Floating Gas Stations, Increased Autonomy: AUVSI Speakers Look to the Future

AUVSI photo.

By Brett Davis



In the near future, you may be able to gas up your spaceship and buy supplies to explore space from an orbiting one-stop shop created by private industry.



That’s part of the vision of Dr. Bill Stone, an adventurer and explorer who has heavily incorporated robotics into his missions to survey and study sinkholes and subterranean Antarctic lakes. Stone kicked off the first full day of AUVSI’s Unmanned Systems 2013 conference and exhibition.



He has helped form the Shackleton Energy Co. to mine energy from the moon and sell it in low-earth orbit, which would be cheaper for customers than launching everything the traditional way.



Stone foresees a fleet of large and small unmanned rovers and excavators that would be overseen by a small number of humans who would live and work on the moon in much the same way workers live on remote oil rigs now.



““We’re not using government funds,” he said. “This is purely privately funded.”



The supplies, which would include water, oxygen and hydrogen, would allow exploration of outer planets and would be available to all countries on a “first-come, first-served basis.” 



Stone is also working on a laser-powered robot that would punch through 14 kilometers of ice on Jupiter’s moon Europa and deploy another vehicle to explore the oceans beneath.



Stone’s team will test a precursor system, named Artemis, in Antarctica in 2015 over four months.



Barclay



Stone was followed by Gen. James O. Barclay III, deputy chief of staff, Army G-8, who said the U.S. Army plans to increase the amount of autonomy in its future air and ground systems.



Over the past 10 to 12 years, “unmanned systems have really come to life, and have developed at a pace that we would have thought unimaginable back in the late 1990s,” Barclay said.



Going forward, however, the Army wants new small air systems and ground systems, although it hasn’t yet decided exactly how small. They should also feature more autonomy, so soldiers don’t have to supervise them as much, or at all.



“What is autonomous, semiautonomous, and what does that mean to us, and where do we want to go with it?” he said. “…  This is something I think is a challenge for this body.”



Ultimately, the Army needs an “affordable, modernized force, that is both manned and unmanned, and that can team together,” he said.