What’s wrong with good, old-fashioned “Manifest Destiny”? We’ve spread out over most of the surface of the Earth, and life either grows or it dies. Thus it is our function and our fate to spread life, especially intelligent life (ie Mankind) beyond the limits of our Earthly cradle.
Don’t try to *reason* with people, humans are barely rational. Appeal to our emotions, and give us a CAUSE!
Fortunately there is still individual pursuits and some are rich enough to follow them. Once we have settlements in the solar system (beyond the first of them which are likely to fail) it will become so obvious that we should have worked harder and earlier to make it happen.
Then everyone will say they knew it all along.
Having visited clean rooms and watched satellites being constructed, I suspect it’ll be quite some time before we’ll be able to duplicate that capability off-planet. The moon, for all of it’s admirable traits, isn’t necessarily a very good place to build satellites. Perhaps one day we’ll have 3D printers with sufficient quality to produce satellite components. Until then, the number of specialized high-quality components needed to build satellites means you’d need to launch a lot of the stuff from the Earth, which kind of defeats the purpose.
Likewise, harvesting lunar ice to produce rocket propellants sounds like a wonderful idea. However, given recent developments such as the Falcon Heavy, will it ever be more economical to harvest that lunar ice for propellant (with all of the required infrastructure) than to launch propellant from the Earth’s surface? If you have to spend untold billions of dollars developing lunar infrastructure, it’d take quite some time befoure you’d recoup your investment compared to spending perhaps $1000 a pound to launch on a Falcon Heavy.
Hi Larry J.
I hope readers to Rand’s site read for themselves Paul’s “Cislunar Rational” and not rely on your Cliff Notes Study Guide. They’d fail the test on understanding and content if they took your comments as fact.
It’s always a good idea for people to read the linked article before commenting on it.
They’d fail the test on understanding and content if they took your comments as fact.
What did I write that wasn’t factual? Please be specific.
“Having visited clean rooms and watched satellites being constructed, I suspect it’ll be quite some time before we’ll be able to duplicate that capability off-planet. The moon, for all of it’s admirable traits, isn’t necessarily a very good place to build satellites. Perhaps one day we’ll have 3D printers with sufficient quality to produce satellite components. Until then, the number of specialized high-quality components needed to build satellites means you’d need to launch a lot of the stuff from the Earth, which kind of defeats the purpose.”
Well, first off, it seems that clean room on the Moon, could make earth’s clean rooms look pretty dirty. But why would need to build all of components of satellite on the moon. Couldn’t build stuff too big to launch from earth on the Moon- like antennas or other modular items.
In addition all those parts for a satellite are probably made all over the country and in foreign countries and shipped to your clean room, could many of the parts for satellite be made on earth and shipped to the Moon or Cis-Lunar space and assembled- perhaps mostly via a automated process?
Don’t believe the article was referring near term project, but as something that occur after such things as rocket fuel markets were established in space
“Likewise, harvesting lunar ice to produce rocket propellants sounds like a wonderful idea. However, given recent developments such as the Falcon Heavy, will it ever be more economical to harvest that lunar ice for propellant (with all of the required infrastructure) than to launch propellant from the Earth’s surface? If you have to spend untold billions of dollars developing lunar infrastructure, it’d take quite some time befoure you’d recoup your investment compared to spending perhaps $1000 a pound to launch on a Falcon Heavy.”
Though it seems to me that the high cost of launching anything from earth shouldn’t prevent lunar mining for water [which is then turned into rocket fuel], I miss [completely] how if the launch cost form earth is lowered this makes it less economically possible.
In fact it seems to me if you were to mine lunar water, one of the consequences would be lower the launch costs from Earth- which a feature rather than a bug.
Now if launch cost from earth were drop well beyond say $50 per lb, that could affect the gross price of total water deposits on the moon.
By which I mean say IF there was only 100 million lbs of water on the Moon [and there easily could more than 1000 times that amount], and if it cost $50 per lb to ship something to LEO, therefore shipping to high orbit or Cis-Lunar would about $100 per lb, then obviously lunar water couldn’t be worth more than 100 per lb- more like say, at most $10 per lb.
And therefore the entire minable deposit of 100 million lbs, would only have a gross worth of 1 billion dollars. But if it was 1000 times this amount it’s a gross worth of trillion dollars- which is decent amount of change.
Well, first off, it seems that clean room on the Moon, could make earth’s clean rooms look pretty dirty.
Based on Apollo experience, that assertion is highly questionable. The Apollo astronauts were unable to keep the moon’s harsh and abrasive dust out of the lunar module. Unless the people working in the clean room never go outside, you’re going to have a hard time keeping that dust out.
But why would need to build all of components of satellite on the moon. Couldn’t build stuff too big to launch from earth on the Moon- like antennas or other modular items.
In addition all those parts for a satellite are probably made all over the country and in foreign countries and shipped to your clean room, could many of the parts for satellite be made on earth and shipped to the Moon or Cis-Lunar space and assembled- perhaps mostly via a automated process?
What possible savings would you have to take all of the parts needed for a satellite, launch them from the Earth to the moon, and assemble the parts there to launch back to the Earth? It’s absurd. It takes far more energy and money to do that than to build and launch the satellites from the Earth to the desired orbit.
Hi Larry J.
Is this a gag?
You do understand the meaning of “cislunar,” right?
“Based on Apollo experience, that assertion is highly questionable. The Apollo astronauts were unable to keep the moon’s harsh and abrasive dust out of the lunar module. Unless the people working in the clean room never go outside, you’re going to have a hard time keeping that dust out.”
It seems fairly simple. Keep the space suit outside- assuming the people who are involved with a clean room wish to play in the lunar dirt.
It seems that if wanted a clean room on the moon, rather than any room/lab space on the moon, you would need to design and build it.
The major problem in any clean room is the human personnel that must enter the room and work there.
If you wanted a ultra clean room on the moon, you would be more concern with any human contamination- humans might need to wear something similar to spacesuit.
The clean room could be pressurize with say nitrogen- though it could be hydrogen [or helium or any other gas]. Having it pressurized could make easier for human personnel. One wouldn’t need to pressure the room to 14.7 psi- 3 to 5 psi would probably work.
If you want a clean room which is a vacuum, your lunar clean room could simply be a large paved area on the Moon. And perhaps some shade and artificial lighting.
So make area about size of city block, level and flat, using sintered lunar material for the paving.
Have road to it, that allows freight and personnel to enter the area. You might need to fence off the area to deal with lunar electrostatic dust transport. You need to bring electrical power to the area.
“What possible savings would you have to take all of the parts needed for a satellite, launch them from the Earth to the moon, and assemble the parts there to launch back to the Earth? It’s absurd.”
Well first of all, no one suggested taking all the parts from Earth. But let’s assume that we take all the parts from Earth.
What advantage could this have.
So we are going to bring rocket propellant, and everything else we need from the Earth’s surface to the lunar surface.
But we NOT going to do this next week. We are only going to do this if we have at minimum a market for rocket fuel in space.
Because this whole discussion is what kind of results would one have if you had a market for rocket fuel in space.
For there to be a market for rocket fuel in space, one doesn’t need rocket fuel made in space, one could simply ship rocket fuel to space from Earth.
My POV is that one needs a market for rocket fuel in space, BEFORE one could commercially make rocket fuel in space.
[I would prefer that there first be a market for water in space, but I mentioned this before and that an unnecessary addition to this conversation.]
Making a market for rocket fuel in space could be extremely easy to do- though NASA might somehow spend a huge amount of money on it.
Or one could say that NASA has already started to do this- it plans to buy cargo shipment to ISS. Shipments to ISS isn’t really a market, but it could be said to be a “start” in the right direction.
If NASA continued that “policy” in regard to lunar exploration, it would probably more like something I would call a market.
So we aren’t really talking about a increase of costs to the taxpayer- but a potential reduction in costs.
So Paul was talking from the prospect after lunar mining or at least after NASA’s manned exploration of the moon has started, but I am going address your question from point after having a market for rocket fuel in space- assuming said market is in Cis-Lunar.
So, at this point in time no one is making rocket fuel or antennas on the Moon, and we are shipping everything from earth.
If satellite makers wanted to build satellites on the Moon, they probably need to build some kind of “base” on the lunar surface. Since there isn’t any rocket fuel for sale on the lunar surface, they might be forced to do this “unmanned”.
Let’s say the least one would pay for a base for satellite assemble was 1 billion dollars- that cost has nothing to do with shipping all that needed to assemble satellites- that just making someplace to do all this.
One could argue that it might cost less or that it cost a lot more- my point is you need to build satellites which probably have a value which is more than billion dollars. But then again, any satellite assembling on earth would require many satellites to made to worth the cost of the facilities [which would be a fairly minor cost compared with all other costs]
And then we the simple fact that why would any satellite maker want any more facilities then they already have. And/or a State could pay them [in tax incentives] to be located in their State.
For the sake of shortening the discussion let’s assume the “base” costs nothing- or practically nothing- due to various “imagined economic/political mechanisms” and focus on the main stated absurdity of shipping all satellites parts to moon, assembling them, launching it to earth [geostationary orbit].
To launch something from the Moon requires 1 gee acceleration or less.
Launching something from Earth require 3 gees acceleration or more.
One could launch a structure from the Moon which is weaker that what required to be at rest on the earth surface. If one wants to launch something from earth it needs to survive gee loading tests which exceed 10 gees. In addition the size of the satellite is constrained by the shroud dimension of available rockets.
From the moon a satellite doesn’t need a rocket shroud, there is no size restriction of a payload launched from the Moon.
This means for example that the ISS [with minor adjustments] could launched as single unit from the lunar surface- something not possible from the earth surface.
Suppose with some satellite you could 1/2 their payload mass if you launched them from the Moon instead Earth.
Suppose one could reduce the risk of a satellite not successful deploying once reaches space from the earth surface?
The largest solar panel on any satellite is around 18 kW, what’s the limiting factor, why not have 40 kW or 50?
If satellite maker could increase the power for the satellites, would this be desirable?
Now you could argue that cis-lunar or LEO would better than the Moon because they require less delta-v. But this argument is largely about the rocket fuel cost in space.
If going from LEO to GEO or Cis-lunar, about half the mass is rocket fuel, then another half the mass to get to lunar surface, and same to leave again. So you obviously use more rocket fuel in total.
How much does this extra rocket fuel cost for a 1/2 billion dollar satellite?
So 5 ton sat cost 5 tons fuel to get GEO from LEO distance. So if using the moon and same mass is 5+5+5. Three times more rocket fuel.
Say rocket fuel is 5000 per lb, 10 million per ton. So instead 50 million in rocket fuel it’s 150 million in rocket fuel- $100 million “more”.
But if satellite can half the mass- it’s 50 million compared to 75 million- 25 million more.
Now there obvious problem, namely all rocket fuel in space wouldn’t be the same costs. If you shipping rocket fuel from earth to LEO and beyond, rocket fuel in LEO will roughly cost 1/2 of what it would cost in Cis-lunar and half again what it would cost on lunar surface:
LEO:2000, Cis lunar 4000, and lunar surface 8000.
BUT if you mining lunar water and making rocket on the moon, it goes the other way: it costs less on lunar surface than cis-lunar: lunar surface: 2000, cislunar: 4000.
I used 5000 to “simplify”. And no have not proven it’s cheaper to assembly satellite on the Moon. But it not as absurd, as delta-v costs would seem to indicate. And if satellite maker needed a 50 kw or larger antennas it might be cheaper [or possible].
4. Currently we cannot routinely access orbits beyond LEO with people and machines to build and maintain such satellites.
Would there be enough demand for satellite repair to have repairmen on call in orbit? Would there be enough demand if those repairmen had another primary job?
Once you have a general purpose ship in orbit (with enough crew capacity for a diversity of skills) you can have a practical answer to these questions.
But this is not an argument for the moon.
Once you have technicians in orbit they can build satellites in orbit probably easier than on the moon.
Hi Larry J.
Is this a gag?
You do understand the meaning of “cislunar,” right?
Did you bother to read the linked article?
“4. Currently we cannot routinely access orbits beyond LEO with people and machines to build and maintain such satellites.
Would there be enough demand for satellite repair to have repairmen on call in orbit? Would there be enough demand if those repairmen had another primary job?”
Like say salvage for scrap metals?
If you going to have repairmen in space, where do they base from?
Are going to be in space for say a couple months to 1/2 year, and return to earth? Or much shorter like a week or two in space, then back to Earth?
Where is fastest point to get to any point in GEO. In GEO orbit?
L-points would be stationary to to GEO, but are not very close- EM L-1 being the closest L point.
If at GEO, one could decrease or increase the 24 hr orbit [go towards earth or away from it]. So from a 24hr orbit to a 20 hr orbit, every 20 hr would gain a 1/6, so 60 hrs gets you opposite side of the orbit.
And the same if you go to 28 hr orbit- about 2 1/2 days gets you anywhere along the orbital path. So generally one should at most about 24 hrs a destination in GEO- transit during a sleep period and “down time”/mission prep.
From EM L-1 it is going to take more than a day to get to any point in GEO.
Roughly if at GEO it takes on average less than a day to travel to other points, and from EM L-1 it takes days to travel to any point in GEO.
And with unmanned one could use less delta-v and take longer to get to a destination, though unless one is dealing a massive cargo, as you get cheaper rocket fuel in space, getting your expensive vehicle and high wage crew to the destination faster will make more economic sense.
As for scrap metal from satellites, how is there and where would they be most valuable?
There are about 100 geo satellites in GEO graveyard:
“Although most GEO satellite operators have not taken advantage of removing their old spacecraft, there are over 100 already there. This number will continue to grow, because some 20 GEO birds expire each year, and some of these will be sent to the graveyard.” http://www.spacedaily.com/reports/The_GEO_Graveyard_May_Not_Be_Permanent_999.html
So somewhere in ballpark of thousands of tons of scrap metal- or close to 1000 tons per decade.
How much is a ton of scrap metal worth in space. It couldn’t be worth more than say $1000 per lb. If 500 per lb it’s million per ton, and so couple of billion or so.
In terms energy how electrical power does it take to make 1000 tons of aluminum from ore?
Using the most efficient means on earth it’s somewhere around 15 kW/h per kg so around 15000 kW/h per ton.
If electrical power is space is worth $50 per kW/h then the energy cost is about $750,00 per ton to make the aluminum from ore.
On earth, the energy cost to make aluminum is around 30% of it’s price.
It takes 2 or 3 times more energy per kg to make aluminum as compared to LH&LOX from water, and even though aluminum isn’t a very good rocket fuel, it’s possible one could economically use such scrap aluminum as a rocket propellant.
It would easier to use scrap aluminum to manufacture aluminum components [wire, sheet metal, etc]
your expensive vehicle and high wage crew
No matter how cheap your fuel, vehicle and crew will be almost none of the cost. Mass is the only issue.
“No matter how cheap your fuel, vehicle and crew will be almost none of the cost. Mass is the only issue.”
Crew cost would have include the cost getting crew into space, housing, food, and returning to Earth. The vehicle have to include it’s develop costs and getting it to orbit.
If you bought a service that provided crew by the hr/job, it could be quite expensive. If renting spacecraft per the day/month it could quite expensive.
It would be expensive because it would include all costs. Just as buying a ton of rocket would reflect all the costs.
So say it cost 50-100 million to get a crew into space. How long the crew can stay in space may depend on what “support infrastructure” there was. If crew were to go one or two satellites in GEO, then return to earth- that indicate certain type of “infrastructure” needed, compared going into space for say a year and going many satellite locations in GEO.
Whether a crew is going for week or a year, one could calculate the costs per day of using a crew. One would assume that the daily costs would cheaper for crew which staying in longer periods- or why doesn’t simply return to earth in shorter intervals.
As for the vehicles required, I mainly thinking reusable/refillable vehicles [not single use disposal]. If have spacecraft which worth 100 million, with control center, maintenance, etc, sitting idle, it’s losing money.
There is not a lot difference in having it idle in space for 2 months, or having traveling somewhere for 2 months, but it’s managed so as to be productive, then travel time to each destination becomes important.
say it cost 50-100 million to get a crew into space
Ok. $63m for Soyez. $20m for Dragon and the price will come down, but you’re in the ball park.
Put a BA330 in orbit with the upper stage of a Falcon Heavy and you’ve got 90% of a general purpose spaceship sitting in LEO waiting for fuel for $195m.
Call it $250m which includes the crews annual salary and provisions (which went up with the crew, dragon has enough volume to include a years provisions when it sends up the crew. If you don’t believe, double the total cost to $500m.
Now you need to add fuel, let’s assume it’s free. With a Merlin engine you need 10x the weight of the ship to get 7.15 km/s delta V. which allows you to cruise to (but not back) from most destinations beyond the moon.
That takes 10 FH flights ($950m) so already free fuel costs twice or more what the ship and crew cost for a year. The ship is a one time cost, the crew is a maintenance cost. Refueling is a continuous cost for as long as you want to move the ship.
The more you want to do with your ship the less the ship and crew costs by percentage.
That but should have been a so… sorry about that. Also note that crew cost more than the ship over it’s life, but fuel is still the major cost.
Also, while 90% may be true, that 10% includes a lot of expensive details, but still not that significant since it’s still just a one time cost. OTOH, development cost for that 90% is already included in the cost to orbit.
“Put a BA330 in orbit with the upper stage of a Falcon Heavy and you’ve got 90% of a general purpose spaceship sitting in LEO waiting for fuel for $195m.
Call it $250m which includes the crews annual salary and provisions (which went up with the crew, dragon has enough volume to include a years provisions when it sends up the crew. If you don’t believe, double the total cost to $500m.”
Ok, so we are putting a inflatable space station in orbit- LEO.
And total cost of 500m seems a reasonable upper limit
“Now you need to add fuel, let’s assume it’s free. With a Merlin engine you need 10x the weight of the ship to get 7.15 km/s delta V. which allows you to cruise to (but not back) from most destinations beyond the moon.”
Buying the rocket fuel on earth can be considered free- or an insignificant cost. Of course once rocket fuel shipped to LEO, it can longer be considered “free” or insignificant cost.
“That takes 10 FH flights ($950m) so already free fuel costs twice or more what the ship and crew cost for a year. The ship is a one time cost, the crew is a maintenance cost. Refueling is a continuous cost for as long as you want to move the ship.”
The “free” rocket fuel you bought on earth could end up cost something like 950 million.
That one could put a dockable space station in Cis-lunar space for about 1.5 billion. And/or if NASA wanted to buy a space station in say L-1 the price tag could around 1.5 billion or less.
And perhaps having such space station and fuel depot in L-1 could significantly lower the operational costs of lunar exploration program?
And in addition lower the operation costs of manned Mars missions?
And we don’t need a NASA hvy lift program and NASA could be on the Moon before 2020?
And be on Mars by 2030.
The FH will be ready in two years. The BA330 is ready now. The Dragon/F9 works now, but has three more years before official crew readiness. If someone builds a lunar lander we could be on the moon by 2014.
Mars orbit is the exact same schedule. For that you need a different mars lander. We could send a non crewed mission by 2016 followed by a crew in 2018. I was ten years old when Neil and Buzz set foot on the moon. I would like to see us get to mars before I’m 70.
“If someone builds a lunar lander we could be on the moon by 2014.”
For NASA to do this requires a President- a real President. Obama would need to grow a brain and some big balls. Bush had enough brains, but lacked the courage.
And a billionaire landing crew on the Moon- though nice, wouldn’t be the same thing.
If NASA landed a crew on the Moon, it would tend to indicate it first did other things and had some kind plan.
NASA if it was semi-conscious, it would first send and unmanned orbiter and lander which had primary task to determine where a manned crew should go.
Though the first thing, would be to create team within NASA which had the task of exploring the Moon- as IBM CEO did to make it’s first IBM PC.
Going to the Moon, isn’t something that requires “national effort”- it’s basically of the scale of building another aircraft carrier.
Opening the space frontier is something the requires “national effort”, and require moving the entire NASA bureaucracy- not mention other governmental bureaucracies. And making a team within NASA to go to the Moon and it going to the Moon, would be useful lever in moving all these bureaucracies.
Considering a single company built the LEM in the 60s with no previous examples I don’t think it’s anywhere near the scale of building an aircraft carrier. I do agree with your larger point.
When Cis-Lunar Space becomes an economic boom-town locale, I want to establish the very first saloon there.
What’s wrong with good, old-fashioned “Manifest Destiny”? We’ve spread out over most of the surface of the Earth, and life either grows or it dies. Thus it is our function and our fate to spread life, especially intelligent life (ie Mankind) beyond the limits of our Earthly cradle.
Don’t try to *reason* with people, humans are barely rational. Appeal to our emotions, and give us a CAUSE!
Fortunately there is still individual pursuits and some are rich enough to follow them. Once we have settlements in the solar system (beyond the first of them which are likely to fail) it will become so obvious that we should have worked harder and earlier to make it happen.
Then everyone will say they knew it all along.
Having visited clean rooms and watched satellites being constructed, I suspect it’ll be quite some time before we’ll be able to duplicate that capability off-planet. The moon, for all of it’s admirable traits, isn’t necessarily a very good place to build satellites. Perhaps one day we’ll have 3D printers with sufficient quality to produce satellite components. Until then, the number of specialized high-quality components needed to build satellites means you’d need to launch a lot of the stuff from the Earth, which kind of defeats the purpose.
Likewise, harvesting lunar ice to produce rocket propellants sounds like a wonderful idea. However, given recent developments such as the Falcon Heavy, will it ever be more economical to harvest that lunar ice for propellant (with all of the required infrastructure) than to launch propellant from the Earth’s surface? If you have to spend untold billions of dollars developing lunar infrastructure, it’d take quite some time befoure you’d recoup your investment compared to spending perhaps $1000 a pound to launch on a Falcon Heavy.
Hi Larry J.
I hope readers to Rand’s site read for themselves Paul’s “Cislunar Rational” and not rely on your Cliff Notes Study Guide. They’d fail the test on understanding and content if they took your comments as fact.
It’s always a good idea for people to read the linked article before commenting on it.
They’d fail the test on understanding and content if they took your comments as fact.
What did I write that wasn’t factual? Please be specific.
“Having visited clean rooms and watched satellites being constructed, I suspect it’ll be quite some time before we’ll be able to duplicate that capability off-planet. The moon, for all of it’s admirable traits, isn’t necessarily a very good place to build satellites. Perhaps one day we’ll have 3D printers with sufficient quality to produce satellite components. Until then, the number of specialized high-quality components needed to build satellites means you’d need to launch a lot of the stuff from the Earth, which kind of defeats the purpose.”
Well, first off, it seems that clean room on the Moon, could make earth’s clean rooms look pretty dirty. But why would need to build all of components of satellite on the moon. Couldn’t build stuff too big to launch from earth on the Moon- like antennas or other modular items.
In addition all those parts for a satellite are probably made all over the country and in foreign countries and shipped to your clean room, could many of the parts for satellite be made on earth and shipped to the Moon or Cis-Lunar space and assembled- perhaps mostly via a automated process?
Don’t believe the article was referring near term project, but as something that occur after such things as rocket fuel markets were established in space
“Likewise, harvesting lunar ice to produce rocket propellants sounds like a wonderful idea. However, given recent developments such as the Falcon Heavy, will it ever be more economical to harvest that lunar ice for propellant (with all of the required infrastructure) than to launch propellant from the Earth’s surface? If you have to spend untold billions of dollars developing lunar infrastructure, it’d take quite some time befoure you’d recoup your investment compared to spending perhaps $1000 a pound to launch on a Falcon Heavy.”
Though it seems to me that the high cost of launching anything from earth shouldn’t prevent lunar mining for water [which is then turned into rocket fuel], I miss [completely] how if the launch cost form earth is lowered this makes it less economically possible.
In fact it seems to me if you were to mine lunar water, one of the consequences would be lower the launch costs from Earth- which a feature rather than a bug.
Now if launch cost from earth were drop well beyond say $50 per lb, that could affect the gross price of total water deposits on the moon.
By which I mean say IF there was only 100 million lbs of water on the Moon [and there easily could more than 1000 times that amount], and if it cost $50 per lb to ship something to LEO, therefore shipping to high orbit or Cis-Lunar would about $100 per lb, then obviously lunar water couldn’t be worth more than 100 per lb- more like say, at most $10 per lb.
And therefore the entire minable deposit of 100 million lbs, would only have a gross worth of 1 billion dollars. But if it was 1000 times this amount it’s a gross worth of trillion dollars- which is decent amount of change.
Well, first off, it seems that clean room on the Moon, could make earth’s clean rooms look pretty dirty.
Based on Apollo experience, that assertion is highly questionable. The Apollo astronauts were unable to keep the moon’s harsh and abrasive dust out of the lunar module. Unless the people working in the clean room never go outside, you’re going to have a hard time keeping that dust out.
But why would need to build all of components of satellite on the moon. Couldn’t build stuff too big to launch from earth on the Moon- like antennas or other modular items.
In addition all those parts for a satellite are probably made all over the country and in foreign countries and shipped to your clean room, could many of the parts for satellite be made on earth and shipped to the Moon or Cis-Lunar space and assembled- perhaps mostly via a automated process?
What possible savings would you have to take all of the parts needed for a satellite, launch them from the Earth to the moon, and assemble the parts there to launch back to the Earth? It’s absurd. It takes far more energy and money to do that than to build and launch the satellites from the Earth to the desired orbit.
Hi Larry J.
Is this a gag?
You do understand the meaning of “cislunar,” right?
“Based on Apollo experience, that assertion is highly questionable. The Apollo astronauts were unable to keep the moon’s harsh and abrasive dust out of the lunar module. Unless the people working in the clean room never go outside, you’re going to have a hard time keeping that dust out.”
It seems fairly simple. Keep the space suit outside- assuming the people who are involved with a clean room wish to play in the lunar dirt.
It seems that if wanted a clean room on the moon, rather than any room/lab space on the moon, you would need to design and build it.
The major problem in any clean room is the human personnel that must enter the room and work there.
If you wanted a ultra clean room on the moon, you would be more concern with any human contamination- humans might need to wear something similar to spacesuit.
The clean room could be pressurize with say nitrogen- though it could be hydrogen [or helium or any other gas]. Having it pressurized could make easier for human personnel. One wouldn’t need to pressure the room to 14.7 psi- 3 to 5 psi would probably work.
If you want a clean room which is a vacuum, your lunar clean room could simply be a large paved area on the Moon. And perhaps some shade and artificial lighting.
So make area about size of city block, level and flat, using sintered lunar material for the paving.
Have road to it, that allows freight and personnel to enter the area. You might need to fence off the area to deal with lunar electrostatic dust transport. You need to bring electrical power to the area.
“What possible savings would you have to take all of the parts needed for a satellite, launch them from the Earth to the moon, and assemble the parts there to launch back to the Earth? It’s absurd.”
Well first of all, no one suggested taking all the parts from Earth. But let’s assume that we take all the parts from Earth.
What advantage could this have.
So we are going to bring rocket propellant, and everything else we need from the Earth’s surface to the lunar surface.
But we NOT going to do this next week. We are only going to do this if we have at minimum a market for rocket fuel in space.
Because this whole discussion is what kind of results would one have if you had a market for rocket fuel in space.
For there to be a market for rocket fuel in space, one doesn’t need rocket fuel made in space, one could simply ship rocket fuel to space from Earth.
My POV is that one needs a market for rocket fuel in space, BEFORE one could commercially make rocket fuel in space.
[I would prefer that there first be a market for water in space, but I mentioned this before and that an unnecessary addition to this conversation.]
Making a market for rocket fuel in space could be extremely easy to do- though NASA might somehow spend a huge amount of money on it.
Or one could say that NASA has already started to do this- it plans to buy cargo shipment to ISS. Shipments to ISS isn’t really a market, but it could be said to be a “start” in the right direction.
If NASA continued that “policy” in regard to lunar exploration, it would probably more like something I would call a market.
So we aren’t really talking about a increase of costs to the taxpayer- but a potential reduction in costs.
So Paul was talking from the prospect after lunar mining or at least after NASA’s manned exploration of the moon has started, but I am going address your question from point after having a market for rocket fuel in space- assuming said market is in Cis-Lunar.
So, at this point in time no one is making rocket fuel or antennas on the Moon, and we are shipping everything from earth.
If satellite makers wanted to build satellites on the Moon, they probably need to build some kind of “base” on the lunar surface. Since there isn’t any rocket fuel for sale on the lunar surface, they might be forced to do this “unmanned”.
Let’s say the least one would pay for a base for satellite assemble was 1 billion dollars- that cost has nothing to do with shipping all that needed to assemble satellites- that just making someplace to do all this.
One could argue that it might cost less or that it cost a lot more- my point is you need to build satellites which probably have a value which is more than billion dollars. But then again, any satellite assembling on earth would require many satellites to made to worth the cost of the facilities [which would be a fairly minor cost compared with all other costs]
And then we the simple fact that why would any satellite maker want any more facilities then they already have. And/or a State could pay them [in tax incentives] to be located in their State.
For the sake of shortening the discussion let’s assume the “base” costs nothing- or practically nothing- due to various “imagined economic/political mechanisms” and focus on the main stated absurdity of shipping all satellites parts to moon, assembling them, launching it to earth [geostationary orbit].
To launch something from the Moon requires 1 gee acceleration or less.
Launching something from Earth require 3 gees acceleration or more.
One could launch a structure from the Moon which is weaker that what required to be at rest on the earth surface. If one wants to launch something from earth it needs to survive gee loading tests which exceed 10 gees. In addition the size of the satellite is constrained by the shroud dimension of available rockets.
From the moon a satellite doesn’t need a rocket shroud, there is no size restriction of a payload launched from the Moon.
This means for example that the ISS [with minor adjustments] could launched as single unit from the lunar surface- something not possible from the earth surface.
Suppose with some satellite you could 1/2 their payload mass if you launched them from the Moon instead Earth.
Suppose one could reduce the risk of a satellite not successful deploying once reaches space from the earth surface?
The largest solar panel on any satellite is around 18 kW, what’s the limiting factor, why not have 40 kW or 50?
http://psz.com/sats/solar-cell_array.jpg
If satellite maker could increase the power for the satellites, would this be desirable?
Now you could argue that cis-lunar or LEO would better than the Moon because they require less delta-v. But this argument is largely about the rocket fuel cost in space.
If going from LEO to GEO or Cis-lunar, about half the mass is rocket fuel, then another half the mass to get to lunar surface, and same to leave again. So you obviously use more rocket fuel in total.
How much does this extra rocket fuel cost for a 1/2 billion dollar satellite?
So 5 ton sat cost 5 tons fuel to get GEO from LEO distance. So if using the moon and same mass is 5+5+5. Three times more rocket fuel.
Say rocket fuel is 5000 per lb, 10 million per ton. So instead 50 million in rocket fuel it’s 150 million in rocket fuel- $100 million “more”.
But if satellite can half the mass- it’s 50 million compared to 75 million- 25 million more.
Now there obvious problem, namely all rocket fuel in space wouldn’t be the same costs. If you shipping rocket fuel from earth to LEO and beyond, rocket fuel in LEO will roughly cost 1/2 of what it would cost in Cis-lunar and half again what it would cost on lunar surface:
LEO:2000, Cis lunar 4000, and lunar surface 8000.
BUT if you mining lunar water and making rocket on the moon, it goes the other way: it costs less on lunar surface than cis-lunar: lunar surface: 2000, cislunar: 4000.
I used 5000 to “simplify”. And no have not proven it’s cheaper to assembly satellite on the Moon. But it not as absurd, as delta-v costs would seem to indicate. And if satellite maker needed a 50 kw or larger antennas it might be cheaper [or possible].
4. Currently we cannot routinely access orbits beyond LEO with people and machines to build and maintain such satellites.
Would there be enough demand for satellite repair to have repairmen on call in orbit? Would there be enough demand if those repairmen had another primary job?
Once you have a general purpose ship in orbit (with enough crew capacity for a diversity of skills) you can have a practical answer to these questions.
But this is not an argument for the moon.
Once you have technicians in orbit they can build satellites in orbit probably easier than on the moon.
Hi Larry J.
Is this a gag?
You do understand the meaning of “cislunar,” right?
Did you bother to read the linked article?
“4. Currently we cannot routinely access orbits beyond LEO with people and machines to build and maintain such satellites.
Would there be enough demand for satellite repair to have repairmen on call in orbit? Would there be enough demand if those repairmen had another primary job?”
Like say salvage for scrap metals?
If you going to have repairmen in space, where do they base from?
Are going to be in space for say a couple months to 1/2 year, and return to earth? Or much shorter like a week or two in space, then back to Earth?
Where is fastest point to get to any point in GEO. In GEO orbit?
L-points would be stationary to to GEO, but are not very close- EM L-1 being the closest L point.
If at GEO, one could decrease or increase the 24 hr orbit [go towards earth or away from it]. So from a 24hr orbit to a 20 hr orbit, every 20 hr would gain a 1/6, so 60 hrs gets you opposite side of the orbit.
And the same if you go to 28 hr orbit- about 2 1/2 days gets you anywhere along the orbital path. So generally one should at most about 24 hrs a destination in GEO- transit during a sleep period and “down time”/mission prep.
From EM L-1 it is going to take more than a day to get to any point in GEO.
Roughly if at GEO it takes on average less than a day to travel to other points, and from EM L-1 it takes days to travel to any point in GEO.
And with unmanned one could use less delta-v and take longer to get to a destination, though unless one is dealing a massive cargo, as you get cheaper rocket fuel in space, getting your expensive vehicle and high wage crew to the destination faster will make more economic sense.
As for scrap metal from satellites, how is there and where would they be most valuable?
There are about 100 geo satellites in GEO graveyard:
“Although most GEO satellite operators have not taken advantage of removing their old spacecraft, there are over 100 already there. This number will continue to grow, because some 20 GEO birds expire each year, and some of these will be sent to the graveyard.”
http://www.spacedaily.com/reports/The_GEO_Graveyard_May_Not_Be_Permanent_999.html
So somewhere in ballpark of thousands of tons of scrap metal- or close to 1000 tons per decade.
How much is a ton of scrap metal worth in space. It couldn’t be worth more than say $1000 per lb. If 500 per lb it’s million per ton, and so couple of billion or so.
In terms energy how electrical power does it take to make 1000 tons of aluminum from ore?
Using the most efficient means on earth it’s somewhere around 15 kW/h per kg so around 15000 kW/h per ton.
If electrical power is space is worth $50 per kW/h then the energy cost is about $750,00 per ton to make the aluminum from ore.
On earth, the energy cost to make aluminum is around 30% of it’s price.
It takes 2 or 3 times more energy per kg to make aluminum as compared to LH&LOX from water, and even though aluminum isn’t a very good rocket fuel, it’s possible one could economically use such scrap aluminum as a rocket propellant.
It would easier to use scrap aluminum to manufacture aluminum components [wire, sheet metal, etc]
your expensive vehicle and high wage crew
No matter how cheap your fuel, vehicle and crew will be almost none of the cost. Mass is the only issue.
“No matter how cheap your fuel, vehicle and crew will be almost none of the cost. Mass is the only issue.”
Crew cost would have include the cost getting crew into space, housing, food, and returning to Earth. The vehicle have to include it’s develop costs and getting it to orbit.
If you bought a service that provided crew by the hr/job, it could be quite expensive. If renting spacecraft per the day/month it could quite expensive.
It would be expensive because it would include all costs. Just as buying a ton of rocket would reflect all the costs.
So say it cost 50-100 million to get a crew into space. How long the crew can stay in space may depend on what “support infrastructure” there was. If crew were to go one or two satellites in GEO, then return to earth- that indicate certain type of “infrastructure” needed, compared going into space for say a year and going many satellite locations in GEO.
Whether a crew is going for week or a year, one could calculate the costs per day of using a crew. One would assume that the daily costs would cheaper for crew which staying in longer periods- or why doesn’t simply return to earth in shorter intervals.
As for the vehicles required, I mainly thinking reusable/refillable vehicles [not single use disposal]. If have spacecraft which worth 100 million, with control center, maintenance, etc, sitting idle, it’s losing money.
There is not a lot difference in having it idle in space for 2 months, or having traveling somewhere for 2 months, but it’s managed so as to be productive, then travel time to each destination becomes important.
say it cost 50-100 million to get a crew into space
Ok. $63m for Soyez. $20m for Dragon and the price will come down, but you’re in the ball park.
Put a BA330 in orbit with the upper stage of a Falcon Heavy and you’ve got 90% of a general purpose spaceship sitting in LEO waiting for fuel for $195m.
Call it $250m which includes the crews annual salary and provisions (which went up with the crew, dragon has enough volume to include a years provisions when it sends up the crew. If you don’t believe, double the total cost to $500m.
Now you need to add fuel, let’s assume it’s free. With a Merlin engine you need 10x the weight of the ship to get 7.15 km/s delta V. which allows you to cruise to (but not back) from most destinations beyond the moon.
That takes 10 FH flights ($950m) so already free fuel costs twice or more what the ship and crew cost for a year. The ship is a one time cost, the crew is a maintenance cost. Refueling is a continuous cost for as long as you want to move the ship.
The more you want to do with your ship the less the ship and crew costs by percentage.
That but should have been a so… sorry about that. Also note that crew cost more than the ship over it’s life, but fuel is still the major cost.
Also, while 90% may be true, that 10% includes a lot of expensive details, but still not that significant since it’s still just a one time cost. OTOH, development cost for that 90% is already included in the cost to orbit.
“Put a BA330 in orbit with the upper stage of a Falcon Heavy and you’ve got 90% of a general purpose spaceship sitting in LEO waiting for fuel for $195m.
Call it $250m which includes the crews annual salary and provisions (which went up with the crew, dragon has enough volume to include a years provisions when it sends up the crew. If you don’t believe, double the total cost to $500m.”
Ok, so we are putting a inflatable space station in orbit- LEO.
And total cost of 500m seems a reasonable upper limit
“Now you need to add fuel, let’s assume it’s free. With a Merlin engine you need 10x the weight of the ship to get 7.15 km/s delta V. which allows you to cruise to (but not back) from most destinations beyond the moon.”
Buying the rocket fuel on earth can be considered free- or an insignificant cost. Of course once rocket fuel shipped to LEO, it can longer be considered “free” or insignificant cost.
“That takes 10 FH flights ($950m) so already free fuel costs twice or more what the ship and crew cost for a year. The ship is a one time cost, the crew is a maintenance cost. Refueling is a continuous cost for as long as you want to move the ship.”
The “free” rocket fuel you bought on earth could end up cost something like 950 million.
That one could put a dockable space station in Cis-lunar space for about 1.5 billion. And/or if NASA wanted to buy a space station in say L-1 the price tag could around 1.5 billion or less.
And perhaps having such space station and fuel depot in L-1 could significantly lower the operational costs of lunar exploration program?
And in addition lower the operation costs of manned Mars missions?
And we don’t need a NASA hvy lift program and NASA could be on the Moon before 2020?
And be on Mars by 2030.
The FH will be ready in two years. The BA330 is ready now. The Dragon/F9 works now, but has three more years before official crew readiness. If someone builds a lunar lander we could be on the moon by 2014.
Mars orbit is the exact same schedule. For that you need a different mars lander. We could send a non crewed mission by 2016 followed by a crew in 2018. I was ten years old when Neil and Buzz set foot on the moon. I would like to see us get to mars before I’m 70.
“If someone builds a lunar lander we could be on the moon by 2014.”
For NASA to do this requires a President- a real President. Obama would need to grow a brain and some big balls. Bush had enough brains, but lacked the courage.
And a billionaire landing crew on the Moon- though nice, wouldn’t be the same thing.
If NASA landed a crew on the Moon, it would tend to indicate it first did other things and had some kind plan.
NASA if it was semi-conscious, it would first send and unmanned orbiter and lander which had primary task to determine where a manned crew should go.
Though the first thing, would be to create team within NASA which had the task of exploring the Moon- as IBM CEO did to make it’s first IBM PC.
Going to the Moon, isn’t something that requires “national effort”- it’s basically of the scale of building another aircraft carrier.
Opening the space frontier is something the requires “national effort”, and require moving the entire NASA bureaucracy- not mention other governmental bureaucracies. And making a team within NASA to go to the Moon and it going to the Moon, would be useful lever in moving all these bureaucracies.
Considering a single company built the LEM in the 60s with no previous examples I don’t think it’s anywhere near the scale of building an aircraft carrier. I do agree with your larger point.
When Cis-Lunar Space becomes an economic boom-town locale, I want to establish the very first saloon there.
I’ll call it: “Cis Boom Bar”