New Mars Forums

Mark Friedenbach wrote:

Impaler, you appear to have a good understanding of legal principles, but not this particular law and the later ratified treaties which clarified or expanded it (such as the Space Liability Convention) or the many existing legal briefs about them. There is, for example, a huge distinction between claims of sovereignty and property. For example, under the U.S. government's current interpretation of the OST, if a U.S. company launches a mining operation on the moon, Mars or asteroid, that facility of sovereign U.S. territory, and the resources which pass through that facility become the legal property of the individual or organization which owns the facility. The U.S. government reserves the right at its option (if it had the capability) to send a hypothetical "Space Coast Guard" to protect the private activities of its citizens in space, and enforce rights of ownership and contract. This is unambiguously true in the current interpretation of the law.

The U.S. government also reserves the right to recognize private land claims, and to similarly enforce them. Note that this is demonstrably different from claiming sovereignty, which is what is prohibited by the OST! This would require an act of congress, but would not require renegotiation of any international treaties.

Mark claims of sovreignty are not allowed we all apart from louis understand this. But the problem in your scenario is that International law differs on just what you use those resources that are mined for. If it is to help fuel a vehicle to further a mission then it comes down to the benefit of Mankinds knowledge. If though it is to garner resources for making profits then there will be court cases and since they will use existing similar law (The law of the sea as an example) to inform the case. The likehood is that the US would lose.

I'm sorry but 90% of what people are speculating about in this thread is just Bunk.  The 1976 Space treaty is not ambiguous as to private ownership of outer space, first off the treaty binds all signatory nations to not allow their nationals and legal entities (corporations) to violate the treaty either.

Article VI
States Parties to the Treaty shall bear international responsibility for national activities in outer space, including the moon and other celestial bodies, whether such activities are carried on by governmental agencies or by non-governmental entities, and for assuring that national activities are carried out in conformity with the provisions set forth in the present Treaty. The activities of non- governmental entities in outer space, including the moon and other celestial bodies, shall require authorization and continuing supervision by the appropriate State Party to the Treaty. When activities are carried on in outer space, including the moon and other celestial bodies, by an international organization, responsibility for compliance with this Treaty shall be borne both by the international organization and by the States Parties to the Treaty participating in such organization.

Right their in black and white, non-governmental agencies are MORE restricted because they are both bound the same restrictions as governments AND they can do nothing without their host government's "authorization and continuing supervision".  If the US government through NASA can't do an activity which would violate the treaty then it can not authorize someone else to do it either.  The US can authorize anything which is treaty compliant but if their is a dispute over this activity it is by definition and international dispute and not something any one government can dictate.

Antarctica is not actually the best Earth-side analogy for the Moon and Mars because most of Antarctica is 'nominally' claimed by government but all the claimant governments mutually agreeing to treat Antarctica as a Scientific commons without renouncing any of their claims.  The appropriate analogy for Space is that of International waters, which have never been claimed and are never can be, the space treaty firmly places space in this category.  But it IS legal to profit from international waters because an international legal regime has been created to govern it, a UN agency grants mining leases to large areas of the ocean floor for the purpose of Manganese nodule harvesting.  Several leases have already been made to various corporations and they will have to pay mining royalties for this.  The US is the only nation that hasn't joined the seafloor mining treaty but even the Bush administration had been willing to do so and it's established international law.

A similar convention for space mining is the most likely long-term outcome.  Anyone actually serious about Asteroid mining should be clamoring for this kind of legal regime not indulging in libertarian fantasies of going out and making extra-legal claims to any moon or asteroid.  I HOPE their are enough serious people within the space enthusiast community to create advocacy and public preshure for proper treaties and they can squelch the childish American space-libertarians camp.

Firstly Commerce and exploitation of raw materials is the rich getting richer, it does not help mankind...
Secondly licensing, leasing have to have ownership rights established in order for the claim to be honored...
While

"The law doesn't operate on the principle "Only what is permitted by law is permissible". It operates on the principle that "That if something is permitted by law or is not forbidden by law, it is permissible". "

is true in that to which leads to law suits and legal rangling to gain a courts verdict on the interputation of the law...

Its all to do with political events down here on Earth and the so called Common heritage of mankind.

It basically comes down to no one can actually own outer space as it is owned by everyone.

louis wrote:

None of that precludes in my view licensing of land for specific purposes, or indeed a declaration of independence by the occupants of a celestial body.  If licensing were not allowed then you would have the absurdity that anyone could come along and say ride a 3 tonne rover over someone else's photovoltaic facility. Clearly there must be allowance made for organisaiton of land use.

So, I see no problem with very long leases of land for instance.

Actually there is great laws all wrapped up in the outer space treaty about how to deal with damaging another countries property in space. There is though no organisation for land use everyone and no one owns it there fore no land leases possible.

The Moon treaty that came out had tried to solve some of those issues but it was and unfortunatly remains a very unsuitable treaty for anyone that wants to move mankind off this rock. The basic quist is that like the law of the sea the final arbiter would be an agency of the UN. And that is to many people of the world and especially Americans a definite No No. It would also insist that anyone attempting to make a profit would not only have to share those profits with the rest of the world it will also insist on full technology transfers to any state that asks.

In short it will not happen until someone gets round to fixing this treaty and if billionaires with clout cant get the US goverment to start down that road then no one can.

You are correct there is a clear legal precedent it is that samples were returned as Scientific samples only and that was the betterment of all mankind.

And of course they were in the possesion of a goverment not a private agency.

The treaties are specific 'Outer space, including the moon and other celestial bodies, is not subject to national appropriation by claim of sovereignty, by means of use or occupation, or by any other means'

So using it for science to benefit mankind big tick
Using it for wealth generation no chance.

Certainly under the current treaties we certainly need a few changes.

I hate to be a posting pig, but that picture just had to draw me in.

I see the rocks in the pool of water.

Even though that pool of water may be very cold (And I presume any adapted life in it have an extremely low metabolism, I have to wonder what the temperature excursions are for the soil at the bottom of the pond.  It seems to me that the warmth of the noonday sunlight must improve it't temperature.

I also see the rocks poking up out of the brine.  That in fact really draws me.  Brine ponds have not been photographed on Mars, but I am not sure they cannot exist.  At least perhaps they can exist at some point in the procession of the tilting of the poles, if for instance snowfall were to contact a salt flat. (Your postings indicate exposed salt flats, and the ice that is quite low in lattitude under the soil in places suggests snowfall has occurred at some time in the past 100,000 years)?

Anyway a rock soaking in brine, if it is at least a bit porous, in the conditions where day night temperatures are extreem, suggests that that process could make the rocks habitible.  Where your articles suggest an extrordinary tollerance for salt by some organisms, it does leave in question if the temperatures on Mars can be high enough.  I would think that at noon time during the summer of the southern hemmisphere, 1/8-1/4 inches inside of the rock, yes.  And the rocks might be soaking in brine.  Perhaps not an open pool of water, but a pool of brine under the surface of the soil.

So, I suppose that if the rocks were like wicks, they woud draw moisture upwards to the exposed surface of the rock.  Sandstone perhaps? 

It is a feature of the Arctic ocean that ice on the ice pack can become fresh enough to drink even though it started as salt water ice.  Freezing causes brine to leave the ice through brine channels. 

So, I speculate that there might be a hope that rocks wicking up mosisture out of briny mud on Mars (Presumed covered with a dry crust), might also from exposure to the cycling of temperatures on Mars generate a less briny fluid for microbes to use within the rock.  It is even possible that orgainsms in the rocks, just under the surface might use photosynthisis.  I would only expect this if they were a remnant organism from Mars past, or some organism that somehow made it to Mars from Earth or Ancient Venus.

Louis:

I went and looked at Reaction Engines' web page,  and crawled around a bit just looking.  Things have changed since I first ran across them a few years ago. 

Most or all of the essential engine component technologies are now funded development programs of this or that agency.  If these component technologies can be made to work about as thought,  then the system can really be built.  Like most web sites,  it's quite optimistic,  but I saw enough "meat" to know for sure it's "real",  meaning this thing might eventually fly.  They do have a long way to go proving all the engine components.  And then there's some airframe components that will have to be proven,  most notably the heat shield. 

A look at their web site was reminiscent of looking at XCOR Aerospace's site,  except Reaction Engines is fairly big by comparison.  Yet,  I know that XCOR's Lynx suborbital tourist spaceplane is "for real",  too.  You should go visit their site. 

I've sat in their Lynx mockup,  and it's simple enough even I could fly that spaceplane.  My contacts there tell me Lynx number 1 is being built this year on their hangar floor. 

XCOR is about 30 guys and gals in one hangar at the Mojave,  CA municipal airport.  They've made their living so far selling rocket engines with the life,  restart,  and maintenance characteristics one expects from FAA-certified aircraft engines.  They're definitely "for real",  too.  Watch them,  I think they'll impress you next year. 

Most of the rest of the flightline at that airport is owned by Burt Rutan / Scaled Composites.  Last time I saw Burt in person was 1985.  Didn't get to go visit him,  when I visited XCOR recently (who's looking for ramjet help from me). 

GW

Please don't misunderstand ... I'm not against ISRU on the first mission.  I'm against betting lives on unproven equipment needlessly.

Nothing never-before-done-in-situ can be considered proven.  We can't really do "real ISRU" till we land on Mars.  Simulations can be quite good sometimes,  but it just ain't the real thing.  Because our estimates of site conditions are only estimates. 

It is essential to thoroughly try out everything we can dream up for ISRU from mission-1 on.  I just don't think it'll work as good as folks wish.  More than 50% of our early rocket shots in the 50's were failures.  This is no different:  it takes real trials to find and fix all the "gotchas",  and believe me,  there will be "gotchas". 

I do have some qualms about using a nearly-pure CO2 atmosphere to make stuff like fuel.  The density is so low.  And how do you compress in any practical equipment from 7 mbar to 10,000 mbar or more?  We have never built compressors like that before,  recip or turbine,  other than near-zero throughput lab devices.  Not very many of them,  either. 

One "out" for compression might be to refrigerate a large volume of atmospheric CO2 to solidify it,  pack it into a much smaller volume sealed container with no free volume,  then re-heat it.  Re-gasification confined like that is automatic compression of the product gas.  Energetically,  that's not a very efficient process because of the refrigeration,  but it might be more practical to do.  I just don't know. 

We might be better off just mining solid dry ice near the poles,  and doing confined-heating compression that way to get CO2 gas bottled at pressures we can really use.  But that's not viable ISRU unless you land near one of the poles.  See what I mean? 

GW

I've also been following Skylon for a number of years. They are certainly shooting high in their ambitions! Full-fledged SSTO, HTOL, no less. The whole shebang. It is a harsh road they are traveling, especially funding-wise, but it could very well end up working and getting european space efforts into the history books. The first real SSTO would indeed be a very big deal, and the precooler seems pretty much done (a full-sized prototype is undergoing testing right now, as is shown on the video). It's a definite maybe, and I hope they succeed, get their funding, start selling spaceplanes, and enter my personal hall of fame.

Rune. As a side project, they are also developing the world's first hypersonic antipodal airplane, the LAPCAT A2. O_O

Based upon the information provided by GW, I have investigated the options for a two-stage launch vehicle.  The first stage is provided by a horizontal take-off ramjet aircraft, which burns jet fuel and is boosted to ~400mph by lox-jet fuel rockets within its wings, at which point ramjet thrust takes over.  I have not subjected this stage to detailed analysis, but have assumed that the vehicle will release the upper stage at a speed of Mach 6 (2km/s) at a height of 100,000’ (30km).

The second stage will be fuelled by LOX-jet fuel.  The additional delta-V required to reach orbit is 6.75km/s.  Assuming acceleration takes place at 5g, gravity losses work out to be 1.25km/s, which is only slightly lower than the upper stage upward release velocity of 1.4km/s, assuming second stage release takes place at 45 degree angle.  I have taken exhaust velocity to be vacuum exhaust velocity of 3500m/s.  With these values, the mass ratio of the upper stage is 6.88.  My assumption is that (initially at least) the upper stage will be expendable, which increases payload mass and reduces design complexity.  A reusable upper stage can be developed later on if cost-benefit analysis shows it to be worthwhile.  The traditional coupling mechanism between stages is explosive bolts.  However, this raises the potential for single point failure across a large number of bolts and is not very compatible with lower stage reusability and rapid turn-around.  Hydraulic clamps may be a better alternative if the mass penalty can be tolerated.

My initial preference for the expendable stage was maximum possible design simplification.  This led me to favour pressure fed fuel feed systems, thus avoiding the need for turbo-pumps.  The engine combustion chamber would work at a pressure of 20bar.  At such low pressure, it could be ablative lined carbon steel, with the exit nozzle being carbon steel and preferably radiatively cooled.  The low chamber pressure does not impact performance as the engine will be firing in a near vacuum.  Tank pressures would be 30bar.

My calculations indicate that even using spherical pressurised tanks it was very difficult to reach the required mass ratio with safety factors of 3.  To overcome this difficulty would require either the use of maraging steels, which cost ~$100/kg or the use of more than one stage.  Alternatively, a lower safety factor could be used, but this would push up quality control costs.  All of these appear to be counterproductive for an expendable stage, which needs to be cheap and easy to mass produce, rather like a bullet.  However, the low chamber pressure would appear to allow the use of gas jet feed pumps, which have no moving parts and should be very cheap to produce.  The gas can be provided by an electrically heated boiler.  Lithium ion batteries appear to provide sufficient energy density to power the heaters without severely impacting the mass ratio.  The use of jet pumps is possible only for engines with relatively low chamber pressures.  Assuming tanks are pressurised to 3bar feed pressure and are constructed from alloy steel with yield stress of 600MPa, then the tank mass ratio reduces to ~2% (i.e. the empty mass of the tank is 2% full mass, ignoring valves).

Attitude control during the 135 second acceleration can be accomplished using some combination of nozzle gimbaling or cold gas (nitrogen) jets, as the required impulse is modest.  The elimination of gambling would allow further simplification of the engine (i.e. fixed nozzle).

Overall a simple, mass produced upper stage would appear to be workable.  Assuming a mass ratio of 2 for the 1st stage and a 10% empty mass for the 2nd stage, the overall mass ratio would be 44.  If total take-off mass is 1000 tonnes, payload to orbit would be 22.7 tonnes.  To deliver payload at a cost of $100/kg, the total launch cost must be no greater than $2.3million.  This is a tall order, and requires that the upper stage be manufactured for not much more than $1million each.  It also requires that the vehicle is able to use conventional facilities (airports) with minimal additional ground infrastructure (hence the choice of propellants).

Just realised I forgot to account for the Earth's spin.  That knocks 500m/s of the orbital speed velocity change and reduces overal mass ratio to 32.  Quite a significant improvement.