Exploring the Unknown - NASA's History Office

EXPLORING THE UNKNOWN 317
ing system through the next ten years or more. They present alternatives that could lead
to eventual commercialization of Landsat, but these involve extensive government participation
through various management, joint-operator or financing options. These respondents
are opposed to commercialization of the weather satellite programs, as well as the
creation of any monopolistic commercial entity for land sensing. It should be noted that
three of the nation’s major aerospace industries (RCA, GE, and Hughes) share this basic
position.
A. Remote Sensing Center, University of Massachusetts (UMass)
The UMass proposal is somewhat ambiguous but looks to an evolutionary, step-bystep
approach leading toward commercialization. However, they believe the current systems
would require extensive federal support if a transfer to private industry were
attempted in the near-term. In the UMass plan, individual segments of the current systems
would be modified and gradually replaced by the private sector until full commercialization
of the land sensing system was achieved. They doubt that total private-sector ownership/operation
of the weather sensing system is feasible now or in the foreseeable future.
(1) Responsiveness to Federal Needs:
Insufficient information is provided to permit an evaluation; however, a
phased take-over should fulfill user needs initially.
(2) Continuity of Service:
Information provided is indeterminate for evaluation; comments in the preceding
paragraphs apply.
[18] (3) Feasibility:
The plan for stepwise commercialization can be implemented within current
technology. The subsystems of data receive/record, command and control, image
processing, assessment and analysis, and communications and distribution are
readily separable. The distributed processing proposed is subject to the same comments
as for Terra-Mar. The (apparent) desire for a central archive, as well as local,
limited archives, is technically feasible; it requires only a data management decision.
Since the “existing systems would be unaffected,” federal global modeling
capacities would not be affected in the near-term (8–10 years). However, the proposal
postulates eventual replacement of government sensors by private sensors
which could acquire “Landsat-like” data. It seems unlikely that the requirements
for more advanced sets of multispectral data can be satisfied by Landsat-like private
sensors. For example, geological researchers are finding that spectral resolutions
on the order of 10–20 nanometers within the short wavelength region
(1.1–2.6 micrometers) and 30–50 nanometers within the thermal region (8–14
micrometers) are showing enormous promise for extracting unique signatures of
surficial minerals, thereby allowing inferences on subsurface content and structure.
These capabilities are beyond the spectral resolutions on Landsat.
(4) National Security and Foreign Policy Concerns:
This response mentions some aspects of national security and foreign policy
issues—e.g., providing priority weather service to DOD. However, the entire concept
is drawn up in the context of U.S. coverage only, with no provision for meeting
federal needs for foreign area data, or for serving foreign users.