http://cosmiclog.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2007/10/18/418340.aspx

And as you note, RpK no longer exists now that the government money has stopped flowing.

Government money is government money. And without it New Space would fade out..Except of course for the billionaire hobby firms.

The question is what will happen to the flow of money fromt he government to New Space if Obama wins?

Will it increase, or decrease with space spending in general?

XCOR received a lot of its funding from the Rocket Racing League. It does have some government research contracts (always fixed price), and uses them to advance its own goals, taking the profit from them and plowing it back into R&D. Unlike most aerospace contractors, XCOR views R&D as a cost of doing business, rather than a profit center, but if they can get the government to pay the to develop something they need for themselves, they’re not stupid enough to turn down the money.

RpK is not receiving any money from anyone, as far as I know. The entity doesn’t even exist any longer. Rocketplane Global is raising funds privately, and not taking any government money that I’m aware of.

Also I probably should have written “Practically no human space activity in LEO…” instead of “space flight” although I think a lack of human space flight would be a likely outcome in such a scenario.

“I’m not trying to nitpick, but your sentence was written in the past, not present, tense[:]”

No problem, it was on purpose since the ISS and the plans for it has been around for a while now. I’m talking about the period of time from when the idea of an ISS partnership was established and up to the present. This reaches all the way back into the early, mid, or late eighties depending on how and from which perspective one looks at it even though the international agreement wasn’t signed before 98 with on-orbit construction starting the same year.

Much as the US had the SS Freedom plans before the ISS the Russians had Mir-2 plans in various incarnations all the way from 1976 onwards including a plan as recent as one year before being partly incorporated into the ISS layout in 1993. However just like SSF Mir-2 was highly unlikely to become an actual station on its own due to a lack of funding/support (its variations had after all existed as a make-work project for about 17 years). If the Soviet Union hadn’t collapsed it would have stumbled on without any launches just as it had and did for at least a year in Russia before they joined the preparations for the ISS partnership.

So my point was and continues to be that without the ISS it would be over two decades (and possibly still counting) of relatively rare ventures of humans into LEO, perhaps even none after a while (including the possibility that there might not have been anything in working order for the Russians to sell to the Chinese for them to modify and call their own).

Practically no human space flight to LEO (and there’s no reason to think it would be replaced by a drive to go elsewhere).

I’ll ask again:

“What’s so good about that? Sure it’s cheap but “nothing” is always cheap. Any other reasons?”

I’m not trying to nitpick, but your sentence was written in the past, not present, tense:

“I’m not aware of any nation that was willing to create any sort of station in LEO on their own (and yes that includes the US).”

Specifically, you used “was”, not “is”.

“I don’t know of any plans or even indications of plans to be executed as alternatives in case the ISS agreement fell through. Feel free to correct me if you know of any.”

Aside from Bigelow and China, there are no other entities pursuing permanent space stations that I’m aware of.

Due to the difficulty of getting access to the ISS, the remaining U.S. microgravity research community is already starting to use Bigelow — witness the Genebox demo on one of Bigelow’s subscale Genesis modules. If the ISS disappeared tomorrow — or if NASA did not railroad its remaining microgravity research onto ISS — it’s a fairly safe guess that use of Bigelow’s capabilities by NASA, U.S., and other microgravity researchers would accelerate.

Although U.S. and Japanese use of Chinese capabilities appears unlikely, there’s little keeping ESA, other European space agencies, and other nations from flying payloads on a future Chinese space station. There are examples of Chinese cooperation/coordination with Europe, Brazil, etc. in other civil space areas today. An extension to microgravity research and human space flight would probably be likely if ISS disappeared tomorrow.

Finally, temporary “space stations” can provide very useful multi-day/week/month access to the microgravity environment. Again, due to limited ISS access, U.S. and European microgravity researchers have flown payloads on Russian Soyuz and Foton vehicles. The same could done on Progress, ATV, HTV, and COTS upper stages, and will likely happen as long as ISS access remains so difficult.

“China might be doing some tiny thing within the next decade or two (2010-2030 timeframe) and once again it’s completely irrelevant to the point I was making.”

Correct me if I’m wrong, but your point was that, other than the members of the ISS partnership, no other nation or entity is interested in pursuing a space station in Earth orbit. Even if we set aside the historical Soviet stations and current Bigelow achievements and plans, why would Chinese planning be irrelevant to this point?

FWIW…

And the government isn’t the major revenue source for the current generation of New Space firms? And just where is the money that firms like Xcor and SpaceX and even RpK receiving coming from?

That is not the only reason they are investing, and it doesn’t logically follow that if those “opportunities” hadn’t been “created by the federal government” that they wouldn’t have existed otherwise, or that they were necessary for investment to occur.

There is a huge difference between thinking about something and opening your wallet for a couple of hundred megabucks when an opportunity appears.

People have been thinking about private spaceflight for decades. Now they are investing because of opportunities created by the government.

Bigelow’s particular design might not exist, but AFAIK Bigelow Aerospace would. Bob Bigelow had been thinking about these things for a while.

I don’t know of any plans or even indications of plans to be executed as alternatives in case the ISS agreement fell through. Feel free to correct me if you know of any.

China might be doing some tiny thing within the next decade or two (2010-2030 timeframe) and once again it’s completely irrelevant to the point I was making.

Rand as I understand it Bigelow Aerospace wouldn’t even exist if it hadn’t been for the fight between NASA and Congress over Transhab with Congress eventually putting it on ice in 99 (same year BA was founded) and then banning NASA from any further work on it in 2000. I’m fairly sure Bigelow himself have indicated pretty much the same (possibly in the Wired interview).