Spending Lotsa Money, or Experimenting More with the Climate

A couple days ago, I used the Moon landing anniversary as an excuse to post a patriotic, hoorahrah, pom-pom-waving rallying cry for space-based solar power. Well, I think it was patriotic, anyway. Fifty-some years ago, we decided, as a nation, to spend a lot of time, money, and effort to accomplish what seemed like to us at the time a vital, if not dire, space-faring goal that could not have come about any other way (i.e.: without the full resources and commitment of the American people and the federal government).

I am asking that we do the same again, not for hundreds of billions this time (the cost of the Apollo program in today's dollars), but many trillions. I estimate the cost of satisfying all of America's power needs (not just electricity!) to be anywhere from $10-300 trillion. Yup, ten to three hundred trillion dollars.

Now, when you recover from collapsing onto the floor, let me give you some reasons why you still need to take space-based solar seriously, despite the sticker shock.

Firstly, climate change, unlike communism, truly threatens our civilization and maybe even our very existence. As bad as Stalin was, something tells me even had his flawed vision of running a nation or the world triumphed, we'd have been much worse off, but not teetering on the brink of self-destruction due to Marxist policies alone. So we need to do something again, this time for a true threat, and it needs to be impactful.

Secondly, we appear hell-bent on answering the final frontier's call. Are we doing this merely to impress any aliens we might meet? Or to benefit from the things space has to offer such as a virtually limitless, 24-7-365 power source?

And, lastly, conservative denier think tanks won't come right out and say it, but they are scheming to profit from a problem they won't admit exists. We are pretty sure dumping sulfur into the stratosphere would cool the planet, but we have no firm sense of what other effects it would have. We have no idea what the true costs of that action would be. And the worst part is it does nothing to reduce our emissions. It's a Band-Aid, not a cure, and a Band-Aid that could cause other sicknesses.

Nothing meaningful we do to combat climate change will be inexpensive. NOTHING. Cheap, quick fixes will most likely make things better in the short term, but worse in the long run, if for no other reason than they kick the can down the road, as with lacing the atmosphere with aerosols. Space-based solar, though monstrously expensive, is a real solution. We know the costs, what to expect, and that it will work as intended. It would reduce our emissions dramatically, and it has the added benefit of coinciding with our space-faring goals. And as launch costs decrease so will the jaw-dropping price tag.