The enormous expansion of private sector investment in space-related activities is the dominant trend at the moment, and will undoubtedly give rise to intense pressures for unfettered access to space for commercial purposes. There is little doubt that in a decade or two, space tourism will become a must for the trendy rich, bored with private tropical islands and Antarctic flyovers. People are already booking seats to the Moon on the Space Shuttle think of the frequent flyer points. One has to ask whether the lessons of tourism on earth have been learned. Expeditions are now sent to Mount Everest to clean up the cans and other waste discarded by climbers, just as you can find rubbish along the walking tracks of the Tasmanian wilderness.
Space is the perfect place to send all of humanity s wastes.
Because in poor countries, Dr Summers wrote, the foregone wages from illness and early death are so much less than in rich countries. As far as we know, there is no-one in space whose welfare would be diminished by dumping plutonium there, no ET whose earning capacity would be diminished or whose willingness to pay to avoid our waste can be elicited using a contingent valuation survey. So let s go for it. The only barrier is one of cost, but the more we pollute the earth, the more attractive it will become to convert Challenger into a rocket-propelled dumpster. Of course the economists tell us that the answer to the question of the optimal use of any resource is the proper allocation of property rights.