---
description: Launch economics, megastructure launch infrastructure, in-space manufacturing, asteroid mining, habitation architecture, and governance frameworks shaping the cislunar economy through 2056
type: moc
---

# space exploration and development

Space represents the largest-scale expression of TeleoHumanity's thesis: the multiplanetary attractor state requires coordination infrastructure that doesn't yet exist, and the governance frameworks for space settlement are being written now with almost no deliberate design. The space economy crossed $613B in 2024 and is converging on $1-2T by 2040, driven by a phase transition in launch costs. This map tracks the full stack: launch economics, orbital manufacturing, asteroid mining, habitation architecture, and the governance gaps that make space a direct test case for designed coordination.

## Launch & Access to Space

Launch cost is the keystone variable. Every downstream space industry has a price threshold below which it becomes viable. The trajectory from $54,500/kg (Shuttle) to a projected $10-20/kg (Starship full reuse) is not gradual decline but phase transition.

- [[launch cost reduction is the keystone variable that unlocks every downstream space industry at specific price thresholds]] — the master key: each 10x cost drop crosses a threshold that makes a new industry viable
- [[Starship achieving routine operations at sub-100 dollars per kg is the single largest enabling condition for the entire space industrial economy]] — the specific vehicle: 100-tonne capacity at target pricing makes depots, SBSP, manufacturing, and ISRU all feasible
- [[the space launch cost trajectory is a phase transition not a gradual decline analogous to sail-to-steam in maritime transport]] — framing the reduction as discontinuous structural change, not incremental improvement
- [[reusability without rapid turnaround and minimal refurbishment does not reduce launch costs as the Space Shuttle proved over 30 years]] — the historical counter-example: the Shuttle's $54,500/kg proves reusability alone is insufficient
- [[SpaceX vertical integration across launch broadband and manufacturing creates compounding cost advantages that no competitor can replicate piecemeal]] — the flywheel: Starlink demand drives cadence drives reuse learning drives cost reduction
- [[Starship economics depend on cadence and reuse rate not vehicle cost because a 90M vehicle flown 100 times beats a 50M expendable by 17x]] — the math: $/kg is entirely determined by flights per vehicle, ranging from $600 expendable to $13-20 at airline-like rates

## Space Economy & Market Structure

The space economy is a $613B commercial industry, not a government-subsidized frontier. Structural shifts in procurement, defense spending, and commercial infrastructure investment are reshaping capital flows.

- [[the space economy reached 613 billion in 2024 and is converging on 1 trillion by 2032 making it a major global industry not a speculative frontier]] — the baseline: 78% commercial revenue, ground equipment as largest segment
- [[governments are transitioning from space system builders to space service buyers which structurally advantages nimble commercial providers]] — the procurement inversion: anchor buyer replaces monopsony customer
- [[commercial space stations are the next infrastructure bet as ISS retirement creates a void that 4 companies are racing to fill by 2030]] — the transition: ISS deorbits 2031, marketplace of competing platforms replaces government monument
- [[defense spending is the new catalyst for space investment with US Space Force budget jumping 39 percent in one year to 40 billion]] — the accelerant: defense demand reshapes VC flows, late-stage deals at decade high

## Cislunar Economics & Infrastructure

The cislunar economy depends on three interdependent resource layers — power, water, and propellant — each enabling the others. The 30-year attractor state is a partially closed industrial system.

- [[the 30-year space economy attractor state is a cislunar industrial system with propellant networks lunar ISRU orbital manufacturing and partial life support closure]] — the destination: five integrated layers forming a chain-link system
- [[water is the strategic keystone resource of the cislunar economy because it simultaneously serves as propellant life support radiation shielding and thermal management]] — the keystone resource: water's versatility makes it the most critical cislunar commodity
- [[orbital propellant depots are the enabling infrastructure for all deep-space operations because they break the tyranny of the rocket equation]] — the connective layer: depots break the exponential mass penalty
- [[power is the binding constraint on all space operations because every capability from ISRU to manufacturing to life support is power-limited]] — the root constraint: power gates everything else
- [[falling launch costs paradoxically both enable and threaten in-space resource utilization by making infrastructure affordable while competing with the end product]] — the paradox: cheap launch both enables and competes with ISRU

## Megastructure Launch Infrastructure

Chemical rockets are bootstrapping technology constrained by the Tsiolkovsky rocket equation. The post-Starship endgame is infrastructure that bypasses the rocket equation entirely, converting launch from a propellant problem to an electricity problem — making [[power is the binding constraint on all space operations because every capability from ISRU to manufacturing to life support is power-limited]] the new keystone constraint. Three concepts form an economic bootstrapping sequence where each stage's cost reduction generates demand and capital for the next. All remain speculative — none have been prototyped at any scale.

- [[skyhooks require no new physics and reduce required rocket delta-v by 40-70 percent using rotating momentum exchange]] — the near-term entry point: proven orbital mechanics, buildable with Starship-class capacity, though tether materials and debris risk are non-trivial engineering challenges
- [[Lofstrom loops convert launch economics from a propellant problem to an electricity problem at a theoretical operating cost of roughly 3 dollars per kg]] — the qualitative shift: electromagnetic acceleration replaces chemical propulsion, with operating cost dominated by electricity (theoretical, from Lofstrom's 1985 analyses)
- [[the megastructure launch sequence from skyhooks to Lofstrom loops to orbital rings may be economically self-bootstrapping if each stage generates sufficient returns to fund the next]] — the developmental logic: economic sequencing (capital and demand), not technological dependency (the three systems share no hardware or engineering techniques)

Key research frontier questions: tether material limits and debris survivability (skyhooks), pellet stream stability and atmospheric sheath design (Lofstrom loops), orbital construction bootstrapping and planetary-scale governance (orbital rings). Relationship to propellant depots: megastructures address Earth-to-orbit; [[orbital propellant depots are the enabling infrastructure for all deep-space operations because they break the tyranny of the rocket equation]] remains critical for in-space operations — the two approaches are complementary across different mission profiles.

## In-Space Manufacturing

Microgravity eliminates convection, sedimentation, and container effects. The three-tier killer app thesis identifies the products most likely to catalyze orbital infrastructure at scale.

- [[the space manufacturing killer app sequence is pharmaceuticals now ZBLAN fiber in 3-5 years and bioprinted organs in 15-25 years each catalyzing the next tier of orbital infrastructure]] — the portfolio thesis: each product tier justifies infrastructure the next tier needs

## Governance & Coordination

The most urgent and most neglected dimension. Technology advances exponentially while institutional design advances linearly.

- [[space governance gaps are widening not narrowing because technology advances exponentially while institutional design advances linearly]] — commercial activity outpaces regulatory frameworks, creating governance demand faster than supply
- [[orbital debris is a classic commons tragedy where individual launch incentives are private but collision risk is externalized to all operators]] — the most concrete governance failure: Kessler syndrome as planetary-scale commons problem
- [[the Outer Space Treaty created a constitutional framework for space but left resource rights property and settlement governance deliberately ambiguous]] — the constitutional foundation: 118 parties, critical ambiguities now becoming urgent
- [[the Artemis Accords replace multilateral treaty-making with bilateral norm-setting to create governance through coalition practice rather than universal consensus]] — the new model: 61 nations, adaptive governance through action, risk of bifurcation with China/Russia
- [[space resource rights are emerging through national legislation creating de facto international law without international agreement]] — the legal needle: US, Luxembourg, UAE, Japan grant extraction rights while disclaiming sovereignty

## Cross-Domain Connections

- [[attractor states provide gravitational reference points for capital allocation during structural industry change]] — space economy attractor state analysis uses this shared framework
- [[complex systems drive themselves to the critical state without external tuning because energy input and dissipation naturally select for the critical slope]] — launch cadence as self-organized criticality; space infrastructure as complex adaptive system
- [[designing coordination rules is categorically different from designing coordination outcomes as nine intellectual traditions independently confirm]] — governance gap requires rule design, not outcome design
- [[Ostrom proved communities self-govern shared resources when eight design principles are met without requiring state control or privatization]] — orbital debris tests Ostrom's principles at planetary scale
- [[proxy inertia is the most reliable predictor of incumbent failure because current profitability rationally discourages pursuit of viable futures]] — legacy launch providers exhibit textbook proxy inertia against SpaceX's flywheel
- [[value in industry transitions accrues to bottleneck positions in the emerging architecture not to pioneers or to the largest incumbents]] — cislunar bottleneck analysis: power and propellant depot operators hold enabling positions
- [[Hayek argued that designed rules of just conduct enable spontaneous order of greater complexity than deliberate arrangement could achieve]] — OST and Artemis Accords as designed rules enabling spontaneous commercial coordination
- [[protocol design enables emergent coordination of arbitrary complexity as Linux Bitcoin and Wikipedia demonstrate]] — Artemis Accords and national resource laws as coordination protocols with voluntary adoption
- [[good management causes disruption because rational resource allocation systematically favors sustaining innovation over disruptive opportunities]] — legacy launch providers rationally optimize for cost-plus while commercial-first competitors redefine the game
