Radically Reinventing NASA in the 2030s: A New Vision for Planetary Defense, Earth Stewardship, and Knowledge
By Julian Scaff
For more than half a century, NASA has represented the pinnacle of American scientific ambition. From the Moon landings to the Hubble Space Telescope, it inspired generations with visions of human progress and cosmic discovery. But today, that NASA is dying. Decades of neglect, erratic funding, and most recently, devastating budget cuts and layoffs imposed by a regime hostile to science have left the agency a shadow of its former self. The anti-science worldview of the 2020s has gutted not only NASA’s capacity to explore but also the morale of its scientific community. As a former employee at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory and a lifelong fan of space science, it’s painful to watch the organization crumble before our eyes, even as it continues to operate amazing missions.
Nothing can be done to save NASA in its current form. Yet the need for its reinvention has never been more urgent. When the next regime comes into power at the end of this decade, the United States will face a stark new reality: a greatly diminished reputation in the world, a brain drain of scientists to Asia and Europe, intensifying climate disasters, and the accelerating degradation of Earth’s biosphere. A newly reinvented NASA will be needed to play a central role in meeting these challenges.
In the years between 2025 and 2029, while the U.S. turns its back on science, China will surge ahead to become the world’s dominant space power. Its investments in orbital infrastructure, planetary defense, and lunar and Martian exploration will quickly leave other nations far behind. By the early 2030s, NASA will not be in a position to lead but rather to learn, rebuild, and catch up. To do so, it will need China’s help, along with the cooperation of Europe, India, Japan, Canada, and emerging spacefaring nations.
The new vision for NASA must therefore be one of partnership, humility, and shared stewardship. Recognizing that Earth’s biosphere knows no political boundaries, NASA should join in the creation of a Global Space Alliance (GSA): a coalition of nations committed to planetary defense, climate stabilization, and equitable access to the benefits of space. The GSA will not be dominated by any one nation but will respect China’s technological leadership while ensuring that space remains a shared domain for all humanity.
In addition to government funding, the new NASA must adopt a sustainable financial model by owning and licensing its intellectual property. For decades, NASA’s innovations flowed freely to private industry without generating direct returns. Companies such as SpaceX have grown wealthy from NASA’s free intellectual property. Under the new vision, every major program, from propulsion to orbital data networks, will include structured revenue streams. NASA will license carbon-neutral aerospace technologies, charge subscriptions for climate and space science data, and collect service fees for orbital energy. These revenues will help fund future missions while reducing dependence on unstable political cycles.
In the fight against climate change, every kilogram of carbon released into the atmosphere must be justified and accounted for. Every gram of emissions should move us closer to a post-carbon future. Space missions can no longer be justified as spectacle or prestige; each must deliver measurable benefits for humanity and our planet. Human spaceflight, with its high costs and large carbon footprint, should be minimized, while robotic missions, cheaper, more efficient, and less polluting, become the primary means of exploration and defense.
Every mission must prove its worthiness by advancing survival, sustainability, and/or knowledge. The following is a portfolio of missions I propose that meet these criteria.
The Proposed Mission Portfolio of the New NASA and GSA (Global Space Alliance)
- Solar Shield: Planetary Climate Stabilization Satellites
Solar Shield will deploy orbital reflectors and adaptive aerosol platforms to slow catastrophic tipping points such as Arctic ice melt and desertification. By stabilizing regional climates, it will protect agriculture, freshwater supplies, and biodiversity. Its governance will be international, ensuring vulnerable nations shape deployment. Beyond survival, Solar Shield will advance climate science by providing real-time feedback on Earth’s atmospheric systems.
2. SolPower: Global Space-Based Solar Power Grid
SolPower will build orbital solar farms that beam clean energy to Earth, reducing dependence on fossil fuels. The system will start with grids in China, India, and the U.S. before expanding worldwide, improving quality of life through reliable, zero-carbon power. For non-spacefaring nations, subsidized access to orbital energy will narrow inequality in the energy transition. This mission stabilizes the biosphere by cutting carbon emissions while creating a shared global infrastructure of clean power.
3. Asteroid Resource Capture & Processing Missions
Asteroid mining missions will secure critical metals and volatiles without further degrading Earth’s biosphere. By redirecting near-Earth asteroids into cis-lunar orbit, the GSA can refine resources in space and reduce terrestrial mining’s environmental damage. This provides humanity with sustainable material supply chains while generating scientific knowledge about the solar system’s formation and composition.
4. Guardian: Asteroid & Comet Defense System
Guardian will be a standing planetary defense network capable of detecting, deflecting, or neutralizing hazardous objects. Protecting Earth from extinction-level events provides the ultimate safeguard for humanity and the biosphere. It will consist of a fleet of observational satellites in orbit around the Earth, the Moon, Venus, Mars, Mercury, and the Sun. This wide distribution ensures better visibility to detect objects in space that pose a danger to Earth. Spacecraft designed to ram asteroids and comets to deflect their trajectories (like NASA’s DART mission) away from Earth will be parked throughout the inner solar system, ready to launch as soon as threats are detected. Its international structure will ensure collective governance and shared security, with the program also advancing astrophysics through continuous monitoring of near-Earth objects.
5. AtmosWatch: Global Carbon & Methane Monitoring Network
AtmosWatch will create a real-time global map of greenhouse gas emissions, using hyperspectral satellites and AI analysis. By identifying industrial leaks, illegal deforestation, and natural feedback loops, it enables faster and fairer policy enforcement. For developing nations, it provides actionable climate data to protect communities. AtmosWatch expands scientific understanding of carbon cycles while directly advancing global climate stabilization.
6. Life Ark: Orbital & Lunar Biodiversity Vaults
Life Ark will establish biodiversity repositories, seeds, DNA, and microbes, in orbit and lunar lava tubes. This preserves humanity’s biological heritage against ecological collapse. Including genetic samples from all regions supports global equity in conservation. Life Ark not only safeguards ecosystems but also advances bioscience by enabling new discoveries in genetics, adaptation, and resilience.
7. Deep Climate Explorer: Ocean–Ice–Atmosphere Monitoring Fleet
Deep Climate Explorer will integrate orbital sensors, ocean drones, and atmospheric monitors to build predictive models of Earth’s climate. Forecasting crises such as monsoon failure or AMOC collapse will help societies prepare decades in advance. The mission strengthens biosphere stability and enhances human quality of life by reducing disaster risks while deepening scientific knowledge of Earth as a dynamic system.
8. SkyClean: Rocket & Aviation Carbon Capture Program
SkyClean will redesign rockets and high-altitude aircraft for carbon neutrality through hydrogen propulsion, carbon-scrubbing exhausts, and reusable systems. This ensures that space exploration does not worsen climate change. Licensing these technologies will spread green aerospace globally, advancing climate goals while allowing sustainable access to space.
9. ExoProbes: Autonomous Deep-Space Science Scouts
The ExoProbes Program will deploy swarms of robotic probes to every planet and moon in the solar system, and extend out to the Kuiper Belt, the Oort Cloud, and interstellar space. These missions expand knowledge of cosmic evolution and the potential for extraterrestrial life at a fraction of the cost and emissions of crewed missions. Data will be shared with global researchers, ensuring scientific benefits reach all humanity.
10. EarthNet: Carbon-Zero Orbital Internet Backbone
EarthNet will move Earth’s most carbon-intensive internet infrastructure, data centers, into orbit. Solar-powered, magnetically shielded data hubs in geostationary orbit will provide a carbon-zero backbone, with constellations in MEO and LEO (Medium and Low Earth Orbit) delivering global connectivity. This improves quality of life by providing universal, green internet access, while stabilizing Earth’s biosphere by slashing IT-sector emissions.
11. SolNet: Interplanetary Internet & Navigation System
SolNet will build a solar-system-wide communications and navigation network, starting with the Earth’s Moon, Venus, and Mars. Eventually, every planet in the solar system will have a constellation of satellites that provide GPS-style navigation on the surface of solid planets and moons, communication relays, data storage, and a kind of solar system-wide internet. It ensures that future missions, robotic or human, from any nation have a reliable infrastructure. By enabling exploration without duplication of effort, SolNet reduces waste, advances interplanetary science, and ensures humanity collectively benefits from space development.
Conclusion: A NASA for Humility, Partnership, and Stewardship
The NASA of the 20th century symbolized the Space Age. The NASA of the 21st century must symbolize planetary survival through international partnership. By 2029, the United States will have lost its scientific edge and global reputation. China will be the undisputed leader in science and space, and the only way forward will be for NASA to join with humility, as an equal partner in a Global Space Alliance.
The mission portfolio, Solar Shield, SolPower, Guardian, AtmosWatch, Life Ark, Deep Climate Explorer, SkyClean, ExoProbes, EarthNet, and SolNet, redefines NASA not as the backbone of global space policy but as a trusted collaborator. Each mission is designed to stabilize Earth’s biosphere, improve human quality of life, or expand knowledge of the universe. This new NASA would also help to repair America’s reputation, restore its role in global science, and help ensure that the benefits of space are shared equitably.
In the 2030s and beyond, NASA’s greatness will not lie in leading alone but in joining together, alongside China, India, Japan, Europe, Canada, and developing nations, in the defense of Earth and the stewardship of humanity’s shared cosmic future.
