With the concessions yesterday by George Allen and Conrad Burns, the Democrats (and the two independents who will caucus with them) have won a majority in the Senate. That means a shift in seating charts and committee assignments, but not necessarily much else. Sen Bill Nelson (D-FL) will now likely chair the space subcommittee of the Senate Commerce Committee, with Sen Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX) becoming the ranking minority member, but both hold very similar positions on space policy issues. Nelson tells the Palm Beach Post that he’ll work to get additional funding for NASA to accelerate development of Orion in an effort to reduce the gap between the end of the shuttle program and the introduction of Orion; Hutchison tells the AP that “Bill Nelson and I have the same objectives in NASA, so I feel we’re going to be in good shape in Texas.”. On the appropriations side, Sens. Barbara Mikulski (D-MD) and Richard Shelby (R-AL) will likely switch positions on the commerce/justice/science subcommittee. That won’t necessarily change the magnitude of NASA support there, but it might nudge the vector a little towards GSFC versus MSFC.
If you have access to the print edition of Space News, there’s a good article in this week’s edition about comments made by staffers on both sides of the aisle about the potential changes should Democrats take control of either or both houses of Congress (as they now have). Their conclusion is that such a shift would not result in major changes for NASA.
Perhaps not major changes, but many on the Hill don’t consider COTS or Centennial Challenges to be “major.” What of them?
Both of those issues came up at the conference with the house and senate staffers that I believe is the one Space News reported on(AAS/AIAA conference on Nov1-2 but I haven’t read the article). I attended it and following are some of my notes. I don’t write fast enough for exact quotes but I hope this helps.
For COTS, the best statemenet was from Paul Carliner (Dem Senate staff director for appropiation subcommittee on commerce, justice and science) when he said the focus is now on the the companies and they are looking to see if they can deliver. He went on to say that the vehicles are still experimental and then asked if they can become operational? And he then asked if this can be done without any big NASA infrastructure.
Johannes Loschnigg (Rep House staff director science subcom. on space and aeronautics) said in an earlier question about shuttle retirement date that COTS is a variable in determining the retirement date of the shuttle.
All the present staffers showed strong support for COTS. Loschnigg said it is the “right direction” and almost mentioned that they (staffers) have looked at all the respondents to the COTS proposals, not just the winners. Jeff Bingham (Rep Senate staff director for Commerce, Science, Transportation subcommittee on scienc and space) even went so far as to say he believes that “NASA can’t be in that business” and that COTS should be funded even more than the $500M.
As for the centennial challenge, it was asked and Loschnigg responded tha until NASA tells them what the challenges there are, they will not authorize it. That it is not zeroed out forever. Carliner echoed this sentiment when he said that not enough justification was given to the Senate to fund it, the need more definition. But he again reiterated that this does not preclude future funding.
These strike me as excellent answers, and even answers that I pretty much agree with (which, of course, are not necessarily the same thing). Once again, I think a new generation is in power in both parties, a generation that grew up watching “Star Trek” and for whom human spaceflight is just part of the background noise, and not something to be opposed to. I’m more worried about today’s young people who seem inward oriented via the Internet and to have little interest in exploration of any type. What happens when they are in power a few decades from now?
— Donald
Well, according to this old article
http://space.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn8701
and this linked NASA document
http://prod.nais.nasa.gov/eps/eps_data/118924-OTHER-001-001.doc
the Centennial Challenges program was investigating prizes for solar sail, LEO fuel depot, commercial space suit, lunar power source, lunar vehicle, and sample return technology. They also had a placeholder for larger, more ambitious prizes. I haven’t heard any news lately about any of these ideas one way or the other.
The answer about NASA not having told them what the new Challenges are is very weak and passive. I don’t think that would be their attitude if some favorite contractor program slipped through the cracks. The question is how can the Challenges become a Congressional priority without restricting them to particular Congressional districts?
Ray’s right on Centennial Challenges. Assuming Mr. Zelnio’s notes are correct, Congressional staff are either not not doing their homework or grasping at excuses not to fund prizes.
NASA presented its Centennial Challenges plans, including specific prizes, on pages 237-9 of its 2007 budget request, which is found here:
http://www.nasa.gov/pdf/142458main_FY07_budget_full.pdf
This document is specifically written for Congressional staff to inform them of NASA’s budget plans, and it clearly identifies which prizes NASA wants to pursue. If a member of the public can find this information, there’s no reason for Mr. Loschnigg, Mr. Carliner, or other Congressional staff to claim that NASA has “not told them what the prizes are.”
Moreover, contrary to Mr. Loschnigg’s comments, Congress already granted NASA prize authority in the last NASA authorization bill. Since he serves on one of the subcommittees responsible for drafting that bill, Mr. Loschnigg should be aware of this and not claiming that Congress “will not authorize” when it already has. It’s just a question of appropriations at this point, which appears to put the ball in Mr. Carliner’s court.
And it’s rather appalling that Mr. Carliner’s subcommittee, through a lack of homework or obfuscation for other reasons, will not approve a $10 million prize budget in 2007 (less than 0.001% of NASA’s $16 billion plus budget), especially given the a string of prize successes (DARPA Grand Challenge, X PRIZE, and now Lunar Lander Challenge) and real problems in NASA’s much bigger and more expensive exploration programs.
Don’t these guys have more important things to focus on? Like whether NASA has a plan for the next lunar robotic mission after LRO (or even a plan for LREP at all)? Like whether Ares I has potentially fatal engineering flaws, between its CG and orbit circularization issues? Like whether the Constellation architecture is still the best choice from either a safety or cost standpoint, given the switch to a 5-segment booster and the loss of traceability to other Shuttle systems?
Forget plans. Centennial Challenges is the one exploration program at NASA that’s actually producing flying results. So let’s fund this pilot program’s measley $10 million budget and spend a little more time on the multi-billion programs that are raising red flags left and right and are years from flying anything.
This is not meant to bash one party or the other, but one can only hope that Mr. Loschnigg and Mr. Carliner are Republican staff and will soon be replaced by better focused Democratic staffers.
Don’t these guys have more important things to focus on? Like whether NASA has a plan for the next lunar robotic mission after LRO (or even a plan for LREP at all)? Like whether Ares I has potentially fatal engineering flaws, between its CG and orbit circularization issues?
Great idea, have even more Congress interference in every detail of NASA’s program, get them involved in the most complex of technical engineering issues at the beginning of a development program. Oversight? Yes of course, but it should be based on sound knowledge and reporting not speculation and rumor in internet forums and blogs.
Improper center-of-mass placement and inadequate thrust for safe orbital circularization are hardly “the most complex of technical issues”. This is aeronautical and aerospace engineering 101. Assuming Congressional staff have at least an undergraduate background in the area, they should be greatly alarmed that the Ares I design has these flaws and that there is no apparent good solution without revisiting the vehicle and/or architecture choice.
And although these issues only get discussed publicly on blogs, these are acknowledged problems with the project, not rumors. NASA would not be pursuing certain design changes and options (5-meter CEV, 5-seg SRB, other propulsion changes) if these problems did not exist.
Same goes for RLEP. We’re two to three years into the robotic lunar exploration program and there’s no overarching mission sequence or even hint of what mission comes after LRO. Forward planning a decade into the future is standard protocol on the Mars program, but it’s nowhere to be found on the lunar program. It hardly take an engineering PhD to be concerned about that.
Congressional staff should not micromanage, advocate specific design solutions, or attempt to solve technical problems. But they have a critical oversight role to play when an important, multi-billion project has developed potentially fatal flaws. When that happens, they should be ringing the alarm and using legislation and budgetary action to force the agency to fix the program.
But in the case of NASA, Ares I, Constellation, and RLEP, that’s not happening. In fact, there appears to be no Congressional oversight on these developments at all. Instead, Congressional staff are spending their time beating up on a small program with insignificant funding that’s off the critical path and that’s actually producing flying hardware.
What a great way to represent the interests of taxpayers and the American people.
Noname: First Carliner is a democrat as I posted earlier. Second, I am gonna take an unpopular position and state that I am still not 100% sold on all the centennial challenges. I am worried that like a lot of government programs, once a new tool is found, they try to apply it everywhere. I think for small prizes, the centennial challenges are great. I had the fortune to talk with Mr. Sponberg abot the prizes a little over a year ago and voice some of my concerns about the fuel depot prize in particular. The fact that there is no incentive for companies to invest in it because there is no market for it was my chief concern and Mr Spoonberg told me that they realized this is a problem but they (NASA) cannot guarantee that there ever will be a market. The x-prize and the DARPA race worked primarily because there was a market for winners of these contests to address. Many of NASA centennial prizes just do not have this incentive.
There are still a lot of open questions about the effectiveness of the prizes. In one of the first hearings on this matter, there were a number of important questions asked which I would be very interested in hearing the answers. For a summary of the type of questions originally asked, see section 7 at http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewsr.html?pid=13399
Jeff Foust did a decent summary of this hearing at http://www.spacepolitics.com/archives/000243.html along with some of Congress’ lingering concerns. There was also some good criticisms at the AIAA roundtable of the prizes that Mr Foust also covered at http://www.spacepolitics.com/archives/000238.html and msnbc wrote a bit more at http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4907485/
Additionally, before you go pointing the finger at congress, NASA needs to present a more coherent argument of how the centennial prizes fit within their budget to congress. It is one thing to release some documents on their website, its quite another to defend this to program to Congress. The last time I remember the centennial program was on the agenda before congress was at a hearing on Feb 16, 2006.(see http://www.house.gov/science/hearings/full06/Feb16/Charter.pdf) . To my recollection, it did not get raised b/c Griffin was too busy defending why he had to cut science programs. How can NASA convince Congress on the one hand to slash science and aeronautics and on the other hand provide funding for centennial programs? To see just how difficult this meeting was with congress, Mr Foust again had a recap at http://www.spacepolitics.com/archives/000834.html
Mr. Zelnio brings up good points. But I’m going to use the micromanagement argument this time and argue that in an agency with a $16 billion plus budget, for Congress to tie NASA’s hands and not allow them experiment with a $10 million pilot program (less than 0.001% of NASA’s budget), especially one that’s achieving success when multi-billion programs are raising red flags left and right, is just silly. There’s only so many Congressional staff and they need to be focused on the big problems.
Even in the worst-case scenario, if NASA stumbled and offered a prize that no one competed for, all that would happen is that those funds would get returned to the Treasury. Times may be tight, but temporarily setting-aside $10 million is not going to significantly impact any of NASA’s multi-hundred million dollar research grant programs. Given the disparity in budgets and the no-risk nature of prizes, it’s ridiculous and lame for Congress to argue otherwise.
If Congress really wants to save NASA’s science and technology programs, then staff should focus on getting Constellation back on a good track and getting NASA off Shuttle ASAP. Eliminating Centennial Challenges saves $10 million. Righting the human space flight programs will save billions.
Not to keep picking on Mr. Zelnio — who again raises good points — but a couple more counterpoints to balance the conversation.
NASA has actually not applied prizes “everywhere”. We’ve only seen NASA execute a couple small, highly focused prize competitions. Although there have been no winners yet, both have resulted in hardware, tests, and flights that broke new technical ground. The Space Elevator Challenge has resulted in the first use of beamed power to perform physical work (not just light up bulbs) that I’m aware of — a key technology for a lot of future space applications. And the Lunar Lander Challenge achieved VTVL and reusable rocket flights with turnaround times never seen before and for an incredibly small fraction of the cost of similar projects (e.g., DC-X). And because there have been no winners, not a penny of taxpayer dollars has been expended. How is that not the definition of focused, successful execution?
And I also must critique an argument that the “effectiveness” of prizes has not been proven. Setting aside NASA’s not insignificant success to date, there’s the DARPA Grand Challenge and the X PRIZE to point to in recent times. And going back farther, there’s dozens of successful aviation prizes (the Orteig Prize and Lindbergh being the most noted) and the Longitude Prize to point to.
Compare that history to Shuttle, ISS, X-33, X-34, X-37, SLI, and now Ares/Constellation. Prizes won’t replace Ares/Constellation, but if I were a Congressional staffer, I’d feel a lot more safe putting taxpayer dollars on prizes than I would on any post-Apollo NASA human space flight development program.
If Congress wanted to argue that they have doubts about some of NASA’s proposed prizes, that would be fine argument to have. But that’s not what they’re claiming. They’re claiming that NASA has not told them what prizes it wants to spend money on, which is proven patently false by publicly available budget documents (and which are probably backed by additional presentations from NASA to Congressional staff). Or they’re claiming that we don’t know if prizes work, which is also patently false given NASA’s, DARPA’s, X PRIZE’s, and earlier historical successes.
If Mr. Carliner is a Democrat on NASA’s Senate appropriations committee, then he probably works for Senator Mikulski out of Maryland. I hope he soon realizes that the next NASA prize competition is being conducted by a Maryland non-profit and funds the program for reasons of pork-barreling, if nothing else. It would be a sad statement on Congress if that’s what gets NASA prizes funded, but so be it.
Not to beat a dead horse, but today’s latest insider info on NASAWatch is yet one more example of what NASA’s Congressional overseers should be alarmed about and focused on:
“Sources inside the development of the Ares 1 launch vehicle (aka Crew Launch Vehicle or “The Stick”) have reported that the current design is underpowered to the tune of a metric ton or more. As currently designed, Ares 1 would not be able to put the present Orion spacecraft design (Crew Exploration Vehicle) into the orbit NASA desires… Alternate approaches such as using EELVs are not welcome solutions by either Griffin or Horowitz.
One possible solution to the Stick’s current design problems is to add side-mounted solid rocket motors. Many inside the program are not so sure that this solution is worth the effort. Others suggest that starting from a clean sheet of paper may be the only prudent course of action.”
If this isn’t a call for Congressional oversight, I don’t know what is.
But no, our Congressional staffers would rather spend their time defunding the one tiny program that’s actually been successful in getting a little hardware flown with some relevance to our lunar return.
Oy vey… insult to injury.
> Additionally, before you go pointing the finger at congress, NASA needs to present a more coherent
> argument of how the centennial prizes fit within their budget to congress.
Fitting a $10 million prize program into a $17 billion budget is not exactly rocket science.
The charge that NASA is applying prizes “everywhere” is simply bizarre. 0.1% of the NASA budget is not “everywhere,” it’s almost nowhere.
There is some truth to Mr. Zelnio’s statement that “once a new tool is found, they try to apply it everywhere.” But that tool is not new, nor does it involve prizes. The one tool that NASA applies almost everywhere is cost-plus contracting.
Zeinio is right to say, “There are still a lot of open questions about the effectiveness of the prizes.” Horrors — that means they might work.
On the other hand, there are no open questions about the effectiveness of the contracting that makes up 99% of NASA’s budget. Forty years of experience prove the failure of that approach.
Counter-reformers see the mote in their neighbor’s eye but completely miss the beam in their own eye.
> As for the centennial challenge, it was asked and Loschnigg responded tha until NASA tells them
> what the challenges there are, they will not authorize it. That it is not zeroed out forever.
Your information is out of date. That was the rationale the Senate gave *last year* for zeroing CC funding in the ’06 budget.
In the ’07 budget request, NASA responded to the Senate’s concerns and identified the specific challenges to be funded.
The rationale given by the Senate this year for zeroing the ’07 funding was that a prize program “creates a pot of unused funds while other aspects of NASA’s mission are being cut or delayed due to a lack of funds.”
In other words, they cut Centennial Challenges to help fund Orion, Ares, etc.
noname said…
>The Space Elevator Challenge has resulted in the >first use of beamed power to perform physical work >(not just light up bulbs) that I’m aware of…
I have an issue of Popular Mechanics from the 1980’s with a small (5-foot wingspan) radio-controlled airplane on the cover powered by a microwave transmitter on the ground. Is that different than what you’re talking about?
Keep in mind that so far NASA has given away a big fat zero dollars in prize money so far. Why reserve more money for prizes when NASA is still running a bunch of competitions already, without a success to date? When NASA can demonstrate the beginning-to-end effectiveness of prize competitions, then we can set aside more money for more competitions. Until then, that $10 or 20 or 30 million could be better spent on almost any other NASA program: there are probably a bunch of astrobiologists or aeronautical researchers who’d love that kind of money.
For Punk:
No, that’s not different than what I’m talking about. (It’s still physical work.) If the plane flew under microwave power, then I retract my earlier statement.
For Mr. Smith:
Defining “success” in a prize program as awarding money is totally the wrong metric. A prize competition should be measured by the technical results its competitors produce, not the amount of money that it passes through its coffers. That would just encourage easy contests with no real technical advancements.
Although I’d be glad to see a few more astrobiology grants out of that $10M, NASA’s space science grants are already measured in the hundreds of millions of dollars. Another $10M will have little appreciable effect on the space science community. But it will DOUBLE the amount of money that NASA can make available for prizes.
Congressional staff should not use a lack of winners in only two competitions to date as an excuse not to fund NASA’s prizes. It ignores facts about NASA’s successes to date with this program and creates a perverse incentive for NASA to conduct technically worthless competitions.
If, as Mr. Wright states, Centennial Challenges was cut to fund Ares and Constellation, then Congressional staff should just admit to it. It would be wrong for them to have done so given all the problems that have been emerging with Ares and Constellation this summer and fall, but at least the blame would get pointed in the right direction.
It’s ok that no Centennial Challenges prize money has been awarded so far. For one thing these prizes just started. Look at the timeline to return to the moon – ~13 years even in the optimistic case. The Lunar Lander challenge got a lot farther than I thought it would by this time.
More importantly, unlike a government contract or a grant, the goal of the prizes is not to transfer money, it’s to make a technology advance that NASA wants. This is done without NASA having to pay for it if the goal isn’t achieved (in which case NASA still gets to observe and assess the efforts before perhaps deciding whether or not to make its own attempt). Additional goals might be to spark some economic activity, to help start a new industry or mini-industry, to promote education, to insert some competitive spirit into the larger aerospace industry, and to get publicity for NASA’s much larger programs. I would say in these respects NASA has already succeeded with very little taxpayer expense (no prizes paid yet, and lots of the prize management run by private organizations) and I give NASA a lot of credit for that.
At any rate, there really isn’t a need for NASA to prove that prizes work. There are many historical cases where they have worked (whether or not a timely payment was made) – the French Academy of Science Alkali Prize, the French prize for making a food preservative method, the Longitude Prize, numerous early automotive and aviation prizes, the Super Efficient refrigerator prize, the Kremer prizes for human-powered flight, the Ansari X Prize, etc…
A certain amount of judgement is needed to pick the right kinds of problem to solve with a prize, and some management ability is needed to define and run the prizes, but I think NASA has the low-level management talent and numerous problems where the prize approach would be a good approach. The question is whether NASA has the right political environment and top management vision to effectively use prizes at a much greater level and perhaps break out of some of the deadlocks it finds itself in.
As for astrobiology or aeronautics, there is already an aeronautics prize, and there is no reason why this approach could not be used to help either area.
See http://www.nap.edu/catalog/9724.html or http://www.rff.org/Documents/RFF-DP-05-33.pdf or http://www.house.gov/science/hearings/space04/jul15/macauley.pdf
Ray http://spaceprizes.blogspot.com/
“At any rate, there really isn’t a need for NASA to prove that prizes work.”
But there is a need to prove that NASA prizes work — understand the difference? Are they picking the right areas to sponsor prizes? Are they being run the right way? As even prize proponents argue, there’s not a lot of experience to date. Wouldn’t it make more sense to be prudent and see how the current prizes play out before setting aside more money? Sure, that money can be recovered if the prizes are never won (and what is the mechanism for doing that? Would NASA get the money back to spend on other programs or would it go back to the Treasury?) but there are a lot of researchers who could use that money now.
“Defining “success” in a prize program as awarding money is totally the wrong metric.”
If that’s the case,maybe there’s an argument for not offering cash prizes at all for competitions. Just follow DARPA’s approach of offering a nice shiny trophy for the winner, freeing up millions for other programs — or simply savings for taxpayers.
> Just follow DARPA’s approach of offering a nice shiny trophy for the winner, freeing up millions
> for other programs — or simply savings for taxpayers.
DARPA offers prizes in the millions of dollars, not just shiny trophies.
> But there is a need to prove that NASA prizes work — understand the difference? Are they
> picking the right areas to sponsor prizes? Are they being run the right way? As even prize proponents
> argue, there’s not a lot of experience to date.
But there *IS* a lot of experience with the traditional NASA contracting system you favor, Joe — and that experience is not good.
You say Congress shouldn’t fund prizes until the cost-effectiveness of prizes has been proven. When are you going to prove the cost-effectiveness of your system, Joe?
Do you think the current system is flawless? NASA has made no mistakes?
You say “almost any other NASA program” would be better than offering prizes. Okay, let’s look at a few of those programs.
What about National Aerospace Plane, Shuttle II, X-2000, X-33, X-34, X-38, 2nd Generation RLV, and Orbital Space Plane?
What did those programs accomplish, Joe? Why were they preferable to offering prizes?
You say NASA shouldn’t offer prizes because no one is sure they’re sponsoring the right prizes. Are you sure that NASP and X-33 were the right vehicles for NASA to sponsor, Joe?
For 40 years, NASA has failed to reduce the cost of access to space. Now, NASA wants to spend tens of billions of dollars to develop new Shuttle-derived boosters that will *increase* the cost of access to space.
There may not be proof of the end-to-end cost effectivenss of NASA prizes, but there is ample proof of the end-to-end cost *ineffectiveness* of the traditional NASA contracting system.
Yet, you don’t say Congress should stop funding cost-plus contracts until NASA proves cost-plus contracts are cost effective. For prizes, no proof seems to be sufficient to satisfy you. For traditional contracting, no proof seems to be necessary.
Joe Smith wrote:
“But there is a need to prove that NASA prizes work — understand the difference?”
Sure. But we have evidence that NASA sponsors effective prize competitions. Witness the results of the Lunar Lander Prize after only six months of competition. Armadillo demonstrated a reusable VTVL rocket with turnaround times significantly shorter than any demonstrated to date and for pennies on the dollar compared to comparable vehicles (e.g., DC-X). If that ain’t the definition of a prize competition that “works”, I don’t know what is.
>>Are they picking the right areas to sponsor prizes?
Yes. The rules in the Lunar Lander Prize make the vehicles relevant to both lunar exploration (in terms of delta-v and landing system capabilities) and to Earth-based suborbital applications. It’s a win-win for NASA and a nascent industry. If that’s not the definition of the “right area” to run a prize competition, I don’t know what is.
>>Are they being run the right way?
Yes. NASA provides the prize money, but the X PRIZE Foundation runs the competition at no cost to NASA. The X PRIZE Foundation garners public interest in the competition by holding it at their annual X PRIZE Cup and solicits private sponsorship to cover operating expenses, in this case the Northrup Grumman Corporation.
In fact, one could argue that NASA manages prize competitions better than DARPA because DARPA reportedly spent something like $10 million to run the competition for its first-year $1M DARPA Grand Challenge prize. NASA paid nothing to run the competition for its Lunar Lander Prize.
If having a proven best-of-breed prize non-profit run the competition at no expense to the taxpayer, if garnering corporate sponsorship from an aerospace giant, and if doing better than other government agencies is not “good management” by NASA, I don’t know what is.
“Wouldn’t it make more sense to be prudent and see how the current prizes play out before setting aside more money?”
Maybe a year ago, but not at this point. We have a proven tool for technical innovation (prizes) and we have an agency that has demonstrated that it can effectively wield that tool (NASA).
It’s now time to add funding and ramp the program up, not terminate its funding.
“Just follow DARPA’s approach of offering a nice shiny trophy for the winner,”
This is a false statement. The DARPA Grand Challenge offered two prizes totalling $3 million over two years. That’s a little more than a “shiny trophy”.
“freeing up millions for other programs”
There are no millions to be freed up. NASA’s prize dollars have apparently already gone to feed human space flight.
If one wants to rob another program’s bank to pay for science grants or aeronautics research, then one needs to pick a program with a sizable bank to rob. NASA prizes never had large bank to begin with and that bank has already been robbed. Given ongoing revelations about Ares I and the lack of any planning on RLEP after LRO (now THERE’S a program that hasn’t told Congress what it plans to do with its money!), the logical place to go in with guns shooting would be one of those two multi-billion programs.
Ed Wright said:
“There may not be proof of the end-to-end cost effectivenss of NASA prizes,”
I disagree. For the first year of the Lunar Lander Prize, NASA has paid out nothing, in terms of actual prize dollars or money to run the competition. And in return, a new company has demonstrated a reusable VTVL rocket with turnaround times and development costs that are a fraction of what went before (e.g., DC-X).
Considerable technical gain in the numerator; no cost to the taxpayer in the denominator. If that ain’t a cost-effective ratio, I don’t know what is.
Time for Congressional staff stop nitpicking Centennial Challenges based on inaccurate information and false premises, ramp the program up with dollars for more and larger prizes, and turn their attention to much bigger problems elsewhere at NASA.
Mr. Zelnio’s concern for US taxpayers is laudable, but it seems to begin and end with his opposition to Centennial Challenges.
Last December, Mr. Zelnio called for the creation of a massive international socialist space bureaucracy. Such an “International Lunar Development Agency” would, of course, be funded mainly by the United States.
http://www.thespacereview.com/article/510/1
Mr. Zelnio wants government funding of this socialist agency to be “mandatory.” In the best euro-socialist tradition, mandatory contributions would be based on each nation’s GNP. “From each according to his ability….”
On the one hand, Mr. Zelnio opposes allocating a mere $10 million to Centennial Challenges because there’s no proof (in his mind) that prizes are effective.
On the other hand, he wants the US government to commit to “mandatory funding” (which would doubtless run into many hundreds of billions) for an International Lunar Development Agency. There’s an enormous double standard here. Does Mr. Zelnio have proof that socialism, Marxian economics, and international bureaucracies are effective?
All of the questions being asked about prizes could also be asked about Zelnio’s international bureaucracy. Would ILDA pick the right areas to research? Would it be run the right way? Wouldn’t it make more sense to be prudent and see how the current socialist experiments (ISS, Amtrak, Cuba) play out before setting aside money for an even more expensive experiment?
Which is more of a risk, spending $10 million on an approach that has “unanswered questions” or spending $100 billion on an approach that we know doesn’t work?
Ryan Zelnio: The x-prize and the DARPA race worked primarily because there was a market for winners of these contests to address.
But was there a market before the X-prise was won? It seems to me there was no more market at the time the X-prise was started for sub-orbital tourism than there is now for, say, an orbital fuel depot. However, I suspect that, like the X-prise, build it and someone may find a marketable use for it.
— Donald
Donald – in the case of the x-prize, there was a market that companies like Futron had identified and created studies on as well as market study surveys by other companies. While I have seen NASA studies on orbital depots (2001 done by MSFC and Boeing) projecting a quite liberal NASA demand for LOX/Hydrogen, I have yet to see any address the commercial market for these.
I don’t want people to get me wrong or put words in my mouth like Mr. Wright has seemed to have done. I am not said anywhere that I am opposed to the centennial challenge. I merely brought up the arguments that have been made in congress, which you would have realized had you followed any of the links I had posted. The original intent of this chain was to look at Congress’ view of centennial challenges and why it was not funded.
What I have yet to see is someone actually look at Congress’s questions that they posed and create a comprehensive response to them. Go back to the link of the July 16th, 2004 congressional hearing that I posted earlier, look at section 7 and provide some answers to that. There are thousands of lobbyists and federal agencies asking congress to appropriate $10M to their projects, and just like other agencies, NASA needs to provide adequate reasons as to why theirs should be funded to Congress. I would challenge someone here who was very passionate about these prizes to go and write an article and post it on the space review or some other public place that addressed the questions Congress asked as I think many of them are quite valid and pertinent questions.
As for orbital fuel depots, I am very much a fan of them and in a previous job I had did a lot of research on them. It is my belief that the technology to create them has been available for quite some time within the large space contractors and could probably be built for less than $200 million. The reason why this has not been put up yet is that there is no market for them. NASA has refused to even state that they would design the CEV or any other of their missions to have the capability for in-orbit servicing/refueling. Comsat manufacturers and operators are way too conservative to ever be early adopters of this and would wait to see someone else using it first. Add to that the fact that many of the comsat manufacturers use different fuels for their spacecraft so the question opens up as to what type of fuel to stock up your depot with. The NASA challenge I believe was geared towards a LOX and hydrogen solution which not one comsat uses especially as hydrogen fuel would involve having to added cryo to a spacecraft which would be expensive.
Now also add to that the issue of how does the fuel depot refuel itself. How expensive would it be given today’s current launchers? What will it take to create a full supply chain? Who is going to pay for it? In fact another problem with the centennial challenges is it doesn’t address who pays to launch to the depot in the first place. A $10M prize wouldn’t even cover the launch costs, not to mention insurance costs.
I do think an orbital depot is essential in the long-term for us to be a space faring society. It is just that all these questions combine to make me personally think if THIS PARTICULAR prize has been well thought out in the first place. I personally prefer the approach DARPA is taking in funding missions like Orbital Express to get us to a point where orbital depots make sense.
And to make sure no one takes this the wrong way, my critique of the depot prize does not reflect my thoughts on other prizes in any way, shape, or form.
As for my article on ILDA, that is a completely different subject which I would be happy to discuss with you Edward via email as it really has nothing to do with this discussion other than for you to attempt to attack my character. I’d love to talk with you if you’re really interested in critiquing ILDA. There was also a lengthy discussion of the article on the T.L. James’ blog in which I clarified some of my positions: http://www.marsblog.net/archives/001654.html
Mr. Zelnio wrote:
“The reason why this has not been put up yet is that there is no market for them. NASA has refused to even state that they would design the CEV or any other of their missions to have the capability for in-orbit servicing/refueling.”
Sorry, this is a patently false statement. Mike Griffin spent four pages of a speech to the American Astronautical Society describing how the Earth departure stage in the Constellation architecture is specifically sized and powered with the intent of leveraging future in-space fueling capabilities. See pages 6-9 in this PDF:
http://www.nasa.gov/pdf/145277main_STABreakfastremarks3-22-06final.pdf
And in-space fueling is repeatedly mentioned by other senior NASA managers in their speeches, for example by Shana Dale on page 4 of the following speech:
http://www.nasa.gov/pdf/145277main_STABreakfastremarks3-22-06final.pdf
In-space fueling clearly fits into NASA’s plans, there is clearly a future market for it, and it’s yet another market for new, lower-cost launch service providers like Space-X, Rocketplane-Kistler, etc. to address.
Even without this framework in place, NASA’s charter obviously includes the advancement of new aerospace technologies, which alone is justification enough for prizes that support the development of in-space fueling technologies and systems. Especially now that we rely on Russian capabilities for refueling and reboost of the ISS.
But with this framework in place, it really is time to drop the red herrings about NASA prizes for technologies or demonstrations of in-space fueling capabilities. To argue otherwise ignores the facts at hand and is just plain silly.
Folks with experience and expertise like Mr. Zelnio should absolutely weigh in on the specific technical goals and rules of such a competition when NASA releases the draft rules. But with the need so apparent and the long-lead times involved, Congress needs to appropriate the funding for one or more in-space fueling prizes now.
Mr. Zelnio wrote:
“What I have yet to see is someone actually look at Congress’s questions that they posed and create a comprehensive response to them. Go back to the link of the July 16th, 2004 congressional hearing that I posted earlier, look at section 7 and provide some answers to that.”
The problem with these questions is that they’re over two years out-of-date and have largely been superseded by events. Just take a look at the questions posed to the NASA representative at the hearing:
“How does NASA plan to design and administer prizes to induce the greatest possible innovation and advances in space technologies?”
This is self-evident from the prizes NASA has started and executed to date. Each is managed by a non-profit organization at no cost to NASA, which, unlike DARPA’s Grand Challenge, keeps overhead costs to the taxpayer low and maximizes the amount of money available for prizes.
“Why has NASA decided to offer prizes for the development of specific, discrete technologies (such as the development of a better astronaut glove) rather than for large technological feats (such as sending a person into orbit)?”
NASA is not offering prizes for specific, discrete technologies. Some are for breakthroughs in fundamental capabilities (transmitted power and high strength materials in the Space Elevator Prize), others are for beating challenges in component or subsystem capabilities (overcoming the dexterity versus pressurization issue in the Astronaut Glove Prize), and yet others involve flight systems that allow competitors to incorporate a range of different components, subsystems, and approaches to providing a capability (the Lunar Lander Prize).
NASA and the X PRIZE Foundation have also studied options for a prize to send a person into orbit. See article here:
http://www.space.com/news/051208_xprize_hov.html
NASA has a good track record executing smaller prizes across the spectrum of technology development and they’ve studied and are primed to pursue larger prizes.
At this point, the only thing that’s keeping NASA from conducting a larger prize competition is the lack of funding from Congress. It’s time for Congress to stop with the red herrings and lame excuses and fund a larger prize.
“2. How does NASA plan to ensure that technologies resulting from a competition are safe, as well as relevant to NASA’s objectives?”
In the case of the Lunar Lander Prize, the FAA was responsible for ensuring the safety of the public, and Armadillo had to undertake considerable paperwork and tests to get their flight permit.
The technical goals embedded in the rules of the Lunar Lander Prize (flight profile, flight duration, landing site size, landing site terrain, repeated flights, access during turnaround) make the demonstrations relevant to advancing both NASA lunar goals (in terms of vertical landings, delta vee, landing systems, etc.) and the emergent suborbital industry (reusability, turnaround, delta vee, etc.)
Congress doesn’t need more plans from NASA on these topics. They have proof of safe and technically relevant execution in the first Lunar Lander Prize competition. Again, it’s time to ramp up the program and fund more and larger prizes.
“How involved does NASA plan to be in specifying either the technologies that must be developed (or the goal that must be achieved) to win a prize, overseeing the work of companies competing for prizes, and judging the outcomes of prize competitions?”
In all of the NASA prizes to date, prize goals are articulated in terms of capabilities (fly this long, carry this much weight, land in this environment), not specific technical solutions (this propellant, those rockets, that avionics system). Even the fundamental technology goals of the Space Elevator Prize do no dictate the type of power transmission (laser, microwave, etc.) or the type of materials (nanotube, composite, etc.) allowed.
And it appears that the non-profit organizations that manage the competitions for NASA are responsible for assembling the judges for each competition. In any case, the judging panels are dominated by experts from outside NASA, with the occasional NASA expert. This is no doubt a good mix to maintain the integrity of the competitions.
“Are there any models NASA is using in designing its prize program?”
It’s apparent that NASA has drawn from both recent and historical examples of successful prize competitions.
The Astronaut Glove Prize is obviously modeled on the British Longitude Prize. Both focus on a key technical obstacle embedded at a component level that requires innovative thinking, not a massive amount of infrastructure, to overcome. Just as a clockmaker came out of right field to beat astronomers to the Longitude Prize, I suspect we’ll see a fashion designer or garage mechanic beat the professional engineers and win the Astronaut Glove Prize.
The Lunar Lander Prize is obviously modeled on DARPA’s Grand Challenge, where teams run a common race course each year and the best performer (above a certain minimum performance) wins the prize. Again, though, NASA has improved on the DARPA model by having a non-profit (X PRIZE) run the competition using private (Northrup Grumman donated) funds, not taxpayer dollars.
The one model NASA has not yet been able to implement is the X PRIZE or Orteig Prize, a large prize for a first-of flight. But again, that’s a function of lack of Congressional funding, not a lack of NASA management or imagination.
“What are the benefits and drawbacks of prizes over other ways the government can spur innovation within the private sector? Are prizes better at drawing participation from non-traditional players in private sector who are not normally involved in government contracts?”
This is self-evident from the results of the first year of the Lunar Lander Prize. A new company (Armadillo) demonstrated a reusable, VTVL vehicle with significantly improved turnaround times and for pennies on the dollar when compared to similar efforts (e.g., DC-X).
I’d also note that NASA has not limited competitors to private sector companies. The Space Elevator Prize is dominated by university, student, and hobbyist teams, for example. This is good, because prizes are about identifying the best performing solution through actual performance, and the wider the field, the better the competition.
Again, to sum up, Congress’s questions have been asked and answered, not only on paper and in testimony but by NASA’s actual performance in implementing, executing, and managing a number of competitions.
What more could Congress want? There’s nothing more that NASA can do at this point to prove that prizes are effective tools and that NASA can effectively wield this tool. Time to dispense with the dithering, the red herrings, and false premises, ramp up the program, and fund more and larger prize competitions at NASA. As much as I support all of NASA’s activities to one degree or another, given the high performance and cost-effectiveness of this program to date, I can’t think of a better place to put an extra dollar at NASA.
As for Congressional attention, that needs to be focused on much bigger NASA programs with actual problems (Ares I, Constellation, RLEP). For example, it would have been nice to have asked some of the questions from the prize hearing when NASA’s lunar architecture was released.
Or to ask them now…
July 16th, 2004 was almost two and a half years ago. Most of the “unanswered” questions you keep harping on have been answered in the interim. Furthermore, you misinterpret the intent of the questions.
Question 1 asked, “Why has NASA decided to offer prizes for the development of specific, discrete technologies (such as the development of a better astronaut glove) rather than for large technological feats (such as sending a person into orbit)?”
That question was not a rhetorical sucker punch against prizes. Far from it. It is an obvious reference to Senator Sam Brownback’s suggestion (just a month before this particular hearing) that NASA create a $100 million “John Glenn Prize.”
The Committee was asking why NASA didn’t allocate *more* money to *bigger* prizes.
Now, there is an unanswered question for you, Mr. Zelnio.
Why not spend more money on prizes instead of programs like developing Shuttle-derived boosters, which will increase the cost of access space, or creating the international socialist bureaucracy you have advocated?
I’ll bet you once again refuse to answer. Anyone want to give me odds?
It’s a rare case indeed, but I have to agree in large part with Ed. NASA has a very poor track record in managing manned-space programs and trusting them to “get it right” on VSE is already proving to be a mistake given the current underperformance of the “stick” which Griffin (the smartest man in NASA, who wrote a book on rocket propulsion, has 4 PhD’s, etc., etc.,….) triumphed as the perfect solution for CEV. But I don’t think Ed has taken this thread to its logical conclusion. We should not settle for $10M prizes, or even $100M prizes. The manned space side of NASA should be dissolved and the associated funding allocated to a pure services contract award to the first commercial company to build, fly, and demonstrate delivery of people/supplies to the ISS. This could be a multi-year contract (5 years?) or a multi-mission award (20 flights?) that would be recompeted at the end of the contract. If there is a parallel commercial market, then the winner is poised to dominate that area as well. Market forces will dictate whether additional launch services are viable and competition will drive prices down.