In the meantime, we should expect an increasing use of space for "global utilities." These utilities warrant the term in its fullest sense. Access to high-data-rate, space-based, global access communications (complemented by effective but not ubiquitous terrestrial networks) is increasing and will likely see continued deployment of the so-called big LEO constellations of small communications satellites. The Internet is also going to space. The next utility, the global positioning system (GPS), has been less recognized but is more encompassing. It already precisely locates goods, services, and people. However, as the GPS becomes the mainspring of an increasingly accurate global clock, commerce will depend on it in invisible ways. As the means to provide nanosecond global accuracy, power and communications channels will come to depend on it implicitly in order to work. Other utilities, such as global traffic management via space-based radar, are on the horizon. And, as noted above, we can look for energy grids to migrate to space in the next century.

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Shaw, John E. and Simon P. Worden. Whither Space Power?: Forging a Strategy for the New Century. Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama: Air University, 2002. [ 8 quotes ] [ page 138 ]