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99895307.doc

PHS 2011

Norton/Harris

Status Quo Solves The Private Sector has developed a refuelling craft Moskowitz 11 (Clara, Space.com Assistant Managing Editor, World's First Space Gas Station for Satellites to
Launch in 2015, March 15, 2011)

companies have announced a new deal to launch the first spacecraft designed to refuel other satellites in orbit. The refueling craft a flying satellite gas station will be built by the Canadian company MacDonald, Dettwiler and Associates Ltd. (MDA) and is slated to launch in 2015. Communications satellite
Two satellite company Intelsat, based in Luxembourg and Washington, has signed on as its first client, agreeing to pay more than $280 million over time for its satellites to be refueled. Until now, satellites orbiting around Earth have been limited by how much fuel they carry onboard. Once those tanks run dry, the satellites die, sometimes languishing in space as uncontrollable debris that then poses the risk of colliding with other spacecraft. The new plan offers the potential not just to extend the lives of working satellites, but to help

Space Infrastructure Servicing (SIS) vehicle, is designed not just to transfer more fuel into existing satellites, but to inspect, tow, reposition and make minor repairs to them.
combat the growing space junk problem. The satellite, called the

Orbital Fuel Depots fail They require Liquid Hydrogen which cant be transferred in space Church 2/12/12 (Gary Michael, Editor, Lifeboat News, BEO-HSF, February 12th, 2012) Liquid hydrogen does not store well and is very difficult to transfer. It is difficult on the ground but in space it has never been done because it is such a nightmare. The entire transfer system and recieving tank have to be pre-cooled with liquid helium and a perfect precool is physically impossible. This generates liquid hydrogen boil-off that must be re-liquified which generates the exo-thermic form of hydrogen that generates more boil-off. Compounded by space radiation and zero gravity effects, this is all a real mess that no one wants to talk about. Like radiation shielding, it is a topic avoided by private space advocates to the point of hurling insults. Not only is hydrogen hard to handle on the ground and much harder to deal with in space, an engine burning it requires a turbopump ten times more powerful than one for a kerosene engine. Which is why kerosene is hyped by private space as such a wonderful propellent because both handling hydrogen and using hydrogen engines is much more expensive and cuts into projected profit margins. So why does the orbital fuel depot and transfer concept specify liquid hydrogen? If kerosene is so much better then why bother with liquid hydrogen in orbital fuel depots? Because there is no substitute for hydrogen Earth Departure Stages when
it comes to escaping earths gravitational field. Using other propellants multiplies the size of these stages several times. Any human missions Beyond Earth Orbit not using liquid hydrogen Earth Departure Stages look like Battlestar Galactica. Because of the Apollo program and every study done on any BEO missions, private space knows they cannot claim otherwise and get away with it. So private space advocates avoid this subject like the plague. Since it is not practical to store or transfer liquid hydrogen in space a direct launch out of orbit, like the Apollo program, is required. The laws of physics have not changed since the 1960s. Since the inferior lift vehicles advocated in the flexible path are capable of boosting a few tons at a time out of orbit, Heavy Lift Vehicles become necessary.

Last printed 9/11/2008 4:28 a9/p9