ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT OF SPACE: EXAMINATION AND SIMULATION

摘要

Given the limited resources of future public outlays in space, long-term space activities have to be envisioned and implemented with the commercial sector in mind. A contribution by SpaceWorks Engineering, Inc. (SEI) to the implementation of NASA's Vision for Space Exploration (VSE) is the Economic Development of Space (EDS): Examination and Simulation project. The EDS project's aim is to examine NASA's utilization of commercial sector assets and evaluate what changes are needed to NASA requirements to promote the commercial development of space. The EDS project involves workshops attended by relevant thought leaders to address both the potential services that can legitimately be provided by the commercial marketplace and the spin-offs from government exploration missions that could be utilized by the private sector. This project also involves the development and application of the Nodal Economic Space Commerce (NESC) model, a dynamic agent-based market simulation of various future space markets (sub-orbital space tourism, ISS crew/cargo re-supply, space resources, etc.), the resultant financial case of entities that undertake these projects., and the impact of the government actions (technology investment, anchor contracts, tax credits, etc.) upon commercial entities.