(Where, here, TPS means The Planetary Society and not thermal protection system.) In a statement released yesterday, the society is strongly suggesting that the shuttle should be grounded to free up funding for the exploration vision. The statement doesn’t go out and state that—if you read to the end you’ll see that they hedge their bets, just in case—but they do believe that NASA should study alternatives to the shuttle for completing the ISS. Those alternatives include making use of the capabilities of the international partners, finding alternatives for cargo delivery to the station (although they do not mention the use of commercial services for ISS cargo or crew, something NASA plans to issue an RFP for in the near future), and even using a shuttle-derived heavy-lift launcher to launch ISS modules (which may run into the same problems as trying to shift ISS modules to other expendable vehicles.) Interestingly, while the statement mentions in passing that the shuttle would also be used for a Hubble repair—something that may well be nearer and dearer to the hearts of more members than the ISS—it offers no alternatives for Hubble. From the statement: “Clearly no one would want to fly the shuttle if it were totally unsafe or prohibitively expensive. Now it is ‘only’ partially unsafe, and is certainly very expensive. Prudence and experience strongly suggest we plan for the possibility that the shuttle remains unavailable.”
The politically interesting thing in all of this is that the Planetary Society was formed by a group of politically liberal planetary scientists. Initially, they were opposed to human spaceflight and argued that all or most spaceflight money should go into automkated planetary exploration. Now, they are singing in Mr. Bush’s VSE song book.
I think the political importance of this cannot be underestimated. It’s all part of the political stars lining up behind an expansionist space policy and can be nothing but good news for the long-term survival of the VSE.
— Donald
At the end of the day, I don’t really care whether the leaders of the Planetary Society are conservatives or liberals. There is an emerging consensus among people who care about policy that NASA should retire the shuttle. But they are still up against a lot of patronage and quite a few go-team NASA fans. (They really are NASA fans even if some of them slam NASA’s leadership.) Whether or not it is part of the VSE “song book” is a non-question, because the VSE plays to both factions.
Actually I think that Bush has nothing to gain from retiring the shuttle before 2008 or so. Not only would shuttle fans and workers be furious, he would also be calling his own bluff with regard to the CEV. Unless there is some new catastrophe with the space station or the space shuttle, I don’t think that he will do it. I’m not sure, I suppose.
The politically interesting thing in all of this is that the Planetary Society was formed by a group of politically liberal planetary scientists.
The Planetary Society still sux.
The Planetary Society still sux.
Well, David, when you were talking about EELVs (unless I’ve got my Davids mixed up) I thought you sounded like a pretty thoughtful guy. I now see otherwise. Politics — and successful political coalitions and successful large-scale political projects like the VSE — are all built on compromise and consensus. If you want the VSE to succeed, I would suggest that you you water down your ideological purity a bit look for your friends where you can find them.
Greg, as has been pointed out here by several others, I think the details of Mr. Griffin’s plan were created with exactly your thoughts in mind. The only way the VSE would succeed politically would be to use as many Shuttle components — and workers — as possible.
— Donald
Whether or not we shut the shuttle down now or in 5 years should not be the focus of our efforts to open up space to more than National Space Organizations. We need to make sure that the RFP’s for supplies to the ISS from entrepreneurial space companies are allowed to succeed. Also, delivery of crew, nescessary machinery and habitates to the ISS and beyond. The CEV, the Shuttle, NASA’s Lunar lander should all be made irrelevant because we as a group promote multiple companies that will supply NASA with the means to do these jobs. There is enough interest out there in suppling these functions. Griffin is wise to tell us that he will not rely on a sole vendor. It is up to us to promote the legislation and the development atmosphere do get the job done.
The fact that they dont just throw away the shuttle for the CEV ahead of the shuttles retirement date shows how much hardcore support in the congress and senate their is for manned space exploration. I like the fact that they are willing to support manned space exploration and the shuttle to the end eventhough I cant wait for the cev.
Donald: It is very possible that Griffin is doing the best he can for one vision of NASA. I think that the blogosphere has been unkind to NASA in applauding O’Keefe and denigrating Griffin. Griffin is a rocket engineer; O’Keefe was an apparatchik.
However, I don’t think that either Bush or NASA has dealt Griffin a very good hand. He is also up against the possibility, which I think is a near certainty, that there won’t be much for astronauts to do on the moon anyway.
there won’t be much for astronauts to do on the moon anyway
What a lack of imagination you have. What do geologists do on Earth? Science traverses; resource searches. Being a more simple world, the moon will probably have fewer surprises per unit area than the Earth does, but that leaves a lot of room for surprise. There are bound to be things, probably many, many things, that nobody expected. Working out practical production oxygen. Farside radio telescopes. Everything the rovers on Mars are doing but with a thousand times the speed and efficiency.
Most important, practicing for Mars and practicing for other airless bodies. The moon is much more representative of the rest of the Solar System (at least that inward of Jupiter) than the Earth is. If you can survive and partially live off the land on Earth’s moon than you can do it anywhere. We are very lucky to have such a body so close to hand, where we can learn without having to be at interplanetary distances from home.
I’m sure others can think of many other things to do.
Surely it is time, Greg, to at least think about stepping out of your cradle, rather than sheltering forever in the safety of home, which is what you appear to want to do. You cannot be a child forever; someday, you have to grow up and step out into the neighborhood. The alternative is intellectual, if not physical, death.
— Donald
It is very easy to imagine all kinds of things for astronauts to do on the moon out in the unforseeable future. But when they were actually there last time, it was getting boring, which was one reason that Nixon cancelled the program. Likewise the space shuttle was exciting at the beginning, but has only gotten less interesting over time.
I can’t prove what will happen this time. All I’m saying is that it could turn out the same way.
Well, the most boring lunar mission still blows the doors off the most exciting shuttle mission yet the shuttle will have ended up lingering for three decades.
Nasa has some time to figure out how to make lunar exploration more exciting in the internet age.
Well, they have made no real progress, other than to lecture people that they lack imagination.
But I don’t think the VSE will succeed, whether or I not I hope that it succeeds. I think the VSE’s spacecraft designs are flawed. Your Planetary Society is advocating flawed designs.
I thought you sounded like a pretty thoughtful guy. I now see otherwise. Politics — and successful political coalitions and successful large-scale political projects like the VSE — are all built on compromise and consensus. If you want the VSE to succeed, I would suggest that you you water down your ideological purity a bit look for your friends where you can find them.
Ok; Dave, Greg and Dfens your missing the point.
The whole point of the VSE is that this is man’s first steps toward long-term, sustained exploration of space. The excitement is in the adventure that that poses for us! As long as the spacecraft dose what it’s supposed to do dose it really matter that it’s “Apollo on steroids” or a souped up “Super Shuttle”? As the need arises the products will be developed.
As for there being nothing to do on the moon, that the Apollo flights were getting boring; You’re comparing the exhilaration of first setting foot on an alien world which was Apollo 11 to prospecting in the desert southwest which was Apollo 17. The former was far more exciting for a short period of time but the latter was far more productive. I’m hoping that if the CEV design is successful there will be many more Apollo 11 moments to come and a steady stream of Apollo 17 prospecting.
the real fascinating thing about this is that the Planetary Society seems willing to sacrifice HST along with the shuttle in order to ‘save’ the VSE. Weren’t they leading the fight just last year to overturn O’Keefe’s cancellation of SM4?
The whole point of the VSE is that this is man’s first steps toward long-term, sustained exploration of space.
Is it? Or is it just another unsustainable dead-end program masquerading as a first step, a Potemkin Village In Space that lacks the economic underpinnings on which anything of real significance can be built?
Everything I see says it’s the latter.
I agree with Mr. Earl.
Greg: I can’t prove what will happen this time. All I’m saying is that it could turn out the same way.
So, you would give up any chance of an expansive future in the Solar System simply because it might turn out, not badly, but insufficiently exciting? If people like you were in charge, there’d be no future at all for humanity. I sincerely hope that you are, by a large margin, a minority. But I fear for all of us that you are not.
— Donald
Donald, you can go on chastising people for not being true believers, but the fact is, this plan is no good. It is another rat hole we will pour money down, like X-33 among a list of others that went no where. The programs will disappear along with our money, and most likely this will happen before the shuttle is retired, so we will be right back where we are now. Stuck with shuttle with no alternatives.
The really sad thing to me is the fact that this course of action is institutionally predetermined. We will not break out of this cycle until either some fundamental changes are made in the way NASA does business, or NASA is dissolved. I think it would be unfortunate if NASA were terminated, but we cannot continue to fund such flawed and anti-productive organization. It just costs too much, and as I’ve said before, it costs us twice the amount we spend. NASA hires incredibly talented people and prevents them from contributing any thing positive to society. At least without NASA they could get jobs where they would contribute.
Dfens, I both agree with you and disagree with you.
First, my problem with Greg is not that he isn’t a “true believer,” it’s that he’s opposed to the very concept of human spaceflight. He isn’t trying to fix the system, he’s gleefully wallowing in its destruction. At best, this is unconstructive; at worst, its willfully destructive.
Second, as you’ve no doubt heard me write before, I think the VSE’s political chances probably ended with the decision not to use the EELVs. However, it is the plan we’ve got, it’s conceivable it will work, and if anyone can make it work it’s Dr. Griffin. I’m willing to give him the chance.
Also, based on historical models, I’m not as pessimistic as you. This is the way difficult frontiers are always entered: inefficient government bases are initial markets for, and slowly displaced by, corporate efforts.
We can see this working right now. The principle market that SpaceX, et al, are after is the Space Station supply contract, and tourists and other paying markets are just beginning to use the Station. It doesn’t matter how badly or inefficiently the Station was built: it’s there and it’s a market. If Dr. Griffin is for real about contracting out Station supply in the next three years (and, as Greg points out in a different context, he has little choice), then the process gets started. If Dr. Griffin is not serious about this, all bets are off, but, while I’m worried, it’s still too early to say.
If by some miracle Dr. Griffin and his successors do manage to cough up a lunar base of some sort, or even a regular serious of below-the-political-radar survey missions, the same process is likely to get started at the moon.
At some point in the still distant future, the process will take on its own momentum and be self-sustaining.
For better or worse, this is the plan and model we’ve got, and Cecil was correct that we are unlikely to get another political opening in the foreseeable future. This plan had better be made to work! The political alternative is another thirty years of screwing around.
— Donald
Donald, as I read Greg’s posts, he is not against human spaceflight. He is against human spaceflight accomplished on the taxpayers dime justified by assertions of scientific achievement, combined with the de-funding other science projects.
Without an economic justification for lunar exploration (or “economic underpinnings” to cite Paul Dietz) Greg might be correct. This is why I believe we need to end the “single payor” system of funding human spaceflight and develop non-taxpayer based revenue streams as soon as possible.
Unlike Greg (& apparently Paul Dietz) I support the VSE but without asserting it will be sufficient by itself to get us where we want to go, which is a genuine spacefaring society.
Bill White: Your summary of my position is really pretty good, but not quite 100%. First, when people make bogus claims of scientific achievement to justify human spaceflight, it harms science even beyond direct defunding of alternatives. The credibility of American science takes a hit from it.
Second, bogus justifications of any other kind are hardly better. Different bogus justifications of anything are largely interchangeable.
Donald: I would have nothing against space stations and moon bases if they were not, as Paul Deitz says, Potemkin villages in space. Potemkin villages lead to stagnation, not to bigger and better things.
If the VSE ever gets off the ground, we will use the moon as a stepping stone/learning center to a countless array of space efforts. Mike Griffin seems to be doing exactly what is necessary to sustain the vision beyond 2009. People in touch with the industry will realize that things at NASA are changing drastically. TPS, NSS, Permanent, The Frontier Foundation, and countless other space exploration advocates have endorsed VSE and Mike Griffin whole-heartedly. He doesn’t seem to be playing anyone’s game. He is working towards a permanent human presence in space. The time for establishing such footholds is way overdue.
Fair enough, Greg. Your corrections are noted.
Me? I’d like to spend Nike’s money not federal tax revenue. Today Nike has a nearly $2 billion per year celebrity endorsement budget. That is billion not million. Add in Reebok, Adidas etc . . . and the totals go up.
What might Burt Rutan accomplish with even $1 billion per year?
If the VSE ever gets off the ground, we will use the moon as a stepping stone/learning center to a countless array of space efforts.
They were saying similar things about the Shuttle and about the Space Station. For neither did it pan out, for ugly economic reasons. Since VSE doesn’t address the economics, why should it do any better?
At best, VSE might have served as a demand-generator to jump start efficient private space service suppliers. But that’s apparently been largely nixed, with only token private efforts being discussed.
Everyone has already hit the high points on why I disagree with your position, Donald. The fact is, people are fed up with the status quo. VSE is not going to build any momentum for space exploration, it will do just the opposite. Even the best case is a 13 year development costing well over $100 BILLION. Even if you don’t think the amount of money is insane, the time period unquestionably is. 13 years for a “derivative” vehicle? “Derivative” it makes me want to spit. It means the starting point for snowballing requirements and costs will be the shuttle. It means no new technology of any significance allowed. Here’s one program that will probably be consumed by VSE. How many more must be sacrificed at the altar of the NASA “mega-program”? So if you kill off all the technology development programs that might make space travel affordable, how is that going to build momentum? You want an example of a pyrrhic success? VSE is it. It will burn tax dollars, burn technology, burn credibility, and ultimately destroy NASA itself. And for what?
Well, Dfens, we’ve spent thirty years on technology and scientific probes, and where has it got us? Many people seem to think that destroying NASA would be a good thing. If so, and if the VSE really would destroy NASA, it seems as good a way to do it as any.
— Donald
Donald: there’s a much cheaper way to destroy NASA than the VSE, and it has the side effect of freeing up a great deal of talent that might be productively used elsewhere in the economy.
Donald: In 30 years, NASA has gotten us some very useful information about the planet that we live on, for example this.
But hey, if we can’t live on other planets any time soon, why bother enjoying or protecting life on Earth either.
We can’t ever live on other planets unless we start learning how.
— Donald
Donald: the gap between what will be required to actually live (and, make a living) in space, and what the VSE/ESAS will provide, is so great that using the former to justify the latter is just not convincing.
The slow pace of the VSE also argues against this ‘learning’ rationalization, since knowledge decays with time. The context in which that knowledge was applicable changes. The brains in which that knowledge resides forget, move on, retire, or die.
Well, Dfens, we’ve spent thirty years on technology and scientific probes, and where has it got us? Many people seem to think that destroying NASA would be a good thing. If so, and if the VSE really would destroy NASA, it seems as good a way to do it as any.
Wow, Donald, I’m jaded, but I’m not in your league. You think 30 years of failure justifies one more go with $100 Billion? You think it justifies killing off all research into better methods of getting to space? It justifies deriving a 40 year old launch vehicle from 30 year old technology?
Dfens, if the nation were willing to spend the money to continuing trying to develop cheaper launch vehicles while also creating a destination, I’d say go for it. If we have to choose, I say, let the government create destinations and let the alt.space crowd build better launch vehicles to supply it. But, thirty years of failure at building better launch vehicles does encourage me to say that we should at least consider a change in strategy.
— Donald