Business Insider: 40th Space Symposium
(SOUTHERN COLORADO) — FOX21 News is teaming up with the Colorado Business Forum and Digest to bring you the latest and most relevant business news impacting life in Southern Colorado.
Dirk Hobbs, Founder and Executive Publisher with the Colorado Media Group, joined FOX21 News Anchors Abbie Burke and Craig Coffey to discuss economic matters, including the Space Symposium's economic impact.
The 40th Space Symposium will take place in Colorado Springs at The Broadmoor from Monday, April 7, to Thursday, April 10.
Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
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US and China need a space hotline for orbital emergencies, experts say
When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. — Finding a peaceful relationship with the growing prowess of China's space program could start with a simple phone call on a new hotline. The United States needs to act now to address threats to space assets, find new approaches to space traffic management to support the growing space economy, and incorporate commercial perspectives into civilian and national security space policy. That's the output from a task force report sponsored by the Council on Foreign Relations, highlighted during the Space Foundation's 40th Space Symposium held April 7-10 in Colorado Springs. The report, "Securing Space: A Plan for U.S. Action," asserts that if the United States is to adapt to today's fast-paced commercial, technological, and national security landscape in space, it needs to make space a top national priority. The report also calls for the creation of a space hotline with China, to be used to lower the risks of miscalculation or misunderstanding as the U.S. and China continue to militarize Earth's orbit. Esther Brimmer, a senior fellow in global governance at the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), said a specially-constituted task force proposed a seven-part plan, urging policymakers to reshape its approach to uphold U.S. leadership in space. "There is no single international organization to help manage space, but we can work with the institutions we have," Brimmer said. She was the project director of the CFR space report. CFR is an independent think tank, generating policy-relevant ideas and analysis on consequential issues that face the United States and the world. "It's the first time the Council on Foreign Relations has addressed anything to do with space," said retired U.S. Space Force Lieutenant General Nina Armagno. She served as co-chair of the CFR report along with Jane Harman, a former U.S. Congresswoman. "The space economy is booming," said Armagno, with escalating booster launchings around the world that lob spacecraft into Earth orbit. "But with that, comes congestion, debris, and the threats that we all know are there by Russia and China." But with all that activity, Armagno said "there are no rules in the space domain" and "is anyone listening, I don't know." Within the space community there is an "echo chamber," Armagno said, noting that the CFR report on space is directed at the Trump administration with the intent that they will declare space as a national priority. If funding is applied to that aim, said Armagno, "then we know this administration is listening." Armagno said that the CFR report acknowledges that China is essentially here to stay. "Our report points to sharpening our policy on China. Our policy can't be 'China bad.'" However, China is preparing for conflict in space, with some reports suggesting that it is honing "dogfighting" skills, Armagno added. "Our policy has to be what can we do in the global domain together," but with eyes wide open knowing the U.S. and China don't agree on everything and there is geopolitical tension between the two countries, she said. Two ideas fleshed out in the CFR report underscore needed rules of the road in space, said Armagno. "We want to reinvigorate the discussion on establishing a hotline," Armagno told the audience. "We have a hotline with Russia," she said, so it's not rocket science, and could be modeled in similar fashion. "So in case of an emergency or a miscalculation, we can pick up the phone and get the truth," observed Armagno. An additional idea broached in the CFR report is search and rescue, almost one of the oldest international endeavors that countries do together. "There's already an astronaut rescue agreement, but it's only to rescue astronauts on the planet … if they end up in the ocean or on land. But there's nothing about rescuing astronauts in space," Armagno said. This would be a table talk topic, Armagno said, to pursue with China ironing out the necessary steps of working together in an emergency situation, be it astronauts, cosmonauts, or even space tourists in trouble. "China is there to stay in the space domain," Armagno said, "so we need to figure out some ways to work together, at the very least, in an emergency situation." Samuel Visner of the Space Information Sharing and Analysis Center focused on the ever-growing commercial space sector. He was a member of the CFR task force. "The private sector is absolutely key to our national security," said Visner. It is intertwined with technological and economic security, he said, and "undermine any of them and you weaken our country, you weaken our allies and partners, and you weaken our global position." The private sector's role in securing space needs to be fully recognized, Visner emphasized, but stressed that commercial space endeavors are also "targets of our adversaries." Visner said commercial space systems, be it for navigating trucks to precise harvesting of fields for enhancing agricultural output are now military targets. "Our adversaries recognize that, potentially, they are vulnerable, that we depend on them, and they are preparing to exploit and attack them," said Visner. As a case in point, Visner highlighted that the first attack by Russia in the ongoing invasion of Ukraine involved a cyber attack of a space system used by Ukraine. "Russia has made it clear," Visner said, "that commercial space systems of their adversaries, Ukraine, potentially NATO, potentially the United States, are now legitimate military targets." RELATED STORIES: — Trump's 2026 budget plan would cancel NASA's Mars Sample Return mission. Experts say that's a 'major step back' — China moving at 'breathtaking speed' in final frontier, Space Force says — 'It's very pro-commercial space right now': An industry insider's off-Earth status report Underscored during the symposium discussion is a warning from the CFR task force report: "Without immediate changes to how space is governed, the benefits of access to space could be lost to everyone. As the leading spacefaring country and the home base of the most innovative space companies, the United States is uniquely positioned to determine this future." The report also notes that "unlike aviation, shipping, and telecommunications, the space economy lacks a unified, single international institution that can establish or enforce an agreed-on set of best practices." The full report can be read on the Council of Foreign Relations' website, along with a video explaining its key findings.
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Business Insider: Impact of Small Business Week
(SOUTHERN COLORADO) — FOX21 News is teaming up with the Colorado Business Forum and Digest to bring you the latest and most relevant business news impacting life in Southern Colorado. Dirk Hobbs, Founder and Executive Publisher with the Colorado Media Group, joined FOX21 News Anchors Abbie Burke and Craig Coffey to discuss the impact of our recent Small Business Week, the benefits local small businesses gain from support, and its effect on the Colorado Springs economy. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
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17-05-2025
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Can we actually build a thriving economy on and around the moon?
When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. COLORADO SPRINGS, Colorado — Cashing in on a cislunar economy is ballyhooed by space exploration advocates. Cislunar space — the region extending from our planet to the moon — is getting a lot of attention these days, as more and more spacecraft make their way to Earth's nearest neighbor. But what needs to happen to help spark a true cislunar economy? And, given actions of late here on Earth, are we headed for a tariff-free cislunar zone? There's a lot of hard work ahead to put in place the needed hardware to sustain and define such a dollar-generating idea, experts say, but we at least have some ideas about how to get started. It turns out that power allowing day-and-night operations on the moon — that is, "plug-in and play" lunar equipment — stands out as a must-have if humanity is to develop a real, rather than aspirational, cislunar economy. The thought of cislunar space becoming a cash cow of the cosmos was heavily discussed during the Space Foundation's 40th Space Symposium, which was held here from April 7 to April 10 by the Space Foundation. "I don't see an inner solar system in which we don't significantly develop the moon if you're going to go anywhere," said Rob Chambers, director of strategy for exploration at Lockheed Martin. "The basis of an economy has to be something that Earthlings will pay for." Lockheed Martin is taking a visionary look at the building blocks of lunar infrastructure. For example, the company thinks that, by 2044, the moon could be abuzz with international research and commercial infrastructure, transforming its barren surface into a livable ecosystem. You can take Lockheed's take on the infrastructure needed to maintain a permanent presence on the moon — near its south pole, which is thought to be rich in water ice — in this futuristic tour. "We're focused on water and therefore hydrogen and oxygen propellants as the key product that is the base of the economy," Timothy Cichan, space exploration architect at Lockheed Martin, told "The big thing is power…lots of power," he said, as well as the mobility needed to source the water ice lying on the chilly, permanently shadowed floors of polar craters. "Even in lunar nighttime, it's as close to cold as the permanently shadowed regions," Chambers explained. "You have to learn how to handle getting in and out of those thermal gradients. You have to be comfortable [with] operating in the nighttime in order to do productive things in the daytime." So, do you design for cold or hot on the moon? "You've got to design for both," Chambers said. "If you've got all the power you want, say hundreds of kilowatts, now you can optimize for something other than just survival." If there's less than 85% continuous sunlight, he added, "our numbers say switch over to nuclear fission at that point. There are not that many places on the moon that have 85% sun. That, to us, says buckle up and get comfortable with nuclear fission. Once you've done that, now the world's your oyster." Cichan pointed to the evolving nature of NASA's Artemis program, which aims to establish a permanent human presence on the moon in the coming years. Additionally, there's the space agency's footing of the bill for lander-carried experiments via its Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) initiative. "NASA is making sure that we can evolve to an actual economy," said Cichan. "Nobody has closed a business case around that as yet, but we want to set up the infrastructure such that it is commercially operated, so that we can evolve to a place where there is a lunar economy. It's in a nascent form right now, very dependent on government dollars." Cichan said that his message is, try to do things today to get prepared for the cislunar economy: "You have got to be there; otherwise, you're not part of the conversation." Chambers labeled our current ability to make money in a cislunar economy as a "chasm of capitalism." "I think there will be either a demand signal that the government says they will keep pouring in billions of dollars and they will buy power — for instance, writing a contract that has a guaranteed procurement with exit clauses if they don't. That's one way of getting through that chasm … assured government spending," Chambers said. Another scenario, he said, is that the mining of helium-3 — a fuel for nuclear fusion reactors — on the moon turns out to be a viable business, and then people will pour in money. "History has shown that humans figure out how to make money anywhere." Michael Nayak is a program manager with the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). He's leading DARPA's 10-Year Lunar Architecture (LunA-10) Capability Study. At the symposium, Nayak spotlighted what's needed within the next decade to establish an era of interoperable lunar infrastructure, which could spur a fully functioning lunar economy. "Today, the lunar economy has mining as its center. But in order for that to scale, we need megawatts of power," he said. In fact, Nayak would bet on a power company to be in the top five of a "lunar Fortune 50" business listing. In second place is heat rejection and generation as a commercial service, Nayak predicted, "especially in the wildly fluctuating temperatures of the moon." Related stories: — Moon mining gains momentum as private companies plan for a lunar economy — Water mining on the moon may be easier than expected, India's Chandrayaan-3 lander finds — NASA's Artemis program: Everything you need to know Of like mind is Jamie Porter, director of the Lunar Surface Innovation Consortium managed by The Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel, Maryland. "If you don't have power, you just can't do anything. You need it to be able to move forward," Porter told the Space Symposium gathering. "At DARPA, we are simply interested in big risks," Nayak said. The hard question that quickly emerged early in the LunA-10 study, he added, was, "How does it scale?" That is, how can we move beyond prototype lunar hardware to industry infrastructure and an actual lunar economy? "Power and thermal are absolutely critical," said Nayak. "The third thing is, where should we go [on the moon] if commercial industry is the point? Where are the specific locations with 'reserves' that are sufficiently deep that I can build an end-to-end economic model around?"
