and intangible materials without causing harm, the Liability Convention takes into account the fact that radiation can produce injury. It was noted, if nuclear damage, under treaty terms, can be made the basis for a recovery of monetary damages, that the same reasoning may be applied to the radiation produced by microwaves. While it remains to be seen what kind of ionizing radiation would be produced in transmitting solar energy to Earth via microwaves, if any or at all, nonetheless, in the event that harms were produced a body of legal rules and procedures now exists which would allow recovery to take place. Emphasis has been placed throughout on the terms of international agreements. Treaties serve the purpose of providing clarity respecting legal rights and duties. While substantial practices of States, which have ripened into customary international law, produce legal rights and duties, the rapidly expanding needs of the space-resource States are better served by the formal treaty process. Customary law may be slow to develop, although this need not be the case. Moreover, it may be variously interpreted depending on ideologies, developmental status, and the capacity to understand and respond to scientific and technological facts. Moreover, assumed national interests can be consulted in more detail and with greater care in the writing of a binding treaty than in the emergence of customary law. Both space-resource and non-resource States presently seem to be in accord that formal agreements are a preferred route to travel. The acceptance of the res communis principle in the 1967 Treaty has given it a firm legal base in the international law of the space environment. This principle is directly related to the further principle that
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