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Future of Energy Reading List

cjhandmer

TL;DR: The future of energy is solar+batteries+synthetics. As of Oct 2023, the global solar deployment rate is approximately one megawatt per minute. Over the last 2-5-10 years this has become increasingly inescapable. As of October 2023, this Nature Communications article reports some recent modeling showing most of the transition will occur by 2027. Here follows a reading list organized by topic for people who are curious to learn more. If you have recommendations not on this list or suggestions for blog topics, let me know. My writing To Conquer the Primary Energy Consumption Layer of Our Entire Civilization (Apr 2025) … Continue reading Future of Energy Reading List

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Mars Trilogy Technical Commentary

cjhandmer

It is with some trepidation that I commence a project long anticipated and oft delayed. The Mars Trilogy by Kim Stanley Robinson is, in my view, one of the finest works of literature ever composed. I have read it three or four times from end to end, in a both formative and conversational process whereby progressively more layers of understanding burrow into my psyche. The usual disclaimers apply. I don’t know how Mars settlement will actually progress, though I have written a few blogs about space-related topics, including a technical commentary on The Martian by Andy Weir. I have also … Continue reading Mars Trilogy Technical Commentary

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Blog Series: Countering misconceptions in space journalism

cjhandmer

As a lover of all things space I enjoy reading a wide variety of perspectives. The more different the origin, the more likely I am to learn something new! Even in articles which contain errors or elements of confusion, there’s still a good chance that I’ll encounter a new way of thinking about an issue. Many posts in this series and otherwise are now part of a book that is available as a commentable Google doc and on Amazon. I have discussed aspects of this topic in two appearances on The Space Show, as well as The Space Cave podcast, … Continue reading Blog Series: Countering misconceptions in space journalism

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Scaling Career and Family: Systems Thinking, Public School, Home Enrichment

cjhandmer

Originally posted on November 29, 2025 by Dr. Christine Corbett Moran When asked on The Cheeky Pint podcast how we educate our children, my husband Casey Handmer replied “benign neglect.” It’s a cheeky answer that captures something real: we’re neither tiger nor helicopter parents. But after seven years and three kids (with a fourth on the way), we’ve developed a more deliberate approach. Here’s what we’ve learned. The Family as a System If I’ve taken anything away from seven years of parenting, it’s this: the family is a system. Treating it as such, rather than asking “is X better than Y?”, leads … Continue reading Scaling Career and Family: Systems Thinking, Public School, Home Enrichment

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Antimatter Development Program

cjhandmer

Printable PDF of this post.  “Space is big. You just won’t believe how vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it’s a long way down the road to the chemist’s, but that’s just peanuts to space.” Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy Our vision for the future has humans traveling between planets much faster than our ancestors sailed across oceans, but no existing rocket technology can achieve that. We’re going to need something significantly more energetic, and antimatter is the key.  In August 2024, I wrote a primer examining the merits of antimatter propulsion … Continue reading Antimatter Development Program

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Terraform Talent Development

cjhandmer

Originally posted at the Terraform Blog on November 17, 2025. Terraform Industries is the vehicle by which I build the people that build the team I need to build the future I am determined to build. One of the unexpected privileges of founding an ambitious, future-oriented hardware company is that I get to hire, mentor, and develop ambitious people to become the leaders of tomorrow. Earlier this year, I formalized this process and today I’m externalizing this memo.  Why? To better prepare candidates for the challenges ahead, to share our insights into organization, and to strengthen the culture of American … Continue reading Terraform Talent Development

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Career Development Guide for Job Seekers

cjhandmer

Context October 2025: With the government shut down and NASA JPL business in apparent terminal decline, I have received numerous inbounds from former colleagues and friends asking for advice in post-NASA career development. At the same time, in my day job running Terraform Industries, I get to interview thousands of hopeful engineers, hire a few of them, then help them learn to make the most of their opportunities. To the extent this is a numbers game, I have some insights here, which I will share.  Obviously, YMMV. Every company does recruitment differently and you should solicit a range of opinions. … Continue reading Career Development Guide for Job Seekers

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Life on Mars

cjhandmer

On September 10, 2025, NASA announced (again) that it had found potential evidence for life on Mars. A few people asked me about it, so I’m dusting off (and updating) this Quora post from March 2014 on the subject. First, let’s discuss the most recent find, from a rock outcrop investigated by Perseverance in July 2024, last year. Speculation about this data, which is uploaded daily, has been rife in the community. Now the paper in Nature outlines the extraordinary efforts taken by the Mars science community to attempt to explain these features without reference to biology. The image below, … Continue reading Life on Mars

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How to get samples back from Mars

cjhandmer

This week NASA announced evidence for life on Mars, for the sixth or seventh time. This time it was an incredibly cool rock, and would you believe the Mars Perseverance rover already has a sample, taken July last year, banked and ready for return to Earth? In addition to this, NASA has already been working on a Mars Sample Return mission for many years! Unfortunately, that mission has been “paused” for almost two years after costs grew from $7b to a projected $11b, and after $3b had already been spent. Now, I love Mars rocks as much as anyone, but … Continue reading How to get samples back from Mars

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Australian Economic Stagnation

cjhandmer

It’s not news, at least in my circles, that much of the developed world is seeing economic stagnation.  Last month Australia convened a Productivity Summit/Economic Reform Roundtable to try to better address the sluggish growth of the economy relative, in particular, to ever increasing government spending obligations.  Specifically, Total Factor Productivity (TFP) growth measures the rate at which economic output grows faster than capital and labor inputs. Usually attributed to “technology”, but technology must be understood in a very broad way, since it includes things like financial system efficiency and manufacturing management techniques, as well as blueprints and research papers. … Continue reading Australian Economic Stagnation

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Economics and AI take off

cjhandmer

Artificial General Intelligence (AGI), Artificial Super Intelligence (ASI) and fully general humanoid robotics are just around the corner, or so many people believe. So it’s time to try to understand how this will affect our economy. Will we be forced into lives of idle leisure and/or meaninglessness? Will the few remaining human workers toil below the API? Will we get fully automated luxury gay space communism? This is a follow up after five years to my original post on post scarcity and post-capitalism. Keynes predicted in 1930 that by 2030, automation would reduce the need for work to just 15 … Continue reading Economics and AI take off