
affordable launch service for such satellites beginning in
2018. Both SpaceShipTwo and LauncherOne will operate under an
FAA operator's license issued by the Office of Commercial Space
Transportation, or AST.
The U.S. has always been a global leader in space, in part
because Congress has created a regulatory and policy
environment that supports commercial space companies by
prioritizing safety without stifling private sector innovation.
The regulatory learning period is a great example of this.
However, to continue our Nation's supportive policies as
launch providers go from test to operations, it is important to
adapt and address new issues facing the industry. For example,
AST must have sufficient resources to successfully undertake
its current responsibilities in an era of increased space
launch activity and the ability to adjust its policies and
practices to respond to industry developments.
As the Government seeks to develop new and innovative space
capabilities, whether for civil or defense purposes, it should
encourage partnerships with the commercial space sector through
firm fixed price contracts and efficient acquisition
strategies. Above all, the Government should refrain from using
taxpayer dollars to fund programs that directly compete with
commercially available or emerging services and strive to
leverage its taxpayer dollars by using commercial services
wherever possible. NASA is already doing this in efforts such
as the Flight Opportunities Program that purchases capacity on
reusable suborbital vehicles for research payloads and in its
Venture Class Launch Services program that uses small launchers
to place cubesats in orbit.
The Government should support policies that allow for
domestic industry growth and increased capture of global market
share. For example, the Government should vigorously continue
its export control reform efforts. Domestically, Congress
should work to ensure that disparate state laws and regulations
do not create unanticipated barriers to innovation and growth.
Finally, the Government should continue its longstanding
policy forbidding the commercial use of excess ICBM assets or
else risk a catastrophic impact on the U.S. launch industrial
base that would undermine national security and civil space
objectives. Since multiple new privately developed vehicles
will be entering the marketplace over the next 2 years, there
is no reason to change this longstanding policy.
Our companies are dedicated to providing frequent,
reliable, and safe transportation to space for humans and
payloads. Our vehicles, along with other commercial space
companies, will continue to push Earth's economics sphere
outward. This subcommittee is helping to ensure that the U.S.
continues to play a leading role in exploring and democratizing
the next great frontier. We look forward to working with you on
these and future issues.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Whitesides follows:]
Prepared Statement of George Whitesides, CEO, Galactic Ventures
Chairman Cruz, Ranking Member Markey, and Members of the
Subcommittee, thank you for giving me the opportunity to provide
testimony for your hearing on ``Reopening the American Frontier'' I am
here representing Virgin Orbit, Virgin Galactic, and The Spaceship
Company. I will provide an overview of our current activities and our
thoughts on the present and future environment for commercial space
operations in the U.S.
I am the CEO of Galactic Ventures and in this role, I am
responsible for guiding all aspects of building the world's first
commercial spaceline which includes both our human spaceflight program
as well as our small satellite launch capability. Galactic Ventures has
three privately-funded commercial space companies within its portfolio:
Virgin Galactic, which will operate a suborbital spacecraft
for the purpose of space tourism and research
The Spaceship Company, which designs, manufactures and tests
our suborbital human spaceflight system
Virgin Orbit, which is developing, and manufacturing a
dedicated, small launch platform for satellites which they will
also operate
Three separate companies, but one shared vision for providing
frequent, reliable and safe access to space for all. In the past few
years, our companies have collectively grown from a handful of
employees to providing roughly 1,000 direct jobs, and supporting
another 1,000 indirect jobs in the aerospace sector.
Thank you for holding this important hearing about the U.S.'s role
in exploring the next important frontier. The U.S. has always been a
global leader in space. In part because Congress has worked diligently
to create a regulatory and policy environment that is supportive of
commercial space companies. The United States is, quite literally,
undergoing a renaissance in space science and technology. New companies
are introducing satellites technologies that allow for increased
capabilities in smaller, more affordable, packages. A new, globally
competitive domestic launch industry is looking to make space
transportation more frequent, reliable, and safe. This new marketplace
even reaches beyond the confines of our planet and serious ideas are in
development to better link private sector energies with the NASA
exploration vision. This industry is not only important for our future
in space, but it is contributing to high-tech jobs and inspiring a new
generation of scientists, engineers, and entrepreneurs in our country
today.
In my written remarks, I will go over some key issues that are
currently contributing to our leadership in space, as well as those
that still need to be addressed such as:
The current regulatory environment for our industry that
prioritizes safety without over-reach, including:
The continued need to regulate based on data rather
than analysis.
The need for a permanent indemnification regime for
launch competitiveness overseas.
Streamlining the licensing of hybrid vehicles--those
that include elements of both aircraft and spacecraft--and
their operations.
The need for legal clarity for informed consent
through the requirement of cross-waivers.
The continued need to mature and expand our concept of
public private partnerships to ensure that commercial space
sector plays a pivotal role in both civil and national security
programs.
Continued support for Government policy that restricts the
use of ICBMs for commercial purposes. Allowing ICBMs into the
commercial marketplace will irreparably damage an emerging
domestic launch sector.
Support for the Ex-Im bank and other policies such as export
control reform that will keep the commercial space sector a
global leader in space transportation and applications.
Virgin Galactic
Virgin Galactic is at the forefront of an important emerging market
that is developing suborbital spaceflight experiences for humans,
commonly referred to as ``space tourism,'' as well as for research
payloads. Founded by Sir Richard Branson and based in Mojave,
California, we are opening access to space to change the world for
good. Virgin Galactic's voyages will allow people to experience true
microgravity, and to see the Earth from space. In addition, Virgin
Galactic will also provide access to the microgravity environment for
research, education and other industrial applications to develop and
test new applications.
Based on the historic SpaceShipOne vehicle built by Scaled
Composites--which safely carried human beings into space in 2004,
claiming the Ansari X PRIZE and becoming the only privately-operated
human spaceflight vehicle to do so to date--Virgin Galactic's vehicles
have been designed with the intention of opening up frequent access to
space while setting new standards for safety, frequency, flexibility,
and cost. Our suborbital spaceflight system consists of two vehicles:
WhiteKnightTwo (pictured in Figure 1 below) is a four-engine, dual-
fuselage jet aircraft capable of high-altitude heavy lift missions,
including but not limited to fulfilling its role as a mothership for
SpaceShipTwo (shown in Figure 2), a suborbital spaceplane designed to
safely and routinely transport people and payloads to space and back.
SpaceShipTwo will carry two pilots and as many as six spaceflight
participants or about 1,000 pounds of science and technology payloads
to space altitudes, where they will have exposure to 3-4 minutes of a
high-quality microgravity environment.
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Figure 1: WhiteKnightTwo Carrier Aircraft, VMS EVE
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Figure 2: SpaceShipTwo, VSS Unity manufactured by The Spaceship
Company
The current SpaceShipTwo, named the VSS Unity, is currently
undergoing flight test, and was manufactured in Mojave, California by
Virgin Galactic's manufacturing wing, The Spaceship Company. Commercial
operations will be based in New Mexico at Spaceport America, the
world's first purpose-built commercial spaceport.
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Figure 3: WhiteKnightTwo and SpaceShipTwo in their mated
configuration during a test flight in March 2017
The Spaceship Company
Virgin Galactic's manufacturing wing is The Spaceship Company,
which is made up of an experienced team that designs, manufactures,
tests and supports unique and innovative aerospace vehicles. They offer
an extensive set of capabilities through the full lifecycle of high and
unique performance vehicles through preliminary vehicle design,
manufacturing, ground testing, propulsion, flight testing and post-
delivery support. They manufacture the fleet of SpaceShipTwos and
WhiteKnightTwos for Virgin Galactic, and are currently flight testing
VSS Unity.
Virgin Orbit
In addition to human spaceflight, Virgin Galactic's sister company,
Virgin Orbit, will provide dedicated, responsive, and affordable launch
services for small satellites. Today, hundreds of companies around the
world are developing small satellites for everything from
communications to remote sensing applications. To help this small
satellite revolution, Virgin Orbit is developing LauncherOne, a
flexible launch service for commercial and government-built satellites.
The LauncherOne platform is dedicated to the task of lowering the cost
and increasing the frequency of space access for payloads in the 150
kg-500 kg weight range.
LauncherOne (shown in Figure 4) is a two stage, liquid propulsion
(LOX/RP) rocket launched from a carrier aircraft. The carrier aircraft
is a modified 747-400 (shown in Figure 5) that will carry the launch
vehicle under the port side wing between the fuselage and inboard
engine to the appropriate altitude before launch. Once released from
the carrier aircraft, LauncherOne will fire its single main stage
engine, a 73,500 lbf, LOX/RP-1 rocket engine. After stage separation,
the single upper stage engine, a 5,000 lbf LOX/RP-1 rocket engine will
carry the satellite (or satellites) into orbit. At the end of this
sequence, LauncherOne will deploy our customers' satellites into their
desired orbit.
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Figure 4: LauncherOne vehicle
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Figure 5: Modified Boeing 787-400 carrying the LauncherOne rocket
Currently, Virgin Orbit is working towards initial test flights of
the LauncherOne system. Virgin Orbit will operate LauncherOne under a
FAA AST license and will initially launch from Mojave Air & Space Port,
but will eventually operate from other licensed sites.
The Regulatory Environment
Virgin Galactic, The Spaceship Company, and Virgin Orbit are a part
of a robust and growing domestic commercial space industry. This U.S.-
based space sector is made up of companies with private financial
backing working on a myriad of missions from rocket launch, human
spaceflight, satellite constellations, to beyond Low-Earth Orbit (LEO)
operations such as asteroid mining, lunar landers, and in-space
habitats. The commercial space industry is well underway and poised to
continue its growth.
The Commercial Space Launch Act as amended and re-codifed at 51
U.S.C. Ch. 509, Sec. Sec. 50901-23, authorizes the Department of
Transportation, and by delegations the Federal Aviation
Administration's office of Commercial Spaceflight (AST), to oversee,
authorize, and regulate commercial launch and reentry vehicles. FAA
AST's regulatory authority over commercial launch and reentry is
expansive when it comes to protecting public safety, national security
and U.S. foreign policy interests, but is limited outside of those
areas. This is significantly different than how the FAA regulates
aviation activities today. However, this regulatory approach is
necessary to encourage the emerging commercial space industry while
prioritizing the safety of the uninvolved public. Recognizing the
importance of these principles for the development of the commercial
space industry, we applaud Congress for reaffirming them in the
Commercial Space Launch Competitiveness Act of 2015.
As we look to the future, Congress has an opportunity to build on
the success of the Commercial Space Launch Competitiveness Act (CSLCA)
in several areas:
The Regulatory Learning Period
Congress has long recognized that the commercial spaceflight
industry is too dynamic and too early in its development cycle for the
kind of full-scale regulation that characterizes air travel. Congress
also recognized that it is impossible for regulators to know enough
yet, about how to regulate a group of vehicles as diverse and
innovative as our industry is developing. The solution was to create a
statutory regulatory learning period, during which AST may regulate for
the safety of the uninvolved public, or in response to an incident, but
not prospectively otherwise.
This learning period was initially enacted in 2004 to allow the
commercial space industry to create a sufficient database of knowledge
on which to base future commercial space regulations. However, due to
technical and economic challenges and industry's emphasis on safety,
commercial space companies did not progress as quickly as was once
envisioned. Congress correctly acknowledged that the learning period
had not yet accomplished its intended purpose and extended the learning
period to 2023 in the CSLCA. The learning period gives AST the
opportunity to collaborate with industry so that both AST and industry
better understand how to operate safely. The learning period also
enables commercial spaceflight companies to innovate for safety more
quickly than they could if regulations were in place. Any update of
CSLCA should maintain the learning period.
Indemnification
Since 1988, U.S. law has included a third-party risk-sharing regime
for FAA-licensed commercial space launches and reentries that allows
U.S. companies to compete more effectively with their foreign
competitors. Passed by multiple Congresses, this ``indemnification''
regime requires companies to buy commercial insurance or demonstrate
available financial resources to cover any third-party damages up to
the Maximum Probable Loss, which is calculated by the FAA pursuant to
Federal regulation (and which is calculated to be exceeded in only one
in a million launches). In exchange, the Secretary of Transportation
commits to seek funds to pay third-party claims above that level, up to
a statutory cap--which would require another separate action by
Congress. However, no claim to date has ever been triggered. Without
these means of limiting catastrophic risk, both the industry and the
Federal government would be subject to significant legal risk. The
CSLCA extended indemnification to 2025. We encourage this Subcommittee
to study and consider a permanent indemnification regime for the U.S.
launch industry. The Congressional Budget Office has scored
indemnification as no cost to the government. The government receives
the benefit of indemnification for all claims up to the Maximum
Probable Loss.
The current regulatory regime should continuously adapt as the
industry continues to grow and deploy new technologies. While we
appreciate and applaud Congress' tremendous efforts on the CSLCA of
2015, there are still outstanding regulatory issues facing our industry
today--such as:
Cross-waivers
Under the Commercial Space Launch Amendments Act (CSLAA),
Commercial human spaceflight operators operate under an informed
consent regime, requiring them to inform spaceflight participants of
the inherent risks of space flight and the specific safety record of
the vehicle type for their flight. In general, spaceflight participants
must state in writing that they understand that the U.S. Government has
not certified the space launch or reentry vehicle as safe and they must
be informed of the risks of the vehicle they are boarding. Six states,
each home to existing or proposed spaceports, have passed varying
levels of informed consent requirements to protect vehicle operators
from claims from spaceflight participants. All state laws exclude
injuries sustained by spaceflight participants that are the result of
gross negligence or intentional misconduct. While these statutes all
require that a licensee obtain informed consent from each spaceflight
participant, state courts have yet to discuss and interpret the
application of this statute to their current body of law. As a result,
it is possible that different jurisdictions will arrive at different
interpretations of these rules.
This lack of legal consistency between the CSLAA and local state
law could undercut the Federal statutory mandate to promote the health
of the commercial space transportation industry. To encourage the
successful growth of the U.S. commercial spaceflight industry, and its
operators, manufacturers, and suppliers, Congress should implement a
predictable and consistent national legal environment.
Streamlining Hybrid Regulations
Virgin Galactic and Virgin Orbit's vehicles form a hybrid launch
system involving both an aircraft and a rocket-powered vehicle.
WhiteKnightTwo operates under an Experimental Airworthiness Certificate
(EAC) issued by FAA's office of Aviation Safety (AVS). When the WK2/SS2
vehicle pair perform test flights where SS2's rocket motor is not used,
the pair operates under an EAC. However, if the vehicle pair takes
flight with the intention of lighting the rocket motor, they operate
under an AST Operator's License. Virgin Galactic received its
Operator's License for SpaceShipTwo from FAA AST in July of 2016. The
license was the culmination of years of interaction with the AST and
required in-depth reviews of the vehicle's system design, safety and
flight trajectory. Both AVS and AST have tremendous expertise in their
respective fields and in our case, have been willing to work with us to
meet our flight test schedule. However, while looking to the future as
more vehicles and flights come online, streamlining the regulatory
environment for hybrid vehicles--in a manner that keeps pace with the
industry's rapid tech advancement without overly complex procedures--
would be a welcome improvement to the current process.
Space Support Vehicles
Operating WK2 and SS2 under the EAC for certain flight operations
restricts use of the vehicles to flights not for-hire. WhiteKnightTwo's
primary purpose is to enable the launch of SpaceShipTwo. However, due
to the capabilities of WK2, there has been interest in using the
aircraft for spaceflight participant training purposes, and for
research payloads as WK2's ceiling is higher than most commercial
aircraft. We are currently unable to do those types of commercial
activities without filing for a waiver. We recommend Congress address
the issue of the use of ``Space Support Vehicles'' for hire either
through streamlining the licensing for these types of vehicles or
implementing new regulatory guidelines.
AST/ATO Coordination/Commercial Space Integration into the Air Space
We represent only two of several different commercial space launch
vehicles operating today and while all are different, commercial space
operations are not currently a large user of the NAS. Furthermore,
because both their speed and their direction of flight are so different
from aircraft, rockets and spaceplanes typically occupy the NAS for
only a few minutes or even seconds per flight, rather than lingering or
passing through the airspace for hours at a time. However, as the
industry's launch cadence increases, it drives the need for efficient
and streamlined processes for continued seamless integration into the
airspace. For example, as part of the AST license issuance, Virgin
Galactic coordinated with the FAA Air Traffic Organization (ATO) and
the local Air Traffic Control (ATC) to receive Letters of Agreement
(LOA) to define operations in the national airspace. The current
process used to get a LOA is lengthy and requires conversations with
multiple elements within the FAA. A much more streamlined process
should be in place for future operations.
The number of commercial launches has been increasing over the past
few years and will continue to do so in the years ahead as the industry
continues to grow. This drives the need for an efficient, defined
process as well as technical tools, like the Space Data Integrator
Prototype being developed by the FAA's Tech Center. The Space Data
Integrator, when fully developed, will automate the current manual
processes used by the FAA to monitor launch and reentry operations and
will be able to respond to off-nominal scenarios to ensure the safety
of the National Airspace System (NAS). Automated data flow also
provides opportunities for more dynamic and efficient airspace
management.
The CSLAA built the foundation for a regulatory regime that
protects public safety while allowing for rapid innovation and
continuous improvements in the launch vehicle industry. The legislation
correctly recognized that regulatory uncertainty or over-reach can
strangle the American commercial space business. As industry continues
to grow, the regulatory environment must allow for continuous
improvements and innovations as well. However, to effectively do so,
AST needs sufficient resources to support increased commercial space
launch activity as well as incorporate next-gen technologies for ever
increasing safety of operations. Virgin looks forward to continuing our
work with the FAA to keep the skies ever safer while reaching new
heights for commercial space operations.
Public Private Partnerships/Use of Commercial Services
As the Government seeks to develop new and innovative space
capabilities, whether for civil or defense purposes, it should
encourage partnership with the commercial space sector through firm-
fixed price contracts and efficient acquisition strategies. The success
of public private partnerships was recently exemplified though the
achievement of NASA's Commercial Cargo Resupply Program. Public private
partnerships and the use of commercial services will be key in
furthering our space exploration program to reach new destinations.
The Government should refrain from using taxpayer dollars to fund
programs that directly compete with commercially available or emerging
services. In fact, in a tight budgetary environment, the U.S.
Government should strive to use commercial services wherever possible.
NASA is already doing this in its programs such as the Flight
Opportunities Program that purchases capacity on commercial reusable
suborbital vehicles for technology development and research payloads,
as well as its Venture Class Launch Services program that uses
commercial small launchers to place cubesats in orbit to conduct
research for the Science Mission Directorate in which Virgin Orbit was
awarded a launch. This allows the government to leverage already
invested private sector capital to meet their agency goals while
supporting the U.S. space industrial base. We strongly support both
programs.
However, current acquisition processes and requirements are seen by
the commercial space sector as contributing to increased costs,
extended mission timelines and reduced capability due to heavy
requirements that prefer reducing risk at all cost. The Government
should review and revise acquisition processes for commercial services
with an emphasis on rapid procurement of innovative capabilities for
both civil and national security purposes.
Damaging Impact of Potential Commercial ICBM Use
Finally, to continue the growth of U.S. domestic launch capability,
the Government should maintain its longstanding policy forbidding the
commercial use of excess ICBM assets. Releasing ICBMs for use as
commercial launch vehicles would have an adverse impact on the U.S.
launch industrial base and would undermine national security and civil
space objectives. Since multiple, new, privately developed vehicles
will be entering the marketplace over the next two years, there is no
reason to change this longstanding policy.
International Competitiveness
Financing from export credit agencies is often a critical
competitive factor in international satellite sales and launch service
deals. Many countries that are active in the global launch and
satellite marketplace offer this kind of financing in some capacity. In
2014, financing support for the space industry started becoming the
fastest-growing sector at the Export-Import Bank of the United States
(Ex-Im). Ex-Im helped to level the international playing field for U.S.
companies, and the Bank's prudent lending practices have led it to
consistently be a net positive contributor to the U.S. Treasury.
However, since July of 2015, the Ex-Im bank has been unavailable to
U.S. exporters due to delayed congressional reauthorization and
currently, vacancies on the Bank's Board of Directors. International
competitors have access to credit that U.S. companies do not without
the Ex-Im bank, which essentially tips the playing field in favor of
our foreign competitors to the detriment of the U.S. space industrial
base.
Finally, I would be remiss if I did not mention the importance that
export control, and more importantly, export control reform, has on our
competitiveness overseas. The commercial spaceflight industry
recognizes the important national security interests at stake, but
overly restrictive export control regulations can obstruct an industry
from capturing global market share while failing to prevent
proliferation. As technologies continue to develop and enter the
commercial marketplace, the International Traffic in Arms Regulations
must be reviewed and updated to adequately control the flow of
technology and information without stifling American innovation or
business. This includes modernizing the Missile Control Technology
Regime regulations to accommodate 21st century space systems such as
commercial space tourism.
Our companies are dedicated to providing frequent, reliable, and
safe transportation to space for humans and payloads. Our vehicles,
along with other commercial space companies working to provide services
in LEO and beyond will continue to push Earth's economic sphere
outward. This Subcommittee is helping to ensure that the United States
continues to play a leading role in exploring and democratizing the
next great frontier. We look forward to working with you on these and
future issues.
The Chairman. Thank you.
Mr. Rush.
STATEMENT OF ANDREW RUSH, CEO, MADE IN SPACE, INC.
Mr. Rush. Chairman Cruz, Ranking Member Markey, Ranking
Member Nelson, and members of the Subcommittee, thank you for
the opportunity to speak with you today.
As CEO of Made In Space, I have the immense privilege of
leading an incredibly passionate and talented team in pursuit
of making the cislunar economy a reality. We want to see people
sustainably commercially living and working in space. We're
developing space-capable manufacturing technologies because we
believe that manufacturing in space is a key enabler of the
cislunar economy.
As a young company with no outside investment, our founding
team started with small practical steps, a philosophy we still
apply today. By working with a variety of groups and leveraging
infrastructure I'll be talking about in a moment, we've made
real progress.
After initially demonstrating 3D printing in microgravity
via NASA's Flight Opportunities Program, Made In Space was
granted a series of SBIR contracts allowing us to work with
Marshall Space Flight Center to build and launch a 3D printer
to the International Space Station. In 2014, that device
produced the very first objects to ever be manufactured off the
face of the planet.
This capability is paradigm shifting, because it allows us
to produce spares, parts, and fixes, on demand, on the spot.
Without infrastructure like the Flight Opportunities Program,
the SBIR program, and the International Space Station, we could
not have developed this capability at the price that we've
developed it at nor in a step-by-step fashion.
We're now building on this foundation in other ways. In
March 2016, under a user agreement with the Center for the
Advancement of Science in Space, CASIS, our second generation
3D printer that we own and operate was launched to the
International Space Station. This device, called AMF, has been
operating profitably on the International Space Station for a
year, producing parts for a wide variety of government and
commercial customers. In fact, the very first customer was the
home improvement giant, Lowe's.
Operating on the International Space Station is a crucial
stepping stone to sustainable commercial activity in space
because it allows for the refinement of technology and
incubates cislunar economic business models. In late 2016, via
a public-private partnership, a Made In Space-led team began
work for NASA's Space Technology Mission Directorate to develop
large-scale, in-space additive manufacturing and assembly
technologies. We call this system Archinaut.
Archinaut enables the optimization of spacecraft structures
for their operational environment, for the microgravity
environment, rather than having to primarily design them to
survive launch. This technology enables us to build large
structures at lower cost in space, enables the robotic
manufacturing assembly of large reflectors, space stations, and
other applications for civil, defense, and space customers. We
applaud the use and expansion of public-private partnerships
which focus on delivering capabilities which are useful to both
the Government and the private sector.
American free enterprise in space can also be expanded via
manufacturing of space-enabled materials. These are materials
which, due to being manufactured in space, have emergent
beneficial properties for use here down on the Earth. These
materials are produced in space and then brought back to Earth
for sale and utilization.
Now, on the International Space Station National Lab, Made
In Space will soon be manufacturing ZBLAN, a space-enabled
optical fiber which market research indicates can be profitably
sold when launching raw materials from Earth. ZBLAN promises to
deliver significantly better signal throughput than traditional
fiber for telecommunications applications, a $2 billion a year
market.
We have self-funded the development of a pilot facility
that we launched and operated on the ISS this year, and we
intend to expand production further on the ISS and eventually
move to commercial platforms in space, opening the door for the
industrial production of thousands of kilometers of material a
year. This would not be achievable without the infrastructure
of the ISS National Lab and the research into ZBLAN's promise
and properties performed by personnel at NASA Ames Research
Center, NASA Marshall Space Flight Center, and other
facilities.
In closing, we at Made In Space are grateful for the
support that we have received. We encourage continued operation
and expansion of the infrastructure that I've just described.
It has allowed us and other companies to develop capabilities
in a step-by-step fashion, creating solutions for both the
public and the private sectors. We strongly believe that in-
space manufacturing will be an anchor tenet of the cislunar
economy and encourage this subcommittee to take steps to ensure
that it flourishes.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Rush follows:]
Prepared Statement of Andrew Rush, CEO, Made In Space, Inc.
Introduction
Made In Space, Inc. (Made In Space, MIS), seeks to develop products
and services that will enable and drive people to one day sustainably
live and work in space. In 2014, Made In Space hardware successfully
produced the first functional objects manufactured off the face of the
planet. Today, Made In Space has several in-space manufacturing
programs underway and is commercially manufacturing for customers
aboard the International Space Station. This success would not be
possible without the Small Business Innovation Research Program, NASA
support, and access to the International Space Station National Lab.
Via in-space manufacturing, Made In Space is developing the first
factories in space which will produce high-value goods for use on
Earth. These factories may one day be the anchor tenants of commercial
space stations.
Made In Space strongly encourages continued support of programs
which enable the step-by-step development of new commercial space
capabilities, including the SBIR program, NASA's Flight Opportunities
Program, and the International Space Station National Lab. Made In
Space believes that personal and intellectual property created by
commercial enterprises in space and aboard the International Space
Station should be owned by the commercial entity. Further, Made In
Space encourages the creation of a transition plan to commercial space
stations before the International Space Station is decommissioned and
expanded support for commercial activity aboard the International Space
Station in order to effectively foster the birth of the cislunar
economy as NASA's activities looks deeper into space.
The Cislunar Economy Is Coming
This is a unique time in history. Although the creation of a
cislunar economy has long been discussed and dreamed of, sustainable,
space-based, commercial manufacturing, tourism, and research and
development has long been elusive. Today, sustained progress is being
made toward this dream because the basic technological and regulatory
framework exists to allow growth of space-based businesses.
We are on the cusp of the next great American technological boom:
the creation of a sustainable cislunar economy. This boom is not
guaranteed. Investments must continue in order to properly germinate
this boom. This boom will encompass commercial satellites leveraging
the best technology the American semiconductor industry has to offer,
consistent space tourism activity sending people on suborbital,
orbital, and translunar adventures, space-based research and
development discovering new drug and compound formulations which can be
made on Earth, and space-based manufacturing of products for use on
Earth which provide revolutionary capability due to being manufactured
in the microgravity environment of space.
Like every boom that has come before, from the smartphone
revolution, to the Internet boom, reaching back to the booms like the
one brought on by the discovery of oil at Oil Creek, Pennsylvania the
mid-19th century, many approaches will be tried, to varying success. In
the creative destruction of progress, many will try. Some will fail.
Some will succeed. Importantly, space entrepreneurs must be allowed to
experiment, fail in small or grand ways, succeed in small or grand
ways, and scale their businesses as the market demands.
Infrastructure enables and enhances economic booms. Without public
and private investments in things like ARPANET and legislative actions
to enable profit making via the Internet, the Internet boom would never
have happened. Without investment, maintenance, and enhancement of the
Global Positioning System, businesses and services like Yelp and Google
Maps could not exist and our smartphones would be pale shadows of the
powerful devices they are today. Going back further, without railway
and eventually pipeline infrastructure created by public and private
entities, transportation and refining of oil into kerosene and other
products would have been severely constrained.
A boom in commerce in low Earth orbit and beyond will be no
different. This space boom will be built upon infrastructure
investments by both the private sector and the public sector. Some of
this infrastructure exists already. The International Space Station
(ISS), the International Space Station National Lab, and the regular
human and cargo missions to and from that installation enable world
beating scientific research and development, new understanding of the
effects of space on the human body, and provide a platform for
pathfinding the technologies and business models that may become the
anchor tenants of future commercial space stations.
Crucially, the ISS allows deployment and operation of payloads to
space at a fraction of the mass a free flying satellite would require
to support the payload. Combined with the frequent cargo modules
launched to the ISS, this creates an ecosystem which allows payloads to
be flown to space and operated at a low price point and a frequency
that is currently unattainable by the orbital launch industry. At a
relatively low cost, this infrastructure allows commercial companies to
develop technologies, test business models, and make profits that may
one day support sustainable operations in commercial space stations or
free flying satellites, where the full promise of sustainable
commercial space industry will be realized and billions in revenues
will be generated.
The ISS allows development, testing, and deployment of pilot
commercial facilities for investments on the order of millions of
dollars, amounts of money that can be realistically attained through
private investment or public sources, such as the Small Business
Innovation Research program. Without this infrastructure, such
development and deployment would cost a hundred million dollars or
more; an amount of money which is rarely invested in unproven space
technologies by either the private or public sector.
Like the ISS and the ISS National Lab, other infrastructure
supports the gradual, step-by-step transition of technologies which
will enable a space-based economic boom from the drawing board to full
scale operation in space. The increasing availability of parabolic
aircraft flights and suborbital rocket flights provides very low cost
to no cost testing of technologies in short bursts of microgravity
ranging from twenty seconds to several minutes. This enables low-cost
prototypes to be tested in their intended operational environment,
without the enormous expense of orbital launch. NASA's Flight
Opportunities Program has long provided these flights to researchers
and entrepreneurial companies, laying the groundwork for government and
commercial payloads that have now been deployed to space.
On the operational end of the spectrum, we at Made In Space are
ecstatic to see plans from commercial space station providers coming
together to deploy modules to space within the next five years.
Similarly, orbital launch providers bringing new, lower cost and
reusable launch vehicles to market is a landmark achievement for
commercial access to space. The combination of the ISS and future
commercial space stations and frequent low-cost commercial launch gives
companies at the forefront of the forthcoming commercial space boom
somewhere to operate and a way to get there. Without somewhere to
operate and a predictable way of getting there, operations are not
possible and expansion of American free enterprise in space is stifled.
Made In Space, Inc. And The Emerging Cislunar Economy
Made In Space, Inc. (Made In Space, MIS) is a small business with
offices in California, Florida, Alabama, and Ohio.
Made In Space was founded in 2010 with the goal of enabling people
to sustainably live and work in space.
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Figure 1. ISS Commander Barry ``Butch'' Wilmore holding a 3D
printed ratchet manufactured in space. The ratchet was designed on the
ground and manufactured in space one week later, making it potentially
the fastest delivery to space ever. Image credit: NASA
This goal is shared by many in the space industry who believe in
the economic promise the final frontier holds. Companies like SpaceX
and Blue Origin are focused on building low cost launch vehicles, 21st
century versions of the covered wagon. We at Made In Space are focused
on developing the tools and manufacturing facilities that will fill
those wagons to the stars, enabling a sustainable cislunar economy.
We focus on two types of space-based manufacturing: manufacturing
technologies that enable new missions in space; and manufacturing
technologies which leverage the space environment to create high value
goods for use on Earth. Both are crucial enabling technologies for the
cislunar economy which will utilize the above described infrastructure
and one day generate revenues sufficient to profitably sustain
commercial orbital launches and space stations.
Made In Space has no outside investors and has been profitable
since its inception. Currently, Made In Space has approximately forty
employees, including several who began their careers in the aerospace
industry via internships funded by the NASA Space Grant and Fellowship
Program.
Manufacturing In Space For Use In Space
Utilizing multiple pieces of the space infrastructure described
above to open up new sources of space-based revenue, Made In Space
engineers initially internally funded a prototype gravity-independent
3D printer. Through a grant from the NASA Flight Opportunities Program,
that prototype was tested and successfully operated on board a
parabolic flight aircraft in 2011. Building on this demonstration of
viability, Made In Space was awarded SBIR contracts to develop the
technology for demonstration aboard the ISS. Via an SBIR Phase III
contract with NASA run out of the In-Space Manufacturing group at NASA
Marshall Space Flight Center, Made In Space built and operated the
first 3D printer to operate in space. In late 2014, via the 3D Printing
In Zero-G Technology Demonstration experiment, this space-capable 3D
printer was installed on the ISS and manufactured the first functional
objects ever made off the planet Earth by humanity (see Figure 1).
Building on this initial on-orbit success, Made In Space built the
Additive Manufacturing Facility (AMF, see Figure 2), a second-
generation more capable 3D printer. The AMF was launched to the ISS in
March 2016. Via agreements with NASA and the Center for the Advancement
of Science In Space (CASIS), the managers of the ISS National Lab, Made
In Space owns and operates the AMF, routinely sending print jobs to the
ISS and manufacturing them on a weekly basis. The AMF print services
business is profitable and has produced parts for NASA, the U.S. Navy,
Lowe's, universities such as Texas A&M University, student groups, and
even individuals. Parts manufactured include space optimized
structures, hand tools for the ISS crew, prototype medical splints and
ventilators, and adaptors for ISS equipment.
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Figure 2. The Additive Manufacturing Facility (left) is the first
ever commercial manufacturing facility deployed to space. A wide
variety of customers have been served, including Lowe's who designed
the first print on this facility, a space optimized hand tool (right).
Image credits: NASA/Made In Space.
The capability to manufacture parts on demand during a space
mission is paradigm shifting. 3D printing serves as a fast and
inexpensive way to manufacture parts on-site and on-demand, reducing
the need for costly spares on the ISS and other spacecraft. Long-term
missions would benefit greatly from having onboard manufacturing
capabilities. New parts may be manufactured to enable new scientific
experiments or augment existing ones.
Further building on this success and internal research and
development into manufacturing very large, space-optimized structures
in space, Made In Space became a ``Tipping Point'' selectee by NASA's
Space Technology Mission Directorate. Under a contract begun in late
2016, Made In Space is leading a team including Northrop Grumman and
Oceaneering Space Systems to develop its Archinaut in-space
manufacturing and assembly technology. During rocket launch, spacecraft
are subjected to high g forces and large vibrational forces. Further,
the entire spacecraft must fit within the limited volume of the launch
fairing. Surviving this launch environment requires wasting mass to
over engineer components to survive launch and engineering deployables
which unfurl once the satellite reaches orbit, creating points of
failure. Archinaut technology will enable optimization of spacecraft
structures for their operational environment, rather than launch.
Additionally, repair and reconfiguration of assets once they are on
orbit will be possible. Further, this technology enables providing
large structures at lower cost and enabling robotic manufacture and
assembly of large reflectors, space stations, and other applications
for civil, defense, and commercial space customers. Before operating in
space, this technology will initially be demonstrated in NASA
environmental testing facilities and aboard ISS via AMF, including
manufacturing space-optimized structures in space.
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Figure 3. This artist's rendering depicts the Archinaut payload
during its deployment in space. Via additive manufacturing and
assembly, a large reflector is manufactured and integrated over time.
Image credit: Made In Space
The Archinaut Development Program is a private-public partnership
designed to develop a technological capability that is useful to both
government and commercial customers. As part of its effort, the Made In
Space-led team is contributing over 25 percent of the program cost.
Made In Space believes that space technologies should be developed into
products which are useful and sold to both government and commercial
space customers. This expands their utilization and lowers costs for
all customers.
Manufacturing Space Enabled Products
Space-enabled products are materials and products which are
manufactured and/or processed in space which, due to being manufactured
and/or processed in space, have beneficial properties. Because of
space's unique properties like microgravity, in-space manufacturing
enables the creation of new materials and products which cannot be
duplicated via Earth-based manufacturing.
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Figure 4. Made In Space will deploy a payload to ISS this year to
manufacture high value optical fiber in space. Image credit: Made In
Space
Some products have been well researched via government funding and
determined to provide significant performance improvements when
manufactured in space. For example, research indicates that space-
manufactured ZBLAN optical fiber has ten to one hundred times better
signal loss compared to traditional silica optical fiber. Due to this
dramatic performance improvement, some government and private analyses
estimate that space-produced ZBLAN optical fiber could generate over a
billion dollars a year in revenue. Commercial manufacturing of ZBLAN in
space would also represent the first industrial use of space, a key
enabler of the cislunar economy.
Because of its unique expertise in microgravity manufacturing and
the market potential of ZBLAN, Made In Space has privately funded the
development and deployment of a ZBLAN manufacturing facility. Via an
agreement with CASIS, this facility will be flown to the ISS this year,
produce optical fiber there, and then be returned to Earth where the
fiber will be characterized and delivered to customers. Made In Space
plans to scale in-space production of ZBLAN quickly aboard the ISS with
the ultimate goal to produce thousands of kilometers of ZBLAN optical
fiber a year in space on a commercially provided platform.
Made In Space is taking a step-by-step approach with this program,
leveraging government research, the ISS, and its own profits to deliver
a commercial in-space manufacturing capability. The promise of in-space
manufacturing is not limited to optical glasses. Government and private
research indicates that many other products and materials can benefit
from in-space manufacturing and close the business case at current
launch costs or launch costs achievable in the medium term, making
manufacturing of space-enabled products a potential anchor tenant of
future commercial space stations in the cislunar economy and adding new
launches to the industry.
Conclusion
Made In Space has benefited enormously from a virtuous cycle of
technology development and operation enabled by the Small Business
Administration, NASA, and CASIS. Made In Space is grateful to all those
that have helped along the way and proud to continue working with NASA
and other government agencies. The step-by-step technology development
path that currently flows from lab development to parabolic flights
through the ISS National Lab and eventually to commercial platforms in
space has been critical to Made In Space's success. Made In Space
strongly encourages continued support of the elements of this path as
well as support and expansion of commercial enterprise aboard the ISS
so that the cislunar economy is well positioned to blossom before the
ISS is decommissioned. By actively supporting the growing commercial
cislunar economy through the end of the ISS's life and supporting the
creation of commercial platforms in LEO, the United States can expand
its supremacy in space.
The Chairman. Thank you, Mr. Rush, and thank you to each of
the witnesses for your very helpful testimony. We'll now move
to the question portion of the hearing, and let me start out
with this.
As Congress looks to build upon the Commercial Space Launch
Competitiveness Act, what are the regulations that are most
impacting your companies that need to be addressed by Congress
or processes that can be streamlined to facilitate or
accelerate the exploration of space?
Mr. Meyerson. If I could start, as I stated in my oral and
also in my written testimony, we think the designation of FAA
as the sole lead agency for licensing commercial space
launches, independent of the location of the range, is the
single most thing that, as a launch operator, we would like to
see to streamline space regulation.
Mr. Whitesides. Senator, two suggestions from Virgin's
perspective. On indemnification, since 1988, U.S. law has
included a third-party risk sharing regime for FAA licensed
commercial space launches and re-entries that allows U.S.
companies to compete more effectively with their foreign
competitors. Without this means of limiting catastrophic risks,
both the industry and the Federal Government would be subject
to significant legal risk. The CSLCA extended indemnification
to 2025. We encourage this subcommittee to study and consider a
permanent indemnification regime for the U.S. launch industry.
And if I could add one more, in terms of streamlining
hybrid regulations, Virgin Galactic and Virgin Orbit's vehicles
form a hybrid launch system involving both an aircraft and a
space vehicle. Both AVS and AST within FAA have tremendous
expertise in their respective fields and, in our case, have
been willing to work with us to meet our flight test schedule.
In the future, as more vehicles and flights come online,
streamlining the regulatory environment for hybrid vehicles
would be a welcome improvement to the current process.
Mr. Bigelow. I'd like to suggest that staying with Space
Act Agreements is a significant step forward as opposed to the
far type of structure of contracting. We have used them with
NASA, and they are expeditious. They are agile. They do not
involve a lot of red tape. So to us, the Space Act Agreements
should be maintained as a principal method of contracting
between the commercial sector and the Government sector.
Mr. Rush. As a company that operates in space, we would
like to see a few things: An affirmation that intellectual
property that's developed in space by companies operating in
space, whether that be within a government facility or without,
be retained wholly by the company that creates that
intellectual property. Further, as a company that is seeking to
manufacture goods on U.S. spacecraft and on U.S. modules, we
would like to see those modules and spacecraft continue to be
treated as U.S. soil, so that one day, when we're manufacturing
a wide variety of high-value goods in space and bringing them
back, there's no question that they're not subject to any sort
of import or customs tax.
Further, in the more near term, simplifying the process for
getting payloads to the ISS and operating those payloads there
is something I think that all operators would like to see.
The Chairman. Well, thank you. Those are all helpful
suggestions, and I'll note, Mr. Rush, on your last point, I
certainly hope we would not trigger reciprocal tariffs from
Mars. That would be a real problem.
Senator Nelson. Nor a border adjustment tax.
[Laughter.]
The Chairman. Mr. Meyerson, Blue Origin and SpaceX are both
making terrific strides in changing human spaceflight and
lowering the price of access through the use of reusable
rockets, a notion that not too long ago would have been almost
unthinkable. What's the difference in the licensing
requirements set by the Air Force and set by the FAA's Office
of Commercial Space Transportation, and when it comes to using
a reusable rocket compared to an expendable rocket?
Mr. Meyerson. So the reusable licensing machine has not
been utilized yet, so it's a relatively new regime within the
FAA, and that's one that we're now exploring with our New
Shepard and our New Glenn vehicles. The current regime
requires--when you fly a commercial vehicle off a Federal
range, it has both FAA and Air Force involvement. So you're
providing the same types of documents--safety analyses, hazard
analyses reports--but in different formats to different
agencies, and that is what I referred to earlier as duplicative
and we think it's unnecessary.
The Chairman. One additional question, Mr. Bigelow. If
Bigelow Aerospace sought to place a Bigelow habitat either on
the surface of the Moon or in orbit around the Moon as a lunar
depot, are there any significant regulatory barriers to doing
so, and does the U.S. Government have a workable framework in
place to enable and support commercial space activities in
space and on and around planetary bodies?
Mr. Bigelow. We don't believe so. We think that it's
consistent within the framework of the 1967 Space Treaty. We
also think that as a partner in the context of a commercial-
government partnership with NASA, we would be mutually aware
that we had to follow prescriptions of behavior to invoke
safety where it would be necessary. We have considered this
type of activity for some years, deploying structures on the
surface of the Moon. We have architectures that address that,
and is the same with orbiting depots.
The Chairman. Thank you.
Senator Markey.
Senator Markey. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Bigelow, what role do you see public-private
partnerships filling in regards to maintaining a national
laboratory in space?
Mr. Bigelow. I don't see it as a zero sum game. I don't see
it as a choice of either/or. If I were in a position of
decision for NASA, I would say I want both. I would want to
harmoniously blend the obtaining of commercial assets under
affordable circumstances and reliable circumstances and be
accustomed to their operation, acclimate my own astronaut corps
to those facilities, those platforms, concurrent with the
operation of the ISS.
And then at the time that the ISS is eventually
repositioned or reassigned other missions may be involving
commercial uses, or not, then I would already have platforms in
place in low Earth orbit where at the same time that those are
being positioned, I would be able to increase the size of my
astronaut corps. I would increase the size of the population of
Johnson Space Center, because now there isn't just one platform
to monitor and to operate. There could be three or four or
five, and the advantage with the commercial sector is that
those platforms, the ones that would be added, would be at a
small fraction of the cost of the original station.
Senator Markey. Thank you.
Mr. Meyerson, Russia, India, China, United Arab Emirate,
Saudi Arabia--there can be a lot of traffic up there as each
year goes by. How would you suggest that we work together in
order to ensure that there are common minimal safety standards
that are established and adhered to globally?
Mr. Meyerson. Well, I think the FAA is currently doing a
very good job of developing those standards. What we need as
space gets global--we need more launch capacity. So with the
long-term vision of millions of people living and working in
space, it's going to be not just Americans, but it's going to
be people throughout the world that are living and working in
space, and we'll need launch capacity to do that. So what I'm
suggesting and urging is a very streamlined process for doing
that so that different companies in different countries can
demonstrate their capabilities in that approach.
Senator Markey. And what would be, from your perspective,
the correct mechanism to use in order to ensure that there is a
minimal international safety standard?
Mr. Meyerson. You know, I'd be happy to provide an answer
to that one on the record. I'm not really prepared to answer
that question. It's a complex question.
Senator Markey. That's fine. We would appreciate it.
Anyone on the panel have any suggestions?
Mr. Bigelow. Well, I think, initially, the philosophy is
less regulation is better while maintaining the context of
common sense and safety and organization. So we have--two or
three years ago, we were working with George Nield and FAA AST
to acquire a policy change within the FAA AST, and that was
achieved, where our company was used sort of, more or less, as
a guinea pig, where launches would not be sanctioned from U.S.
territory to be vectoring a payload to a location on the
surface of the Moon where Bigelow Aerospace had some kind of
activity ongoing, and that was a policy change.
The next step from that is to--in addition to that would be
probably to prescribe a standoff distance, because that was
mute, as to--if there were some kind of miscalculation in the
delivery of that payload, what is a logical standoff distance
of safety? Would it be 300 kilometers, 250 miles, whatever, as
a radius so that you have geographic protection.
Senator Markey. Thank you. And maybe I'll just throw this
out for anyone who wants to take it. What is the role of the
Air Force going forward? Do you see that ultimately being
phased out, and the private sector will just be in charge of
its own responsibilities? Can any of you take that as a
question?
Mr. Bigelow. We would like to see a Space Command have a
presence in space. We would like to actually see that those
kinds of assets are accessed earlier than later. We think that
the Naval Research Laboratory or the Air Force Research
Laboratory could use those kinds of locations for unique
laboratory purposes.
Mr. Meyerson. I'd like to add the urging is on FAA
regulation of commercial launches. The Air Force, of course,
has their own missions that are of a national security nature
and would require a different type of oversight, and that is
absolutely necessary and essential, and we'd see that
continuing.
Senator Markey. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Thank you.
Senator Nelson.
Senator Nelson. I was fascinated, Mr. Rush, in you telling
about using a 3D printer to create a new, more pure fiber optic
cable and because of the properties of Zero-G. It would be so
pure that it becomes economical to manufacture it in space and
take it back to Earth because it can convey so much more
information so rapidly. Is that correct?
Mr. Rush. That is correct, Senator.
Senator Nelson. Well, so how can we improve the ISS as an
incubator to help enterprises such as yours, and do you see
that it needs to be extended beyond the existing life, which is
2024?
Mr. Rush. I believe that similarly amazing strides have
been taken to let folks like us operate on the ISS, period, and
pursue these things. You know, really, having the framework of
the ISS National Lab gives us access to that in a way that, you
know, I can build a pilot factory that's maybe 50 kilograms and
get that up and operate it, where, if absent that facility, I
would be buying a ride from some of these fine gentlemen's
companies at, you know, orders of magnitude, greater costs,
which for a commercial entity might not be possible.
As we move forward, I would recommend that the ISS National
Lab and the folks that support that entity more fully embrace
commercial pathfinding on the ISS and commercial profitmaking
on there, because the ultimate goal is for companies like us to
transition to commercial platforms, like Mr. Bigelow's
facilities. But we can't jump from, you know, making a little
bit of money or no money to paying for a significant portion of
his module or anybody's facility because the math just doesn't
quite solve. So we need a step-wise transition to laws to
expand operations, first on ISS and then perhaps next on a
commercial module attached to ISS, and then ultimately to a
free flyer.
We would strongly recommend that a transition plan be
created that is committed to a continuous presence in low Earth
orbit for persistent microgravity platforms, which likely looks
like supporting a commercial space station being created and
put up in space while the ISS is still there, whether that's by
2024 or beyond.
Senator Nelson. So that fits very nicely with what Mr.
Bigelow testified about. Now, you are a small group of folks
that started this startup. You got a NASA space grant. So do
you want to tell us in 45 seconds, no more, how important it is
for NASA to invest in young scientists and engineers in your
example?
Mr. Rush. Absolutely, yes. I got my very first job in the
industry via a NASA space grant. A couple of the co-founders of
our company have similar experiences, as well as a lot of the
guys that we employ, including new interns that are working for
us. Just as NASA invests in technology from, you know, a low
Technology Readiness Level and eventually brings it into
operational capabilities, we need to do that with people as
well, and I'm proud to be one of those people and to employ
people like that.
Senator Nelson. I want Mr. Whitesides and Mr. Meyerson to
be contemplating the need to streamline the regulatory process
for the growing commercial launch industry. Already, we had a
major step forward that a lot of people don't realize. The
destruct system that previously was always done by the Air
Force with an Air Force lieutenant sitting there with his
finger on the destruct button in case it started going off
course and headed to a populated place--has on some of the
commercial activities and launches been replaced with an
autonomous flight safety system which allows the turnaround for
rocket launches to be much greater.
SpaceX, for example, told me in a few years, they expect to
be--just SpaceX--launching 40 launches a year just from the
Cape, additional ones from Brownsville, and additional ones
from Vandenberg that need to go into polar orbit. But the
biggest bulk of them, 40--that's quite an activity when you add
all the others in. So I want you all to be thinking and give to
us how that regulatory process, particularly with the FAA, can
be improved?
[The information referred to follows:]
Space Law & Policy Solutions
Rochester, NH, April 21, 2017
Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX), Chairman, Senator Edward J. Markey (D-MA),
Ranking Member and Members of Space, Science and
Competitiveness Subcommittee
Re: Reducing Regulatory Barriers and Expanding American Free Enterprise
in Space
Senator Cruz, Senator Markey and Members of the Subcommittee:
My name is Michael J. Listner, and I am an attorney licensed to
practice law in and before the state and Federal courts of the State of
New Hampshire. I am also the Founder and Principal of the legal and
policy consultation firm, Space Law and Policy Solutions and the editor
of the space law and policy briefing-letter The Precis.
On July 4, 1982, President Reagan steered the United States on a
path to permit private actors to perform activities in outer space per
his executive order found in National Security Decision Directive
Number 42 (NSDD-42). Congress subsequently supplemented the leanings of
President Reagan and passed the Commercial Space Launch Act of 1982
(Public Law 98-575), which created a private interest for non-
governmental actors to perform outer space activities pursuant to
licensing and regulation through the Department of Transportation.
The implementation of both NSDD-42 and Public Law 98-575 has been
followed by successive Administrations and Congress who have laid out
further directives both through superseding executive orders most
recently in PPD-42 and legislation amending Public 98-575 most recently
with the Commercial Space Launch Competitiveness Act of 2015 (Public
Law 114-90). These directives and legislation have the effect of
directing agencies of the United States Government to encourage the
development of commercial space activities as opposed to strictly
government space activities.
The direct result of these initiatives is the creation of a new
economic sector that has vast potential. The realm of commercial space
is found most prolifically in new commercial space launch companies who
not only provide launch services for commercial satellites but also
national security and eventual crewed missions to the International
Space Station. There has also been an upsurge of companies offering the
promise of a gambit of outer space activities from sub-orbital and
orbital tourism and even harvesting of space resources from celestial
bodies like the Moon and asteroids. In each of these cases, the
Executive Branch and Congress have created or need to create a
conducive legal and regulatory environment to facilitate these
activities.
The call to reduce regulations from the commercial space industry
is a consistent one and the focus of this Subcommittee's hearing.
Indeed, regulatory and licensing requirements are a stepping stone for
private actors to bring their commercial activities to fruition but
also represent an actual expense and time impediment to these proposed
activities. However, the answer to the industry's call does not lie in
completely deregulating the commercial space industry.
The United States has ongoing legal obligations to the
international community through treaty commitments, including the Outer
Space Treaty, which among other obligations requires the government to
``authorize'' and ``continually supervise'' the activities of non-
governmental entities. These international legal obligations, while
imputed to the United States government, are executed and exercised by
the Commercial Space Launch Act of 1984 and successive commercial space
laws passed by Congress and signed into law by the Executive Branch.
Regulation in some form is necessary for the commercial space industry
if not only to meet the United States' international legal obligations
under treaties like the Outer Space Treaty, then to address national
security and public safety. That said, regulation need not be
prescriptive in nature but could take the form of performance-based
regulations or has been proposed to take the form of self-regulation by
the industry itself.
Ancillary to the issue of regulation is the extent to which private
space activities will begin to move beyond the bounds of what was
foreseen under the current body of international space law. Issues like
real property rights for private actors in particular is one that is
coming to the forefront, yet the current state of international space
law does not provide for it. Indeed, issues like real property rights
raises the temptation to make interpretations of international space
law that might form a favorable customary interpretation to benefit
commercial space activities. Considering the ability of the United
States to create customary international law and binding
interpretations through its actions as a state, this Committee would be
prudent to consider not only the immediate effect of adopting
interpretations of the Outer Space Treaty that may be outside the
province of current international space law but the long term effects
of those interpretations as well.
That said, the time may come where the Outer Space Treaty itself
may become an impediment to developing and exploiting outer space. At
this point, it may be necessary to review the United States'
participation in this foundational Treaty and take steps to withdraw
and refashion outer space law to be more responsive to the needs of
commercial space actors. This type of consideration is not to be taken
lightly and the consequences must be fully examined if it is decided to
do so at some future point.
In conclusion, I respectfully request this Committee consider the
gravity of international treaty obligations when it discusses the
future regulatory environment of the commercial space industry.
Regulation of the commercial industry need not be non-existent or
overly burdensome but rather it is plausible to strike a proper balance
that encourages the expansion of commercial space activities and
satisfies the legal obligations of the United States.
Respectively submitted,
Michael J. Listner.
cc: Senator John Thune (R-SD), Chair, Senate Committee on Commerce,
Science, and Transportation
Senator Nelson. I would say, in closing, Mr. Chairman,
that, shortly, we expect the Vice President to be announced as
the head of a re-established Space Council in the White House.
I think this is a good step, and I think it will allow us, as
Members of Congress, to work much more easily with a group that
is dedicated to focus on the space program, and that will, I
think, improve the lines of communication considerably.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Thank you, Senator Nelson.
Senator Udall.
STATEMENT OF HON. TOM UDALL,
U.S. SENATOR FROM NEW MEXICO
Senator Udall. Thank you, Chairman Cruz, very much.
And thank you to this excellent panel for your insightful
testimony here today, and Chairman Cruz for focusing in on this
subject.
Last Saturday was Earth Day, and the first March for
Science took place across the country--I was in Santa Fe at one
of the 600 marches across the globe--to highlight the
importance of scientific research at a time when many
scientists, and especially climate scientists, believe they are
under attack from the Trump administration. American leadership
in science put a man on the Moon. This committee has a
responsibility to stand up for science, to stand with
researchers and innovators who keep America at the cutting edge
of science and technology.
The commercial space industry, I think, is a great example
here. Suborbital spaceflight from Spaceport America in my home
state of New Mexico will soon be a reality. George, you
mentioned that in your opening statement. Commercial space
companies are aiming for the stars, and this committee has an
important role to help them reach this new frontier, as
emphasized by the questions before me.
Mr. Whitesides, many New Mexicans hope to see full
commercial spaceflight operations begin as soon as possible.
Sir Richard Branson said that he would be very disappointed if
Virgin Galactic's commercial service is not well underway by
the end of next year. Is that a realistic timeline?
Mr. Whitesides. It is, Senator, yes. We're well into test
flight now, and we're looking forward to moving a fairly big
transition of our staff to your state of New Mexico.
Senator Udall. That's great, and as you know, New Mexico
has invested, I think, $200 million in that Spaceport. So we
want to see you be a success there.
Mr. Rush, I was pleased to read in your statement about how
Made In Space took advantage of NASA's Flight Opportunities
Program to test a 3D printer on a low-cost suborbital flight,
and I think Senator Nelson talked about that. This is exactly
the kind of low-cost, high-impact success story I envisioned
when fighting to authorize the Flight Opportunities Program in
the 2009 NASA bill. Flight Opportunities costs less than one-
one thousandths of the NASA budget, and I believe it delivers a
big bang for the buck.
Mr. Rush and Mr. Whitesides, do you support funding for the
NASA Flight Opportunities Program?
Mr. Rush. Yes, absolutely. The Flight Opportunities Program
is an integral portion of our technology development process,
that we're able to take low-cost prototypes and expose them to
microgravity and see if they work before we make more
investments in that to put them into orbit.
Mr. Whitesides. Senator, I think it fits well with the
ecosystem. Testing out space technologies in suborbital or
other platforms and then moving those to the International
Space Station and beyond is a terrific investment and allows
great companies like Made In Space and others to prosper and
grow. So we think it's a really exciting area for our American
researchers.
Senator Udall. Good. Thank you.
Mr. Meyerson. If I may add, Senator----
Senator Udall. Yes, please, Mr. Meyerson.
Mr. Meyerson. Our New Shepard system which has been
flying--we've already flown payloads at our own expense on the
New Shepard rocket over the last year and are part of the
Flight Opportunities Program. We support it. We think it's a
great opportunity to get our students from K-12 all the way up
to our scientists in national labs using space weightlessness
as a science platform and demonstrating new things. So we're
very excited about it.
Senator Udall. Great. Thank you.
Mr. Bigelow, do you have a comment on that?
Mr. Bigelow. Well, all of these activities are building
blocks. They're all part of the entire mosaic that we're all
trying to achieve. So I approve and applaud all these kinds of
efforts.
Senator Udall. Great.
Mr. Whitesides, your written testimony notes that Virgin
Galactic worked extensively with the FAA's Office of Commercial
Space Transportation when getting an operator's license for
SpaceShipTwo. Given the growth in the commercial spaceflight
industry, do you expect the resource needs for the FAA AST
office to grow as more and more commercial companies develop
and launch space vehicles?
Mr. Whitesides. I do, Senator. The reality is that the AST
is a very small fraction right now of the FAA's budget, and if
you look to the horizon, all these exciting increases in volume
is going to drive significant resource demands inside AST. I
think relatively small increases from the perspective of the
Federal budget would drive huge results in terms of enabling
companies like ours, like Rob's, and others to quickly get to
the operating line and moving out. So we really think--you
know, it may be rare for companies to be pushing more funding
for their regulators, but we really think that this is a case
where it could be a good investment for the country.
Senator Udall. Great. Thank you so much. We look forward to
working with you.
Thank you, Chairman Cruz.
The Chairman. Thank you, Senator Udall.
Let's shift to a different aspect to focus on, which is, as
we discussed earlier in the hearing, the United Nations Outer
Space Treaty was enacted 50 years ago in 1967. How relevant is
that Treaty today, and how do you see it impacting commercial
operations for your company and others in space?
Mr. Bigelow. I think the Treaty needs to be updated. I
think there are aspects of that Treaty that should always be
maintained, such as the prevention of nuclear weaponry in low
Earth orbit or other remote places on foreign bodies or in deep
space, whatever. But I think that that Treaty was cast in a
time-frame where the United States and Russia didn't know who
was going to be reaching the Moon first. There were concerns
about proprietary possession, ownership of different--perhaps
of that asset of the Moon. So the philosophy was different than
today.
It was un-thought of at that time, I'm assuming, that
commercial folks would have the wherewithal or the audacity to
be thinking about traveling to the Moon and conducting business
there. So I think it needs to be updated. I don't think that
the updates are inconsistent with most of the language provided
in the Treaty today.
The Treaty definitely provides for bases to be positioned
by sovereign entities, to allow those sovereign entities to
populate those bases with military personnel. The Treaty is
mute on any reference to the size of those bases territorially.
There are no geographic constrictions. There is no mention of
the number of bases that you may have. So it's wide open, as we
know. Not to pick on China, but the fact is that the Chinese
Red Army controls their space program.
Now, I think that through the FAA AST efforts on
sanctioning--or being aware not to sanction launches that could
interfere with--payloads that could interfere if they were
misdirected into somebody's activity on the surface is a start.
I think there needs to be a geographic expansion or definition
of what is that isolation standoff distance. What should that
be? It's possible that you could extend that to a patented
mining opportunity to define the area in which cadastrals and
monuments could be established as they have been for a great
length of time here in this country and around the world.
It's very difficult to not want that if you're a company
that is promoting mining. You're going to spend large amounts
of money, risk people's lives, and you don't have some security
of a geographical definition. You're not asking for ownership
of the property, but ownership of what you extract in situ from
that area.
So I think this is not inconsistent. The 1967 Treaty
provides for--that each signatory to that Treaty needs to
prepare methods of their own within each country of how they
are going to behave to carry out the spirit of that Treaty,
which is that all foreign bodies should be used in the interest
of the common welfare of mankind. That doesn't exclude free
enterprise by any means. Free enterprise hallmark is--free
enterprise succeeds the best when it serves the public in the
greatest way possible. So free enterprise is definitely
consistent with serving mankind.
So I don't see any kind of discontinuity. The Treaty
provides for these kinds of things because it leaves it up to
sovereign countries to make these decisions, but it also could
be updated. The risk of that is trying to get a consensus where
you would actually be able to get a large population of
countries to agree, I think.
The Chairman. Are there any specific updates to the Treaty
that you think are necessary?
Mr. Bigelow. I think good fences make good neighbors. I
think that there needs to be some language that for the common
good of mankind that activities are going to be exercised on
the Moon, that there needs to be some specificity to conducting
an operation under some geographic definition. And, again, as I
said, the location of bases is permitted. There is no language
as to how many or the size of those bases. One base could be
the size of Texas, because there is nothing in that Treaty that
says it couldn't be.
The Chairman. Now, you mentioned China in your testimony,
and earlier this morning, you and I were visiting about a
number of issues, including China. Could you share with this
committee your concerns about China's lunar ambitions?
Mr. Bigelow. I have a great respect for any company, any
country, any people that achieve great things, and China falls
into that category very much. So I respect China a great deal.
I also have--I believe I have an understanding that's correct
that China is very predisposed to ownership. Whether it's
creating the islands in the South China Sea, whether it's
properties in massive quantities that they purchased in South
America or Africa, other places, whether you open a company and
can only own 49 percent of it, they are very ownership minded.
I think that that logically is possible to be extended in that
philosophy to the Moon.
So I can see a scenario that's not unrealistic to me that
China could exercise an effort to start to lay claim to certain
lunar territories. They could do it the old fashioned way, by
using lasers to mark the points, put down cadastrals and
monuments, and, over time, acquire a very large amount of
territory that might be in the select areas where there's
constant sunlight and those kinds of things, you know, in terms
of location, location, location on the Moon.
So I don't think it's a joke. I don't think it's something
to be cavalier about. I think such an ownership consequence
would have an amazing impact on the image of China, vis-a-vis
the United States and the rest of the world, if they should own
large amounts of territory on that body, and we stood back and
we weren't prepared. So it's a concept that I think deserves
thinking about.
The Chairman. Do others on the panel share the concerns
about China's ambitions? And I want to expand the question also
to include the potential military threat of China in space,
taking out space assets, potentially.
Mr. Rush. I would say with respect to Chinese ambitions,
you know, more folks launching into space and conducting space
activities is generally a good thing. But there are certainly
aspects--there are certainly technologies that they have
stated, including our own technologies and the ability to
manufacture in space, to manufacture large assets and assemble
them in space, which we believe have a--provide an asymmetric
advantage to the U.S. military, that we should be cognizant of
other countries attempting to develop as we move forward.
The Chairman. Last year, Russia signaled that it might
separate the Russian segment of the ISS from the American
segment sometime between 2023 and 2024. What would it mean to
the United States and to our space program if Russia were to
separate from the ISS? And could you foresee Russia operating
its own station or partnering with China in doing so?
Mr. Bigelow. We've had some business relationships with the
Russians, and we were treated very well. So what we learned is
that they are very accomplished, and they tend to build things
that are bullet-proof, you know, as an alternative to other
approaches in terms of the way that you have a philosophy in
creating space hardware.
I think it would be devastating to the Station, in my
understanding, was initially created as a mechanism to do two
or three or four different kinds of things, and one of those
was to gather together a number of countries in a communal
relationship that was unique. I think that the history of the
Station ought to be that, when it's written--the cessation of
the station ought to be in some kind of a context that emerges
into something else that, if not profound, at least was
amenable to everybody, and it wasn't a step going backward.
I would see a dislocation of those modules by the Russians
as a step backwards, unless there was some kind of alternative
agreement that said, ``Well, they may do that, but, oh, by the
way, we are doing other things here to continue the
relationship between the two countries.'' And I don't see that
that necessarily also is not applicable to China in some way. I
wouldn't say that--again, it's not a zero sum game. I don't see
these as being mutually exclusive.
The Chairman. Thank you.
Senator Peters.
STATEMENT OF HON. GARY PETERS,
U.S. SENATOR FROM MICHIGAN
Senator Peters. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
This first question is for Mr. Whitesides, but I certainly
would love to have a response from all the panel. As we all
know, certain countries have and continue to unfairly subsidize
their commercial activity, and this undermines competitiveness
of many U.S. companies in many different industries. But in
many sectors, a clear line can be drawn between appropriate
government support of industry versus anti-competitive business
practices. For example, there's a difference between providing
infrastructure and then awarding contracts with that underlying
infrastructure versus state-owned enterprises that really
undercut free market enterprise.
So my question is as the commercial space industry
continues to mature, are you concerned that certain governments
are going to undermine companies like yours?
Mr. Whitesides. We are, Senator, and I think it's something
that Congress should maintain an awareness of and potentially
to consider as it thinks about future actions. I think that the
principles that we would think about are reciprocity--are
American companies able to sell into that market? That's an
important question. Often, that is not the case--and the
creation of corporate entities whose sole purpose is to sell
into the commercial marketplace, which often does not allow
fair commercial competition.
So, you know, what we've done is invested hundreds of
millions of dollars to create new commercial space platforms
that we hope to compete successfully. We're asking for a fair
shot, both in the U.S. markets and abroad. And because these
markets are intrinsically global, if certain players are
competing in different terms, then that's something that I
think the Congress should be aware of.
Senator Peters. It's global, but there are also a small
number of players and it seems like because there are a small
number of players that you're also more susceptible to
potential anti-competitive behavior by other countries and
their programs. Is that accurate?
Mr. Whitesides. Yes. There are certainly a limited number
of operators around the world, and, you know, it's a very price
sensitive market. So these are important issues, I think, for
Congress to be thinking about.
Senator Peters. Do others have concerns?
Mr. Meyerson. I'd like to add--I mean, these space programs
are a matter of national pride. They're national programs. So
it is--you know, having a space program is something that any
large government takes great pride in. I think we can take
great pride in the innovation that's coming out of the United
States aerospace industry with companies that are on this panel
and others, and, certainly from my standpoint, demonstrating
reusability, which has the greatest potential for lowering cost
of access to space and increasing space access for all, not
just Americans but people and payloads throughout the world.
So, yes, I agree with Mr. Whitesides that we want to make
sure that we have a fair shot at access to these foreign
markets. But we should take a lot of pride that that innovation
is continuing in the United States, and if we can combine that
with some of the regulatory streamlining I talked about
earlier, I think it can help the U.S. broaden markets.
Senator Peters. Thinking of the commercial space industry,
is there a line that we draw between appropriate government
support and anti-competitive behavior that we may see from
other countries?
Mr. Bigelow. It's tough to compete against operations that
are government-supported financially, which is not uncommon.
Senator Peters. Right.
Mr. Bigelow. And so that's a significant challenge, because
now you're competing against something with a very powerful
money-printing partner capability. So that's certainly a
significant challenge. How you regulate that or prohibit that,
I don't know.
Senator Peters. Right. Thank you very much. I appreciate
it.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Thank you, Senator Peters.
I want to thank each of the witnesses for coming this
morning. I think this has been a productive and informative
hearing, and I thank you for the time and energy you have
invested in being here and for the leadership you provide in
commercial space. It is important, not just to your companies,
but to the United States as a whole, to the national interest,
and to the future.
The hearing record for this hearing will remain open for 2
weeks. During this time, Senators are asked to submit any
questions for the record, and upon receipt, the witnesses are
requested to submit their written answers to the Committee as
soon as possible.
And with that, this hearing is now adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 11:30 a.m., the hearing was adjourned.]
A P P E N D I X
Response to Written Questions Submitted by Hon. Maggie Hassan to
Robert T. Bigelow
Question 1. Space exploration creates vast opportunities for
scientific discovery, advancing our knowledge here on Earth, and
creating new and unique places for businesses to thrive. For decades,
we as a nation have prioritized sound science in our academic
institutions, and in our government. I recently called upon the
President to continue this age-old tradition and act swiftly in
appointing well-qualified experts to the Office of Science and
Technology Policy so that our government can remain informed on areas
where science affects our national security, economy, U.S.
competitiveness, and innovation. Do you agree that we need leaders in
our government who will focus on science and fact-based decision making
for space exploration to thrive? Can you speak to how our Federal
efforts in science and technology at NASA and in other areas of our
government bolster or complement the work of the private sector?
Answer. I believe that we need leaders who understand that people
with business acumen provide the necessary and valuable experience to
enable free enterprise in space. The costs and risks associated with
space exploration and utilization require more than just a fundamental
understanding of science, but also economics and budgetary constraints
to successfully move humans and spacecraft beyond Earth orbit. In order
to effectuate good science and fact-based decision making, I believe
that we need bold leadership to further the American ideals of life,
liberty, and the pursuit of happiness in space. Bold leaders understand
that to achieve success, one must accept the risk of failure and
responsibly balance risks and rewards. I believe that continuing
adaptive contracting vehicles such as Space Act Agreements and Other
Transaction Authorities will bolster Federal efforts in science and
technology because these vehicles enable the commercial sector to
contribute as a partner in the technological development of space
capabilities, sharing resources and risks across the public and private
sectors.
Question 2. According to NASA, there are over 500,000 pieces of
debris orbiting the Earth. This debris ranges in size from non-
functional satellites, to fragmented debris as small as nickles and
dimes, or even specks of paint. This debris travels around the Earth at
speeds of up to 17,500 miles per hour, roughly ten times faster than a
bullet. At these speeds even the tiniest bits of debris can cause
damage, and windows on the Space Shuttle were replaced because of
damage from tiny debris. In 2007, China blew up one of its satellites
with a ballistic missile, creating over 3,000 new pieces of space
debris. In 2013 Russian engineers confirmed that pieces of this debris
collided with one of their satellites. In 2009 an active American
satellite collided with an inoperative Russian satellite still in
orbit. When this type of debris comes near the ISS the crew climbs into
their escape pod and simply hopes nothing happens. With the increasing
launches of micro-satellites and decreasing launch costs it is now
easier than ever to launch craft into low Earth orbit, and the problem
is likely to increase many times over. Do you believe that current
processes and regulations in the United States are sufficient to
mitigate the increase in space debris? Do you think that there are
opportunities where we can improve our mitigation efforts without
hindering commercial development of space?
Answer. I do not believe that commercial space activities will be
the predominant source of future debris because commerce does not
thrive in congested and contested environments. Commercial space actors
are strongly incentivized to responsibly avoid generation of debris as
fundamental to the success of their business operations. Rather, it is
foreign and Federal governmental activities, particularly military,
that have and may continue to create debris hazards. The focus of
effort should be on establishing international standards among national
space actors rather than domestic regulation of commercial actors
already demonstrating responsible debris practices.
Question 3. I have a number of suppliers working on the Orion crew
exploration program in my home state of New Hampshire. As many of you
know, Orion is the next generation space vehicle that will be launched
on the Space Launch System rocket in a few years, and will carry humans
further into space than ever before.
The question I would like to ask is, How can the U.S. maintain a
robust and functional industrial base that supports both government and
commercial space activities?
Answer. The U.S. can maintain a robust and functional industrial
base through the maximization and integration of the best business
leaders and entrepreneurs into planning space activities that enable
robust and innovative technologies for space exploration and
utilization. The commercialization of traditional space activities
enhances the American industrial base by incentivizing and enabling
sustainable employment in technological and non-technological sectors
while preserving limited Federal funding, through servicing both
governmental and private customers. In particular, a company like
Bigelow Aerospace can provide market certainty that there will be a
destination to test technologies and other capabilities when we bring
online two flight ready B330s at the end of 2020. In doing so, we will
be able to provide an accessible, affordable pathway for inventors and
creators to realize their efforts in commercializing their ideas, from
terrestrial development to deployment in space. Providing regulatory
certainty to commercial entities will enable the economies to grow and
maintain a robust industrial base that can support both government and
commercial space activities.
______
Response to Written Questions Submitted by Hon. Bill Nelson to
Robert Meyerson
Question 1. What do you see as the biggest needs for enabling a
dramatic increase in launch cadence at the Cape in terms of shared
infrastructure, the licensing and approval process, scheduling and de-
conflicting launches or other areas where we may be of help?
Answer. An increase in launch cadence at the Cape would be enabled
by streamlining the regulatory process for reusable rocket launches
from Federal Ranges. Currently Air Force safety requirements for
launching reusable vehicles from a Federal Range are completely
different from the Office of Commercial Space Transportation (AST)
reusable launch vehicle license requirements, yet they claim to address
the same goal: public safety. The presence of duplicative authorities
creates an onerous approval process for the launch operators trying to
make the biggest strides in this industry--those pursuing reusability.
Efforts focused on aligning requirements and removing these duplicative
authorities will ease the burden on commercial launch providers.
Similarly, scheduling and de-conflicting launches from aviation users
in the national airspace is a critical long-term need. FAA should
address and prioritize with both AST and the FAA's Air Traffic
Organization efforts to fully integrate commercial space activities as
equal users of the national airspace system.
Additionally, supporting NASA Enhanced Use Lease In-Kind
Consideration will also help the Cape by allowing NASA to cultivate
public-private partnerships to transform underutilized real property,
including launch and test infrastructure remaining from the Apollo and
Space Shuttle eras.
Question 2. A number of emerging commercial space activities are
not covered by existing regulatory authorities. We will need to provide
the appropriate level of supervision for activities in space and we
need to provide regulatory certainty for industry. The previous
administration proposed expanding the Department of Transportation's
jurisdiction to approve and authorize activities in space that aren't
covered already by the FCC, Department of Commerce, or Department of
Transportation. Do you think it makes sense to expand the purview of
the Department of Transportation to approve new activities in space
that are not covered under existing authorities? If not, what would you
suggest as an alternative?
Answer. Blue Origin is open to the expansion of authorities at the
Department of Transportation to meet U.S. obligations under the Outer
Space Treaty for ``authorization and continuing supervision'' for
activities carried on in outer space. This effort would require only a
narrow expansion of DOT's authority and could be accomplished with
minimal additional demand on existing resources. However, it is
important to note that the FAA Office of Commercial Space
Transportation is currently under-resourced to fulfill its existing
mandates for launch, reentry, and spaceport needs. We would advocate
for an increase in AST's resources, with a near-term prioritization of
its current authorities prior to adding any additional
responsibilities.
Question 3. What more does the FAA need to put in place to
facilitate human spaceflight and how comfortable are you that the FAA
will be ready when the time comes for you to start launching space
flight participants?
Answer. The current human spaceflight learning period regime is
appropriate and allows companies to create rigorous internal safety
standards and robust test programs for unique systems as they are
developed. Recently, AST has supported industry consensus standards
efforts, and by continuing to do so, AST can ensure that industry
focuses on the standards development AST considers most important for
human spaceflight safety. When the time comes for AST to further
regulate space vehicles for passenger safety, AST can build off the
work the industry has already performed by requiring an operator's
compliance with industry standards for FAA-licensed activities.
______
Response to Written Questions Submitted by Hon. Maggie Hassan to
Robert Meyerson
Question 1. Space exploration creates vast opportunities for
scientific discovery, advancing our knowledge here on Earth, and
creating new and unique places for businesses to thrive. For decades,
we as a nation have prioritized sound science in our academic
institutions, and in our government. I recently called upon the
President to continue this age-old tradition and act swiftly in
appointing well-qualified experts to the Office of Science and
Technology Policy so that our government can remain informed on areas
where science affects our national security, economy, U.S.
competitiveness, and innovation. Do you agree that we need leaders in
our government who will focus on science and fact-based decision making
for space exploration to thrive? Can you speak to how our Federal
efforts in science and technology at NASA and in other areas of our
government bolster or complement the work of the private sector?
Answer. Blue Origin agrees that the country needs government
leaders who focus on science and fact-based decision making for this
industry to thrive. The work done by NASA and other government agencies
has undeniably facilitated the growth of the private space sector. As
the private space sector has developed, NASA has played a significant
role as a partner and customer, and the two have become inextricably
linked. Programs such as Commercial Crew and Cargo, DARPA's XS-1
spaceplane program, and even the Department of Defense national
security space launch programs are all examples of how the private
sector and government complement each other to achieve shared
interests. Emerging NASA programs like Flight Opportunities and
NextSTEP continue to further this legacy by encouraging competition,
utilizing innovative cost share approaches, and supporting industry-
agency knowledge exchange.
Question 2. According to NASA, there are over 500,000 pieces of
debris orbiting the Earth. This debris ranges in size from non-
functional satellites, to fragmented debris as small as nickles and
dimes, or even specks of paint. This debris travels around the Earth at
speeds of up to 17,500 miles per hour, roughly ten times faster than a
bullet. At these speeds even the tiniest bits of debris can cause
damage, and windows on the Space Shuttle were replaced because of
damage from tiny debris. In 2007, China blew up one of its satellites
with a ballistic missile, creating over 3,000 new pieces of space
debris. In 2013, Russian engineers confirmed that pieces of this debris
collided with one of their satellites. In 2009, an active American
satellite collided with an inoperative Russian satellite still in
orbit. When this type of debris comes near the ISS the crew climbs into
their escape pod and simply hopes nothing happens. With the increasing
launches of micro-satellites and decreasing launch costs it is now
easier than ever to launch craft into low Earth orbit, and the problem
is likely to increase many times over. Do you believe that current
processes and regulations in the United States are sufficient to
mitigate the increase in space debris? Do you think that there are
opportunities where we can improve our mitigation efforts without
hindering commercial development of space?
Answer. We believe current processes and regulations are
sufficient, but we also understand the increasing burden on the
Department of Defense in tracking space debris and facilitating
collision avoidance among commercial entities. Currently,
internationally recognized debris mitigation guidelines must be met by
industry prior to receiving any FCC, NOAA, or FAA licenses for space
operations. We support and encourage advancements in technologies with
the objective of removing space debris and enhancing collision
avoidance. Furthermore, commercial entities have access to data and
tools for conducting conjunction analyses and maintaining space
situational awareness, and have expressed willingness to partner with
the government on this crucial task. While we appreciate DOD's desire
to transfer this function to a civil agency, we strongly encourage the
fullest possible utilization of commercial capabilities as a near-term
solution.
Question 3. I have a number of suppliers working on the Orion crew
exploration program in my home state of New Hampshire. As many of you
know, Orion is the next generation space vehicle that will be launched
on the Space Launch System rocket in a few years, and will carry humans
further into space than ever before.
The question I would like to ask is, How can the U.S. maintain a
robust and functional industrial base that supports both government and
commercial space activities?
Answer. A robust industrial base is enabled by setting clear U.S.
Government civil and national security space goals. The government
plays a critical role by being a reliable customer and a promoter of
innovation while reducing regulatory barriers and burdens. We believe
it is better for the U.S. Government to be one among many customers for
the commercial space industry, as opposed to shouldering the entire
industrial base.
______
Response to Written Questions Submitted by Hon. Bill Nelson to
George Whitesides
Question 1. What do you see as the biggest needs for enabling a
dramatic increase in launch cadence at the Cape in terms of shared
infrastructure, the licensing and approval process, scheduling and de-
conflicting launches or other areas where we may be of help?
Answer. Support and encouragement for autonomous flight termination
systems, and how those systems interface smoothly with the national
airspace system.
Support for standardized launch licenses that permit multiple
standard launches on a given flight path, similar to suborbital
reusable flights.
Continued government support for physical infrastructure--roads,
bridges, rail, seaport, etc.
Assistance on delivery of critical utilities and commodities such
as power, water, communications, propellants and hazardous material
handling.
Continue support for infrastructure of safety, security, and
response.
Support for ``lifestyle infrastructure'' so that the Cape can
attract the best and brightest new talent.
Question 2. What more does the FAA need to put in place to
facilitate human spaceflight and how comfortable are you that the FAA
will be ready when the time comes for you to start launching space
flight participants?
Answer. Currently the Office of Commercial Space (AST) within the
FAA has been great to work with for the licensing of our human
spaceflight vehicle. They have been doing great work in preparation of
human spaceflight, like recently releasing guidelines for informed
consent. However, as we move from test flight to commercial operations
for the launch of space flight participants, AST needs increased
resources to accommodate the increased launch cadence. In addition, as
we gain more flight data and continuously improve our systems, AST
should also maintain up to date regulations that take into account the
latest commercial technology in use. This takes resources that AST does
not currently have.
Question 3. A number of emerging commercial space activities are
not covered by existing regulatory authorities. We will need to provide
the appropriate level of supervision for activities in space and we
need to provide regulatory certainty for industry. The previous
administration proposed expanding the Department of Transportation's
jurisdiction to approve and authorize activities in space that aren't
covered already by the FCC, Department of Commerce, or Department of
Transportation. Do you think it makes sense to expand the purview of
the Department of Transportation to approve new activities in space
that are not covered under existing authorities? If not, what would you
suggest as an alternative?
Answer. Much like the current launch environment, we need a stable,
predictable, and permissive regulatory environment that promotes
innovation. This can take many forms, but the regulatory environment
should be one that allows for sustainable and efficient processes for
commercial companies to do business.
______
Response to Written Questions Submitted by Hon. Maggie Hassan to
George Whitesides
Question 1. Space exploration creates vast opportunities for
scientific discovery, advancing our knowledge here on Earth, and
creating new and unique places for businesses to thrive. For decades,
we as a nation have prioritized sound science in our academic
institutions, and in our government. I recently called upon the
President to continue this age-old tradition and act swiftly in
appointing well-qualified experts to the Office of Science and
Technology Policy so that our government can remain informed on areas
where science affects our national security, economy, U.S.
competitiveness, and innovation. Do you agree that we need leaders in
our government who will focus on science and fact-based decision making
for space exploration to thrive? Can you speak to how our Federal
efforts in science and technology at NASA and in other areas of our
government bolster or complement the work of the private sector?
Answer. Many of the current efforts in science and technology
development use commercial services in one way or another, but there is
room for increased partnership with industry. For example, NASA's
Flight Opportunities Program provides commercial suborbital flights for
technology development payloads to raise the TRLs of technology
critical to the mission of the agency. Another program within NASA,
called Venture Class Launch Services, uses commercial small launch
providers to launch small satellites from the Science Mission
Directorate to perform low-cost, high-value science. Programs such as
these, and others that use commercial services to provide an
opportunity to do cost-effective and frequent research and technology
development will further the agency's work in a fiscally-responsible
yet innovative way.
Question 2. According to NASA, there are over 500,000 pieces of
debris orbiting the Earth. This debris ranges in size from non-
functional satellites, to fragmented debris as small as nickles and
dimes, or even specks of paint. This debris travels around the Earth at
speeds of up to 17,500 miles per hour, roughly ten times faster than a
bullet. At these speeds even the tiniest bits of debris can cause
damage, and windows on the Space Shuttle were replaced because of
damage from tiny debris. In 2007, China blew up one of its satellites
with a ballistic missile, creating over 3,000 new pieces of space
debris. In 2013 Russian engineers confirmed that pieces of this debris
collided with one of their satellites. In 2009 an active American
satellite collided with an inoperative Russian satellite still in
orbit. When this type of debris comes near the ISS the crew climbs into
their escape pod and simply hopes nothing happens. With the increasing
launches of micro-satellites and decreasing launch costs it is now
easier than ever to launch craft into low Earth orbit, and the problem
is likely to increase many times over. Do you believe that current
processes and regulations in the United States are sufficient to
mitigate the increase in space debris? Do you think that there are
opportunities where we can improve our mitigation efforts without
hindering commercial development of space?
Answer. Virgin is committed to running a long-term sustainable
space business, and this includes preserving access to space by
preventing and managing debris. With the success of small satellite
technology and business cases, we will indeed begin to see increased
activity on orbit. One opportunity to improve mitigation efforts
without hindering commercial development of space would be to begin
efforts, with industry, to review and revise existing IADC space debris
mitigation efforts that were put into place over 25 years ago. Such a
review would likely reveal that there are a number of ways in which the
U.S. could lead a collaborative global effort to minimize future space
debris.
Question 3. I have a number of suppliers working on the Orion crew
exploration program in my home state of New Hampshire. As many of you
know, Orion is the next generation space vehicle that will be launched
on the Space Launch System rocket in a few years, and will carry humans
further into space than ever before.
The question I would like to ask is, ``How can the U.S. maintain a
robust and functional industrial base that supports both government and
commercial space activities?
Answer. The exploration of space will always include both
government and commercial space activities. To maintain a robust
industrial base:
First and foremost, the United States should seek to implement
policies that encourage private sector innovation and minimize
regulatory burdens. The industrial base is rarely a problem in vibrant
and growing industries.
As the U.S. Government seeks to develop new and innovative space
capabilities, it should encourage partnership with the commercial space
sector. This will allow Government programs more capability to achieve
agency goals in a cost-effective manner, and create a healthy
industrial base in the U.S. for both civil and defense purposes.
The Government should refrain from using taxpayer dollars to fund
programs that directly compete with commercial available or emerging
services. There are many missions and objectives within NASA that only
the U.S. Government has the ability to fulfill--however, by using
commercially available services where available, the Government can
make greater use of its unique in-house capabilities to explore further
and achieve once inaccessible destinations.
When partnering with the commercial industry, government should
strive to use firm-fixed price contracts and efficient acquisition
strategies. Overly burdensome and costly contracting methods will
stifle private sector innovation and shrink the commercial space
industrial base in which government could benefit from.
______
Response to Written Questions Submitted by Hon. Maggie Hassan to
Andrew Rush
Question 1. Space exploration creates vast opportunities for
scientific discovery, advancing our knowledge here on Earth, and
creating new and unique places for businesses to thrive. For decades,
we as a nation have prioritized sound science in our academic
institutions, and in our government. I recently called upon the
President to continue this age-old tradition and act swiftly in
appointing well-qualified experts to the Office of Science and
Technology Policy so that our government can remain informed on areas
where science affects our national security, economy, U.S.
competitiveness, and innovation. Do you agree that we need leaders in
our government who will focus on science and fact-based decision making
for space exploration to thrive? Can you speak to how our Federal
efforts in science and technology at NASA and in other areas of our
government bolster or complement the work of the private sector?
Answer. Reasoning based on sound scientific and technical analysis
is crucial to a sustainable, thriving space exploration program. It is
also critical for space-based industry to profitably grow. Technology
development by NASA and other government agencies are a critical engine
of economic development. Via the SBIR program, initial technology
development is done which is often too risky or speculative for private
investment. Once developed, products, services, and sometimes entire
sectors flourish, based on the government funded work. For example,
NASA SBIR funded research into 3D printing in space. Now, Made In Space
is operated a commercial 3D printing facility on the ISS and
manufacturing parts for customers in space on a routine basis. While
SBIR excels at transitioning technologies on the lower end of the
Technology Readiness Level (TRL) spectrum, programs like the Tipping
Point Program from NASA's Space Technology Mission Directorate,
facilitate further development and commercialization of new technology.
This ensures that returns are realized on initial investments and that
technology is available at a cost effective rate for NASA and other
government agency use.
Question 2. I have a number of suppliers working on the Orion crew
exploration program in my home state of New Hampshire. As many of you
know, Orion is the next generation space vehicle that will be launched
on the Space Launch System rocket in a few years, and will carry humans
further into space than ever before.
The question I would like to ask is, ``How can the U.S. maintain a
robust and functional industrial base that supports both government and
commercial space activities?
Answer. The U.S. can maintain a robust and functional industrial
base that supports both government and commercial space activities by:
(1) clearly defining intellectual property rights for commercial
companies operating in space, including aboard U.S. assets and the
International Space Station (ISS); (2) providing for a transition plan
in Low Earth Orbit from the ISS to commercial space stations; and (3)
making continued investment in space technology development via NASA's
Space Technology Mission Directorate, the Advanced Explorations Systems
division of the Human Exploration and Operations Mission Directorate,
the ISS Program Office, and others.
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