A night in the Empathy Suite at the Palms Casino Resort in Las Vegas will set you back
around $100,000, making it the most expensive hotel room in the world.
But is this record about to be broken?
The Bigelow Commercial Space Station is set to open to paying customers within the decade,
and its prices are truly out of this world.
So, how much will a night aboard this world-first cost?
One of the most difficult obstacles to overcome when constructing a space station is the limitation
on size, an issue created by maximum payloads on expensive rocket launches.
However, Bigelow Aerospace seem to have found an exciting solution to this.
Founded by American businessman Robert Bigelow in 1998, Bigelow Aerospace specialises in
the development and manufacturing of expandable space station habitats.
These expandable habitats are tightly packed atop a rocket for launch, then enlarged and
fully deployed once in space, meaning that considerably larger space stations can be
established for a fraction of the comparative cost.
NASA didn t let Bigelow s work go unnoticed.
They had previously worked on a similar project in the 1990s called the Transhab , so they
were well accustomed to the idea expandable habitats.
In 2010, NASA entered into an agreement with Bigelow for the production of an inflatable
habitat to attach to the International Space Station, and in 2016, Bigelow realised this
goal by launching one of their habitats into space.
The Bigelow Expandable Activity Module, otherwise known as BEAM, docked with the International
Space Station after arriving aboard a SpaceX Dragon capsule.
BEAM was collected and put into position by British astronaut Tim Peake, then unpackaged
and expanded, eventually allowing astronauts on the ISS to test the safety of inflatable
space structures by recording air quality and radiation protection inside the module.
Early results indicate that the safety levels are comparable to those in the rest of the
ISS, and that the module s protective layers had successfully resisted a few probable micro-meteoroid
impacts.
Now that the validity of inflatable space modules has been confirmed, Bigelow have drawn
up plans for the first commercial space station, utilising the creation of their first full-scale
production module, the B330.
Weighing in at 23 metric tons with a fully extended length of 14 meters, the B330 is
the current largest production variant of its type, but it doesn t stop there.
Once in space, the modules can be connected to one another, meaning that the size of Bigelow
s first space station is virtually limitless.
Under current plans, there are two concepts for Bigelow Space Stations, the Space Complex
Alpha, and the Space Complex Bravo.
Space Complex Alpha is the smaller of the two proposed concepts, consisting of 2 B330
modules and a similar, but smaller, Sundance module.
With a crew of up to 12 people, Space Complex Alpha is the ideal steppingstone for Bigelow
to learn and move onto the construction of larger stations, which brings us to Space
Station Bravo.
This concept uses between 4 and 9 B330 capsules creating up to 2,800 cubic meters of habitable
space, all of which is prime real estate.
Housing up to 24 crew, Space Station Bravo would become the largest privately funded
object of its kind, and the potential home of the galaxy s first space hotel.
So, now that we know how the space hotel will be constructed, we can get to the question
on everyone s mind; how much for a room at the space hotel?
As you can imagine, the cost to develop, manufacture, launch and assemble a space hotel is colossal,
and that s without factoring in the cost of passenger transportation.
With all this in mind, Bigelow have set an initial estimated price for a round trip at
an astronomical $26.5 million for 10 days in space, or $2.65 million per night.
This may sound like a mind-boggling figure, but compared to its space tourism competitors,
Bigelow offers a lot of bang for its buck.
Virgin Galactic charges $250,000 for a short trip to skim the edge of space, whereas Axiom
plans to charge $55 million for a ticket to visit the International Space Station itself.
Still, the cost is monumentally high.
Only one in every 4,000 Americans are thought to even be able to afford a ticket, with the
price being equivalent to the average cost of 132 American homes, 660 new cars, or nearly
7 million big macs.
Truly, it is a fee that only the world s most eccentric billionaires can pay up.
So, what does Bigelow plan to do going forwards?
Originally, Bigelow s plan was to launch its first space station in 2016, with it being
commercially available to rent by 2017.
However, due to setbacks, the launch date was changed to 2020, with it being further
delayed to late 2021.
But this hasn t stopped Bigelow from developing new modules.
The BA2100 is currently Bigelow s largest inflatable habitat, with a fully expanded
space of 2,100 cubic meters per module.
Its mass could be as low as 65,000kg, although this is more likely to be in the range of
100 metric tons when completed.
This presents a problem.
There are currently no launch vehicles capable of taking a 100-ton payload into space during
a single trip.
However, there are a few in development.
NASA s Space Launch System, or the SLS, is currently in development for the Artemis moon
program, and is scheduled for its first launch in November 2021.
This would be able to launch a payload of up to 130 metric tons, enough to send up the
BA2100 with room to spare.
Similarly, the SpaceX Starship system is also in development, and has a mooted payload of
over 100 tons.
The concurrent development of other space technologies is vital for Bigelow Aerospace
to turn the space hotel dream into reality.
Let s hope that one day soon we may be able to spend a night among the stars.
Thanks for watching Elderfox.
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