All areas of science have significant crossovers and areas of common interest. It is likely that large elements of the research necessary for space power realization have already been carried out in unrelated fields. Thus it is important to communicate effectively with a broad range of scientists through recognized scientific channels, and new channels if necessary, to identify these areas and avoid unnecessary effort and spending. It is part of a scientist's training to consider risks and failure probabilities in a realistic manner. While many people succumb to the temptation to consider only best-case scenarios for, for example, lifetimes of materials and noise levels, the scientists are able to keep a perspective without a vested interest. This relative objectivity is important in realistic assessment of technologies and projecting progress. Despite the important role the scientific community can have within ISPO it must be noted that its influence over general public is not strong or consistent. This influence depends on the way in which scientists present their ideas and opinions: they should not address only small groups of experts, but rather seek opportunities to communicate with an enlarged public without a specialist education. Only in this case will the scientific community be important in gaining popular support for the program. The negative influence the scientific community can have, on the other hand, is significant. Thus effective communication with those researchers opposed to space power is critical to limit the damage they do to the program in the public eye. Interfacing with the Scientific Community The ISPO program, in common with all major research undertakings, requires cooperation and collaboration between university and other research teams in order to allow a better use of the human and technological resources already in place throughout the world. Skilled people need to be brought together with the equipment and facilities necessary to carry out experiments, wherever they may be located. Research related to space power will be coordinated and driven by an international scientific committee, appointed by the Board of Governors of ISPO. This would be modelled on currently existing scientific assessment committees for national space programs. The committee will consist of a small number of distinguished people with high research profiles. Members of the group will be chosen according to their spontaneous interest in all aspects of space power study and their standing within the research community. This committee is a point of contact for other scientists interested in space power. They will help to ensure that Space Solar Power is presented in journals accessible to the rest of the community and that data is made available to interested parties. Within the organization, the committee is the interface between the business side and the scientists. The committee advises the program manager of scientific priorities and large-scale funding requirements for major areas of research. In association with project scientists, it will coordinate the activities of scientists working on space power, without preventing them from carrying out their own research in other areas. To this end it will select experiments consistent with the major scientific objectives for the program and Principal Investigators for these experiments. This will include the many ground-based experiments that must be carried out as well as those onboard satellites. This structure allows individual scientists involved in pure and applied research to contribute to good technological and scientific progress while keeping fundamental independence from purely industrial and business activities. As the scale of space power research increases, it will become necessary to have more conferences, like SPS ‘91, dedicated to the study of space power, in order both to gain an external perspective from other scientists attending and to disseminate information on the activities within ISPO to a wider audience. IPSO itself should encourage, support and eventually coordinate these enlarged conferences. As commercial aspects of space power become more important, the scientific priorities will change. With the exception of independent experiments piggy-backing on the large platforms that commercial space power requires, especially for space to Earth projects, science will play a reduced role. Unless there is a strong incentive, scientists will be less willing to devote their time to the project. As there will be many people who have worked on the program by this stage it should be possible to retain an effective internal scientific group to carry out additional research as it becomes necessary. This will probably consist of post-doctoral students still interested in the challenges of all aspects of the program. In addition, scientists could act as consultants to the organization, as required.
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