January is the beginning of so many things, well maybe not baseball season.  As I think about our past year and the one approaching, I am thankful for all the volunteers and the progress we have made.  Similar to the old retiree joke, "I woke up this morning with nothing to do... but I only accomplished half of it."  ISEC reached out this year a long way with initiation of research and history committees.  Each of these have progressed with products shown on our website.  In addition, the developing concept for our international conference has matured to lead the space elevator community with current topics, challenging ideas/discussions, and keynote speeches that stimulate us to keep reaching beyond the expected.

This year, I would like to challenge each of you to help us reach a little further.  We should finish the study concentrating on Architectures and Roadmaps; however, we just initiated the study on Defining the Marine Node.  We developed a plan for future space elevator research; however, we need to further define and then initiate some research.  We have an affiliation with the National Space Society; however, we need to expand that to other similar minded organizations.  The history committee has conducted many oral history interviews; however, there are many more space elevator advocates we need to connect with.

The challenge: Which volunteer area are you going to jump into?

"Keep Climbing my Friends!"  Pete Swan

ISEC is very pleased to announce the second annual membership drive during the month of February, 2015.  During this month new members may join and current members can renew at a reduced rate!

Those who join or renew at the Professional level will only have to pay $58, a $10 discount from the normal $68 rate. Professional level members are entitled to receive the most recent print version of CLIMB, the Space Elevator Magazine.

Those who join or renew at the Student level will only have to pay $20, a $5 discount from the normal $25 rate.  Student level members are entitled to receive the most recent electronic version issue of CLIMB.

So, take advantage of the reduced rates, visit the ISEC member join/renew page and join or renew your membership in February!