ET Project - Conclusions and Recommendations As has been discussed in the previous pages, the External Tank is a very large, very inexpensive enhancement of the American space effort. For almost no additional cost, the STS can deliver an ET complete with residual cryogenics to a space station orbit. This 69,000 pound object could become a multi-billion dollar investment in the future of our space program. Typical figures for aluminium mass alone a yield net worth over $20 billion after 250 launches. This does not include the previously discussed economic advantages of cryogenics scavenging, aluminium fueled rockets, ACC additional volume, and the resulting elimination of the volume limit for STS launches. With the external tank, we have the potential for achieving an extremely high return if the tanks are taken to orbit today and stored for later use. This is something that can be used to leverage the growth, national preeminence in space utilization, jobs, and tax revenues. It is also an enabling technology that will enhance the safety in potentially dangerous research in genetics, pharmaceuticals, and industrial chemicals by stationing the ’lab* in orbit. The existence of large inexpensive space platforms opens the field for space based research on more risky and less well known subjects. This widens the possible avenues of both commercial and governmental research and allows additional approaches to be made with the corresponding potential increase in new discoveries. The space station can be enhanced by flying literally a fleet of additional stations in close proximity. The multiple stations could include DOD, Corporate, and Foreign platforms both manned and unmanned. The actual enhancements of the station itself include elbow room, storm shelters, experimental volumes, fuels scavenging and storage, to name just a few. The addition of the ET or the ET/ACC to the space station will be a welcome answer to those critics of the space program that want low costs and high returns on investments. As with any other suggestion that paints a very rosy picture, the use of the ET does have its problems. These include the lack of a current market for a large number of tanks, the maintenance of the tanks in an orbit high enough not to decay to an uncontrolled reentry, and the problems of SOFI outgassing. The information used by the author in this report indicates that none of these
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