Free Space Settlement

Hundreds of millions of years ago there was life in the ocean, but no life on land. Today, there is life on Earth and very little life in space, just a few astronauts, plants and animals on the International Space Station and a few bacteria here and there on spacecraft. We can change that. In the 1970's Princeton physicist Gerard O'Neill showed that we can build giant spaceships in free space and live in them. These space settlements could be wonderful places to live; about the size of a California beach town and endowed with weightless recreation, fantastic views, freedom, elbow-room in spades, and great wealth. In time, we may see hundreds of thousands of free space habitats in our solar system alone. Unlike earlier colonization events, no people will be oppressed and no ecosystems destroyed for the simple reason that there aren't any out there. Space settlement is as important as ocean-based Life's colonization of land half a billion years ago, perhaps more so.

You can now buy space settlement t-shirts, coffee mugs, mouse pads and much more at my online free space settlement store.

Some of My Space Settlement Writing

• "Paths to Space Settlement," Al Globus, NSS Space Settlement Journal November 2012.
• "The Fruits of a Space Settlement Contest," Al Globus, Ad Astra, Spring, 2013.
• "Our Solar System, Our Galaxy, then the Universe," Al Globus, March 2012. A short paper on how Life can expand throughout the universe using orbital space settlements co-orbiting with small bodies such as asteroids and comets.
• "Lunar Mines," Al Globus. A short paper on the advantages of lunar mining.
• New Space Policy Targets Launch. Support for President Obama's new space policy.
• Space Settlement and the Environment. Describes some of the potential benefits to Earth's environment from space settlement.
• Obama's Brilliant Space Policy. Analyzes President Obama's space policy from the point of view of space settlement. As you might guess, I like what I see. This was written after the policy was formally announced and budget figures were available.
• Obama's Present to Space Settlement. Recent decisions regarding the human space flight program may, probably unintentionally, be just what space settlement development needs. This was written before the policy was formally announced.
• A Sensible Space Program proposes space solar power, rather than putting a small number of people beyond Low Earth Orbit, as the primary new project for NASA.
• Presentation: Paths to Space Settlement given to the NASA Ames Research Center in February 2009. PDF (39MB) Power Point (9MB)
• Presentation: Paths to Space Settlement given to the ATWG (Aerospace Technology Working Group) at NASA Ames Research Center in December 2008. PDF (25MB) Power Point (7MB)
• In Defense of Space Solar Power January 2009.
• Paths to Space Settlement (25MB) a presentation given to the ATWG (Aerospace Technology Working Group) at NASA Ames Research Center in December 2008.
• A Solution to the Launch Problem? Maybe. September 2008.
• Proposals for International Space University team projects:
  • Space Olympics. Submitted 2012, resubmitted with newly available Bigelow cost data 18 January 2013.
  • Human asteroid mission comparison. Submitted 2011.
  • Asteroid mining. Submitted 2008. Used in the summer of 2010.
  • Low-cost human space program. Submitted 2008.
  • Orbital retirement home. Submitted 2008.
  • Space Solar Power. Submitted 2008.
  • Cleaning up large LEO debris. Submitted 2010.
• "Fifteen Years of NASA Student Space Settlement Design Contests: Some Lessons," Al Globus, Ruth Globus, Tugrul Sezen, Hami E. Teal, Wenonah Vercoutere, Bryan Yager, International Conference On Environmental Systems, June 2008, San Francisco, CA, USA, Session: Education Outreach.
• A Space Program for Americans, 2008 Al Globus, February 2008.
• "A Better Strategy for America?," Al Globus, April 2007.
• "The Kalpana One Orbital Space Settlement Revised," Al Globus, Ankur Bajoria, Nitin Arora, Joe Straut, April 2007.
• Will We Live in Orbit?
• "Contest-Driven Development of Orbital Tourist Vehicles," Al Globus, AIAA Space 2006, San Jose, California, 19-21 September 2006.
• " A U.S. Space Program for Space Settlement, Al Globus, 25th Internatioal Space Development Conference, National Space Society and the Planetary Society, Los Angeles, California, 4-7 May, 2006.
• "Kalpana One: A New Orbital Space Colony Design," Al Globus, Ankur Bajoria, Nitin Arora, 25th Internatioal Space Development Conference, National Space Society and the Planetary Society, Los Angeles, California, 4-7 May, 2006.
• "Kalpana One: A New Space Colony Design," Ankur Bajoria, Nitin Arora, Al Globus, Earth and Space 2000, 10th ASCE Aerospace Division International Conference on Engineering, Construction and Operations in Challenging Environments, Houston, Texas, 5-9 March 2006. This improves on Lewis One (see below).
• In the summer of 2005 Diplomatie, a French magazine, interviewed me on space colonization. The article appeared in the September/October 2005 issue. Read article in English.
• Introduction to my book "Orbital Space Colonies" The publisher cancelled not only the book, but the entire division of the company. I still like the intro ...
• Excerpts, from an orbital space settlement book that was never finished. I like the excerpts though.
• "Teleoperated Modular Robots for Lunar Operations," Al Globus, Greg Hornby, Greg Larchev, Matt Hancher, Howard Cannon, Jason Lohn AIAA 4th Aviation Technology, Integration and Operations (ATIO) Forum, Chicago, Illinois, 20 - 23 Sep 2004. A plan for building robotic lunar bases that might be used for mining.
• The Design and Visualization of a Space Biosphere," Space Manufacturing 8, Energy and Materials from Space, Space Studies Institute, Princeton, NJ, May 1991, pages 303-313. This presents the Lewis One space settlement design intended to improve on the 10,000 inhabitant designs of the mid-70s. The new design features large shielded micro-g construction bays, low-g agriculture near the rotation axis to reduce the length of cylindrical settlements, large micro-g visitor and recreation areas, space viewing, and low-g recreation.
• "Remote Teleoperation Earth to Moon - An Experiment," Fifth Princeton/AIAA Conference on Space Manufacturing, 1981.
Shows that ordinary people can drive a rover on a simulated lunar surface with a three second time delay as if they were teleoperating from Earth.
• Annotated space settlement bibliography.
• Basics
• Who? You, and people pretty much like you.
• What? Kilometer-scale spacecraft with all the amenities of home, and then some.
• Where? In orbit; near Earth at first, throughout the solar system this millenium, then on to the stars.
• How? Space tourism, orbital retirement homes, solar power satellites, asteroid mining and chutzpah.
• Why? To grow and survive.
• When? First one this century.
• How much will it cost? If you have to ask, you can't afford it (but still much cheaper than killing each other) ... unless molecular nanotechnology works

• "A Comparison of Astronaut Near-Earth Object Missions," Al Globus, Chris Cassell, Stephen Covey, Jim Luebke, Mark Sonter, Bryan Versteeg, and James Wolff, AIAA Space 2012, Pasadena, CA, 11-13 September 2012. This paper examines the advantages of bringing small asteroids into cis-lunar space for exploitation.
• Asteroid Mining (5.3 Mbytes), presentation materials for the International Space University in 2010.
• Asteroid mining proposal for the International Space University. Submitted 2008. Used in the summer of 2010.
• "AsterAnts: A Concept for Large-Scale Meteoroid Return and Processing Using the International Space Station," Al Globus, Bryan Biegel, and Steve Traugott, NAS technical report NAS-99-006, presented at Space Frontier Conference 8. Presents a plan to retrieve very large numbers of very small asteroids with fleets of identical solar-sail-powered spacecraft.
• Work by other members of the Asteroid Mining Group
  • Asteroid Mining: Key to the Space Economy, by Mark Sonter
  • Technologies for Asteroid Capture into Earth Orbit, by Stephen D. Covey
  • The Technical and Economic Feasibility of Mining the Near-Earth Asteroids, by Mark Sonter (1998 paper)
  • The Technical and Economic Feasibility of Mining the Near-Earth Asteroids, by Mark Sonter (1998 Master's Thesis updated 2012) PDF 207 pages
  • The Sisyphus Victorious Asteroid Project, a presentation by Marco Tantardini at CalTech December 6, 2010. This presentation led to the creation of the Keck Workshop on Asteroid Retrieval.

• "A Space Solar Power Industry for $2 Billion or your Money Back," Al Globus, AIAA Space 2012, Pasadena, CA 11-13 May 2012. This paper investigates using prizes to develop space solar power.
• "Towards an Early Profitable PowerSat, Part II" Al Globus, Ion Bararu, and Mihai Radu Popescu, International Space Development Conference 2011, National Space Society, Huntsville, Alabama, 18-22 May, 2011. This paper suggests an approach to developing a small, single-launch SSP system that may be profitable in certain high-priced niche markets. The underlying technologies could be developed by a modest R&D program, suggesting that critics who claim SSP is multiple orders of magnitude from profitability are wrong.
• "Towards an Early Profitable PowerSat," Al Globus, Space Manufacturing 14: Critical Technologies for Space Settlement, NASA Ames Research Center, Mountain View, CA, October 29-31, 2010. This paper examines a new design that, using technologies proven in space and on the ground, may be profitable or nearly so given optimistic but reasonable assumptions for near term R&D results.
• New Space Policy Targets Launch. Support for President Obama's new space policy.
• Space Solar Power and the Environment makes the argument that Space Solar Power (SSP) is one of, if not the, most environmentally sound source of energy if the space segment is built from lunar materials. A slightly different version entitled Space Solar power, Lunar Mining, and the Environment was published in the Online Journal of Space Communication issue 16.
• Obama's Present to Space Settlement. Recent decisions regarding the human space flight program may, probably unintentionally, be just what space settlement development needs.
• Is SSP Competitive with Nuclear investigates evidence that building space solar power systems may cost only a few times more than a comparable nuclear power plant today.
• A Sensible Space Program proposes space solar power, rather than putting a small number of people beyond Low Earth Orbit, as the primary new project for NASA.
• "Space Solar Power Via Prizes," Al Globus. A later version of this is published in the Online Journal of Space Communication issue 16 as SSP Via Prizes.
• "Paths to Space Settlement," Al Globus.
• Presentation: Paths to Space Settlement given to the NASA Ames Research Center in February 2009. PDF (39MB) Power Point (9MB)
• Presentation: Paths to Space Settlement given to the ATWG (Aerospace Technology Working Group) at NASA Ames Research Center in December 2008. PDF (25MB) Power Point (7MB)
• In Defense of Space Solar Power January 2009.
• Paths to Space Settlement (25MB) a presentation given to the ATWG (Aerospace Technology Working Group) at NASA Ames Research Center in December 2008.
• A Solution to the Launch Problem? Maybe. September 2008.
• I wrote a series of proposals in May 2008 for the International Space University (ISU) summer program. One was for Space Solar Power
• Space Solar Power X-Prize Space Settlement Advocacy Committee, December 2007. This is a proposal to the X-Prize Foundation for a Space Solar Power (SSP) prize.
• A Space Program for Americans, 2008 Al Globus, February 2008.
• "A Better Strategy for America?," Al Globus, April 2007.
• " A U.S. Space Program for Space Settlement, Al Globus, 25th Internatioal Space Development Conference, National Space Society and the Planetary Society, Los Angeles, California, 4-7 May, 2006.

• NASA Ames/Stanford 1975 Summer Study.
• Space Resources and Space Settlements NASA Ames 1977 Summer Study.
• Space Resources Overview NASA-California Space Institute 1992 Summer Study.
• Space Resources Volume 1, Scenarios NASA-California Space Institute 1992 Summer Study.
• Space Resources Volume 2, Energy, Power, and Transport NASA-California Space Institute 1992
• Space Resources Volume 3, Materials Nasa-California Space Institute 1992
• Space Resources Volume 4, Social Concerns NASA-California Space Institute 1992
• CoEvolution Book on space settlement edited by Stewart Brand and published in 1977. This work contains arguments for and against space colonization, very interesting. This is what got me interested in space colonization.

• Kalpana One space settlement images.
• Bryan Versteeg's space settlement 3D and video art.
• NASA Ames summer studies (1970's).
• Space Studies Institute slide set.
• Images of the moon from the National Space Science Data Center.
• Asteroid and Comet Fact Sheets.
• Videos of weightless living.

• National Space Society space settlement page.
• The NSS Space Settlement Library Asteroid Mining Page
• NASA space settlement site.
• Mike Combs' excellent space settlement page. I particlularly like his FAQ
• A collection of space settlement quotes.
• L5 News. The L5 Society was founded to promote space settlement. It eventually merged to become the National Space Society. Back issues of the L5 News can be found at this site.
• The Space Frontier Foundation.
• P.E.R.M.A.N.E.N.T.
• Space Studies Institue.
• Wikipedia entries
  • Space colonization
  • Space habitat
  • Space manufacturing
• Spacesettlers. Newgroup to share your thoughts on space setttlements and related topics with fellow spacesettlers.
• Space Station Threshold A community driven jumping off point for reaching space.
• The Artemis Project to establish a self-sufficient lunar colony.
• Isaac Asimov on space settlement.
• Cygo Space Initiative. CYGO's Space Initiative has to do with planning and deliberate action towards mining near earth asteroids, molding and casting of interlocking pieces, assembly of private interconnectable space vehicles, assembly of space platforms in various configurations (incl. settlements and quarters for residents and tourists) and assisting in the setting up of new commercial and industrial operations in space.
• Bigelow Aerospace, Inc. is developing a private, human-rated space station and offers a $50 million prize for demonstration of a launch vehicle that can get there.
• BIO-Plex Information Exchange. NASA Ames Research Center In-House LIfe Support Technology Review Databook.
• Biosphere 2 was able to support 8 people for two years in a (almost) materially closed system, although many problems were encountered. Such closed systems are essential for space colonization.
• Burning the Cosmic Commons: Evolutionary Strategies for Interstellar Colonization. A paper by Robin Hanson
• Freeluna.com dedicated to the proposition that the colonization of outer space is critical for the long term survival of the human species, and that colonization of the moon and the exploitation of the moon's natural resources is one of the best first steps in that incredible journey off planet.
• Adaptation of Stereolithography to the In-Situ Construction of Lunar Basalt Structures A novel method of basalt casting with applications towards semi-autonomous robotic processing is presented by William Clawson.
• First Millennial Foundation. Projects to Employ Resources of the Moon and Asteroids Near Earth in the Near Term.
• Spaceflight or Extinction A civilization restricted to the surface of a single planet has inevitable threats to its long-term existence. Natural threats such as epidemics and impacts from space objects, and man-made threats such as nuclear and biological war, will be joined by new threats from emerging sciences and technologies.
• Space Quotes to Ponder What famous people (and some not famous) have said about why humankind must expand into space.
• Space Future for everyone who wants to go to space.
• Uranos A club for grouping people interested in the development of human civilization and its expansion into extraterrestial space.

• Bootstrapping space Communities with Micro Rovers and High Tensile Boot Laces (Tethers). How to Start Building Cities and Factories Throughout the Solar System, for What We Are Now Spending on Space, authored by Bruce A. MacKenzie, Space Studies Institute - Senior Associate, and National Space Society - Director.
• Centripetal Vivarium Space Habitats by Andrew Thompson. Includes pictures and 3D model.
• Distant Space Travel Better Conducted As Family Affair. University of Florida Daily News article.
• SpaceSettlers. A site devoted to space settlement discussion.
• The Space Show. The Space Show focuses on timely and important issues influencing the developmentof outer-space commerce and space tourism, as well as other related subjects of interest to us all.
• Links to solar sail web sites.
• General Public Space Travel and Tourism
• Related web sites.

Parting Words

Arthur C. Clarke once wrote that new ideas pass through three periods:

• "It can't be done."
• "It probably can be done, but it's not worth doing."
• "I knew it was a good idea all along!"

Contact: Al Globus