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America's Future in Space Aligning the Civil Space Program with National Needs (2009) / Chapter Skim
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Pages 59-66

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From page 59...
... Civil space activities offer the promise of helping to address challenging national imperatives, such as ensuring national security, protecting the environment, providing clean and affordable energy, meeting 21st-century needs for education, sustaining global economic competitiveness, and promoting beneficial international relations. Because civil space activities benefit citizens' lives and the national interest in so many tangible and intangible ways, the U.S.
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From page 60...
... NASA and NOAA should lead the formation of an international satellite-observing architecture capable of monitoring global climate change and its consequences and support the research needed to interpret and understand the data in time for meaningful policy decisions. The committee recognizes the important role in climate change studies that was assigned to the NPOESS and that is now in question, and the committee also concurs with the recommendations in the NRC report Earth Science and Applications from Space: National Imperatives for the Next Decade and Beyond calling for a compelling program of Earth-monitoring space systems.
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From page 61...
... NASA should revitalize its advanced technology development program by establishing a DARPA-like organization within NASA as a priority mission area to support preeminent civil, national security (if dual-use) , and commercial space programs.
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From page 62...
... Leading an effort in which the United States and other major space-faring nations cooperate to develop rules for a robust space operating regime that ensures that space becomes a more productive global commons for science, commerce, and other activities; c. Rationalizing export controls so as to ensure that ongoing prevention of inappropriate transfer of sensitive technologies to adversaries while eliminating barriers to international cooperation and commerce that do not contribute effectively to national security; d.
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From page 63...
... Establishing clear goals for each step in a sequence of human spaceflight missions beyond low Earth orbit that will develop techniques and hardware that can be used in a next step further outward; c. Focusing use of the ISS on advancing capabilities for human space exploration (e.g., by demonstrating large-scale reuse of water, developing largely autonomous crew operations, and rigorously investigating key space medical issues)
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From page 64...
... Coordinated budgetary guidance will enable the Administration to view the nation's portfolio of space programs as a whole and make better-informed decisions about the programs' goals and requirements. Aligning the strategies of the various civil and national security space agencies will address many current issues arising from or exacerbated by the current uncoordinated, overlapping, and unilateral strategies.
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From page 65...
... The committee agrees on the need for a process to define a national space strategy, and believes that the Office of Science and Technology Policy and the National Security Council must play a leading role in the process. All of the agencies involved in the national security and civil space communities share the same pool of trained talent, industrial base, technology advances, launch infrastructure, and ground and test equipment.
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From page 66...
... civil space program cuts across many federal agencies and shares important aspects with the national security space program, Recommendation 7 urges that the federal government begin to align those space activities so that they will serve the national interest effectively.
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Key Terms

  • space activities
  • space program
  • human spaceflight
  • national space
  • security space

  • space programs
  • space policy
  • national imperatives
  • international cooperation
  • industrial base

  • space technology
  • space industrial
  • international space
  • robust space
  • space exploration

  • space strategy
  • larger national
  • broader national
  • committee agrees
  • export controls

  • budgetary guidance
  • agencies involved
  • commercial space
  • space customers
  • space relationships

  • future space
  • space industry
  • space portfolio
  • space operating
  • space proactively


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