Private Enterprise in Space

Although it's not directly related to getting the initial lunar basegoing, business operations in cislunar space are important to thelong-range financial forecast for a lunar community. That's why thecislunar space traffic model is so important to the Artemis Project. Tohave a thriving community on the moon, we'll need customers for lunarmaterials (oxygen, helium-3, etc.).

One of the major goals of the Artemis Project is to "bootstrap privateindustry into manned space operations". Satellite servicing is one example.Today, satellites aren't really designed to be refueled or upgraded inorbit, but when that service is available, they will be.

Our goal is to create the environment that makes all this possible, notto try to do it all ourselves. Having one big corporation that doeseverything is not a good idea.

It's difficult enough for the human mind to encompass the scope of therole The Lunar Resources Company playsin the Artemis Project. We can understand and appreciate all the othereconomic opportunities, but to handle the details of all those businessplans and organizations would require a huge, lethargic bureacracy withmanagers reporting to managers reporting to managers, ad infinitum. Itwould make Exxon look like a mom & pop shop. (Exxon is huge, but they focuson one business and do it extremely well.)

We don't know what the optimum size for a corporate organization is,which is why we're already talking with other companies about makingspacecraft and robots. They'll do what they do best so we can go to themoon and play in the sand.

There could be a technical problem with using manned spacecraft forservicing or retrieving communications satellites. Geostationary orbit isinside Earth's radiation belts, a place where humans would not want toloiter. However, we might send a lunar-fueled robotic craft into theradiation zone to retrieve the satellite, and use human hands service at aspace station in a higher orbit.