Today, we have a pair of California airheads, who are unfortunately elected representatives. First, we have Barbara “Don’t Call Me Ma’am” Boxer, who thinks that carbon dioxide is a pollutant, and then we have Lois Capps, who thinks that global warming is a bigger threat to humanity than AIDS, malaria and pandemic flu.
No one tell Chris Mooney.
I haven’t read it, but it can’t be worse than ObamaCare.
My piece on yesterday’s announcement is up at Popular Mechanics.
I’m watching the press conference now. Clark Lindsey is live blogging it.
I’d say that the big news is that it’s got more payload than expected, and will mean previously unthinkable price per pound. It is also big enough to do any conceivable planetary mission one would want, in sufficient numbers. The one question I wish that someone would ask is fairing size.
[Update a while later]
Clark has the press release.
[Update later in the morning]
Apparently I mistitled the post. It’s not a Falcon 9 Heavy, it’s a Falcon Heavy. I’m not sure what this means, other than the upgraded engines. Is is a different upper stage as well? It’s not obvious from the press release. Time to ask SpaceX.
[Update late morning]
Here’s the SpaceX simulation:
I was out of town for the weekend, and hadn’t had a chance to look at this briefing, which purports to show that Commercial Crew is a bad deal for NASA. While one suspects that this was the goal of those who commissioned it, ironically, it actually does the opposite.
I should preface this by saying that I’ve known John Skratt for about a quarter of a century, and worked with him quite a bit, and he’s a veteran cost analyst and a straight shooter. In fact, I left him a phone message last week, having no idea that this was in work, suggesting that we get together to discuss the situation with the broken cost models. In retrospect, I’m now unshocked that he hasn’t yet returned the call.
The real problem with the paper (as is often the case, unfortunately — it’s a lot easier to challenge such things when there are flaws in the math or logic) is in the assumptions. Every single one of them on charts 3 and 4 are nonsensical. I’m going to make the assumption that they are not John’s, but perhaps those who asked him to do it (with input from the Hill?). Thus, garbage in, garbage out, as the Commercial Spaceflight Federation points out in devastating detail.
But as frequent Space Politics commenter “Major Tom” also points out (scroll way down, it’s currently the bottom of a 150-comment post), even with these nutty assumptions, it’s still cheaper than a NASA solution:
The report’s bottom line is that under multiple worst-case conditions (halved NASA business, commercial customers at a loss, new LV developments, oppressive safety regime, etc.), NASA could expect to pay ~$20 billion for commercial crew development and ten years of operations.
That’s half of what Ares I/Orion development would have cost ($35-40 billion). It’s equivalent to what SLS/MPCV development will cost ($16 billion-plus for Shuttle-derived SLS plus another ~$5 billion for an Orion-based MPCV). Neither of those option even get to operations before blowing $20 billion.
Per the Commercial Spaceflight Federation, the study is conservative to a fault.
But even with all that conservatism and all those worst-case conditions, commercial crew still comes out ahead of Shuttle-derived solutions like Ares I/Orion or SLS/MPCV by a factor of 2-4.
Expect it, though, to be trumpeted by the defenders of the status quo as the death knell for the nutty notion of having actual competition in human spaceflight.
[Mid-afternoon update]
Funny, John returned my call this afternoon. I don’t know if it was in response to this post (I doubt it), but the conversation was cordial. And interesting. But unfortunately, off the record.
Yes, I know it’s a tease, but I thought I should at least mention that we did finally talk.
For governor? Or president?
We could do worse. And have, are and (sadly) will.
Paul Spudis says that propellant depots are a necessary but not sufficient condition for opening up the solar system.
Well, in the long run, sure. But as Clark Lindsey notes, in the short term, I think that a dollar spent on reducing launch costs will have a lot higher ROI than a dollar spent on getting propellant from the moon. That’s just the harsh economic reality, largely because reducing launch costs is a very low-hanging fruit, given how ridiculously and unnecessarily high they currently are. Elon has already started to show the way, and fully reusable space transports that develop out of the suborbital and other markets will accelerate the process. Once we solve that problem (and it won’t take that long, once we get serious about it, which will start when the markets flower), then ISRU will start to look a lot more attractive, because doing it will be a lot cheaper as well.
Megan McArdle describes one of the biggest problems with a progressive income tax — the volatility of the revenue. This is why California in particular is in such big financial trouble — in boom times the coffers encourage them to create all sorts of programs, needed or otherwise, for which the revenue collapses in a recession. A flat rate would have much less dramatic swings.
Bill Whittle and Iowahawk team up, and the results are what you might expect. No human beings were harmed in the making of this video, but Michael Moore takes a hell of a beating.
Alan Wilhite, Doug Stanley, Dale Arney and Chris Jones have put together an extremely politically incorrect technical presentation, in that it explains how one does serious space exploration and even development without using the Senate Launch System. They baselined Falcon 9 and its heavy version for the launch systems. I haven’t looked at it in detail, but as Jon Goff and Clark Lindsey have noted, it is a much more affordable concept than the SLS route. They appear to be assuming that the Merlin 2 won’t be developed, but if it were, I would imagine a significant decrease in recurring costs, particularly for the heavy. I’m curious to know how much cooperation they got from SpaceX for this work.
I’ll be looking it over and figuring out how to repurpose it to wage some political battles, but for now I’d just note chart 6, and the dominance of the costs for heavy lift in the HEFT studies. There are a lot of things that we could buy for that $2.5B per year that would have a lot more value.
One other point (as Jon also mentioned) — I’ve known Alan Wilhite and Doug Stanley for decades, having done a lot of work with them at Langley in the early nineties, and they’re both good guys, but Doug was in charge of the controversial ESAS activity that gave us Constellation (he had left Langley and gone to work at OSC, where he was working fairly closely with Mike Griffin). Whatever one wants to think about that effort, I would say that this one redeems him considerably. It also (as Jon notes) makes a very powerful statement about the earlier results and the need for heavy lift. Also, Doug was on record of opposing a lunar return, wanting to get on to Mars. I’m thinking that the de-emphasis on the moon in the new “Flexible Path” approach has freed him up somewhat (not to mention that he no longer has to please his former boss).
[Update a few minutes later]
I would add that there some very clueless comments at the NASA Watch post. Those commenting either didn’t actually read, or didn’t understand the briefing, if they still believe that HLV is more cost effective.
[Update a while later]
OK, I’m glancing through the briefing, and they don’t seem to be considering the fact that dry launching the in-space hardware will reduce its structural weight somewhat. Doing so will make the concept even better.
Also, Chart 31 is interesting — note the note: “These NAFCOM costs are a factor of 3 to 6 higher than actual costs for ISS Cygnus and Dragon DDT&E.”
NAFCOM is the NASA Air-Force Cost Model. I’ve been wanting to write a piece for a while now with the title, “The Cost Models Are Broken.” We’ve sort of known it since DC-X and the X-Prize, but SpaceX has really completely shattered them. This is actually good news, since parametric costing has been locking us into high costs on cost-plus contracts for decades.
More later as I continue to peruse.
[Update a while later]
Here’s the summary of the issues and benefits:
Issues
- Authorization Act language
- Requires longer storage of cryo propellants than alternatives and addition of zero-g transfer technologies
- Multiple launches statistically will result in more launch failures, but most launches are to the depot and not on critical mission path
- NASA loses some control/oversight
- Added complexity of depot
Benefits
- Tens of billions of dollars of cost savings and lower up-front costs to fit within budget profile (no HLLV-based options fit within budget)
- Launch every 2 or 3 months rather than 1 every 18 months with HLLV
- – Provides experienced and focused workforce to improve safety
- – Operational learning for reduced costs and higher launch reliability.
- Allows multiple competitors for propellant delivery
- – Competition drives down costs
- – Alternatives available if critical launch failure occurs
- – Low-risk, hands-off way for international partners to contribute
- Reduced critical path mission complexity (AR&Ds, events, number of unique elements)
- Provides additional mission flexibility by altering propellant load
- Commonality with commercial crew/COTS vehicles will allow sharing of fixed costs between programs and “right-sized” vehicle for ISS
- Stimulate US commercial launch industry
They forgot the biggest issue — it doesn’t preserve the Shuttle Industrial Complex, particularly in Utah. Though they may be subtly alluding to that with their semi-cryptic “Authorization Language” bullet. As for the benefits, it’s almost like they read my essay.