When you’re trying to come up with a compromise in a hurry, it’s pretty much impossible to come up with a proposal that makes sense. “Major Tom” has already reviewed the numbers in the Senate Authorization, in comments over at Space Politics. Jeff’s site doesn’t seem to have comment permalinks, so I’ll move it to the front page here:
The authorization bill doesn’t provide the funding necessary, not by a long shot, to support the development of an Orion Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle (MPCV) by its stated 2016 goal. We know what an ISS-capable Orion was going to cost from the runout NASA’s FY 2010 budget (Griffin’s last Constellation budget) and we can compare that to funding limits for the MPCV in the authorization bill:
Fiscal Orion in MPCV in
Year FY10 Budg FY11 Auth Shortfall
2011 $1.9B $1.3B $0.6B
2012 $2.1B $1.4B $0.7B
2013 $1.9B $1.4B $0.5B
Total $5.9B $4.1B $1.8BSo there’s at least a $1.8 billion or over 30% shortfall through FY 2013 in the MPCV budget alone.
And the MPCV shortfall is actually bigger than that, since those FY 2010 Orion figures only supported a 2017 delivery date (at best) for an ISS-capable Orion, not the 2016 deadline set in the authorization bill for an exploration-capable Orion MPCV. We’re probably looking at close to a 50% shortfall through FY 2013 to support a 2016 launch date.
Even the overall flat funding profile is goofy for a development program that has to ramp up then down — it’s a profile for a technology program, not a development program. At the funding levels in the authorization bill, NASA would be very lucky to get the MPCV flying by 2020. Hopefully, commercial crew can still deliver at least one capsule on its reduced budget by circa 2015. But by making no hard decisions between the old Shuttle infrastructure and lower-cost commercial/military solutions, the Senate authorization bill runs a much higher risk of NASA relying on Soyuzes for the next decade-plus than NASA’s FY 2011 budget request.
A lot of folks have already remarked about the stupidity of designing an HLV in the absence of defined exploration targets and architectures. But honestly, if/when the MPCV does deliver, its high recurring costs, combined with the recurring costs for the authorization bill’s Space Launch System (SLS), aren’t going to support exploration anyway. To represent the SLS, the cheapest recurring costs I can find for a Shuttle-derived HLV are Jupiter 130, quoted at $1.9 billion per year. For MPCV recurring, the final report of the Augustine Committee stated that Orion will cost $1 billion per mission. So just two MPCV missions per year on SLS will run $4 billion at a minimum. That’s as costly as the old Space Shuttle budget — there’s no savings from which exploration hardware can be built or operated. More likely, the DIRECT team cost estimate for Jupiter 130/SLS recurring that I’m using is highly optimistic and even a couple missions a year may be unaffordable within the Shuttle operations budget.
So the proposal in the authorization bill is budgetarily broken on both the development and operations sides. One of three things is going to happen from here:
1) Someone on appropriations or in the White House is going to realize how broken the budget in the authorization bill is and won’t take it as input for appropriations and/or will stop the bill’s passage.
2) If this direction is allowed to make it into law via authorization or appropriations, NASA will get creative in its interpretation, minimize spending on Shuttle- and Constellation-derived infrastructure, open MPCV and SLS up to competition and solutions that leverage commercial/military spending and infrastructure, and define SLS broadly to include in-space transportation capabilities.
3) NASA staggers along for a few more years trying to make a Shuttle- and Constellation-derived MPCV and SLS work on a reduced development budget that doesn’t support operations until the 2020s, someone in power (probably in this or another White House) realizes this, another Augustine-like blue-ribbon review is conducted, MPCV and SLS are proposed for termination, and the political cycle starts anew. If the remaining funding for commercial crew and technology are protected during that time, they will have gotten far enough that maybe the old Apollo/Shuttle infrastructure and its huge costs will finally be put out of our misery.
It’s too bad that after Apollo, Shuttle, ALS/NLS, SEI, and now Constellation, the nation’s space policy makers haven’t learned that they can’t afford much more than a LEO operation using that infrastructure. But as others have pointed out, jobs still trump the goal of breaking out of LEO.
Yes, but this bill isn’t the last word. It’s a still a long way from being the new policy. It still has to make it out of the full Senate, the House has to do a version, it has to be reconciled, and it has to be signed, and even then, as he notes in one of the options, all that really matters is what’s in the appropriation bill. If NASA is operating on a CR with insufficient funding to do everything in the authorization, they’ll have a lot of leeway to do whatever they want. And note, one of the things that is not in the “compromise” is Ares I. It’s dead, Jim.
That last paragraph is the information I was looking for, thanks. It’s not over, and let’s hope clearer heads prevail.
4) NASA turns to ULA to put forth innovative solutions to lower the launch/development cost and move forward within the existing budget. Instead of simply saying “can’t be done” as Augustine did based on cost. NASA might select the high road take the old “Can do” spirit and innovate to find a solution turning to the commercial sector for assistance as Griffin should have done. Its unlikely and if they stay with current splash-down concept its pathetically archaic and senseless to pursue in the first place.
this will probably be very similar to the final outcome however, because nobody can swallow the pill that is hard to swallow.
they couldnt let the car companies or financial companies go under and reset for the long term good.
and they won’t be able to lay off the shuttle workforce for the long term good.
long term we’re screwed because china executes losers rather than bailing them out. short term the hot dog guy at ksc keeps affording hbo tv.
and now that doug mentions it, maybe nasa should get out of the primitive direct entry capsule business. if they’re going to be spending all this money anyway, perhaps they should be spending it on something better than a big apollo capsule
Orion, envisioned as the Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle (MPCV), is another “do everything” vehicle, one that does no one mission very well. And because of that, it is destined to be expensive and somewhat limited. It’s a vehicle without a defined mission requirement.
The idea of a CRV also serving as the habitat for an expedition, or even just dragging it around with you between the Earth and the Moon/Lagrange/NEO destinations, doesn’t make sense to me.
It seems like Congress is finally OK with having commercial crew take care of the LEO transportation, so I see the next step as building a true spacecraft for moving beyond LEO. This could be as simple as an ISS module outfitted with a propulsion module (few other ISS related things too like an airlock and remote arm).
Unfortunately Congress wants to salvage Orion as a jobs program, instead of commissioning a study or competition to define what is really needed. Oh well, it can always do lifeboat duty…
That authorization bill requires that NASA have a government-owned and operated National Launch System. Can Bolden park an Atlas or Delta in a the VAB, mount an Orion MPCV on top, launch the stack from LC-39 and still comply with NLS legislation?
Are they afraid?
The debate over NASA’s future direction and the the outcome (for now) of the fight over commercial crew has crystallized a thought that’s been circulating around my brain for quite awhile-are they afraid? Are porkish traitors like Shelby, Hutchinson, Nelson, and others scared of a powerful private space effort, and I’m not just talking about defending their pig farms. After all, even a Republican Congress Creature these days is a feeder from the govt trough, and therefore a potential looter. Eventually, a successful commercial space effort would hopefully mean space settlement. The types of people that would move out into the Solar System would be very skilled, self-reliant, hi-tech types, who would not be amenable to govt control at all. I’m sure the pseudo-brains in Congress who hate Obama’s space plan don’t think these thoughts on a conscious level, but at some lower level, deep in the limbic system, they’ll all scared of a powerful, independent group of people they, or their successors, couldn’t control. After all, if the people in a Martian colony don’t want to pay high taxes, what are the looters going to do, send in the Space Marines? The locals would have all kinds of dual-use technology at their disposal to make life difficult for any interplanetary “Revenooers.”
John, no. It has to be shuttle derived in order to avoid contract termination costs and for workforce preservation reasons.
Need to strap a couple of SRBs to the Delta first.
This LA Times subhead is too perfect — and unintentionally hilarious.
“Senators terminate the moon program and replace it with an undefined mission that will require the space agency to build a rocket.”
John Kavanagh,
Sec. 302 is very clear that the SLS developed be initially capable of 70 MT with the potential to be expanded to 150 MT for BEO.
Also Sec. 301 is very clear on the purpose of the SLS which is to return humans to the Moon, then go on to NEO’s with the ultimate goal of Mars.
It also appears the Moon is intended to be a near term target. In Paragraph 7 of Sec. 301 it requires NASA to report within 120 days of the Acts passage on NASA’s progress in defining near term Cis-Lunar Missions.
And on Page 9 it defines Cis-Lunar space as the region around the surface of the Moon.
Basically this Authorization bill confirms once again Congressional support for the goals of VSE, without naming it and without the existing launch architecture, while adding NEOs as an intermediate step to Mars.
Alex,
The LA Times author appears to have no knowledge of what is in the Act. They should have read it first as Title III of the act is very clear on why the HLV is needed and where humanity is going.
I’m not too thrilled about Tech Dev & Robotic Precursors getting savaged.
OTOH, having NAS do a HSF Decadal Survey seems like an interesting (and perhaps overdue) idea.
“Also Sec. 301 is very clear on the purpose of the SLS which is to return humans to the Moon, then go on to NEO’s with the ultimate goal of Mars.”
No, cislunar space as defined there (and in common usage) doesn’t include the surface of the Moon. Here’s the direct quote from the draft bill:
“CIS-LUNAR SPACE.—The term ‘‘cis-lunar
12 space’’ means the region of space from the Earth
13 out to and including the region around the surface
14 of the moon.”
It includes non-surface locations in space in the Earth-Moon region.
The MPCV is supposed to eventually get to destinations like Earth-Moon Lagrange points and lunar orbit. That would be good in general, and helpful on a path to the Moon, if it could be done affordably, but I doubt that will happen. There is nothing in the draft document about vehicles to get to the lunar surface, and in fact the draft bill wipes out almost all of the robotic precursor and technology budgets for things like lunar surface vehicles, lunar ISRU work, and so on. There is also a lot of talk in the draft bill, but no funding, for space infrastructure that might help you get to the lunar surface from cislunar space.
From the Orlando Sentinel:
“NASA’s plans to return astronauts to the moon by 2020 died a quiet death Thursday when a key Senate panel approved a new course for the agency that terminates the Constellation moon-rocket program and instructs NASA to build a new rocket for a yet-undefined mission.”
“NASA’s plans to return astronauts to the moon by 2020 died a quiet death Thursday when a key Senate panel approved a new course for the agency that terminates the Constellation moon-rocket program and instructs NASA to build a new rocket for a yet-undefined mission.”
So, they’re allocating billions to develop the new rocket. Too bad they aren’t allocating any money to build a payload for it. Like the Shuttle (especially post Challenger) and the ISS, the new rocket will be a vehicle in search of a mission.
At some point, you all are going to have to admit that a government space program is simply yet another way to consume tax dollars (current or borrowed from the future) to no good end. Government is fundamentally unable to get something like this right.
@ Michael G. Gallagher:
Nah, it’s just near-term pork.
You credit them with far more foresight than they deserve…
Red,
If that is true then why does Congress want a report within 120 days of the Act’s passage by NASA on their progress on defining Lunar destination missions? I expect its not just to make more paperwork for NASA…
> If that is true then why does Congress want a report within 120 days of the Act’s passage
> by NASA on their progress on defining Lunar destination missions? I expect its not just
> to make more paperwork for NASA…
No, Tom, it’s to get suckers like you to think that NASA can send a few Orion capsules to the Moon, at several billion dollars a pop, and that will somehow create all the lunar bases, mines, factories, etc. you dream about.
I predict you will fall for it, just as you fell for Constellation. Five years from now, you will deny ever supporting this scheme, too — just like Constellation.
That cycle will continue as long as you continue to rely on pretty pictures and avoid doing even the simplest financial calculations.
There is also a lot of talk in the draft bill, but no funding, for space infrastructure that might help you get to the lunar surface from cislunar space.
That might turn out to be a good thing, in the long run, if the lack of funding forces NASA to consider innovative low-cost approaches, like relying on vehicles from Armadillo and Masten.
Unfortunately, such an approach would not please the Moonies who take it as an Article of Faith that “only NASA can.” The Moonies are their own worst enemy, and maintaining their articles of faith seems to be more important to them than actually reaching the Moon.
I don’t think Matula is a sucker.
> Also Sec. 301 is very clear on the purpose of the SLS which is to return humans to the Moon, then go on to NEO’s with the ultimate goal of Mars. It also appears the Moon is intended to be a near term target. In Paragraph 7 of Sec. 301 it requires NASA to report within 120 days of the Acts passage on NASA’s progress in defining near term Cis-Lunar Missions.
You may want to read it again. Sec 301 lists NEOs, the Moon, Mars, and other deep-space locations as potential destinations, but does not prioritize them in any way (either in terms of importance or schedule). Rather, it calls for the National Academies to conduct a study in FY2012 to review and prioritize NASA’s exploration goals, potential architectures, and destinations.
Also, you do realize “cislunar space” is, as defined in the bill, “the region of space from the Earth out to and including the region around the surface of the moon” and includes things like low-Earth orbit and Lagrange points, right?
Neil,
But it also talks about the advantage of working with other nations on lunar destinations. And asks NASA to report on their progress in defining missions for lunar destinations.
I am sure that ESA, or Russia, could build a lunar lander if NASA provides the HLV and Orion for it enabling an international return to the Moon. So its an open issue, more so then under then President Obama’s policy that shut off the Moon completely.
Edward,
So tell me, why do you hate the Moon so much? You know some folks see the purpose of a space program as being about much more then suborbital joy sides for teachers.
Speaking of busting the budget. How about ISS forever?
http://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2010/07/iss-partners-assess-extension-2025-potentially-2028/
Congress has already shown a desire to treat ISS as sacrosanct pork, just as they did with STS. If Congress supports a creaking ISS into perpetuity, how will NASA come us with enough money to support manned BEO operations?
Plus, I fear the early years of the Shuttle program which had such a hostile effect on non-NASA launch vehicles might be repeated with the ISS and private space stations such as Bigelow’s.
Brad,
Good point. Although it may benefit New Space by creating the need for commercial crew it also creates a negative impact by being competition for private stations like Bigelow that would create true commercial crew.
The question is how to get free of it? The ISS Agreement does allow partners to withdraw with a year’s notice, but who would be willing to take over the liabilities for the ISS portion? China perhaps? Perhaps India? I wonder what they would pay for the U.S section?
Another alternative, perhaps more politically practical, might be “commercialization” of the U.S. section by spinning it off into a government owned corporation that could eventually be privatized. One question would be just what the operation costs would be for ISS if the ISS was moved outside of NASA… That is how much of the ISS budget is for overhead of HSF at NASA and how much are the actual costs.
> But it also talks about the advantage of working with other nations on lunar destinations. And asks NASA to report on their progress in defining missions for lunar destinations.
Thomas, you’re still missing it. The bill items you’re referring to say nothing about lunar destinations, but near-term cislunar exploration. The bill explicitly defines “cislunar” as not just lunar surface, but also low-Earth orbit, Earth-Moon Lagrange points, and everything in between. In the near-term such cislunar international collaboration will primarily involve the ISS and -maybe- the Lagrange points. Anything beyond that will be established by the National Academies study in FY2012.
I decided to plow through the Senate bill for myself rather than rely so much on other’s interpretations. It’s sections 302 and 303 which seem to be causing most of the confusion.
http://blogs.chron.com/sciguy/archives/NASA%20Rockefeller1.pdf
Typical legalese for the most part. In other words, very sloppy.
But nowhere could I find a requirement that the HLV fly by 2016 (see 302). On the other hand the NASA manned spacecraft did have such a requirement (see 303).
The requirements for the HLV are so poorly defined, that it would be easy to evade some of them. For example, where it seems to define the “Space Launch System” to require growth potential for 150 tons payload to LEO, that is not the language used!
“The Space Launch System
shall incorporate capabilities for evolutionary growth
to launch objects beyond low-Earth orbit and to
carry heavier or larger payloads of up to 150 tons.”
Of course who knows what the final form of the bill will take by the time it completes the entire Congressional sausage grinder.
It also seems we will have to get used another term of tecno-babble though, the so-called “Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle”, as Congress renames the CEV spacecraft. Same job, different name.
Well, not quite. Whereas the CEV was intended by NASA as it’s only means for manned access to LEO in the POR, the MPCV is only intended as a backup to commercial services according to the bill language. Commercial crew still remains the primary means of LEO access under this bill.
And though the SLS is required to be able to launch the MPCV, there is no requirement for the MPCV to be carried only by the SLS. So it seems Congress is open to having this spacecraft launched by many other launch vehicles (perhaps even a Falcon 9!) The Congressional requirements also seem to free the MPCV from the straitjacket the Orion found itself in, such as the Orion’s crew of six, an Apollo moldline RV, 5000 fps delta v of propellant, etc.
And the bill also has about three billion dollars per year for ISS operations. Talk about your wasteful standing army! The Shuttle Great White Elephant may be almost dead but the ISS Phoenix rises to take it’s place at the trough.
So tell me, why do you hate the Moon so much?
I don’t hate the moon, Tom, but I’ve done the basic business math that you never bother with. I know the fantasy that you can build a mining colony by spending a hundreds of billions to launch maybe a dozen astronauts makes no economic sense. The failure to understand such simple financial math is why your space program has been going around in circles for the last 50 years.
There are viable steps that could be taken toward lunar development, but you have no interest in them.
I guess you love the Moon so much you want to prevent human beings from ever walking on it, in any meaningful numbers.
Edward,
[[[The failure to understand such simple financial math is why your space program has been going around in circles for the last 50 years.]]]
Maybe you need to work on your math more. 50 years ago there was no one going in circles in space, and its been 38 years since the last human lunar mission.
The problem is that like most New Space Advocates you are not interested in the goal unless its reached in a matter that is “ideologically pure”. Really no different then the communists whose space program was driven by ideology rather then pragmatism. And like the communists attack anyone you believe is not “pure” in terms of ideology.
The problem is that an ideological focus tends to get you in trouble in drafting policy. Example 1 below.
Under the old policy and POR SpaceX could have well been getting COTS-D funding this year and maybe flying astronauts to ISS on Dragon in 2013. Instead, because of the push back against President Obama’s space policy there will be no funding available for commercial crew procurement until 2012 at the earliest and ONLY if the following conditions are satisfied (pages 37-42).
1. Human Rating Requirements are developed. I discussed before how this could be a killer to cheap commercial crew.
2. Commercial Market Assessment for non-government users of commercial crew. i.e are there really viable commercial markets for commercial crew? And what if they find out there are none?
3. Procurement System Review to determine the most cost effective means of procurement. – i.e is fixed price the best way?
4. Use of Government Supplied Capabilities and Infrastructure
5. Flight Demonstration and Readiness Requirements
6. Commercial Crew Rescue Capabilities
Yep, it looks like all of FY2011 funds and time will be spent on NASA STUDYING commercial crew before any decision is made on how to “best” spend funds on it. Paralysis by analysis anyone?
Yes, this is in my mind the real tragedy of the compromise, but one I am not surprised at given New Space’s aggressive support of President’s Obama’s policy and its bashing of those in Congress opposed to it. New Space would have been better off staying under the radar scope as with the old policy.
And no, don’t expect President Obama to save you. He has moved on beyond space and besides, how could he speak up against studies designed to protect astronaut’s lives and avoid NASA “wasting” money on a program that might fail?
Perhaps rather then an amendment giving more money to commercial crew in 2011, which will only be burned up in NASA studies, the New Space community should have focused on an amendment that overturned the prohibition and procurement of those services in 2011 and eliminated all these hurdles put in front of the procurement for it. Hmmm, maybe something for New Space to do for the House Bill.
And BTW, for the record, I would support strongly an amendment the overturned the prohibition as I think both commercial crew and a NASA system are needed to close the gap and move forward in space.
Brad: “And the bill also has about three billion dollars per year for ISS operations.”
The ISS funding, which in NASA’s FY2011-15 budget proposal is boosted by a couple billion dollars, is one of the areas (like Science, Aeronautics, Human Research, etc) that was treated as off-limits by the Senate committee. The committee’s draft budget for those items was the same as the Administration’s proposal.
That being the case, and the Exploration Technology budget having been mostly wiped out in the bill, I wonder if it would make sense to shift the Flagship Technology Demonstration mission that puts an inflatable habitat module on the ISS, and later does closed-loop life support technology demonstrations there, to the ISS budget.
With a little scaling back of ambitions for closed-loop life support, and possibly some COTS-like shared investment by a commercial firm (which might benefit from the inflatable habitat technology work, and might be able to make some money off of the module attached to the ISS, too), perhaps it could fit the expanded ISS budget.
If all of this work is clearly identified as part of ISS work, then maybe Senate ISS supporters like Hutchison would look upon it more kindly. Also, since the inflatable module needs the Autonomous Rendezvous and Docking vehicle (i.e. the space tug for 3 of the first 4 flagship technology demos) to get it to the ISS, that might get ISS supporters to get on the side of that vehicle, too.
This would also reduce the initial set of 4 Flagship missions to 3, making it a bit less impossible to fit them in the drastically reduced exploration technology budget.
Red,
Those are good ideas and possible ways of working with NASA on some of the tech demonstrators. Good post!
Tom
The problem is that like most New Space Advocates you are not interested in the goal unless its reached in a matter that is “ideologically pure”.
Did you conduct a representative poll? Or are you just mind reading? What makes you think most New Space advocates are not interested in anything but pure solutions? If the new plan is one bucket of raw sewage and a glass of champagne (to paraphrase another blog poster) then what’s wrong with pointing out the sewage?
What bothers me is that some people simply lie about their motives and were shilling for SDLV and the big NASA/contractor political industrial complex all the time while pretending to be friendly to commercial space.
Maybe you need to work on your math more. 50 years ago there was no one going in circles in space, and its been 38 years since the last human lunar mission.
Sputnik 1 was launched in October, 1957. That’s more than 52 years ago. Must you constantly make a fool of yourself, Tom?
Okay, this isn’t quite as bad as the time you claimed Von Braun had launched Nazi astronauts on V-2 rockets. 🙂
The problem is that like most New Space Advocates you are not interested in the goal unless its reached in a matter that is “ideologically pure”.
Sorry, Tom, but ideological purity is your bag. After all, you’re the little man who attacks CRUSR and Commercial Crew and Cargo for not being ideologically “pure.” Lacking any rational argument for your ideas, all you can do is name call, I guess.
Under the old policy and POR SpaceX could have well been getting COTS-D funding this year
No, under the old policy, COTS-D was merely a proposal with no actual funding. It’s hard to tell whether you’re delusional enough to believe these things or just making them up.
Commercial Market Assessment for non-government users of commercial crew. i.e are there really viable commercial markets for commercial crew? And what if they find out there are none?
That’s irrelevant, Tom, because there are commercial markets. The fact that you are ignorant of something doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist.
On the other hand, what if there are no nuclear reactors capable of burning Helium-3? Or no market for platinum-group metals costing millions of dollars per ounce — which is what any lunar material “mined” by your Plan Of Record would cost by the time you got them back to Earth?
Procurement System Review to determine the most cost effective means of procurement. – i.e is fixed price the best way?
Well, Tom. we tried it your way. We spent the cost of a small war on Project Apollo. What did all of your lovely cost-plus contracts get us? Did Von Braun create the paradise you imagine on the Moon? Where are the colonies? The mines? The factories?
Einstein said the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.
I would support strongly an amendment the overturned the prohibition as I think both commercial crew and a NASA system are needed to close the gap and move forward in space.
What you “think” is irrelevant, Tom, until such time as you start to pay attention to the financials. You couldn’t get financing for a corner bakery without doing the math, but you want the taxpayers to hand over hundreds of billions of dollars based on nothing more than handwaving, CGI pictures, and few stories about the pyramids and the Erie Canal.
The mind boggles.
Ed,
Classic Edward Wright bait and switch, switching from human spacecraft to robotic ones. Robotic spacecraft have done much more in the last 50 years then go in circles, don’t you follow space news at all?
Also don’t tell there are commercial markets for commercial crew and better ways to do procurement. Tell NASA. They are the ones spending the millions in commercial crew money for this year for the studies.
Robotic spacecraft have done much more in the last 50 years then go in circles, don’t you follow space news at all?
Really, Tom? Robotic spacecraft have done “much more”? They’ve built lunar colonies? Mining facilities? Factories? Done any of the things you think Apollo II will do?
Well, maybe, if you define “mining” as three Russian Luna probes scooping up a few grams of regolith. Even Apollo “mined” far more material than that.
That’s a far cry from the massive full-scale mining operation you’re talking about. A few grams (or even kilograms) of lunar material will produce enough platinum to replace 500 million automobiles with electric cars? I don’t think so.
Talk about “bait and switch.” Wow. Just wow.
You seem to have learned your “debating” tactics from Lenin: “Accuse your enemies of doing whatever you plan to do, but accuse them first.”
Also don’t tell there are commercial markets for commercial crew and better ways to do procurement. Tell NASA.
Gladly, Tom. The current leadership of NASA is far more reasonable and clear-headed than you are.
Leaving aside the incoherent Oler-like syntax of your statement, you told us repeatedly that there are no commercial markets for LEO, or suborbital, or anything else except the Moon. So, someone needs to tell you something. Unfortunately, no one can tell you anything. Facts bounce off you like bullets off Superman.
Edward,
You rants are the perfect example of how the best support New Space like yourself could give to entrepreneurial firms like SpaceX is to just stay out of the debate. All you do is attack people. Politics and policy are the art of compromise, not the radical twisting of facts and viewpoints.
Martijn Meijering,
You don’t need to do a poll. You just need to read all the blog posts and op-eds New Space advocates have been flooding the blogsphere with since President Obama policy came out, acting as his attack dogs, referring to anyone who supported the POR and VSE as “Constellation Huggers, Apollo Cargo Cultists, and Socialists. And pity the poor reporters who failed to report on it with the”New Space” slant.
These same New Space posters called Members of Congress and astronauts who support the POR and VSE were greedy, looking for Pork, while the astronauts and handful of members supporting President’s Obama’s policy were “heroes”. A classic example of approaching a political debate based on ideology not solutions.
All the New Space posters had the same ideological slant, government bad, stupid, greedy, New Space Entrepreneurs good, noble, smart. They were looking for “solutions” but pushing a philosophy. with the libertarian arguments they used being taken right out of Atlas Shrugged…
And so is it any wonder the members of Congress New Space trashed on the blogsphere decided to take a “closer” look at they were being villainized for, opposing “commercial crew”? Unfortunately, by commercial crew being linked to New Space you basically guaranteed it will be delayed instead of accelerated under the compromise.
COTS was working because it was under the radar screen. It was not seen on any critical path. That is why COTS-D would have been quietly funded once the first COTS demo flight was successful. Indeed it would have probably been funded already if SpaceX hadn’t fallen behind its original COTS goal of 2008…
These same New Space posters called Members of Congress and astronauts who support the POR and VSE were greedy, looking for Pork, while the astronauts and handful of members supporting President’s Obama’s policy were “heroes”. A classic example of approaching a political debate based on ideology not solutions.
Ignoring that the characterization of the members of Congress is probably 100% accurate, why should we support Ares program? It competes directly with commercial providers of the same service (generating a massive conflict of interest for NASA), has significant engineering problems that go away when you drop the SRM as first stage, and has all the signs of a massively poorly planned and managed program (for example, the numerous redesigns of the Orion capsule, being many years behind schedule and above budget, and “front-loading” the costs via Ares I while holding off on Ares V for more than ten years).
Sure there are “New Space posters” who will villainize the opposition. That’s true of any side of any political debate. Why does the New Space part have to police their side of the argument while others do not? What is the reason for this strange requirement that no one can enforce?
And so is it any wonder the members of Congress New Space trashed on the blogsphere decided to take a “closer” look at they were being villainized for, opposing “commercial crew”? Unfortunately, by commercial crew being linked to New Space you basically guaranteed it will be delayed instead of accelerated under the compromise.
There’s a simpler explanation. The politicians in question who are “taking a closer look” are funded by the current, politically powerful NASA supply chain. Commercial space flight threatens that.
There’s no need to purify the New Space blogosphere. Congresscritters get demonized all the time. It comes with the job. A simpler approach is to attempt to remove the obstacle say by contributing to the opposition in elections.
Karl,
Its not a requirement, just pointing out that the more often you poke the Tiger the more likely you are to get eaten by it. The zero sum game approach by New Space has done far more to harm the environment for entrepreneurial space firms in terms of NASA contracts then help them in term of the compromise bill.
Also don’t forget SpaceX and Virgin Galactic are behind schedule as well. Schedule slips seem to be par for the course for most aerospace projects, government or private. So the rule about throwing bricks in glass houses would apply here.
As for voting/funding the opposition, go ahead. But given that even most New Space advocates admit to not voting/working for a candidate based on their space record I expect most members of Congress recognize that its a hollow threat from New Space. By contrast the aerospace unions do make their contributions based on a candidates space record. Food for thought.
With 500+ people with 600+ different Ideas, why not just abolish NASA and see just how profitable the business side of the house thinks space exploration really is. That can end debate and save a lot of gas passing on capitol hill, for sure!