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Robert Bigelow is betting his
real estate fortune on inflatable space hotels -- with a lunar space race his
ace in the hole.
Events have overtaken the
publishing schedule. Things are happening so fast now, I cannot write to you
on a Friday with any sense of certainty as to what will happen in the
following 72 hours.
The sovereign debt crisis in Europe has
brought back "weekend risk" -- that fun phenomenon where breaking
news on a Sunday has potential to rock the market on Monday.
We are now at the stage with
Greece where a "Lehman 2.0" event is imminent, and may in fact be
unfolding as you read this.
On the other hand, if the powers
that be pull off yet another Hail Mary temporary fix, investors could be
reverting back to their euphoric "crisis averted" stance for the
umpteenth time.
Not knowing what life's box of
chocolates has in store for us, let's take a twist and look at something
completely different: An eccentric Las Vegas mogul who is building inflatable
space hotels, with the America-China moon race his ace in the hole.
Yes, you read that right. There
is life beyond the credit crisis, and some of it is pretty interesting.
Bigelow
Aerospace
Robert Bigelow, 67, owns a real estate empire worth $700 million
(according to Forbes) -- not quite a cool billion, but close enough. He
borrowed $20,000 to invest in Las Vegas apartments in the late 1960s, and
built his way up from there. In 1988 Bigelow founded Budget Suites of
America, a no-frills extended-stay hotel chain.
As Bigelow amassed his real
estate fortune, however, his head was in the clouds. Or to be more accurate,
the stars. As a child, Bigelow heard the story of his grandparents being
approached by a glowing UFO in the Nevada desert. His fascination with space
was sealed from that point on.
Today, the real estate mogul's
main passion is Bigelow Aerospace, a compound set on what Forbes calls
"50 acres of dirt and scrub" in the Mojave Desert.
Within this tightly controlled
area, complete with razor-wire fence and armed security, Bigelow is building space hotels -- "high-tech,
low-cost inflatable space stations 228 miles above sea level."
The venture is real. Or at the
very least, credible people are taking Bigelow seriously. "Bigelow is
absolutely viable," NASA director Phil McAlister reports. "We're
very interested to see how they proceed."
Bigelow isn't exactly sure yet
how his inflatable space hotels will be hauled into orbit. But he is
confident one of his fellow space entrepreneurs will figure it out. Wealthy
visionaries like Elon Musk, who built his original
fortune in PayPal, and Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon.com, are bankrolling the
type of space exploration and development companies that could wind up
partnering with Bigelow.
Bigelow's hope is to have a
full-function inflatable space hotel in orbit by 2016, at which point he will
start charging rent. And boy is that rent going to be steep -- roughly $29
million per month, per astronaut, to start off with. (That's a better deal
than the $35 million various rich guys have paid to visit the International
Space Station.)
Space Hotels -- The Future of Space Exploration?
The question is,
how will these space hotels ever become economically viable? With costs that
could be considered "astronomical" or "out of this world"
-- sorry, couldn't resist -- recouping the initial investment seems like an
impossible proposition. How will they get the critical mass of
"beta" customers necessary to work out the kinks and bring
technology costs down?
Bigelow thinks various
governments will step up and pay.
As we move into the 21st
century, space exploration is increasingly being outsourced to the private
sector. And as access to space becomes more viable, the prospect of mining
the moon grows more tempting.
(Yes I know,
the story just keeps getting nuttier...)
As Bigelow points out, the Outer
Space Treaty of 1967 establishes the moon as neutral territory. The major
powers have all agreed that no country will claim lunar land or resources as
their own. But there is a clause near the end of the treaty allowing a
country to opt out on 12 months' notice.
Which means if a country like,
say, China were to opt out and make advances toward "mining the
moon" -- Helium 3 anyone? -- America would have to step up too, at which
point the great "space race" would be on (and Bigelow's hotels
would be booked).
No one knows how all this will
play out, obviously. But it's a good reminder that the world will keep
turning and humans will keep innovating, even in the midst of economic
crisis. Virtually no matter what, wild new developments -- some of them quite
positive -- are still ahead.
Justice
Litle
Taipan
Publishing Group
Article
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