We are on the verge of exponential growth in the space industry as new, interesting developments pop up every now and then. Standing among the innovators responsible for this upheaval is the incredible Emeline Paat-Dahlstrom, CEO of SpaceBase, a social enterprise focused on democratizing space for everyone by co-creating space ecosystems in developing and emerging countries from New Zealand. In this conversation with Dr. Awesome at the Futurist Society Podcast, Emeline takes us on a ride towards the future of space enterprise and shows us what key developments are on the horizon and how they are going to impact society as a whole. Brace yourself for impact and tune in!

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The Future Of Space Enterprise – A Conversation With Emeline Paat-Dahlstrom

In this episode, we have Emeline Paat-Dahlstrom, who is a CEO at SpaceBase and a thought leader in the entire space industry. I’m very happy to have her and we are very excited to talk with her about all the different things that are happening in space. I feel like we’re on the verge of an exponential growth curve with space, wouldn’t you say, Emeline?

Yes, definitely. These past several years have been a game-changer. If you think about the development of space for the past 50 to 60 years, it’s always been on a linear curve and it’s always very expensive and mostly government-based, but several years ago, because of exponential technologies and the democratization of space, that has basically changed. There’s so much happening now that is pretty exciting, especially in the commercial world.

You’re in the commercial world. Tell me a little bit about where SpaceBase fits into all that.

For some context here, I’ve worked for 2 to 3 decades in the new space commercial world either in the US or in Europe. A few years ago, my husband and I who is also a space geek moved to New Zealand and we created SpaceBase. The main focus of SpaceBase is to catalyze space industries in developing emerging countries just because we think that, to create a sustainable and abundant space feature, you need to have everybody along with the rides and nobody gets left behind. The purpose of SpaceBase is to make sure that this entrepreneurial space ecosystem actually gets built all around the world. We are prototyping in New Zealand and seeing how that happens and how that works. The lessons learned that we’ve gathered over the past years definitely can shape and create impact here and we want to impart that to the rest of the world.

I hear you. It would be nice if countries other than the big major economies like the USA, China, Russia, and all the big-time countries that have been doing space for a long time have a developing country to be in the mix with that. Realistically, with a small country like New Zealand, what is the reason for their interest in space? What is the reason for a country like Fiji or some sort of other small country? What is their interest in space that they would benefit from?

 

 

That’s a great question. If you think about the reasons why even anybody would be interested in space, there are a couple of things. One thing is, traditionally, it’s like science exploration. There’s always this human need to explore, look at other things, and basically do adventure. That’s one thing that’s important to look at anybody. At the same time, because of the democratization of space, the new space or the commercial space, that space is actually the next frontier.

A couple of decades ago, the internet opened up quite a lot of things for everybody economically. Nowadays, space is being looked at us also the next frontier for economic development. That’s something that not just the big players but also the younger countries or the developing countries look to see if they can participate and also create economic prosperity. The other thing that is also very interesting that’s happening now is that space is not just looking up and looking outward, space is also being leveraged for its technology and the breakthroughs that are happening now for solving global grand challenges on Earth.

Those are the things that most countries, specifically in the developing world, could leverage to help solve some of the problems. For example, nowadays, climate change is one big thing that is top of mind for everybody. If you think about satellite technology and Earth observation, 90% of climate change monitoring is actually being done from space and about 50% of the most important elements that you need to quantify and measure climate change can only be done in space. Those are at least some of the motivations that are driving a lot of countries to look at space in the future. For New Zealand, it’s really interesting. It’s why we’re here. It takes a lot of the elements to create a sustainable space industry. Its isolation is very much a plus because in terms of launch, for example, New Zealand is the fourth country that launches the most spacecraft.

As a spaceport, it is perfect. It has all of the things necessary for it to be an excellent spaceport. Let’s game this out for 20 to 30 years. There are only a handful of places that have the qualifications that New Zealand has. It’s going to be in a good position to be a spaceport in the future. What about a country like Afghanistan? Certainly, there’s a lot that they could get from a space industry because, in general, that’s going to make everybody more prosperous, but what is Afghanistan have to contribute to the space race?

That’s a great question because, for one, the definition of space has changed. When you think about space before, it’s just rockets, launch, and going out to explore, but now, the definition of space is everything along the supply chain, everything from design all the way to what you do with either human in space like food production or the energy that could potentially come from space that can be leveraged and potentially being down to earth. It’s everything.

 

 

I always say sometimes that every industry nowadays will actually be a space industry in the future because everything that you do terrestrial, if you just extend that to extreme environment, which now is happening because of climate change, space is just an extreme environment where everything in terms of industry from manufacturing to food production to anything that’s about biology, medicine, and legal regulations, all of those apply when you’re looking at space as potentially another destination or another area that humans expand into.

That’s interesting. I mean I could see that as a proving ground for different lunar vehicles or ways of surviving the harsh environments. For a smaller country, that might be something that would benefit that small country. The thing that I’m most interested in about speaking with you is the idea of colonies, like satellite colonies or Mars colonies. That’s something that is on everybody’s mind like, “We’re going into space a lot, but eventually, we’re going to need to go to someplace and set up some way station at the Moon,” or even another International Space Station. The idea of living in space is what everybody’s excited about. Where are we at with that? What do you feel is going to be the next direction with that?

First of all, I actually don’t even use the word colonization anymore because that has a negative stigma. The words that we use nowadays are settlements or expansion.

It also has a bad connotation.

Yes, it has some, but just to stay away from home. As you mentioned, there’s a lot that’s happening on Leo, which is the lower Earth orbit where the space station is and lots of more constellations of satellites, but the next way, which is now beginning to what we’re now seeing is what we call the cislunar economy. That’s anything between Earth and the Moon. You’ve heard of the Artemis program where it’s Apollo 2.0. The motivations is for sure totally different because during the Apollo era, it was a race and it was just for national pride between the big two superpowers. Now, the Moon 2.0 that you’re talking about is we want to move there, expand, and stay.

To create a sustainable and abundant space future, you need to have everybody along on the ride. Nobody gets left behind.

With the Artemis program that is being pioneered by NASA, there are a number of missions. Between now and 2030, the count now is almost 100 of not just NASA or the US but also different countries wanting to send some kind of a mission to the Moon with the particular goal of trying to make sure that we can actually stay there. Part of the reason for the Artemis program, one of the biggest things is to create what they’re now calling Gateway, which is the International Space Station around the Moon.

That’s one big program that everybody’s contributing to. Lots of countries are working to do that because it’s another way of the first steps to having something a permanent presence around the Moon. The next step to that is landing on the Moon and scouting out, “How do you create a Moon base which would then be the robotic missions that are going to happen.” Now, there is a program called CLIPS where it’s a combination.

It’s a public-private partnership between the US government and the commercial companies that are now bidding to do all of those missions for them. These are actual commercial companies that are building Landers and Rovers now. There’s a series of them that will happen within the next few years to create the beginnings of a base. In then in the next few years as well, it’s the humans landing. NASA is preparing to have the first woman to land on the Moon.

I saw them on Jimmy Kimmel. It was one of the late-night talk shows, maybe Stephen Colbert. They were impressive people and I’m really excited to see them land. That would be such a great moment for humanity. We’re overdue for something like that. One of the things that I like about what you said earlier was the idea of the robotic missions. I know that you’re involved with the robotics company yourself, so tell us a little bit about where you think you are with that because it’s going to be interesting to see the robots that are made for the Moon because anything’s on the table. You don’t need to have four legs. You don’t need to have two legs. Who knows what they’re going to look like?

The way that they’re developing now, there are so many designs. There are so many different things as well that they’re working on. These are the precursors of when before humans actually settle. What kind of robots do we need? We need ones that can do the infrastructure, create the habitats, and create the communication relays. Those are things that are happening now. One thing that also excites me is that SpaceX building Starship, which is a huge rocket compared to what we are normally used to.

Most of the time, for one, the reason why space and launches are expensive is that launches are expensive traditionally, but SpaceX is changing that game where the launch price has come down so much with Starship. If it becomes successful, then it means that you no longer have to optimize for physical space where it used to be that you always have to make it miniaturized and small. That’s a trend still, but if you have a big rocket that can go to the Moon cheaper as well, then all of these things that we normally need for building things that normally are huge can now go on a spaceship and then be transferred over.

Think about those big bulldozers or machinery that were needed to create all of these Moon bases. What is the implication of that? It means that you also shorten the time because it used to be you’d have to have those small pieces of equipment that needed to be launched and then assembled and then used, but then if you have the same form factor as you have here terrestrially, then it will accelerate.

Can the new rockets carry a bulldozer to space?

This is what I’m saying because SpaceX with Starship is so huge. If you compare it to all of the things that have actually flown before, it can carry bulldozers. We’re talking about hundreds of tons here compared to the small miniature amount.

That’s crazy.

That’s why I always say that it’s a game-changer.

That’s going to blow my mind if that’s actually true.

I’m going to remember how many tons Starship actually can take.

I researched. It’s 150 tons. How much is a bulldozer in tons? It’s 180. Smaller dozers are available in as little as 8 tons. Theoretically, you can carry nearly twenty bulldozers. That’s crazy. That was me exploding my brain.

It changes the game.

That’s going to be cool. I want big robots. I feel like like I’m tired of small robots. I want big bulldozer robots. That’s going to be interesting. You’re part of a robotics company. Are you making big robots or small robots?

These things are the biggest probably for Ceres Robotics, which is the company that I’m connected with. I think 1 ton is what they are aiming for.

That’s still a big robot. A ton.

A ton is like a MINI Cooper. There have been big satellites that are the ones that go to the stationary. They are big. They’re bus sizes. Those are the ones that are the big geo birds that are doing the weather

or commercial.

With the amount of space you can make, you can make something significant in space now, which has always been something that has bothered me about space. I’m not claustrophobic, but I don’t want to be feeling like living in an apartment in Japan or in Tokyo where I’m taking a shower standing up but I can’t even move my hands.

I think it’s going to start that way, but as things get constructed, for sure it’s not going to be what we think now.

What are you looking forward to the most?

There are a lot of resources that can be utilized sustainably for settlements and living and working in space but at the same time also be utilized for what we need down here on Earth so that we stop unsustainably pillaging our resources on Earth. It’s a dual use here where you can certainly use it for space for all of the things and the possibilities that we can potentially use it for, but at the same time, also solve problems here.

There are a lot of resources that can be utilized sustainably for settlements and actually living and working in space, but at the same time, also for what we need down here on Earth.

It’s the trickle-down technology effect. The technology that we learn from the space race trickles down to enrich our lives.

It goes both ways as well. The technologies that we’re developing for terrestrial purposes now can also be used for space. It’s certainly both ways.

What do you mean by that? Can you give an example of that?

I’ve talked about the extreme environments earlier like food production, which is something that we really need now anyway, especially with all of the things that are happening weatherwise and the failure of crops because of all of these things and the famine. If we can optimize food production sustainably in extreme environments that can certainly feed also areas of the world now that are suffering from what is happening, but at the same time, with that technology, we can also use it for the future because we need to be self-sustainable.

We can’t just all launch our food. We have to create them. That particular type of technology can certainly be done. That’s one. The other one that is also at its beginning is that there are certain companies that are working on power beaming from either microwave or laser where you can beam energy from one place to the other. Terrestrial, this is very also important, especially in places where the devastation is always happening annually. I’m originally from the Philippines. We’re the most typhoon-hit country that always experiences typhoons every year.

The power lines always get destroyed and we build them every time. If you do power beaming, at some point, you don’t even need those infrastructures. That technology in itself can also be used in space. How can you harness solar energy, which is abundant in space, and use that for actual energy either in your Moon base or at the same time, there’s also been research and theories of how you potentially beam solar energy from an infrastructure in space to Earth. That would then make us not reliant on fossil fuels if that actually happens. That’s happening now. In research, there are companies that are working on power-beaming.

One of the things that I like about what you said is the idea of making it sustainable in such a way that we don’t disrupt that environment. That’s something that I found interesting. When they throw up a Mars Rover, it has to be completely sterile so that we’re not introducing even bacteria under the surface of Mars. It is that idea of leaving only footprints and taking only pictures, that kind of thing, even if we had trash like if we’re living up in space and I throw away a banana peel, we’re not throwing it onto the lunar surface that we find a way to dispose of that in such a way where it’s completely sustainable.

That would be powerful for the world down here. We could interact in such a way that we only left footprints from down here. We’re not having any significant impact on the environment. That’s something that will have that cross-pollination that you’re talking about. I do find the idea of power beaming a little bit scary. Hopefully, when we get fusion power, it won’t even be necessary. I feel like every week, I see something new about fusion power, which opens up a lot of possibilities for space too.

There’s definitely a lot of different research that’s happening. Even with launches, we’ve been using the same technology. Even SpaceX has been using the same technology that was used when Gagarin went up in the ‘60s. There needs to be a change in terms of how we would be launching in space, how we would be utilizing energy, and what kind of energy it is that we’ll be using to also make it more optimized for long-term duration travel. For example, for launches on Earth, it’s no longer just chemical launches that are being tried now.

There’s one interesting and crazy company called SpinLaunch and it’s using a catapult to catapult a spacecraft in space. There’s also more reusability instead of launching rockets where SpaceX and Blue Origin now are not 100% reusable but can come back down. Several years ago, that was deemed impossible. Now, it’s just routine for SpaceX to be able to come down and bring the rockets down. There are also companies that are working on space planes. The form factor of horizontal takeoff and horizontal landing on actual airports, they don’t even need a spaceport.

There’s one company called Dawn Aerospace here in New Zealand that is doing successful tests here in that respect. That would also be another game changer not just for space but basically for transportation. At some point in time, if that technology can be human-rated, you can go across the world in 30 minutes. For example, Dawn Aerospace is using green technology and their goal is to be able to launch several times a day. It’s just not for launching something in space, which would then be more frequent and potentially more sustainable. If it becomes also human-rated, then it will disrupt the air industry as well.

I’m excited about that idea. How far are we from there? Are these people getting into low earth orbit at all?

That’s the goal. Now, they are just doing test flights first for the maneuverability and so forth so the next milestone is to be able to go sub-orbital. Once you get some sub-orbital, then you can potentially release payloads into orbit there. In terms of flying point-to-point, you need to go sub-orbital. There’s a bigger step between having that technology proven which would then be great for package delivery because it’s not human-rated yet. Think of FedEx via sub-orbital-like cargo. The bigger step is for that to become human-rated. That I don’t know because it will all depend on policy and law regulations, which is harder than the technology to do nowadays.

The regulation is difficult but important. I don’t want anybody throwing up stuff. I think it’s important. The progress is happening at a breakneck pace. Everybody is seeing it. The Moon landing will help everybody get more galvanized into this whole space industry, but more importantly, the inspiring nature of it is going to make it a realistic career choice. I could say to my parents like, “I’m going into the space industry.” It’s not something like, “We’re really worried about him.” It’s certainly become more credible as a career choice these days.

Even several years ago, people would actually laugh at you if you said that you wanted to be part of the space industry because the only pathway originally was for you to be either a great rocket scientist or be working for a space agency government that has a space program. It used to be the superpower of now. I take myself as a Filipino and American, but when I got started, I was Filipino. There was absolutely no way that I would be part of the space industry because you can’t see it from where you’re from. Half a century later, I’m sitting here talking to you and I’m talking about space, which is something that I would never have dreamed of a few years ago.

Did you know that was something you were interested in and that was going to be your career choice back then?

Absolutely. I grew up watching Star Wars on the big screen. Even way back then, I was gung-ho about being able to go to space at some point in time, but during that period, it was a pipe dream. I was too stubborn to give up on the dream. I said, “What is the best way to do it and hopefully I might be successful?” which is why I took a physics space science educational pathway.

That’s awesome.

Nowadays, because of that democratization, if you’re passionate about anything, even if you’re passionate about law, Space Law is a thing. It’s very much needed because of all of the things that are happening now, the thing that is lagging behind is the regulations and the policies that need to happen so that we are doing the right thing. That goes where things that are happening in terms of space debris to being able to regulate what you launch up there.

The thing that is lagging behind in the space industry is the regulations and the policies that need to happen so that we are actually doing the right thing.

Anybody, either you’re interested in biology or traditionally if you are an engineer, can certainly work on either being in a company that’s already established or being a founder. I’ve known founders who are not just from the US. They come from many different countries from South America to Eastern Europe and then how very successful they are. You can come from anywhere. It’s the opportunities.

When you say they’re very successful, what does that look like? Did they launch something onto the space or they’re financially successful?

Several years ago, I was working for Singularity University in Silicon Valley for years. It’s a very non-traditional institution that leverages exponential technologies to solve global challenges. Part of their goal is to birth startups. There’s a bunch of startups that got started from just attending the programs that have happened there. As an example, with Satellogic, the founder is Argentinian. He did the program back in 2010 with no background in space at all. Somehow he became passionate about space and started this satellite company called Satellogic.

If you google Satellogic, they’ve got at least over 30-something consolation satellites up in space. It’s an earth observation satellite consolation. They’re also publicly traded now. That’s one example. There’s another founder, the same program who’s from Bulgaria. He started the EnduroSat. He was on the cover of Forbes Magazine a few years back and it’s now also creating constellations as a service. It launched satellite and satellite parts up there. These are founders who are not from the US. They’re not from Russia or China.

They started up startups. It doesn’t matter where you are coming from. I’ve known people who are starting space startups. They don’t have to be hardware as well. It could be data analytics out of satellite data. There are several companies that are very disruptive in a good way in terms of the technology that they’re developing that are coming out of here in New Zealand. I see it. There are also companies or startups that start out as terrestrial companies. They don’t even know that they have products and services that can be applied to the space industry. Some of the things that we’re doing is connecting the dots for those startups to see that there are opportunities in the space industry of the technology that they’ve already developed for terrestrial purposes. There are some of those as well and they’re all over the world.

If I wanted to start a company in space medicine and had this idea, how difficult would it be to do that if I had this idea that I wanted to start up a company like this as other people? Where do I get started?

You basically start just like any startup at all. For one, you do your due diligence to see whether if your idea is out there already. It’s to make sure that it’s really a novel one. Start also connecting with people in the space industry who are working on research that is similar. You can talk to them about where the gap is, like what is still missing, and what is needed. Everything else that a founder needs to start a company from finding who would be the best people who would invest in your ideas, to finding the network and the community that is also thriving locally or globally.

It’s still the same trajectory of creating a startup but with a space lens and making sure that you are up to date with everything that is happening within the medical space community. There are several conferences and organizations out there that you can particularly be a part of. If your idea is novel and new, you’re going to try because I’ve seen it so many times in different places, not in the US, not in very far remove places where they can actually innovate and think out of the box type of ideas and opportunities and it certainly works. You just need to find the funding and the person who will bet on you to make it happen.

I want to switch gears here and ask you. Do you think that colonies of the Lagrangian points will be realized before a colony on the Moon, or do you think a colony on the Moon is going to be realized before the other ones?

If I remember correctly, the Chinese are working on some things and they’re interested in the Lagrangian points because most people think that either orbiting the Moon or being on the Moon is something that people are more aware of that’s probably where all of the concentration and all of the effort is going to go. For example, the very first mission for the Artemis program was this tiny satellite called Capstone. It was developed by a startup. It was a public-private collaboration between NASA. The main goal of that is to go in this very eccentric orbit around the Moon where, potentially, Gateway, which is the space station on the Moon, is going to be part of.

That’s certainly something that they were working on. They’re finding where the best place is to park or to put something that is near the Moon. There are a lot of opportunities because all the missions that are now being developed and are being planned are all either for landing on the Moon or being in an orbit around the Moon. Certainly, stable places like the Lagrangian Point would personally be great for gas stations. It would be a stable place where if you’re going somewhere else, it would be great to have those infrastructures available for you to dock to either refuel or whatever and then go elsewhere.

I’m a big fan of Japanese animation and science fiction. They have a number of different science fiction future ideas, whether it’s utopia or dystopia, I’m not really sure, but the fact of the matter is they have all these interesting reimaginings of what space colonies will look like. That will be interesting.

Did you watch the series The Expanse?

No, I haven’t. Is it good?

To me, it’s the Star Trek of this generation. It’s really good. If anybody there is reading, it’s on Amazon. It had six seasons. It’s now done, but it was all based on the book by James Corey. There were nine books altogether. It’s like what’s happened to Earth in about 200 years or more time. It’s where we’ve already gone and settled. We’re terraforming Mars. Moon is the present where you live there. There are what they call belters, who are mining resources in the asteroid belt like the Moons of Jupiter and Saturn. It’s really good.

I’ll have to check it out. I’m really looking forward to binge-watching a new science fiction something. I just finished with the new Star Trek series. Star Trek, to me, is the best utopian vision of the future. The idea of the post-scarcity society of us just living our best lives and trying to maximize our own potential is something that I can get behind. The fact that you said that it was like the Star Trek of this generation to me is a very bold statement. I’m going to have to check this show out and make sure that it lives up to that statement.

We are getting to the end of our time and I did want to reserve a few minutes for the same questions that I ask all of my guests. Number one, where do you get your inspiration from? As you can obviously tell, it’s science fiction and all the different things that we talked about. That’s a big inspiration for me. It’s a big inspiration for why I do this show because I want to have that utopian vision of the future similar to some of the science fiction that we’ve talked about. What about you? You’ve been in this industry for a very long time. It seems like you’re very passionate about it still even after 25 years or so. What fuels that passion?

Same here, science fiction certainly is a big driver. Star Trek, as you mentioned, I always joke around that. I’m trying to build a Star Trek universe. Whether it happens within my lifetime is not the point. I want to be part of that movement that actually drives us there. That’s one point. The other thing as well is that it’s the motivation of we don’t get to that dystopian side. Another movie, did you watch Elysium a few years back? This was a Matt Damon movie as well. In Elysium, the problem there is that we managed to utilize all of these exponential technologies and you can cure cancer and everything, but it’s only for the elite.

 

 

It means that they created this utopian spinning colony in space, but it’s only for the elite and everything body else on Earth is Mad Max. That’s the future that I never want to happen. That’s the motivation for SpaceBase. I never want that to happen, which is why I want to make sure that nobody gets left behind. If we can create some of this opportunity for other countries to come and be part of this hopefully utopian future, then that’s my motivation. It’s both negative and positive in terms of what motivates me, but it’s all based on science fiction.

I really appreciate all of the different science fiction recommendations because I’m always looking for new movies and new videos to watch. I appreciate the recommendations that you’ve given me. A lot of the stuff that you’re talking about about the future is centered around space. I want to know. What is the future that you see for space in the next ten years? What can we expect from the space industry to trickle down to everyday people?

In terms of the future, I want to stay on the positive side, even though there are a lot of things that are happening nowadays. We will solve the issues that are happening like space debris, crowding, and all of these things that are a main concern nowadays. Humanity will solve them, so within ten years, we will actually have not an actual community yet but at least some presence on the Moon. We’re now on that trajectory to be settlers as opposed to visitors. This cislunar economy is going to materialize via the companies that are going to be birthed specifically for that. Ten years is not very long. If you think about ten years ago, we didn’t have any of all of these things that we’ve now realized are available. If you think about the exponential curve, the pace of change is also going to be exponential. This cislunar future that we’re trying to build, we already see that taking place.

The pace of change is going to be exponential.

Based on that for my third question, what do you feel is the technology that’s going to bring that about? What technology are you most excited about that will bring about that future that you talked about?

That’s a good question. As I mentioned earlier, if we can change the way that we launch things in space in a more sustainable way or in a way that can accelerate that build, then that’s the technology that’s missing now. We’re at the edge or we’re at the beginning of some breakthroughs that will happen because, as I mentioned, we’ve been using the same technology for decades. If that happens, it will jumpstart and exponentially accelerate everything that’s going to happen.

I appreciate you telling me about that jump in weight differential between the old rockets and then the current rockets. The fact that we can lift 160 tons into space now with this new propulsion system is amazing. I can only imagine what is going to come down the pipeline when that number gets higher or the cost gets lower. Who knows what’s happening? The fact of the matter is that that was mind-blowing. I appreciate that little bit of insight that you’ve given to all of us. It was a great conversation. I appreciate you coming out. All the best with the SpaceBase and everything that you’re doing in New Zealand. For those of you guys who are reading on a regular basis, please, as always, like and subscribe. For those of you guys who are going to read our next episode, I will see you again in the future. Thanks, Emeline. Thanks, everybody. Have a good day.

Thanks so much for having me.

 

Important Links

• SpaceBase

 

About Emeline Paat-Dahlstrom

Space entrepreneur, writer, and ecosystem builder. Emeline is Co-Founder and CEO of SpaceBase, a social enterprise focused on democratizing space for everyone by co-creating space ecosystems in developing and emerging countries from New Zealand. Emeline is also on the team of Ceres Robotics Inc. and a Co-Founder of International Space Consultants, USA.

She is an Edmund Hillary Fellow, an Institute of Space Commerce Fellow, and a member of the Associate Editorial Board for the New Space Journal. She was the former Chief Impact Officer and Executive VP of Operations at Singularity University (SU). Emeline also served as Space track lead for SU’s Global Solutions Program for four years. She sits on the Board of Trustees for the Ten to the 9th Plus Foundation.

Emeline has BS and MSc degrees in physics, and Earth and space science. She attended the International Space University (ISU) Space Studies Program in Strasbourg, France and subsequently worked for ISU developing it’s masters program and running its summer space studies program. In commercial space, she has worked and consulted for several startups including serving as Director of Program Development and Research, and Director of Operations for Space Adventures Ltd, a space tourism company sending private citizens to the International Space Station; and Odyssey Moon and Moon Express, which plan commercial transport to the Moon, and Orbital Astronautics.

Emeline is co-author of the book “Realizing Tomorrow: The Path to Private Space Flight,” which was on the US Air Force’s Chief of Staff Reading List (2013).