In 2011, the U.S. had surrendered the entire mid-sized commercial space launch business to subsidized global competition. Support for commercial space goes back to Ronald Reagan’s signing of the Commercial Space Launch Act of 1984 and the Trump team has stated that public-private partnership will form the cornerstone of American space policy. Funding Urgently Required to Support the Space BoomAll this commercial space activity presents a challenge to a couple of obscure and sadly underfunded government agencies that were established as part of Reagan’s commercial space initiative. The FAA’s Office of Commercial Space Transportation (AST) regulates commercial spaceflights with the specific mandate of protecting the uninvolved public. The Commerce Department’s Office of Space Commerce (OSC) is charged with advocating for U.S. commercial space in both domestic and foreign markets.

Source: Forbes April 01, 2017 19:41 UTC