Blueprints for Off-World Living: Scaling Human Settlements in Space

We invite you to join the final session of our Beyond Earth Working Group Report Webinar Series to spotlight and unpack the 2025-2026 Working Group papers. Each session features the experts behind this work and offer a focused deep dive into the ideas shaping the future of space development.

Blueprints for Off-World Living: Scaling Human Settlements in Space

Humanity's next frontier takes us beyond Earth and keeps us there. The final installment of the Beyond Earth Working Group webinar series dives into the report "Blueprint for Off-World Living," which tackles the question of scalability in space settlement: what does it take to grow from a 10-person off-Earth expedition to a 1,000-person self-sufficient town? Drawing on hard-won lessons from Antarctic research stations and frontier mining towns, we'll examine how governance must evolve at each stage, from mission-style leadership reliant on Earth, to role specialization and local decision-making, to fully autonomous towns with their own institutions.

Taking a bottom-up, functional approach to governance, our panel of experts will look at what a community needs day to day while staying grounded in existing frameworks like the Outer Space Treaty and Artemis Accords. Whether you're an aerospace planner, policy thinker, or just curious about how humans might govern themselves off-world, this session offers a roadmap for building resilient, enduring communities beyond Earth.

Speakers

Tyler Bender, Policy Analyst, Beyond Earth Institute
Melanie Saunders, Human Spaceflight Expert, The Aerospace Corporation
Dallas Bienhoff, Space Systems Architect, Off-World, Inc.
John Reed, United Launch Alliance, Chief Rocket Scientist

About the Working Group & Reports

The Beyond Earth Institute Leadership Council convenes industry leaders, policy experts, innovators, and researchers to tackle critical questions shaping the future of space development.

The 2025-2026 papers cover commercial LEO development, cislunar markets and infrastructure, Mars readiness, and scalable off-world governance, including:
• Blueprints for Off-World Living: Scaling Human Settlements in Space
• Securing a Cislunar Future: Markets, Minerals, and Momentum
• The Future of Commercial Space Stations: Key Issues in Commercial LEO Development and Policy Recommendations
• On To Mars: A Readiness Assessment for Mars Exploration and Settlement

Download your copy of the reports here.