12. Joel Sercel: 'There is Gold in Them Hills!': A Deep Dive Into Asteroid Mining & Space Logistics

June 16, 2021

In this episode, Senior Fellow in Defense Studies Peter Garretson interviews Joel Sercel, Founder and CEO of TransAstra Corporation. They discuss TransAstra's plans for Space Logistics, including the placement and servicing of as many as 100,000 satellites in LEO, its flex-fuel Omnivore solar-thermal engine, its broader architecture for Asteroid mining, and approach to agile engineering. They discuss how water is the ultimate future-proof safe bet for space logistics, the coming age of mega-sats in GEO, human spaceflight, the wealth and carrying capacity of the Asteroid belt, and the ultimate big picture of spreading Earth life. They discuss the specifics of asteroid mining and Lunar mining for water ice, the different scales of ambition between NASA and the private sector, and the need for NASA and Space Force to leverage the private sector to enable efficiencies approaching 10x. Joel provides a grand vision of our future, and lays out the key roles for NASA, FAA, Commerce, and Space Force. They also discuss the threats of Coronal Mass Ejections and Asteroid strikes -- and how TransAstra's Sutter Telescope network and Apis architecture could provide solutions.

Joel Sercel info:

https://spacesettlementsummit2019.nss.org/home/speakers/joel-sercel/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/joelsercel/

TransAstra:

https://www.transastracorp.com/

TransAstra Video Gallery (where you can see the architecture & optical mining):

https://www.transastracorp.com/gallery

Stepping Stones Study:

http://spaceref.biz/commercial-space/report-stepping-stones-economic-analysis-of-space-transportation-supplied-from-neo-resources.html

https://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/atoms/files/eso_final_report.pdf

https://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/atoms/files/eso_final_report_1.pdf

http://fiso.spiritastro.net/telecon16-18/Sercel_8-16-17/Sercel_8-16-17.pdf