Go to Space Now: A Practical Manifesto for a Breakthrough Decade
We stand at an inflection point. For decades, access to orbit felt expensive, rare, and risky—the realm of superpowers. In the last few years, that has changed. Launch cadence is surging, costs are falling, and commercial players are proving new ways to operate beyond Earth. Yet the step-change we need—the kind of breakthrough that makes space routine—still lies ahead. This is a call to organize, fund, and build the technologies that make “go to space now” a practical directive, not a slogan.
New revolutionary technology—beyond incrementalism
It’s true that much of space tech progress since Apollo has felt incremental: better materials, electronics, and software layered onto the same basic architectures. But the curve is finally bending. Independent data show per‑kilogram launch costs have fallen by an order of magnitude since the 2000s; the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) documents a steep decline in cost between 2005 and 2020, a trend Our World in Data updated in March 2025. (Aerospace Security, Our World in Data)
Reusability is the lever. As Ars Technica summarized, Falcon 9 now flies at a rate “about 30 times higher than the shuttle at one‑hundredth the cost,” driven by rapid reflight and streamlined operations. That claim is based on internal cost estimates and historical shuttle program totals; even if you haircut the comparison, the direction is unmistakable. (Ars Technica)
But we still need ground‑breaking tech that changes the status quo again—full and rapid reusability at heavy‑lift scales, in‑space propellant transfer, advanced power and propulsion, and autonomous assembly and manufacturing. Nuclear propulsion, long discussed for deep‑space missions, illustrates both the promise and the headwinds: NASA’s Bill Nelson said in 2023 that nuclear thermal engines could let “astronauts… journey to and from deep space faster than ever,” but the DARPA/NASA DRACO demo was canceled in mid‑2025 amid shifting priorities and cost‑benefit analyses. (NASA, Breaking Defense)
Safer, cheaper, faster—make access routine
“Safer, cheaper, faster” is not a wish list; it’s a design brief. The evidence:
Cheaper: Inflation‑adjusted cost to LEO has collapsed from tens of thousands of dollars per kilogram in the shuttle era to mere thousands today, across small, medium, and heavy vehicles. CSIS’ methodology standardizes this to unit flyaway costs, showing the long slide over six decades and an especially steep drop since 2005. (Aerospace Security)
Faster: 2024 set records with roughly 259 orbital attempts—about one every 34 hours, according to Space Foundation. Commercial providers accounted for 70% of global attempts, up sharply from 2022. (Space Foundation, Payload)
Safer: Seradata’s tally put the 2024 failure rate near 3% (down from ~6% the prior year), while independent launch logs show record reliability among leading vehicles. (Seradata, launchreport.neocities.org)
Taken together, these trends point toward a more airline‑like cadence. We should design policy and engineering processes that assume high frequency and high reliability—and demand further gains.
Organize efforts—collaboration as a force multiplier
Coordination is our unfair advantage. The Artemis Accords provide a shared legal and operational playbook for peaceful, transparent exploration; as NASA puts it, they are “principles for a safe, peaceful, and prosperous future in space,” with 56 nations signed as of July 24, 2025. That breadth matters for interoperability, deconfliction (“safety zones”), and “timely, full, and open sharing of scientific data.” (NASA)
Standards and open tooling lower barriers, too. The CubeSat specification—born at Stanford and Cal Poly in 1999—democratized satellite building for universities, startups, and governments worldwide. NASA’s Open Mission Control Technologies (Open MCT) extends that spirit to ground systems with a modern, open‑source ops framework. These are the kinds of “common rails” that let more teams enter and innovate. (CubeSat, nasa.github.io)
Take risks—on capital and code, not crew
We can be bold without gambling with human life. Planetary exploration already leans on autonomy: NASA’s Perseverance rover uses self‑driving AutoNav to cover ground rapidly, while the Ingenuity helicopter flew 72 times before its 2024 retirement—turning a 30‑day tech demo into a three‑year aerial campaign. “Digital smarts help [missions] get more done in less time,” NASA notes. The lesson for cislunar and in‑space operations is clear: iterate with robots, simulate ruthlessly, and human‑rate only after the envelopes are proven. (NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory, NASA Science, NASA)
Increase R&D funding—fuel the flywheel
This is the moment to step on the gas. The global space economy reached $613 billion in 2024, with commercial activity driving most of the growth, according to Space Foundation’s Space Report. Private capital is similarly active: Space Capital’s Q2‑2025 review tracked $7.8 billion invested that quarter and $29 billion over the preceding 12 months across 392 companies. Public grants, tax incentives, procurement (e.g., services contracts rather than bespoke widgets), and patient research funding amplify that momentum. (Space Foundation, Space Capital)
We should also protect programs that convert research into markets. NASA’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) buys delivery services from U.S. firms; in 2024 Intuitive Machines’ Odysseus (IM‑1) achieved the first U.S. lunar landing since 1972—the first ever by a commercial company—validating a model that pays for performance. (NASA, SpacePolicyOnline)
Revise old concepts—mine the archives for gems
Not every breakthrough awaits a eureka in a lab; some are hiding in shelved studies:
Momentum‑exchange tethers (rotovators) can “transfer energy and momentum” to fling payloads between orbits, reducing propellant needs and launch vehicle size. Modern materials, navigation, and control could make them practical at modest scales. (EO Portal, niac.usra.edu)
Nuclear propulsion still offers game‑changing specific impulse for Mars‑class missions, even if DRACO’s cancellation pauses near‑term demos. NASA’s Space Nuclear Propulsion office continues foundational work across thermal and electric options. (Breaking Defense, NASA)
The test for any “old‑new” idea is simple: re‑run it with today’s constraints, software, and supply chains. Many concepts rejected in the 1960s–90s fail fast under modern scrutiny; a few will shine.
Colonize space—build resilience for humanity
Colonization is not escapism; it’s resilience. The IPCC warns of intensifying climate risks this century; diversified habitats add options we may one day need. Meanwhile, NASA’s DART mission proved planetary defense is actionable: the impact “altered [an] asteroid’s orbit… by 32 minutes,” our first deliberate change to the motion of a celestial body. Reducing existential risk on Earth and expanding beyond it are complementary goals. (IPCC, NASA)
A blueprint for the next ten years
Back full reusability and in‑space logistics (propellant transfer, depots, autonomous tugs).
Institutionalize safety‑by‑software: autonomy, verification, and continuous testing before human rating.
Procure services, not parts: scale programs like CLPS that buy outcomes and let industry iterate.
Open by default: standards, data, and tools (like Open MCT) to broaden participation.
Fund the frontier: increase competitive R&D grants, offer tax credits for first‑of‑a‑kind flights, and co‑invest in enabling infrastructure (tracking, comms, debris mitigation).
Re‑evaluate legacy ideas with modern capabilities and markets—not nostalgia.
Anchor cooperation in the Artemis Accords and expand norms for transparency, interoperability, and debris mitigation. (NASA)
“Principles for a safe, peaceful, and prosperous future in space.” That’s NASA’s own framing of the Accords—and it should be our north star for the build‑out ahead. (NASA)
The case for urgency is data‑driven: record launch cadence, falling cost curves, improving reliability, and a $600‑billion‑plus economy that rewards speed. The case for boldness is moral: to expand knowledge, to protect Earth, and to widen the circle of who gets to participate. If we commit to safer, cheaper, faster vehicles; organize our efforts; take smart risks; increase R&D; and re‑examine old ideas with fresh eyes, space can become as accessible as the early Internet—open, generative, and transformative.
Let’s get to work. Let’s go to space—now.