Space Station ambitions

A PROPOSAL by Asgardia, the space nation, to build and supply a new node module for the International Space Station (ISS) is revealed in an exclusive article in the winter issue of the global space industry publication ROOM Space Journal.

Asgardia - represented by three Austrian-based legal entities, Asgardia Terra Ark (ATA) NGO, Asgardia Financial Ark (AFA) AG and Asgardia Independent Research Centre (AIRC) GmbH - has modelled the node on the proven design of existing European-built modules.

Expanding on the idea in his ROOM article, Dr Igor Ashurbeyli, founder of Asgardia and the general designer of the Asgardia node module and the lead of the project, said the module would help extend the capacity and commercial value of the Space Station.

Asgardia has created a consortium of established industry players, including Nanoracks Europe, Thales Alenia Space (Italy), OHB System (Germany) and QinetiQ (Belgium), to develop, build and deliver the module

As well as supporting commercial development and expanding scientific research opportunities, the state-of-art module would ultimately have the capacity to eventually form the core node of an autonomous space station operated by Asgardia.

In his article, Dr Ashurbeyli notes that the limited number of available docking ports and related infrastructure constitutes a major obstacle to the future expansion of commercial capabilities on the ISS.

“To directly address this, Asgardia has proposed the provision of an Asgardia node module that would be integrated into the European part of the ISS,” he says.

Asgardia’s proposal for a new ISS module was submitted in 2020 in response to a European Space Agency (ESA) Call for Ideas entitled, ‘Space Exploration as a Driver for Growth and Competitiveness: Opportunities for the Private Sector’.

Dr Ashurbeyli describes the project as being “very much in line with the goals of ESA’s space exploration strategy”, adopted in 2014 with the strategic goals of scientific advancement; innovation and economic growth; global cooperation; and inspiration.

“It addresses the current limitations in habitable volume and research capabilities, incorporating the much-needed additional docking ports, which would be made available to both agency and commercial customers.”

He says the project is designed to capture investment from around the world, while providing jobs for European industry and offering a path to take European independence in space to a new level.

Asgardia would own the new infrastructure - comprising a node module based on ISS existing orbital infrastructure developed by the European space industry.

It would commercially fund the project via external investment as part of a public-private partnership (PPP) between commercial organisations and ESA.

An initial technical feasibility study would focus on the insertion of the Asgardia node module between Node 2 starboard and ESA’s Columbus, a configuration that best enables the expansion of docking facilities for third party customers.

Development, manufacturing and deployment is planned to take about five years leading to a possible launch in 2026.

The Asgardia node module would also provide functions for autonomous flight, including rendezvous and docking, a capability crucial for the time when, following the ISS end of life, the Asgardia module could be re-deployed as a core element of Asgardia’s proposed Earth Ark, an autonomous space infrastructure that will enable continuous development and research beyond the operational lifetime of the Space Station.

Despite recognising its “technical validity and potential promise”, ESA has for now declined the consortium’s proposal due to what it described as “political and technological risks”, both of which are refuted by Dr Ashurbeyli in his article.

Addressing the widely noted aspect of Asgardia's positioning as a digital space nation, he writes: “As a digital space nation Asgardia is not yet formally recognised by earthly states and so political risks are zero.”

“Technological risks are also minimal given that the consortium members are space industry world leaders and are committed to the project to design, build and delivery. “Asgardia also remains confident that the financial resources for the project can be found in the marketplace.”

The ambitious proposal was first revealed to space industry leaders by Dr Ashurbeyli during the Asgardia Space Science & Investment Conference (ASIC) in Darmstadt, Germany, in 2019.

Dr Ashurbeyli, a Russian scientist, businessman and philanthropist, is the Founder of Asgardia, which is also currently working to launch the world's first national digital economy.

Asgardia's core technical scientific vision is the birth of the first human child in space - a first   step towards the ultimate survival of the humankind as a species in the universe.

To achieve this Asgardia is examining solutions for protecting people from space radiation, creating artificial gravity for fully-fledged life in space, and is drafting laws to create a fair and equitable society beyond planet Earth.

The full article published in ROOM is available to read by clicking here.

Selling England by the Pound

Pictures paint a thousand words - coincidence or a divine warning?

WHILE the appalling Covid-19 figures in the UK, the latest nationwide lock down and vaccine rollout dominate mainstream news, the tragedy of post-Brexit Britain unfolds like some secondary subplot in a long drawn out dystopian soap opera.

Ironically, the intense media focus on the handling of Covid-19 in the UK is proving useful ‘cover’ for the damage being inflicted day-by-day to the economic fabric of the country now it is fully out of the EU. But that may only last for so long now.

Post-Brexit Britain's early days of going solo have already been characterised by lost business, extra costs, delays, unexpected tariffs and additional paperwork for many. So, far at least, no one seems to be trumpeting any tangible new freedoms or benefits.

Add the latest events in Washington, however, into the mix and we suddenly throw a more intense and critical spotlight on the UK's doomsday scenario of Covid-19 and Brexit under the leadership of an increasingly corrupt government.

President-elect Joe Biden has described Boris Johnson as "a physical & emotional clone of Donald Trump" whilst Trump himself described Johnson as “Britain’s Trump”. In return Johnson, a fine judge of character, suggested that Trump was a suitable candidate for a Nobel Peace Prize.

It has to be said, however, that Johnson and co are by no means as open or obvious about their self-serving motives as Trump has been. Instead they work insidiously in the background, stealing the UK’s democracy bit by bit.

For example, lying and glossing over truths by government ministers is now pretty much a normal thing. Johnson prorogued Parliament illegally and is in the process of changing electoral boundaries to give themselves more seats.

And the list goes on. They are reducing the power of judicial review to prevent challenge to their power. They selected candidates to Parliament who swore ‘loyalty’. They are packing the Lords. And they have taken enormous executive powers to themselves in recent bills that bypass Parliament entirely.

Make no mistake, the Johnson government is authoritarian to the core and its members want ever more of that authority. Whatever it may say in public, underneath this ruling class does not appear to believe in or respect parliamentary democracy.

Yet, we are constantly informed via trite PR statements about Johnson 'levelling up', trying his hardest or caring for the poorest, or whatever the latest propaganda phrase might be - all parroted by favourable media which normalise the corruption by failing to call out the lies.

It's all much more insidious than Trump ever was because at least everyone knew more or less what Trump was about. In contrast Johnson is still largely portrayed as a sort of posh but innocent buffoon who is really quite harmless. This is definitely not the case.

And the difference now between the US and UK? The US withstood attempts to close it's parliament down and will now curtail Trump's powers. But in September 2019, when Boris Johnson closed the British parliament down illegally, the right-wing mainstream press supported him to the extent that he eventually got re-elected.
                                       
So, what happened in the United States is a reminder of the risks we all face when the norms of liberal democracy are eroded.

It is interesting, for example, to note that in 2016 Vote Leave in the UK and Trump in the US had in common some of the same financial backers and media supporters.

And, only quite recently, Tory councillors and politicians were instructed to use “Trumpian methods” to promote their politics, further undermining an already subverted democracy and defining an allegiance to the Trump way of doing things.

In the UK, we have also ignored at our peril the irrefutable proof that Vote Leave broke the law during the referendum. Our political system and mainstream media were just too broken to hold them to account. Instead, we gave them more power.

It all kind of makes that much hailed Brexit slogan of “taking back control” a bit trite and disingenuous, doesn’t it? Unless, of course, you are the one in control.