The Legal Issues of Planetary Protection- A Path Less Travelled By
- Paper number
IAC-11,E7,3,14,x11376
- Author
Mr. Utsav Mukherjee, India
- Year
2011
- Abstract
Since the early years of the space program, scientists have expressed concern about planetary protection- that is, the prevention of human-caused biological cross-contamination between Earth and other bodies in the solar system. After the successful launch of Sputnik on October 4, 1957, scientists realized that if future programs capitalized on this new technology, the potential was very real for introducing terrestrial material onto other planets, and vice versa. In practical terms, the concerns are two-fold: avoiding forward contamination, the transport of terrestrial microbes on outbound spacecraft, and secondly, backward contamination, the introduction onto Earth of contamination or life-forms that could be returned from space. This gives rise to serious legal concerns. On a broad basis, these apprehensions are covered in provisions of the Outer Space Treaty of 1967. However, since more and more missions are being sent to other celestial bodies, the legal issues are coming further to the fore. Given the unknown nature of extra-terrestrial life, a question of public safety also emerges and constitutional and regulatory responses about quarantine become matters of grave importance. Conversely, issues like impact of space exploration on extra-terrestrial environment are also to be kept in mind. It would be appalling for nations of the Earth to contaminate life-forms, if any are found, on other celestial bodies and establishing liability in those situations is a question to be contemplated at the present moment rather than later. Although, NASA policies and requirements cover the basic needs to have pre-requisite checks before a mission and stringent procedures regarding planetary protection, they are still susceptible to loopholes. Firstly, these requirements are not global and even though the space communities generally approve of them there is a lack of a proper international regulation on the subject. Legal complications are bound to arise if the mission is done collaboratively with one or more international partners. Resolution of these ambiguous areas will require an integration of scientific and technical information, legal interpretation, regulatory judgments, and public perceptions. This paper is an endeavour to study and relate the various existing policies and regulations used in various countries and in the international legal arena. The second part of the paper attempts to establish a concrete regime of dealing with the numerous possible issues while keeping in mind the conflicts in international law.
- Abstract document
- Manuscript document
(absent)