
Getting to space is about to get a lot easier. I talked about the reasons why in the last episode. Now for the fun part: what it will lead to. This summary is focused on some of the changes we're likely to see in the next 5 to 20 years. Here's a link to the full essay, or you can listen and check out the links below. Links mentioned NASA announcement that Starship had won the contract to land humans on the Moon again "The Lunar Space Elevator" on the Cool Worlds YouTube channel Kessler syndrome — the scenario where one or more orbital collisions cause a cascade of further collisions NASA's Orbital Debris quarterly newsletter Axiom Space's breakdown of why microgravity is beneficial Varda Space Industries Ivan Kirigin interviews Delian Asparouhov about Varda and building factories in space A concept for an asteroid railway (check out the drawings) More on the 1999 NASA study about space-based solar power Resources to follow along /r/spacex — I've been a lurker on this subreddit for nearly 10 years now and can say that it's probably the best source for news and intelligent discussion on SpaceX. NASA Spaceflight has a good discussion board as well. NASA YouTube channel SpaceX YouTube channel Everyday Astronaut YouTube channel — There's a handful of really good space- and rocket-focused channels from both professional rocket scientists and amateur space enthusiasts. Tim Dodd's "Everyday Astronaut" is probably my favorite. Tons of good content, with technical explanations, news breakdowns, interviews and more. Scott Manley's is another good one, as is Marcus House's. Reference material The Case for Space, by Robert Zubrin. Probably the best rundown of why we need to continue our push into space, how we'll get there, and what it will look like when we do. Beyond, by Chris Impey. Very similar to The Case for Space, so if you're interested I would just read that. I read Beyond first a few years ago and it has a lot of great explanations and potential futures, like using nuclear or fusion engines to explore the universe. Winchell Chung's Atomic Rockets. Basically a Wikipedia for space travel and sci-fi concepts. You could spend days on this site without finishing it.
May 3, 2021
26 min

The cost and ease of getting to space are about to improve by many orders of magnitude. This will drive the space industry to be one of the biggest sources of growth over the next 10-20 years. This is the first of a two-part essay on the upcoming future of the space industry. See the full post: https://futureblind.com/2021/03/03/the-future-of-space-1/ Footnotes & References Here's the Google Sheet with the table I used to calculate the breakdown of cost to LEO for Falcon and Starship rockets. On Elon Musk's use of first principles that helped build SpaceX. A good explainer video on the full-flow combustion cycle engine and its efficiencies. Here’s a timeline of a few milestones of the recent commercialization of space: 2008-12 — Commercial Resupply Services (CRS) contract of $1.6B to SpaceX and $1.9B to Orbital Sciences to deliver supplies to ISS. This helps fund Falcon 9 development. 2012-05 — SpaceX Dragon capsule launches “empty” to perform tests and dock with the ISS, the first commercial spacecraft ever to do so. 2012-10 — SpaceX CRS-1 mission sends Dragon with supplies to ISS. Dragon is the only cargo vehicle at the time capable of returning supplies to Earth. 2014-09 — NASA awards final Commercial Crew Program (CCP) contract to SpaceX ($2.6B) and Boeing ($4.2B) for the capability to send 4-5 astronauts to the ISS. First flights for both initially planned in 2017. 2020-01 — NASA awards Axiom Space the first ever contract to build a commercial module for the ISS. 2020-04 — NASA awards lunar lander contracts to Blue Origin, Dynetics, and SpaceX under the Artemis program. The goal is to land “the first woman and the next man” on the Moon by 2024. 2020-05 — Commercial Crew Demo mission sends 2 astronauts to ISS. These are the first astronauts on a commercial mission, and the first from US soil since retirement of the Space Shuttle in 2011. 10 million people worldwide watched it live. 2020-11 — Crew 1, the first operational flight, sends 4 astronauts to ISS. Due to delays and other issues, Boeing’s Starliner isn’t set to fly for another year. 2020-12 — NASA awards Blue Origin a Launch Services contract to transport planetary, Earth observation, exploration and scientific satellites.
Apr 26, 2021
11 min

Welcome to the FutureBlind podcast. My name is Max Olson, and this is the audio edition of my blog FutureBlind. In this introductory episode, I talk briefly about my motivation for starting the podcast and what excites me about the medium. This is my experiment in audio storytelling. Enjoy!
Apr 26, 2021
3 min