Mars & Space News Roundup

On Sunday, May 25, NASA and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory’s Mars Phoenix Lander is scheduled to physically land on the Red Planet, near Mars’ arctic region. Phoenix is designed to study the history of water and the habitability potential in the Martian arctic’s ice-rich soil. Science museums across the country will carry a live feed from NASA during the landing sequence. If you’re in the Denver area, the Denver Museum of Nature and Science is already selling tickets to the event. Some details:

Phoenix on Mars—Live!
Sunday, May 25
4:00 - 9:30 p.m.
Phipps IMAX Theater
$7 member adult, $10 nonmember adult, $5 child/student
For reservations, call 303-322-7009 or 1-800-925-2250, Monday through Friday, between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m.

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Additional Mars news includes revitalized plans for a sample return mission. The Mars Science Laboratory could begin the process of collecting samples. A dedicated sample return mission could launch in 2020. Scientists and engineers are busy poring over the avalanche of data already sent by current Mars probes.

Climate Sensor to Fly on Satellite

This is certainly good news. A previously slashed instrument has been reapproved for inclusion to the NPOESS satellite scheduled for launch in 2013.

NOAA, the U.S. Air Force and NASA agreed this week to restore the Total Solar Irradiance Sensor (TSIS) to the first NPOESS (National Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite System). Set to launch in 2013, NPOESS is a new civil/military satellite system that will monitor the Earth’s weather, atmosphere, oceans, land and near-space environment. The mission will monitor the planet and providing data for long-range weather and climate forecast models.

TSIS will measure the total amount of solar radiation that comes into the earth’s atmosphere- a key data point and factor in climate change.

As mentioned, scientists need those high quality data for inclusion in models. A number of climate change denyers didn’t want that sensor to fly: it’s easier to say something isn’t happening if nobody can measure it accurately. I am very pleased this sensor is once again being included.

Some Space-Related News

NASA, Europe Explore Joint Mission to Outer Planets. Currently, the Cassini spacecraft continues to examine the Saturnian system. NASA and the European Space Agency are considering a probe to either Jupiter or Saturn. The Jupiter mission would also send a secondary probe to Europa. The Saturn mission would send a secondary probe to Titan. Both Europa and Titan are interesting targets in the quest to understand solar system formation dynamics as well as potential sites where life might exist. Russia has expressed interest in joining the Jupiter mission.

Space Station Commander Sets New U.S. Record. Peggy Whitson has set the U.S. record for most cumulative time spent in orbit: 377 days over two spaceflights. She landed back on Earth this past Saturday. She also holds the world record for most spacewalking time by a female astronaut. The 377 days in orbit places her 20th on the world-wide list of most experienced spaceflyers. The all-time leader? Sergei Krikalev has spent over 803 days in space!

Spaceship Prototype Flown in New Mexico. A new type of automated and reusable spaceship is a step closer to being able to transport payloads into space in the near future. Lockheed Martin, the designer and operator, recently inked a Memo of Understanding with the New Mexico Spaceport Authority to carry out future testing at the spaceport. It is high time for private companies to develop and deploy space payload delivery systems.

Earth to Mars Missions Continue Development. Just over one month from now (May 25th), the Phoenix Lander will land at the north pole of Mars. The next probe being readied for launch is NASA’s Mars Science Laboratory. It should arrive in 2010. The European Space Agency is getting in on the act with their ExoMars mission scheduled for touchdown in 2014. When Spirit and Opportunity landed at Mars, I went to the Denver Museum of Nature and Science. They had set up live feeds from NASA as the landings occurred. In an incredible display of support for science, the two original rooms were filled beyond capacity hours before the official landing even occurred. Museum officials were scrambling to set up people in other rooms across the museum with additional TVs and such. I can’t wait to see the crowds for Phoenix!

CAFE & Other Topic Roundup

Think Progress has a new feature: the Wonk Room. One item caught my attention: Grover Norquist said recently that 2,000 more people will die because of the recent change in CAFE standards. He was referring to a study done in 1993 that tried to establish a relation between vehicle weight and safety. Of course, the reality of crashes is more complex than Norquist was making it out to be. The real problem with our standards is they’re a fleet average and they’re too low. Cars sold in America can’t be sold in China because the Chinese have a more stringent fuel standard and it’s the minimum allowed. So US car manufacturers’ complaints that regulations might strangle them here will actually work to minimize overseas sales in the future. Way to look ahead.

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The rover Spirit on Mars has been given a reprieve: previously announced budget cuts may not affect the operations. The two rovers on Mars have revolutionized our understanding of the Red Planet. Their original 90 day expected life span have turned into four years of successful operations. All the billions being wasted in support of an occupation have so many other positive uses. Stay tuned.

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Found this: climate savers smart computing. Among other things, it includes what you can do to minimize the power your computer uses. After all, 50% of the power drawn is simply wasted.

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Deep Trunk had a write-up about Bob Schaffer’s non-involvement in the House while he was a Representative. Does Colorado want to replace do-nothing Allard with another guaranteed do-nothing Republican?

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Conservative chatter-boxes have been busy making wild exaggerations regarding Gov. Ritter’s New Energy Economy, saying that changing how decisions will be made will cause energy companies to leave the state in search of easier deals (prey). I never gave their statements much credence: the resources currently under the ground are far too large for them to simply pack up and go elsewhere. Turns out, the energy industry is not running away from Colorado.

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More disinformation about climate change in the corporate media. I’ll have more on this op-ed in the future.

Climate Change Information Update

A few items were made available recently that provide additional information regarding global climate change.

In the last month, much has been made about the cooling recording in January. Delayers have used this data to claim that there is global cooling, not warming going on. If only they didn’t react to every single datum that came out, they might be able to build a coherent argument. But let’s stick with the data, shall we? Both NASA and the Hadley Center’s analysis show that global temperatures in 2007 remained high: NASA listed 2007 as the second warmest on record, behind 2005, and the Hadley center listed 2007 as the seventh warmest. And before someone comes along and tries to argue that the difference in rankings prove something, both centers’ data show a difference of less than 0.5C between the first and tenth warmest year. The point is that 2007 was among the warmest in the last 100+ years.

Which brings us to January of this year. Embedded within the 2007 temperature data is the following: it was actually characterized by a strong La Nina event. La Nina is the cooler portion of ENSO. That’s right: global temperatures, even under the influence of a major ocean temperature cooling phenomenon, were still among the warmest recorded: almost as warm as the extreme El Nino event of 1998. By January, the La Nina event was in its mature stage. Here’s where the delayers’ argument comes in: January 2008 was much cooler than January 2007. Instead of a +0.632C anomaly in Jan. 2007, Jan. 2008 had a +0.037C anomaly.

Hmm, that’s interesting. Anomaly compared to what? Every dataset they’re examining uses mid-20th century data as a baseline, which is fine, or doesn’t consider the entire globe, which isn’t fine. Temperature data at the poles are critical for understanding what the global change of temperature is doing. This is especially true when one realizes that most of the temperature changes we’ve recorded have occurred in the polar regions. Most mid-latitude locations haven’t recorded the same magnitude of warming that the poles have (normalized differences are very large at the poles, thus you’ll rarely, if ever, see delayers use them as a data source).

So if 2007 was among the warmest years recorded and a strong La Nina developed during the year, what kind of temperature anomalies will we see during the next strong El Nino? And what lame excuse will delayers come up with to try to explain it away?

Space and Science News Updates: 3/16/08

NASA astronauts are making good progress this weekend at the International Space Station. Work includes installation of the first portion of Kobi, Japan’s science laboratory, and assembly of Canada’s Mr. Dextre, a large robotic appendage designed to perform tasks on the outside of the ISS so that humans don’t have to suit up and do them.

Kobi

Everything has run smoothly and the initial module of Kobi was opened for the first time Friday. The hatch was opened at 7:24 MDT March 15, marking the first time the space station’s 15-nation program has full on-orbit participation. Kobi is in a temporary berth at the station, and will likely be moved prior to the arrival of the next portion.

Dextre

Not everything ran smoothly with Mr. Dextre’s installation. A power problem prevented its initial deployment. The problem was eventually traced to a flawed cable in the pallet containing the robot during shuttle delivery. Once power from the station was introduced, the robot responded to controls. The cable ended up not being the correct type for the powering system.

Last night’s work focused on attaching Dextre’s two arms. Work with the arms was temporarily slowed due to stubborn bolts, but things were wrapped up by 12:57 MDT this morning. Initial tests of Dextre and it’s two arms indicate a nominally operative piece of equipment, which is excellent news.

Cassini

I wrote a post a few days ago regarding Cassini’s planned fly-through and testing of Encaladus’ eruptive geyser. Unfortunately, a software glitch prevented instrument from determining the make-up of the geyser material during the fly-through. The good news is that cameras were operating at the critical time. They discovered that the north pole of Enceladus appears much older than the moon’s south pole.

All is not lost with regard to determining the make-up of the ejecta. NASA officials said that Cassini’s Wednesday flyby is the first of four close-up swings past the moon this year. A similar plume pass is slated for October 9th.

And that’s just Enceladus. Cassini continues to probe the remainder of the Saturnian system.

Space & Science News

NASA’s Cassini spacecraft has been orbiting the Saturnian system for over 3.5 years now. During that time, many exciting discoveries have been made. One of those is the moon Enceladus: it’s south polar region is ejecting frozen water vapor into space. So Cassini is being directed to fly through the edges of the geysers to determine what they’re made up of. The geysers were discovered by Cassini in 2005. Of additional interest, the material is bolstering Saturn’s E-ring.

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NASA has invited other nations to place instrumentation in a Lunar Network. To kick off the ILN, NASA would lob on one launcher two small landing packages, one each to the poles of the Moon. The target launch date is 2013-2014. A second pair of U.S. nodes would fly in 2016-2017. Ideally, by year’s end, what nations are joining in on the network, what core instruments are to be flown, and a landing site working group will be agreed to.

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It was reported last week that our nearest stellar neighbor, Alpha Centauri, might contain Earth-like planets. From the article:

“Several factors mark the system, particularly Alpha Centauri B as friendly to planet formation, [study co-author Gregory] Laughlin said. The metallicity of Alpha Centauri B (or how much of its matter is made up of elements heavier than hydrogen and helium) is higher than our Sun’s, so there would be plenty of heavier-mass material for planets to form from, he said. [...] The Doppler detection method, which has revealed the majority of the 228 known extrasolar planets, measures shifts in the light from a star to detect the tiny wobble induced by the gravitational tug of an orbiting planet.

Because Alpha Centauri B is so bright and nearby, detecting a small terrestrial planet’s miniscule wobble would be that much easier. Also, its position high in the sky of the Southern Hemisphere means it is observable for most of the year, just as the Big Dipper is observable for most of the year in the Northern Hemisphere.”

Two Missions to the International Space Station

An unmanned European cargo ship blasted off on Saturday to the International Space Station in the maiden voyage of a new class of ships. From Space.com: “About the size of a double-decker London bus, the 21-ton cargo tug is 32 feet (10 meters) long, almost 15 feet (4.5 meters) wide and is designed to haul up to 16,800 pounds (7,620 kg) - about three times that of current Russian cargo ships - of fresh supplies to the space station. After six months in space, the spacecraft will be jettisoned for disposal in Earth’s atmosphere.”

The ships are scheduled to be launched every 18 months, relieving the needs for Russian Progress units. Interestingly, the Europeans launched the ship but will have to make it wait for its docking until Endeavour finishes its mission to the ISS.

Speaking of which, the U.S. space shuttle Endeavour is scheduled for launch tonight from Kennedy Space Center at 2:28 EDT. It is carrying the first piece of the Japanese science module, Kibo. Astronauts will also assemble a monstrous, two-armed Canadian robot and deliver a suite of on-orbit experiments during their mission, scheduled to last 16 days! More from Space.com: “ Two days after Japan’s first orbital room is stowed in a temporary berth at the space station, spacewalkers Linnehan, Foreman and Behnken will piece together Dextre — the Canadian Space Agency’s (CSA) maintenance robot that weighs more than 3,440 pounds (1,560 kilograms).

The giant robot, often personified by the STS-123 crew as “Mr. Dextre,” will have an arm span of about 30 feet (9 meters) and stand 12 feet (3.7 meters) tall. By guiding highly precise “hands” from inside the space station, astronauts can perform basic space station maintenance without having to venture into the unforgiving space environment outside.”

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Update 3/11/08 12:45A MDT

Endeavour has successfully reached orbit.  Hope the rest of the mission goes as well!

Weekend Random Stories

NASA’s Mars Science Laboratory is running into technical problems and cost over-runs. Currently, it’s scheduled for a 2009 launch. I don’t think either issues is something to be worried about. Technical problems always crop up during a developmental phase. They’ll continue to appear during an operational phase. That’s why scientists and engineers are employed: to take care of things like a heat shield that needs to be redesigned. Added costs? They’re around $20 million, which isn’t much when the project was budgeted for $1.8 billion. Now, maybe those numbers are a little too high. But I think we’ll get considerably more out of that $1.8B than we do from spending a similar amount to occupy Iraq.

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A good story showed up in today’s Denver Post. Counter to the pro-fossil fuel stance, it turns out that once renewable energy companies are established, they have a tendency to attract similar busineses to an area. Vestas, the Danish turbine-maker, is going to open a plant near Windsor this week. Vestas is the world’s largest wind-energy manufacturer. As such, a number of firms that will serve as vendors to the Windsor plant are looking to establish locations near the Windsor plant. That means more good paying jobs in the region.

The article goes on to mention that the plant was supposed to employ 400 workers on four production lines. It turns out that that projection is wrong. Instead, 650 workers on six production lines will be needed due to growth in demand in the wind turbine market. Wait, wait wait. Conservatives wail that renewable energy will hurt the economy and cause job losses. An extra 250 workers will earn an average of $37,000 per year than originally planned in an area of the state that could use some more good paying jobs. And that’s just the beginning. Research continues on turbine efficiency, requiring highly educated personnel who also command good salaries. If only the companies had CEOs pulling in hundreds of millions of dollars per year, the story would like rank as a success in conservative circles.

The culprit behind all of this do-gooder news? Voters in 2004 who passed an alternative-energy mandate and then in 2006 elected Gov. Bill Ritter. Ritter actually has a plan for renewable energy development as part of a New Energy Economy. Pat each other on the backs if you were forward-looking enough to recognize the opportunities that are beginning to manifest themselves. If you didn’t like Amendment 37 or Ritter, please continue to howl about renewables into your obscurity.

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Disappearing ice in the Arctic has been attributed to global warming.  Now, Inupiat Eskimos are suing nine oil companies, 14 electric-power companies and one coal company to pay to move their village, which is under siege by waves of the frigid ocean, once blocked by Arctic ice.

If nothing else, the case should build a factual record.  Fossil fuel corporations have engaged in the largest disinformation campaign since the tobacco industry in the mid-1900’s.  Unfortunately, this won’t be the last suit.  Will the record be established in time to do something to save not only the Inupiat, but millions of others now at risk to rising sea levels?

Shuttle Quick Hit

Astronauts flying on the Mar. 11 Endeavour flight went through a launch rehearsal.

The first section of the Japanese Kibo module is going up with them.