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Private spaceflight is flight beyond the Kármán line (above the nominal edge of space at Earth altitude) that is conducted and paid for by an entity other than a government agency. In the early decades of the Space Age, the government space agencies of the Soviet Union and United States pioneered space technology in collaboration with affiliated design bureaus in the USSR and private companies in the US. The European Space Agency was formed in 1975, largely following the same model of space technology development. Later on, large defense contractors began to develop and operate space launch systems, derived from government rockets. Private spaceflight in Earth orbit includes communications satellites, satellite television, satellite radio, astronaut transport and sub-orbital and orbital space tourism. Entrepreneurs have begun designing and deploying competitive space systems to the national-monopoly governmental systems of the early decades of the space age.〔 Successes to date include flying suborbital spaceplanes, launching orbital rockets, and flying a couple of orbital expandable test modules (Genesis I and II). Planned private spaceflights beyond Earth orbit include personal spaceflights around the Moon.〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=Circumlunar mission )〕 Two private orbital habitat prototypes are already in Earth orbit, with larger versions to follow.〔(【引用サイトリンク】url=http://www.bigelowaerospace.com/news/?Special_Announcement )〕 Planned private spaceflights beyond Earth orbit include solar sailing prototypes (LightSail-3). == History of commercial space transportation == In a 2012 article in Bloomberg, author Michael Burgan asserted that there is a "grand tradition of private wealth furthering advances in rocketry and space exploration" dating back to the early rocketry experiments of Robert Goddard. Despite those earlier private undertakings, during the principal period of spaceflight in the mid-twentieth century, only nation states developed and flew spacecraft above the Kármán line, the nominal boundary of space. Spaceflight was thus the monopoly province of a small group of national governments. Both the U.S. civilian space program and Soviet space program were operated using mainly military pilots as astronauts. During this period, no commercial space launches were available to private operators, and no private organization was able to offer space launches. Eventually, private organizations were able to both offer and purchase space launches, thus beginning the period of private spaceflight. The first phase of private space operation was the launch of the first commercial communications satellites. The U.S. Communications Satellite Act of 1962 opened the way to commercial consortia owning and operating their own satellites, although these were still launched on state-owned launch vehicles. History of full private space transportation includes early efforts by Germany OTRAG company in the 20th century and numerous modern projects of orbital and suborbital launch systems in the 21st century. Last ones counts the manned programs also - most famous and important of them are suborbital flights of Virgin Galactic and orbital flights of SpaceX and other COTS participants. Development of alternatives to government-provided space launch services began in earnest in the 2000s. Private interests began funding limited development programs, but the US government later sponsored a series of programs to incentivize and encourage private companies to begin offering both cargo, and later, crew space transportation services. By 2012, a private company had begun transporting cargo to and from the International Space Station (ISS), while a second private company was scheduled to begin making deliveries in 2013, ushering in a time of regular private space cargo delivery to and return from the government-owned space facility in low-Earth orbit (LEO).〔 In this new paradigm for LEO cargo transport, the government contracts for and pays for cargo services on substantially privately developed space vehicles rather than the government operating each of the cargo vehicles and cargo delivery systems. , there is a mix of private and government resupply vehicles being used for the ISS, as the Russian Soyuz and Progress vehicles, and the European Space Agency (ESA) ATV (through 2014) and the Japanese HTV (through 2014) remain in operation after the 2011 retirement of the US Space Shuttle. Wired magazine went so far as to say that 2012 was "the year of private space," recounting the success of SpaceX in conducting two launches to the International Space Station, with progress toward emerging competition in that industry sector, while also highlighting the well-funded capital and experienced engineering teams behind the startup companies Planetary Resources–asteroid mining–and Golden Spike–private human Lunar surface excursions.〔 In June 2013, British newspaper ''The Independent claimed that "the space race is flaring back into life, and it's not massive institutions such as Nasa that are in the running. The old view that human space flight is so complex, difficult and expensive that only huge government agencies could hope to accomplish it is being disproved by a new breed of flamboyant space privateers, who are planning to send humans out beyond the Earth's orbit for the first time since 1972," particularly noting projects underway by Mars One, Inspiration Mars Foundation, Bigelow Aerospace and SpaceX.〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Private spaceflight」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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