March 27, 2025 Quick space links
Courtesy of BtB’s stringer Jay. This post is also an open thread. I welcome my readers to post any comments or additional links relating to any space issues, even if unrelated to the links below.
- Rocket startup Interstellar touts is rocket engine, powered by “liquid biomethane, a renewable fuel”
Jay looked up “biomethane,” and discovered it is manufactured using manure.
- China touts a toy model display showing the future for its Wencheng coastal spaceport
The model shows more than a dozen launchpads, packed close together. We shall see what the future really brings.
- ESA confirms that its very successful Gaia spacecraft has gone silent and has been shut down
Over its decade-long mission it precisely measured the distances to more than a billion objects in the Milky Way, revolutionizing astronomy most significantly.
Readers!
My annual February birthday fund-raising drive for Behind the Black is now over. Thank you to everyone who donated or subscribed. While not a record-setter, the donations were more than sufficient and slightly above average.
As I have said many times before, I can’t express what it means to me to get such support, especially as no one is required to pay anything to read my work. Thank you all again!
For those readers who like my work here at Behind the Black and haven't contributed so far, please consider donating or subscribing. My analysis of space, politics, and culture, taken from the perspective of an historian, is almost always on the money and ahead of the game. For example, in 2020 I correctly predicted that the COVID panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Every one of those 2020 conclusions has turned out right.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are four ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
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Courtesy of BtB’s stringer Jay. This post is also an open thread. I welcome my readers to post any comments or additional links relating to any space issues, even if unrelated to the links below.
- Rocket startup Interstellar touts is rocket engine, powered by “liquid biomethane, a renewable fuel”
Jay looked up “biomethane,” and discovered it is manufactured using manure.
- China touts a toy model display showing the future for its Wencheng coastal spaceport
The model shows more than a dozen launchpads, packed close together. We shall see what the future really brings.
- ESA confirms that its very successful Gaia spacecraft has gone silent and has been shut down
Over its decade-long mission it precisely measured the distances to more than a billion objects in the Milky Way, revolutionizing astronomy most significantly.
Readers!
My annual February birthday fund-raising drive for Behind the Black is now over. Thank you to everyone who donated or subscribed. While not a record-setter, the donations were more than sufficient and slightly above average.
As I have said many times before, I can’t express what it means to me to get such support, especially as no one is required to pay anything to read my work. Thank you all again!
For those readers who like my work here at Behind the Black and haven't contributed so far, please consider donating or subscribing. My analysis of space, politics, and culture, taken from the perspective of an historian, is almost always on the money and ahead of the game. For example, in 2020 I correctly predicted that the COVID panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Every one of those 2020 conclusions has turned out right.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are four ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
3. A Paypal Donation or subscription:
4. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652
You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above.
That made me laugh, “Bio-Methane”, CH4 identical to regular methane from deep in the earth or from the sun. I guess manure is as good of source as any biodegradable material.
Fun fact, 95% of methane from cow feed is generated as it rots on the ground after it leaves the cow. (Not in the cow)(The cow burp’s is mostly “air” swallowed from chewing it’s cud into foam) methane from manure becomes a valuable source of carbon dioxide when tilled into the ground as fertilizer for crops.
And then the company I work for buys those crops and turns it into bio fuel, a substitute for diesel fuel, so it may feel good about itself while it reduces the food supply driving up prices. They can’t remove all the water from biofuel as a cost saving measure, just as they don’t remove all the water from alcohol when it’s added to gasoline at a 10% mixture. I haven’t checked in a while, but 100 proof alcohol means for every 20 gallons of gas, you get a gallon of alcohol and a gallon of water which is not a fuel.
I suspect that’s what’s happening with my equipment because now I’m fueling 2000 gallons a day instead of 1000 per day. The “woke” mind virus still infests corporations across the country.
If Interstellar expects plaudits from the woke greenies for their manure-powered rocket engine I fear they will be disappointed. The woke greenies want to get rid of cows too. In the future, we’re all supposed to own nothing, live in pods, eat only bugs and be happy.
That’s one reason I loved the little Sojourner rover–since it had solar panels up top–no one noticed the radioactive Warm Electronics Box within.