Resource-efficient tech is must-have in space.

Over its 50-year history, NASA has helped to spark development of More than 1,500 technologies and overseen their transfer from the agency to the private sector, contributing to the fields of human health, worker productivity, national security, consumer product design and the environment. NASA-backed research has boosted technologies for the remote and resource-constrained environment of space exploration, producing lightweight and durable materials, funneling new power-system innovations to the transportation industry and developing hyper-spectral imaging technology being applied to projects such as distinguishing genetically modified corn from traditional corn.

What’s more, NASA technology is giving a boost to clean energy, climate change and environmental cleanup, too. Agency-led innovations have included more fuel-efficient aircraft engines, photovoltaic solar cells for use in remote locations, wind energy technology, polymer films for home energy conservation, and even soil remediation solutions to restore grounds contaminated after early launches at Kennedy Space Center. The agency’s remote sensing expertise has also been put to use monitoring wildlife habitat with light detection and ranging technology, which sends laser pulses to the earth’s surface to collect detailed land-cover data.

“Sustainability of our planet is something in which NASA is very interested,” says Doug Comstock, director of the agency’s Innovative Partnerships Program, which fosters technology partnerships, commercialization and innovation in support of NASA’s mission and national priorities.

Often overshadowed by its space missions, NASA’s goals and programs to better understand planet Earth tend to get low priority.In 2001, the Bush administration launched the Climate Change Research Initiative, tasking NASA to track global climate change [see “NASA’s non-position on climate change,” this page]. In the most comprehensive survey ever undertaken of the massive ice sheets covering both Greenland and Antarctica, NASA scientists are playing a pivotal role in tracking ever-shrinking polar ice. The agency’s strategic plan for 2006–2016 includes a wide range of initiatives to refine its remote sensing capabilities to track future changes in the planet’s ice cover, carbon cycles, ecosystems and coastal processes.

The agency’s Ames Research Center has launched a Cleantech Partnership Program to guide the work of 50 researchers in clean energy, environmental treatment, environmental monitoring, and climatology and modeling. Ames has also formed a Global Research into Energy and the Environment at NASA (GREEN) Team, a group of NASA and non-NASA scientists, engineers and educators, to determine how the agency’s tools and expertise developed for exploring and living in space can be applied to energy and environmental problems on Earth.

“These technologies can help us lower our carbon footprints on Earth and help us use our limited resources more efficiently,” says Gary Martin, director of strategic management and advanced planning at Ames. “Working to identify these dual-use technologies allows the investments made by U.S. taxpayers in the space program to help develop new sustainable technologies here on Earth.”

As an agency often pushing the boundaries of what’s been done before, NASA is constantly searching for new technologies to bolster its current capabilities and develop new ones. To do so, NASA needs a continual supply of ideas for new technologies, from materials to sensors, controls and communication systems. That’s why the agency relies so heavily on the country’s private sector, universities and research centers for innovative technologies.

At the same time, technology transfer out of NASA to applications in everyday life, including tackling environmental challenges, has also been a pivotal role of the agency. In fact, technology transfer has been a mandate for the agency since its inception in 1958 by the National Aeronautics and Space Act, which requires NASA to widely disseminate results of its activities and research. Since the Act passed, Congress has bolstered technology transfer out of the agency with nearly a dozen supporting pieces of federal legislation. “It’s very much a two -way street in what we do,” Comstock says. “We rely on innovation from outside the agency to help address our needs, and we transfer technology out of the agency for the public good.”

Comstock says the mission of the Innovative Partnerships Program is to provide leveraged technology for NASA’s mission directorates, programs and projects through investments and technology partnerships with industry, academia, government agencies and national laboratories. Every year, the program coordinates NASA’s requests for outside assistance on technology research and design, and also produces Spinoff, an annual publication sharing the success stories from the agency’s collaboration with and technology transfer to the private sector.

Comstock notes the agency uses several means to attract outside help, including seed funds, small business contracts of up to $750,000 through the federal Small Business Innovation Research and Technology Transfer programs, prize competitions and other incentives. In turn, NASA generates several hundred new inventions every year through the agency’s 10 field centers and actively seeks outside partners to bring the inventions to non-NASA applications.

It’s a synergistic partnership reaping big rewards for the agency, big dollars for companies to commercialize technologies, and often big benefits for the public and the environment. Some of the most significant energy technologies, such as thin-film solar cells and wind turbines designed to function in demanding space applications are injecting new innovation into the country’s clean power industry. Others note NASA’s partnerships are motivated by the agency’s other concerns, too.

“Beyond giving boosts to innovative technologies, NASA is driven by a need to stay grounded and relevant to people’s everyday lives by doing things other than just making rockets,” says Keith Cowing, a former NASA employee who’s now one of its most prominent watchdogs. And, like many agencies, Cowing says NASA is often hindered by lack of staff and budget, pulled in different directions by changing administration priorities.

As for the future, Comstock says, while the agency typically lets the development of new technologies unfold as they are needed, the agency is poised be a pivotal player in helping address global environmental issues. But which direction the agency takes will largely depend on the next administration.

Distributed Energy Systems designed wind turbines for Mars.

The agency has also been pivotal in supporting renewable energy projects since the 1970s. From 1974 to 1981, NASA’s Glenn Research Center led the nation’s wind energy program for large, horizontal–axis wind turbines. With help from the National Science Foundation and the U.S. Department of Energy, NASA went on to develop 13 experimental wind turbines, helping spark what is today a thriving wind power industry. Jonathan Lynch, vice president of wind power for the Wallingford, Conn.–based company Distributed Energy Systems knows first–hand the value of NASA technology partnerships. Northern Power Systems, a Distributed Energy subsidiary, received two rounds of awards from NASA through the Small Business Innovation Research program to develop wind power technology for extreme environments such as those found on Mars.

Bringing water technology to Earth

Water Security Corp.'s filtration system.

Ken Kearney also knows the benefits of NASA technology. His company, Water Security Corp., is bringing clean water to rural villages from Africa to Iraq, thanks to technology developed in a partnership between NASA and Myrtle, Oregon–based Umpqua Research Company formed 30 years ago. The partnership, which provided Water Security Corp. with money from NASA to develop methods to purify water for space shuttle missions, resulted in development of an iodine-based resin treatment technology with applications now reaching far beyond NASA.

Sparks, Nev.–based Water Security Corp., which purchased the right to bring the technology to the commercial market, is now producing mobile treatment systems that filter and produce potable water at a rate of 4 gallons per minute— enough water to supply a small rural village. With the help of NASA engineers from the Marshall Space Flight Center, one of Water Security Corp.’s systems has been installed in the war-torn northern Iraq town of Kendala.

Kearney, vice president of sales and marketing with Water Security Corp., says his company saw not only a market opportunity, but also a chance to put space-based know-how to work on Earth.

“People like to focus on our technology,” Kearney says. “But the real story is that a technology developed for outer space is now being used to provide drinking water in Third World countries where people don’t even know space exploration exists.”