gained. Note that it is about 200 times NASA's current annual budget. And by the way, solar power can clean up the environment of the Earth by displacing fossil and nuclear fuels. It also can make it possible for literally billions of human being.s to lift themselves out of poverty. Now that's a space program that, I believe, makes sense. We really need to change vitally the course of the U.S. national space program, because, as it is now headed, NASA is increasingly irrelevant in the future. One reason is that we arc not the only nation with capability in space. The Europeans, the Russians and the Japanese have shown that they arc capable of profiting by our mistakes and taking the sensible paths which we strayed from. They have intelligent, well-directed space programs of their own, far more cost-effective than ours. If we continue to ignore satellite power as a xvii goal of our space program, satellite power is not going to be forgotten. It will simply be picked up and exploited by one or more other nations that see that potential six trillion dollar a year market. The nations that do will become the leading nations of the twentyfirst century. I hope very much that the U.S. plays an important role in whatever consortium of nations does develop solar satellite power, but it's currently doubtful that we wil~ and it will not happen if the U.S. federal space program continues as it's now headed. I apologize to the speakers this morning for having taken their time, but it seemed to me important to give you these strong beliefs based on more than 30 years of observation of the U.S. and foreign space programs. We have an exciting program for you this morning. I will ask now for the first paper on the f ascinating subject of space power.
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