ADELAIDE
1
The
final
frontier
Space may be the final frontier, but for Adelaide it has
been front and centre with the city set to remake itself as
a smart city for the 21 st century, writes Sheridan Randall.
When Elon Musk turns up people generally
want to listen, especially when he is talking
about his “Big F…… Rocket” and his desire
to put a million people on Mars. He’s also
the chap behind the world’s largest lithium
ion battery recently installed in Jamestown.
So when he showed up in Adelaide for the
recent 68th International Astronautical
Congress (IAC), South Australians were
joined by a global audience wanting hear
what he had to say.
Hosting IAC was a watershed moment
for Adelaide and South Australia in a
number of ways beyond the star power
of Musk. The Turnbull Government used
the conference to announce a national
space agency. South Australian senator
Simon Birmingham officially announced
the government’s plans at the opening of
the conference, saying the agency “will be
the anchor for our domestic coordination
and the front door for our international
engagement with so many of you across
the world’s space industries”.
Acting Minister for Industry, Innovation and
Science, Michaelia Cash says it is “crucial”
that Australia is part of the growing global
space industry.
“A national space agency will ensure
we have a strategic long-term plan that
supports the development and application
of space technologies and grows our
domestic space industry,” she says.
“The agency will be the anchor for our
domestic coordination and the front door
for our international engagement.”
The move aims at cashing in on the global
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$420 billion aeronautical industry, which
could see our local space industry which
is worth around $4 billion increase fivefold
in 20 years. South Australia is looking for
a greater role in shaping Australia’s new
focus on space, with the State already
home to more than 60 space-related
organisations, in addition to the newly
established SA Space Industry Centre.
The South Australia and ACT governments
recently signed a memorandum of
understanding on the matter, teaming up
on a proposal for a space agency to be
headquartered in Canberra but with an
operational node in Adelaide.
The space industry also dovetails into the
State’s burgeoning defence industry with
Adelaide-based defence firm Nova Systems