My latest piece at AOL News, on how the House seems determined to continue to undermine the non-proliferation regime with its porkfest of a NASA appropriations bill, is up now.
Category Archives: Space
Grounded In Congress
Jack Kennedy has a good op-ed in the Roanoke Times about the space-policy mess on the Hill.
Good Space Reporting
It’s so rare, I want to applaud it when it occurs. There’s a story at the WaPo that has a good summary of what’s going on in space policy, though I think that the headline is a little understated. It might have been nice to get a little more elaboration on this, though:
The House bill awaiting action would give twice as much money to Russia for transporting astronauts and cargo to the space station as it would give to U.S. companies working to build that capacity.
Insanity. And it doesn’t even mention the fact that this undermines the non-proliferation regime, due to the need to continually waive the requirements for INKSNA (a subject on which I’ll have more tomorrow).
Big-Government Republicans
…at least when it comes to space.
Et Tu, Jim?
In a roundup of some House races, Jim Geraghty at National Review comments on Suzanne Kosmas’ district:
Kosmas defied her district by voting for health-care reform, and many figured she had traded her vote to the Obama administration for some sort of deal to save Space Coast jobs. Instead, President Obama’s space-policy changes are effectively ending manned spaceflight, disastrous news for workers in her district.
I don’t know who figured that she had made such a trade, or how that was supposed to work, but the new policy is not “effectively ending manned spaceflight.” As I’ve explained myself at National Review, in fact, it was the Bush/Griffin policy that was doing that, in wasting money on an unaffordable and unnecessary new rocket that was extending the post-Shuttle gap into the indefinite future. The new policy could have a (commercial) crew delivery system in as little as four years, given proper (and comparatively modest) funding, while allowing the agency to focus instead on human exploration beyond earth orbit.
None of which is to say, of course, that Kosmas should necessarily be reelected.
[Update a while later]
Jim has updated his post to note that this assessment is that of the Republican candidate, and not necessarily his own.
The Men Who Sold The Moon
A review of what looks like an interesting book on mid-twentieth-century advertising, over at Reason.
NASA’s Fate On The Hill
It still remains unresolved. Amanda Carey has the current state of play over at The Daily Caller.
A Space Bubble?
One of the biggest concerns about the commercial spaceflight industry is whether there will be sufficient demand to support multiple players. Technology Review has an article on the subject.
I would note that the limit on crew rotation to the ISS is somewhat arbitrary, and that the crew capacity is artificially limited by lifeboat capacity. I don’t think it would be that hard to increase the life support to handle a larger crew if they could solve this problem. I personally don’t think it’s really a problem — we don’t have “lifeboats” for McMurdo in winter, and I don’t understand why we really need one at ISS, but if we do, the solution is not to evacuate the entire station and bring everyone back to earth, which is really kind of stupid if you think much about it, but it’s been the default requirement since the eighties. As I’ve noted before, the Titanic’s lifeboats weren’t designed to get people back to Southampton — they were designed to provide a safe haven until their passengers could be rescued by another ship. A much better solution is to have a coorbiting habitat (e.g., a Bigelow facility) with a true lifeboat in the form of a crew tug (I’d make the tug large and inflatable as well, to maximize utilization of the docking port, and it could serve as a temporary safe haven itself). If NASA really wanted to goose the market, they’d buy at least one of each.
Imagine
Jon Goff has a vision for space development. As noted in comments, it won’t happen until the government (or at least NASA) gets out of the transportation business, though.
Like some commenters, I wonder if it would really be practical to remediate the Van Allen belts, and if so, if there might be unintended environmental consequences.
Have We Won?
Henry Vanderbilt is reporting that HR 5781 will not be put on the calendar this session:
HR.5781 is not on the House calendar for this week. Our sources tell us that at least in part due to a significant number of constituent calls late last week, the House Leadership does not (currently) intend to put HR.5781 on the calendar this session (at least not in its current form.) We hear that negotiations with Senate Authorizers continue, with the outcome (if any) now more likely to be based on the Senate bill. So, the battle is going well – to everyone who made a contact so far, thanks! But the battle over this NASA Authorization continues. We need to keep the pressure on, with the general message being, NASA Exploration R&D (including Commercial Crew and Cargo) is a good thing to fund, while NASA in-house booster developments (see numbers in the Generic reason below) are very likely to be massive wastes of scarce funds. Those of you who’ve already contacted your Representative might want to contact your Senators now too. Those of you who haven’t yet made a contact, why not? More when we know more.
The worst has been avoided, but the outcome could still be bad. Stay tuned.