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Interstellar Space Flight: Social and Economic Considerations
by Richard Obousy
Arguably one of the key factors in the decision to begin construction of an interstellar spacecraft will be the economics. Any interstellar space vehicle is likely to be astronomically expensive to build, and in all likelihood will cost tens, hundreds and possibly thousands of times more than even the International Space Station (ISS). Of course, this potentially multi-trillion dollar burden on today’s suffocated economy is incredibly unlikely. However, we can perform a simple exercise to calculate approximately when such a project becomes fiscally feasible. Before we do consider the economics let us first contemplate some of the motives that might drive us to partake in such a project. Arguably one of the most convincing arguments, although least urgent, is the long-term stability of the sun. Clearly on billion year timescales, continued life on earth cannot be guaranteed. While Earth’s fate is not entirely sealed, the belief that the death of the sun is an event looming in the distant future is widely accepted. Although a civilization of some deep future may engineer ingenious methods to perpetuate life on Earth as long as possible, the Earth and ultimately the solar system itself will become increasingly inhospitable, and more appealing climes will manifest themselves compelling us to visit and maybe colonize other star systems. Another persuasive argument for the exploration and possible migration of at least a cross section of the human species is to hedge against natural or even manmade disasters thus adding security to our ultimate survival. Earth’s history is marked by profound and species destroying events including, but not limited to, asteroid impact, supervolcanic eruptions, and climate change. It appears that the human race is existing within a very human-friendly ‘pocket’ of geological history, but such favorable conditions are by no means guaranteed to last indefinitely. An alternative and somewhat convincing reason to explore beyond our own solar system is that such a mission could be considered an end in itself, the undertaking of which serves no deep survival purpose. Interstellar exploration could merely be an expression of a curious and energetic species looking to expand our grasp of the universe that we inhabit, much as today’s exploration of the solar system serves no ends other than to expand our knowledge of our direct neighbors in space. A future civilization with more abundant wealth and resources at her command may naturally become inclined to interstellar exploration. Underlying all of these assumptions is the belief that the solar system will in time, become the domain of an all encompassing, profoundly well organized commonwealth, with a vast economic and productive capability [1]. Perhaps the enterprise of starship building, gargantuan by today’s standards, may be one of the few that is demanding enough to keep the community engaged. If history is to serve as a reliable yardstick, evidence indicates that new technological innovations tend to catalyze productivity, which is further used in the creation of armies, empires and opulent masterpieces of stone, steel and canvas. Starship construction may serve as a welcome alternative to these historic follies. Indeed – with a vast civilization comes a vast population and the lack of employment is known to be a factor in the destabilization of practical governments. At its zenith, the Apollo program employed 400,000 people and needed the support of more than 20,000 industrial firms and universities [2]. The enterprise of constructing a starship would very likely be abundantly more challenging and quite possibly be 100 to 1000 times more demanding than the Apollo moon program. Thus, an admittedly simple, yet instructive linear extrapolation indicates that construction of an interstellar spacecraft might employ as many as 400 million people – more than the current population of the United States. Although these figures are very rough estimates, they do serve as an instructive guide to the possible scale of the project. What seems immediately apparent is that an interstellar vehicle would be a massive source of employment thus representing a huge public service. So what might the total cost be? According to Freeman Dyson in his 1968 paper titled ‘Interstellar Transport’ the cost could be as little as $100 Billion [3] which, adjusted for inflation, is about $650 billion US today. Contrast this with the estimates provided in the Daedalus papers [4] of as much as $100 trillion. For the purpose of this article, we will examine three different starship scenarios and attempt to estimate when the economical conditions would be in place to entertain such an endeavor. The first scenario is the ‘Thrifty Dyson Starship’ costing only $1 trillion. The second is a ‘Budget Daedalus’ with a price tag of $20 trillion. Finally we’ll have the full ‘Daedalus Class Starship’ with a price tag of $100 trillion. Let us assume that it will be economically feasible (and politically viable) to engage in the construction of an interstellar vehicle when the total cost represents just 1% Gross Domestic Product (GDP) for the constructing nation. As justification for this figure, some estimates place the price tag for the ISS at $100 billion for NASA (excluding costs shared by other partners), which represents about .6% of the GDP of the United States, and so 1% of the constructing nation’s GDP is a reasonable figure to work with. Assuming a conservative baseline growth of the economy of 2% per annum, we can extrapolate from current GDP to estimate when the project might begin. Next we must decide which nation(s) GDP we will examine. For the sake of argument we will select two possibilities. The first will be the GDP of the United States of America ($14.6 Trillion [5]), a country with a rich history of space exploration and a willingness to commit resources to the space program. The second will be a somewhat more optimistic GDP – that of the entire planet Earth ($61.1 Trillion [5]). It is not inconceivable that the current trend for governments to work closer will converge on a global scale. Challenging as this may be for us to imagine, we already see examples of this trend at work with the merging of the European economies into the Euro and the existence of the European Space Agency. It is with only a very small leap of the imagination that we may one day see a fully globalized economy with all nations of the Earth integrated and mutually benefiting from the arrangement. From this baseline setup we will next generate predictions for the date when it will become economically feasible to build each of the three starship scenarios, for the two selected economies assuming a 2% growth per year (Table 1).
Table 1. Predicted year that the construction of an interstellar spacecraft becomes economically feasible based on a 2% growth rate of the US and the global economy for three classes of vehicle
From Table 1 we see a range of predictions for the date when construction of an interstellar spacecraft becomes economically feasible. These estimates lie between 2013 as the earliest date, and 2340 as the latest date that construction could begin. The best-case scenario of 2013 is clearly ovelry optimistic in the sense that it would only give our planet 3 years to become economically and politically integrated and governed by a unified political entity. The estimate is, however, encouraging in the sense that, with enough will, we could construct an interstellar spacecraft in the not-too-distant future. All of this may seem like an incredible undertaking, but if we are to tackle a problem on the astronomical scale, then we must visualize solutions to suit. As a final exercise we will explore a lavishly optimistic scenario where we assume our ‘unified planetary government’ grows at 4% per annum and calculate the date it would become possible to build the ‘Budget Daedalus’ craft whose costs lie between our thrifty Dyson Starship and the full Daedalus Class starship. Compounding the Global GDP at 4% returns a date of 2099 for when construction of the ‘Budget Daedalus’ represents only 1% of the planets GDP. Thus it is, in some sense of the word, possible that our transition from the 21st century into the 22nd century will be celebrated with the construction of Earth’s first interstellar explorer. An exciting and delightful end to this century, one has to admit. [1] A. Martin, ‘World Ships – Concept, Cause, Cost, Construction and Colonisation’ JBIS, Vol 37, pp243-254, 1984. [2] NASA Langley Research Center’s Contributions to the Apollo Program. NASA Langley Research Center. [3] F. Dyson, ‘Interstellar Transport’, Physics Today, pp41-45, October 1968. [4] A. Martin, ‘Project Daedalus – The Final Report on the BIS Starship Study’, JBIS Supplement, 1978. [5] World Bank.
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I think Icarus needs to be sold as Stimulus not cost . I am more convinced than ever that economic growth is tied to tecnolgical breakthrough and in the last 50 years that has slowed dramatically. We have had improvements in computing and biomedicine but nothing to compare to the growth we had from 1900 to Apollo. We have also been help back by in fact subsidizing backward technologies like fossil fuels. I could go on but Icaras needs to be sold a growth and stimulus not cost
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I can think of a way to help the world economy reach the level needed to build such a project such as the Dyson star ship.(1)First the international community would set up an Intelsat type organization with a federal cooperation representing the United States percentage in it.(2) The federal corporation would build molten salt reactors on earth and a space based molten salt reactors to burn spent nuclear fuel.The design and flight test would be a international effort.Nuclear electric propulsion would be a spin off benefit.(3) the nuclear waste trust fund is expected to generate $90 billion through 2050,use this to build space based molten salt reactors and there launchers on a greatly expanded scale,The Intelsat model would suggest that the world community would build this space based power generating network, and that the power transmitting architecture would be shared with a space based solar power network.The $500 billion that the world was going to spend over the next 70 years disposing of spent nuclear fuel would be used to send it into space in a usable form instead.
(4)Another $300 billion over 70 years, of space based solar power facility that share the transmitting of power with the reactors.
(5) The $500 billion expenditure is a stimulus to the world space based power generator(WSBP), and is designed if necessary not to be amortized as an expense to the rate payers,however electrical sells are expected to sustain and grow the system after words.
I wish there were error bars on the numbers given above.
It is quite difficult estimate such things though.
The focus here is correct, it’s not engineering physics that limits interstellar flight it is economics.
Yet economics implies some very important unpredictable factors. The author correctly surmises that it might take (it actually may be imperative ) that there exist a (gasp) world wide political entity that will to devote a vast fraction of global treasure to interstellar flight. That means a peaceful cooperative world entity. I think this places such uncertainties on the time estimates above as to make them very questionable. I think a more conservative estimate may would be to add 500 to 1000 or more years to the future dates given. There is a real horizon of unpredictability underlying the estimates given.
The one voice is that this probably never be built. According to over 50 years NASA experience, everything is to be cheap (about some billion dollars) or politically brilliant – first to go to see this near star systems, will cost so more, and nobody probably want to made it – we had problems with backing to moon, during to economy. The USA have ‘black hole’ in budget, The Europe also have it, and (suprise) The China had it. So sadly – we known how, but we don’t known why, so we may go in near thousand years, or not go during next millenia. We need someone like Columbus Christopher – to make us believe that will be good spend money and getting it back during next millenium is the best what can we do
…
if we put 7 billion population in the planet earth
and if just 1.5% of the global population and approximately 100 million rich people each one can buy shares of this project in the amount of $1 million, then we have $100 trillion to make this project and create 400 million jobs.
there are $10 trillion in the London Financial market and also in New York, Hong Kong, Tokyo, Dubai financial markets you can find another $10 trillion finance for the building the interstellar star ship. also they say that there are $2 trillion non interest Islamic finance in financial centers such as Dubai international Financial center.
during last years US Government raised $780 billion to rebuild the economy and most of this finance raised from china banks,
I think that china can finance more than $2 trillion dollar for this project if they want.
I suggest building interstellar project from Wormhole technology and time travel, faster than light technoology that proofed in physics and also in US Labs,
to travel all around the universe and build new planet similar to earth.
also I suggest to building a new nation under colonization of US government or UK Kingdom or even independent government in small Island and build new economy to finance for this project for traveling abroad in the universe.
there is possibility in financial market that you can finance a project for the duration of 25 years.
I have experience on financial markets and am serious about this project. if I find a few hard working partners I believe that we can build this project during next 20 years.
Very bold thinking Aryan! If you haven’t already, you will probably enjoy the book Odd John by Olaf Stapeldon.
Although I do not disagree with your ideas to channel resources into interstellar vehicle research, I think it would take an individual of titanic will, and ability, to accomplish both civilization building on the scale you suggest.
Keep thinking big!
Richard
I am sorely puzzled why this endeavor should cost so much. Consider Daedalus. Empty it masses 2,300 tonnes. That’s a small freighter which costs mere millions. Why the gargantuan costings for spaceflight? Or consider a SpaceX Falcon 9 which masses ~ 30 tonnes empty and costs ~ $100 million. Surely a Daedalus should then cost ~$8 billion or so. There’s hundreds of nearby stars so an assembly line is not inconceivable? We cost according to the energy price as though we were buying from a utility but the energy density of the propellants is millions of times that of coal or gas, so why the obscene pricing?
I dont know enough about your project structure
but for your information it will be good to read below information:
you need to at least simulate and analyse the starship structure,
for this purpose world largest supercomputer can built from $100 million USD in a few months or even with lower costs and less time.
for the project structure it may be interested about world largest structures : here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_largest_buildings_in_the_world
world largest structure is at Dubai international airport
The partly underground Terminal 3 was built at a cost of US$4.5 billion,
exclusively for Emirates and will have a capacity of 43 million passengers once fully complete.
The terminal will have 5 Airbus A380 gates at Concourse 2, and will have 18 at Concourse 3
Terminal Three + (Concourse 2)
Opened 14 October 2008 (operational)
Floor area 1,185,000 m2 (12,760,000 sq ft)
Handling capacity 27million passengers
Parking bays 26 (aerobridge)
I will try to put here more information about project economics considerations that may be helpful for this project to become reality.
again another useful information about economic consideration
Last year, a South Korean consortium led by Kepco won a Dh75 billion (approx $20.5 billion usd) deal to build and operate four nuclear reactors for the UAE.
Hi again, during last days I developed new website and study about our project and we will happy if hear from you about our considerations:
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Anti matter Cost:
Scientists claim antimatter is the costliest material to make. In 2006, Gerald Smith estimated $250 million could produce 10 milligrams of positrons[19] (equivalent to $25 billion per gram); and in 1999 NASA gave a figure of $62.5 trillion per gram of antihydrogen. This is because production is difficult (only a few antiprotons are produced in reactions in particle accelerators), and because there is higher demand for the other uses of particle accelerators. According to CERN, it has cost a few hundred million Swiss Francs to produce about 1 billionth of a gram (the amount used so far for particle/antiparticle collisions).
Several NASA Institute for Advanced Concepts-funded studies are exploring whether it might be possible to use magnetic scoops to collect the antimatter that occurs naturally in the Van Allen belt of the Earth, and ultimately, the belts of gas giants like Jupiter, hopefully at a lower cost per gram.
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NASA Unveils $17.6 Billion Budget
WASHINGTON – NASA announced a $17.6 billion budget for fiscal year 2009 to continue exploring the solar system, building the International Space Station, studying Earth from space and conducting aeronautics research.
NASA Deputy Administrator Shana Dale said the increase for NASA’s 2009 budget demonstrates President Bush’s commitment to the agency’s missions. With the increase, NASA still accounts for less than 1 percent of the federal budget.
The NASA budget includes $5.78 billion for the space shuttle and space station programs, $4.44 billion for science, $3.5 billion for development of new manned spacecraft systems and $447 million for aeronautics research.
“With over $2.6 billion in NASA funds available over the next five years to purchase cargo and crew services to support ISS operations, we would much rather be using this money to purchase cargo and crew services from American commercial companies than foreign entities,” she added.
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our project at this phase study on feasibility of Interstellar Space Flight Agency that consists of:
1- Earth Station similar to NASA agency
2- Space shuttle for delivery from Earth Station to Space Station
3- Space Station Similar to International Space Station
4- Interstellar Starship with faster than light technology
1- earth Station that can compare to NASA organization may need approximately $50 billion USD budget
all of technologies for building such thing exists at current.
2- Space Shuttle manufacturing can built by approximately $25 billion budget
all of technologies for building such thing exists at current.
3- Manufacturing and operating of Space station for launching Interstellar Starship may need approximately $25 billion budget
all of technologies for building such thing exists at current.
4- Starship with faster than light technology
this technology needs some research
and approximate budget maybe $100 billion usd
all project can be done with $200 billion
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source: http://tourinmoment.com
Hi,
this is our latest research on Global Economy,
hope can be useful,
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Current and future trends of U.S. and global economy:
Current trends:
U.S. Economic activity is increasing. The economy has expanded rapidly—from a $2.7 trillion economy in 1980 to a $13.2 trillion economy in 2006—and the size of the economy will more than double over the next 30 years.
in 2009 U.S. GDP was $14.4 trillion where Global Economy GDP was $70 trillion
the $2.7 trillion transportation industry accounts for 17 percent of the U.S. economy.
Industry and household spending on transportation accounted for nearly 10% of U.S. gross domestic product in 2006, or about $1.3 trillion, much of it spent to purchase transportation services
Processed food sales worldwide are approximately US$3.2 trillion (2004). In the U.S., Over 16.5 million people are employed in the food industry and consumers spend approximately US$1 trillion annually on food.
future trends:
Based on Morgan Stanley (a private bank) research, $21.7 Trillion USD will spend on Emerging markets infrastructure over next decade,
50 million jobs and $3.6 trillion of the world’s GDP will depend on aviation by 2026
According to New Report by Global Industry Analysts, Inc. Global Foodservice Industry Revenues to reach $2.2 trillion and Global Supermarket Revenues to reach $1.74 trillion by 2015,
Cost Savings:
Substituting inefficient traditional lighting with more advanced technologies, such as Compact Fluorescent Lights (CFLs) and Low Emitting Diodes (LEDs), in homes and businesses can save up to $20.8 trillion.
Increasing the efficiency of electronic equipment, such as personal computers, office equipment and home entertainment systems, can save up to $11.6 trillion.
Improving building efficiency for new and retro-fitted buildings, for example by improving insulation, reducing the loss of heated or cooled air from walls, doors and windows and adding reflective roof coatings, can save up to $2.5 trillion.
Environmental damage caused by human activity in 2008 was estimated to be $6.6 trillion
Investment trends:
in 2008 A group of 135 investors that manage more than $6 trillion are calling for binding targets on carbon-dioxide emissions ahead of United Nations talks
in 2010 International Islamic Finance Forum Abu Dhabi announced Global Islamic banking industry will hit $2 trillion by 2015
The global wealth industry manages USD16.5 trillion in HNW assets in 2010
According to New Report by Global Industry Analysts, Inc. Global Asset Management Market to Reach US$129.2 Trillion by 2015,
The growth of carbon emissions trading markets may reach $1 trillion in value in 2017
IEA believes to Bargain of $46 Trillion Roadmap for Halving Global Emissions market.
References available on demand.
source: http://tourinmoment.com/forum/index.php?topic=40.0
Sample
A fiktive spaceship make per fullspeed a Gravity by 1G. How long need this ship to leave the solsystem ande when does it arrive speed 1/2 Lightspeed?
In reality, we are talking about motivations here. Give humankind a good reason and Icarus would be built, as surely as Apollo did. Technology advancement, employment, the notion of profitable activities for contractors, exploration are indeed good arguments for certain people, but there has to be some good – better – motivation for the wide public because common people are ultimately the taxpayers that would sustain such an investment, and so all depends on public opinion. Discovering a truly Earth-like planet, exo-life, or even better, some sort of intelligent civilization out there would certainly boost the interest in interstellar missions and the need for deep space transport capabilities, including military. Exoplanet discoveries and the results obtained by astrobiologists in the next years will determine to a large extent if we will see something like Icarus fly any time soon.
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thoroughly enjoying your blog. I am also an aspiring blogger but I’m still new to everything. Do you have any tips for inexperienced blog writers? I’d certainly appreciate it.
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