Stimulus For Space Exploration

NASA recently won approval from Congress to spend $1 billion in economic stimulus funds to support entrepreneuriial activity in space exploration. The agency has already announced $50 million of that will go to the winner of a competitive bid contract that will seek to develop a private sector capability to deliver crew and cargo to orbit. That is separate from the COTS program, which has already awarded contracts to SpaceX and Orbital Sciences to develop vehicles capable of delivering cargo to the ISS.

Having a private sector spacecraft capable of ferrying people to and from Earth orbit would clearly be a game changer. Not having to rely on NASA for such access would allow university researchers and private companies to finally begin working out how to bring the resources and unque possibilities of the space environment into the human economy. Doing that could well mark the opening of an era that could lift human wealth and opportunity beyond the wildest dreams of anyone who has yet lived.