explore the ideas, all the ideas, and that also requires effort and moneys—-and that effort, we only have studied one concept. And even that concept requires further study before I would come and say, hey, this makes economic sense and we should appropriate billions of dollars. Senator Ford. I think you make sense. Now, Dr. Greenblat, am I correct in saying that ECON only considered the solar cell method of obtaining power and you did not consider the Powersat concept? Dr. Greenblat. That is correct, Mr. Chairman. Senator Ford. Why did you limit your analysis this way? Dr. Greenblat. One, by direction, Mr. Chairman; also the Boeing Company is studying alternative generation concepts for NASA, a similar type of study. Senator Ford. Can you, from your study, say anything at all about the economic or technical merit of the Powersat system? Dr. Greenblat. I have attended some briefings. We started our study about 6 months before they did. I don't think their study is mature enough to have come up with comparable cost estimates as ours—at least I have not seen the cost data, so I do not think that it is appropriate for me to comment on that. Senator Ford. Well, let's look at the technological feasibility, if we may. Would you say that there are many areas of technology that we have to work on to be able to build this solar power satellite? How many, would you say? Dr. Greenblat. We have identified eight areas that I read in. This corresponds with a list, that very closely corresponds with a list developed independently by NASA. They have nine areas—-and I am not sure, but perhaps they will be reported on today. But there are eight or nine key subsystems areas. Senator Ford. We are getting to a point of decisionmaking. And I don't have a feeling for how much technological uncertainty is reasonable and acceptable when we are deciding to go with a development program of this magnitude. What kind of risk have we been willing to take in the past? I mean, how many risks, how much risk should we be willing to take before we say it is go or stop? Dr. Greenblat. Well, let me say that we are now looking—we have some funds to continue our study—we are now looking at these risks. In other words, we are trying to quantify or convert technical uncertainty into cost risk, so that perhaps at some later time we will be able to say that we expect, based upon the technical uncertainties, the costs to be such and such—and we can say that with a certain amount of confidence. Now, I don't want to say at this moment what the risk is-—we don't know. We do know that there is tremendous risk in terrestrial systems. So it is a question of comparing both approaches on an equivalent basis. If we were not to build SSPS, if we were not to develop it—what risks do we incur, let's say, by not having the power that we believe we will require twenty years from now? That would require looking at the risks associated with the current terrestrial systems in the fusion, in the breeder reactor program, in terrestrial solar systems program.
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