NASA

NASA budget documents posted

NASA has posted its more detailed documents for the FY11 budget proposal. Start with the overview document, which includes these details:

  • $19.0 billion for NASA in the FY11 request, rising to nearly $21 billion in FY15;
  • Just under $600M a year in FY11-14 for heavy-lift and propulsion research, rising to about $750M in FY15;
  • Robotic precursor missions will go from $125M in FY11 to nearly $1B in FY15;
  • Commercial crew will start with $500M in FY11, but quickly go to $1.2-1.4B/yr through FY15;
  • $2.5B in FY11-12 for Constellation closeout costs;
  • Relatively steady funding for space sciences.

150 comments to NASA budget documents posted

  • “At $3.1 billion over five years, an aggressive, new heavy lift research and
    development program will focus on development of new engines, propellants,
    materials and combustion processes, ultimately leading to innovative ways of
    accessing space to go beyond low Earth orbit. ” Bolden.

    That meager funding for an HLV is a joke!

  • David

    Honestly, I was hoping that a possible beneficiary of the Constellation cancellation would be a sizable increase in funding for NASA’s forgotten half, the aeronautics research. As big of a deal as people make about space (and yes, I realize this is “space politics”), aeronautics is the bread and butter of “aerospace”, at least in terms of utility, practicality, and widespread use. I’d love to have seen more money supporting subsonic, supersonic, and hypersonic research.

    Honestly, many of major manufacturers have stagnating research and development operations… NASA (and the Air Force to some extent) seems to be the only game in town still looking at SST, hypersonics, multicycle engines (like turbine-ramjet or turbine-scramjet engines), and blended wing body designs. Too bad little of the Constellation money is being funneled that way. :/

  • Major Tom

    A few notes:

    ISRU is back in under Exploration Technology and Demonstrations:

    “Demonstrates a broad range of key technologies, including in-situ resource utilization and advanced in-space propulsion.”

    Heavy Lift and Propulsion R&D includes:

    “New approaches to first-stage launch propulsion; [and] In-space advanced engine technology development and demonstrations”

    Will be interesting to see what “new first-stage approaches” means.

    Robotic Precursor Missions include:

    “robotic precursor missions to the Moon Mars and its moons Lagrange points Moon, moons, points, and nearby asteroids to scout targets for
    future human activities, and identify the hazards and resources that will determine the future course of the expansion of human civilization into space… Missions may include: Landing on the Moon with a robot that can be tele-operated from Earth and can transmit near-live video [and] Demonstrating a factory to process lunar or asteroid materials for use for various purposes”

    Prizes are back under Space Technology:

    “Uses prizes and other innovative research funding mechanisms, in addition to grants and other more traditional funding mechanisms.”

    FWIW…

  • Major Tom

    “That meager funding for an HLV is a joke!”

    It’s $3.0 billion more than what was in last year’s budget.

    FWIW…

  • richardb

    Eye watering pork for Congress to salivate over. Without a mission beyond the ISS, Nasa can’t really justify the expense of the current robotic Mars or Moon exploration programs nor can NASA justify spending serious R&D on rocket motors with no booster in need of it. All pork and all available.

    I wonder how much longer the the MSL will last before it too is cancelled?
    I wonder how much support Congress will have for the ISS 2 or 3 years from now?

    Face it folks, with a 3.8 TRILLION budget, this President could have easily fixed NASA’S Constellation issues without a blip on the budget. He choose not to because Barack Hussein Obama doesn’t believe in it. Maybe it was too “Bush like”; maybe he is like most on the left, just not interested. All he proposed was to kill a sound program that most definitely would work, so said the Augustine Commission, and replace it with Hope and not much else.

  • David

    @richardb
    “All he proposed was to kill a sound program that most definitely would work, so said the Augustine Commission, and replace it with Hope and not much else.”

    A program that most definitely work, according to the Augustine Commission? I think you were reading the wrong reports! In fact, their conclusion was that the goals of the Constellation program would be impossible to meet with any possible increase in money. Therefore, it suggested several other routes, one of which kept a lot of the Constellation program, and pushed the missions into the 2030s! I don’t know about you, but I’d like to do *something* with NASA in the next 20 years!

  • common sense

    ” NASA (and the Air Force to some extent) seems to be the only game in town still looking at SST, hypersonics, multicycle engines (like turbine-ramjet or turbine-scramjet engines), and blended wing body designs. Too bad little of the Constellation money is being funneled that way. ”

    I don’t know that you can claim this just yet. HOWEVER, the technologies you just listed have more to do with DoD than with NASA. There is very little chance to see a commercial SST because of airport and ATC infrastructures (they barely work for current subsonic aircraft). Blended wing are real nice but here again it would most likely require changes in infratructures as well as imaginative emergency procedures to geet people out of such a plane. Multi cycle engines are so far off in the future even for DoD applications that the current program(s) seem to be just fine. There will most likely NEVER be a multi-cycle crewed vehicle (airliner or combat aircraft). There may be a little chance to see some “cruise” missile and SSTO based on such technologies but nothing else.

  • David Davenport

    “new first-stage approaches”

    Including air beathing boosters.

    There will most likely NEVER be a multi-cycle crewed vehicle (airliner or combat aircraft).

    Says you.

  • wut

    What is this ‘science’ I keep hearing about? I thought NASA was only supposed to send middle-aged people up to drink tang and flip off the Chinese?

  • common sense

    @David Davenport:

    Says me? You bet! Go ask those who know, don’t ask me, I cannot care less. I am telling you what I KNOW. And since you seem to know so much please provide link that supports your assertion. Do you have any iodea whatsoever about multi-cycle engine and how they work? What it takes to boost an aircraft to the SCRAMJET operating speeds? What the fact that you have an enormous ramp in the back does to your aerodynamcis while the thing does not light? What you need to do to overcome such problems? What kind of ATC and airport infrastructures you might need? If you haave no idea to any of those questions at the very least then you don’t know what you are talikng about. Then there is propellant but that may be too technical here.

  • Rhyolite

    What happens to Orion?

  • @ Major Tom

    “It’s $3.0 billion more than what was in last year’s budget.”

    That’s less than NASA was spending on developing the Ares I without including the cost of the Orion-CEV. And Ares I cost were expected to rise up to $2 billion a year by next year.

    This is clearly not a HLV development program but merely a HLV research program with really no goal to develop anything. Obama is really just kicking real HLV development off to the next administration. And if this is all he can offer then he may get his wish sooner than he thinks!

  • @ richardb

    I agree with you. This NASA budget is an absolute Pork Fest!

  • richardb

    David, evidently you didn’t read this from the Augustine report, I quote:

    “We’ve reviewed the Ares I and Orion elements of that program, which are the two parts that are principally underway,” Augustine said Thursday. “We found those programs to be reasonably well managed, we found them to have technical problems of a nature that’s probably not uncommon for complex undertakings of this type.

    “It’s our belief that given ample time and funds, the engineers at NASA and their contractors are certainly capable of solving those problems. So we think the program within itself has a very good likelihood of succeeding. The issue that comes up under Ares I is whether the program is useful when it has succeeded because of a mismatch of the time schedules and the costs with what will be needed for it to do.”

    Since Obama told the Augustine commission not to assume significant budget improvements for NASA, he obviously had to state that last sentence. Clearly in a 3.8 trillion budget, Constellation’s out year budgets were gnat like and of no consequence budget wise.

    With this change in direction, Obama is forsaking something that would work for hope that the commercial providers such as SpaceX, and Elon Musk was a Obama contributor, will deliver not even an Ares I replacement. In fact what Obama is hoping for is something similar to what we had in 1965.

  • nonymouse

    “Constellation program would be impossible to meet with any possible increase in money.” – David

    can you find the quote on that? because I never read it that way… what I read was about starvation, and how that kept pushing the dates out. BUT. and this is a biggie… what IS this Constellation they are speaking of? The disparate parts seem to be in varying stages of on track, assuming they don’t change their minds for the n+1 time on land vs. water landing, etc. etc. etc.

    Also? They have gone the opposite direction AGAIN on current tech evolution versus new tech revolution. X-33 was the last new revolution, and they didn’t stick with it either. OI! If you ACTUALLY want to launch something, it’s easier to push your current lift than to make some kind of new engine.

    Here’s the thing. New tech is great but it’s a gamble. with X-33 they figured out how to do some of the tech several years AFTER the cancellation of the program. If you decide to launch something with the least waste of money, you push your current design a bit to see what can be done.

    I can’t believe we are going to go back into the SSTO and TSTO wilderness again. Argh. X-33, X-38, OSP, CEV-I… isn’t anyone paying attention? /rant

  • Major Tom

    “Nasa can’t really justify the expense of the current robotic Mars or Moon exploration programs”

    The Mars Exploration Program is managed by the Science Mission Directorate. It pursues goals set by the planetary science community via decadal reviews at the National Academies. For better or worse, it’s justified to Congress on the basis of science (e.g., search for water and life on Mars) and not human space exploration.

    There was no robotic “Moon exploration program”, at least in the old budget. There was only LRO/LREP in the Exploration Systems Mission Directorate. The rest of the robotic lunar exploration missions had been cancelled to fund Ares I/Orion. The Science Mission Directorate is independently pursuing a couple small lunar missions like LADEE.

    “I wonder how much support Congress will have for the ISS 2 or 3 years from now?”

    Congress supported the space station program for almost two decades before Constellation came along. They’ll continue to support it after. Their support for ISS has nothing to do with whether there is a human space exploration program or what the content of that program is.

    “he proposed was to kill a sound program that most definitely would work, so said the Augustine Commission”

    The final Augustine Report said no such thing. Of the PoR, it states:

    “Starting in the late 2010s, piloted flights in the Ares I and Orion could begin at a pace of several flights per year, but with no specific destination defined. The heavy-lift Ares V is not available until the late 2020s, allowing only orbital flights to the Moon. In addition, there are insufficient funds to develop the lunar lander and lunar surface systems until well into the 2030s, if ever.”

    It’s a broken program, creating launch vehicles after their destinations have ceased to exist (ISS) or without the in-space hardware necessary to reach other destinations like the Moon.

    Even setting aside Constellation’s programmatic problems, the Augustine report stated of the projects:

    Orion — “The current development is under considerable stress associated with schedule and weight margins. The primary long-term concern of the Committee is the recurring cost of the system.”

    Ares I — “[Problems should be] resolvable with commensurate cost and schedule impacts. Its ultimate utility is diminished by schedule delays, which cause a mismatch with the programs it is intended to serve.”

    It’s not just a question of money. It’s also a question of time. And even then, the Augustine Committee provided no guarantee and noted a number of technical issues with these projects.

    FWIW…

  • Major Tom

    “I can’t believe we are going to go back into the SSTO and TSTO wilderness again.”

    Who said we were?

    FWIW…

  • nonymouse

    “Just under $600M a year in FY11-14 for heavy-lift and propulsion research, rising to about $750M in FY15; ”

    Dunno Major Tom, doesn’t a line item like that look like they will start casting about for some kind of ill defined research projects again?

  • Robert G. Oler

    richardb wrote @ February 1st, 2010 at 1:39 pm

    “It’s our belief that given ample time and funds,”

    that is government speak for spend whatever it takes and take whatever time it needs.

    sorry we are moving out of that era.

    Robert G. Oler

  • richardb

    I love this from the budget doc:

    “An independent panel found that Constellation was years behind schedule and would require
    large budget increases to land even a handful of astronauts back on the Moon before 2030…..”

    Like he’s disappointed that it’s only a few? Was he expecting that NASA should have planned on send hundreds or thousands to the Moon by 2030? Would he have supported Constellation then?

  • MoonExploration

    Though I’m past one hundred thousand miles
    I’m feeling very still
    And I think my spaceship knows which way to go
    Tell my wife I love her very much (she knows!)
    Ground Control to Major Tom
    Your circuit’s dead, there’s something wrong
    Can you hear me, Major Tom?
    Can you hear me, Major Tom?
    Can you hear me, Major Tom?
    Can you hear….

    “ am I floating round my tin can
    Far above the Moon
    Planet Earth is blue
    And there’s nothing I can do.?

  • Robert G. Oler

    Marcel F. Williams wrote @ February 1st, 2010 at 1:34 pm

    That’s less than NASA was spending on developing the Ares I without including the cost of the Orion-CEV..

    three billion is a lot of money and SHOULD Be able to make considerable progress in a tight well managed program.

    Musk has according to most folks used about 1 billion dollars to get to having flown Falcon 1 successfully into orbit…and having a few unsuccessful test flights along the way…and is on the verge of flying Falcon 9. The trick is of course he ran a fairly tight ship…and used reasonably available technology.

    It strikes me that using “what is at hand” or “near hand” 3 billion should be able to move toward a heavy lift.

    on NASAspaceflight.com people were claiming that by 2012 (and you bought this number) they could cobble up a “Jupiter” HLV …no cost figures but ….

    Robert G. Oler

  • Major Tom

    “Dunno Major Tom, doesn’t a line item like that look like they will start casting about for some kind of ill defined research projects again?”

    Go to the documents. They say nothing about SSTO or TSTO. It’s all heavy lift (which I actually have concerns about) and in-space propulsion.

    There are also references to new first-stage technology, which might be a reusable booster. But it’s a stretch.

    FWIW…

  • Robert G. Oler

    richardb wrote @ February 1st, 2010 at 1:50 pm

    Like he’s disappointed that it’s only a few? ..

    I think surprised is the word. After 100 billion dollars and two or so decades one would think we could muster the effort to send more then just a handfull of NASA astronauts back to the Moon to redo something we did half a century (or more) ago.

    you act like going back was really going to change things.

    Robert G. Oler

  • Robert G. Oler

    MoonExploration wrote @ February 1st, 2010 at 1:52 pm

    that gets the Dick Shelby award

    Robert G. Oler

  • Major Tom

    “Can you hear me, Major Tom?”

    Yeah, I know my screenname is from Bowie “Space Oddity”. I chose it because of the pop reference.

    Come back to the discussion when you have a relevant point about the topic at hand.

    FWIW…

  • Major Tom

    “Like he’s disappointed that it’s only a few?”

    You’re ignoring the date. Bush II tasked Constellation with delivering lunar surface missions before 2020, not 2030.

    FWIW…

  • This expensive pork filled NASA budget with– no specific goals– is going to prompt many citizens and legislators in Congress to seriously question why NASA needs a $19 billion a year budget. And since there are no specific goals, it should make it pretty easy for the president to cut the NASA budget in the future without threatening any future programs– because there really are no specific programs except for continuing to finance the hyper expensive ISS boondoggle which has absolutely captured the US public’s imagination:-)

  • richardb

    Robert G, its patently obvious that no one knows how to send large numbers of people into space, not ISS, not the Moon, not to Alpha Centauri. Why Obama would approve such silly language in his budget docs speaks to a certain silliness by his writers. Its like from Casablanca where Inspector Reneau is “shocked, shocked at gambling” in Rick’s place.

  • David

    @richardb: no, it’s not that they’re disappointed that it’s only a few; it’s that the program was sold on returning in the 2020s, not the 2030s (the whole Apollo program happened in that schedule slip!)

    @common sense: I know what you’re saying about commercial SSTs and infrastructure challenges, but, to paraphrase a quote we all rather like, we don’t choose to do something because it’s easy, we choose to do it because it’s hard. We’ve come a long way in SST technology, with very little funding, since Concorde and the HSCT. A low boom SST is technically possible. Whether or not it’s worth the expense, is there a market, etc., is a good question, but that’s why NASA needs to be the one doing the research. If we knew it were going to be profitable, Boeing and NGC and LM would be all over it. NASA doesn’t need to be profitable.

    As for hypersonics, scramjets, etc…. The Air Force is doing a lot of the research in that field, but there is a lot of potential there too for civil applications. I know a lot of people seem to hate TSTO launch vehicles, but an airbreathing, mixed cycle engine *might* be a breakthrough cost wise. We don’t know that for sure, but if we don’t try we’ll never know. I would have liked to see some of the Constellation money funneled towards the underfunded aeronautics work.

  • nonymouse

    Ah, Major Tom, I was being less specific about missions and more about how those programs gyrated around and didn’t produce much visible anything.

    The Q? is why do you need heavy lift form NASA without a mission profile?

  • Major Tom

    “This expensive pork filled NASA budget…”

    The term “pork” refers to Congressional earmarks. This budget just went to Congress today. Congress hasn’t had a chance to add any earmarks. There won’t be any “pork” in the FY 2011 budget for weeks and months to come.

    FWIW…

  • Robert G. Oler

    richardb wrote @ February 1st, 2010 at 2:06 pm

    this administration did not start Constellation nor Ares, nor was the major track record of the program established under this administration.

    What this administration inherited was a program that was slipping in schedule and needed more funding…all for the goal of sending a few NASA astronauts back to the Moon and for what no one could really say.

    IF ARES/CONSTELLATION were on budget and on time table you and other folks might have an argument that it should be continued. It isnt. AT best we are looking (without massive increases in funding and then I would argue that it still would not change) at 2030 or so that is two decades before we are in a position to send a few NASA astronauts back to the Moon.

    What point is there in continuing?

    In many aspects Obama did what either Nixon or Ford or Carter should have done. Looked at the shuttle program and come to the conclusion that the program was simply not going to produce what it claimed it was going to produce and ended the franken thing before it ate the entire agency up.

    All the explanations to support more money “well its a rounding error”…are all attempts to explain a program that is not doing what it claimed it could do, for what it claimed it could do it, in the time frame it claimed to be capable of.

    Ie explaining failure.

    Sorry, that dog wont hunt anymore

    Robert G. Oler

  • @ Robert G. Oler

    But the Augustine Commission claimed that NASA was distorting the facts when they argued that they could fund the development of a heavy lift vehicle. After the completion of the Ares I (an architecture that I strongly oppose, by the way), NASA would have had at least 3.4 billion a year to work with to develop a heavy lifter. That’s $17 billion dollars over 5 years, $34 billion over 10 years.

    Now all of a sudden a mere $3.1 billion is all it takes?

  • Robert G. Oler

    Marcel F. Williams wrote @ February 1st, 2010 at 2:02 pm

    This expensive pork filled NASA budget with– no specific goals– is going to prompt many citizens and legislators in Congress to seriously question why NASA needs a $19 billion a year budget…

    you dont understand pork

    Robert G. Oler

  • Robert G. Oler

    Marcel F. Williams wrote @ February 1st, 2010 at 2:17 pm

    I dont think that the Ares staff structure and people could produce anything under any time frame for any amount of money. The spent between 4 to 9 billion dollars to get to a 1:44 or so test flight.

    Just because “they” cannot do it, doesnt mean it cannot be done.

    You need to look at the Cougar vehicle the USMC bought visa ve the vehicle that Lockheed claimed it was building for the Cougar mission.

    The Lockheed vehicle is still going no where…Cougars are in combat.

    A HLV can be done if it is done in some fashion different and with different people in charge then what Ares had.

    Robert G. OLer

  • common sense

    @David:

    ” low boom SST is technically possible. Whether or not it’s worth the expense, is there a market, etc., is a good question, but that’s why NASA needs to be the one doing the research.”

    Yes, so who said they aren’t? Or will not? The only potential, identified market today is that of a SSBJ. And even that is a long stretch. A lot of the involved technologies may NOT be released to the public…

    “The Air Force is doing a lot of the research in that field, ”

    Yes and NASA should not duplicate the effort hence the changes with X-43/X-51.

    “is a lot of potential there too for civil applications.”

    No there is no such potential.

    “I would have liked to see some of the Constellation money funneled towards the underfunded aeronautics work.”

    Wait and see then. I don’t think we know everything just yet.

  • @ Robert G. Oler

    “you dont understand pork”

    I understand what pork means in its technical political sense. Pork is short for Pork Barrel and is defined as:

    the use of government funds for projects designed to please voters or legislators and win votes : political pork barrel for the benefit of their respective sponsors | [as adj. ] wasteful, pork-barrel spending.

    So I think I understand when you’re wasting the tax payer funds as a make work program instead of attempting to accomplish something. And that’s the problem with this budget.

    But I’m not against pure R&D. But I don’t think NASA should be used solely as a pure R&D program or as an exploratory program.

  • richardb

    So let me ask all the happy campers out there:
    What do we after the ISS splashes down circa 2020?
    What does this hoped for commercial launcher do then?
    Why would SpaceX build, on commercial terms, a very expensive system that will be used by one sure customer for just a couple years and then mothballed for lack of customers?

    The simple fact is this budget doesn’t have a new start to a follow on to the ISS. No new program just vague “game changers” for no particular purpose. Given how long any manned space project takes, I would guess even a new start would take 10 years to complete. So given nothing now and nothing committed to during Obama’s first term, I think we end up with Nasa essentially shutting down its manned program as soon as the ISS is deorbited.

  • @Robert G. Oler

    The Ares program was simply the wrong architecture!

    However, the Augustine Commissioned claimed that the directly shuttle derived vehicles were also too expensive– while NASA and the DIRECT folks claimed that they weren’t. Of course, unlike the other scenarios, the Augustine Commission report financially burdened the directly shuttle derived scenario with a 5 year extension of the space shuttle program plus a 5 year extension of the ISS program, and then falsely claimed that it required three launches of an SD-HLV per manned Moon mission.

    So its difficult for me to take anything that the Augustine Commission said– too seriously!

  • Major Tom

    “What do we after the ISS splashes down circa 2020?”

    The program is extended to 2020. That doesn’t mean it’s going to end in 2020. It may be extended further.

    “What does this hoped for commercial launcher do then?”

    Well, if they’re smart, like Falcon 9 and Taurus II, it will be capable of launching satellites, not just human capsules (as Ares I was).

    And even if ISS is retired, who’s to say Bigelow won’t have a station on orbit? Or in lunar orbit?

    And besides, SpaceX is selling Dragon for in-space research flights. Even Dragon may not need a destination to generate business.

    “Why would SpaceX build, on commercial terms, a very expensive system that will be used by one sure customer for just a couple years and then mothballed for lack of customers?”

    Falcon 9 already has multiple customers.

    “The simple fact is this budget doesn’t have a new start to a follow on to the ISS.”

    Since when is an HLV not a new start? Or a flagship-class in-space propellant depot test?

    “No new program…”

    There’s lots of new programs. Havn’t you read any of the NASA or the White House’s budget materials?

    “So given nothing now and nothing committed to during Obama’s first term, I think we end up with Nasa essentially shutting down its manned program as soon as the ISS is deorbited.”

    That was guaranteed to happen under the POR, anyway. ISS would have deorbited in 2016, Ares I/Orion would have come online in 2017-19 with nowhere to go, and Ares V would have come online circa 2030 with no lunar hardware.

    At least now there’s a shot that ISS and commercial crew will coexist for some number of years and that we’ll have an HLV and other exploration hardware online sometime before my one-year old niece graduates college.

    FWIW…

  • Robert G. Oler

    Marcel F. Williams wrote @ February 1st, 2010 at 2:51 pm

    So I think I understand when you’re wasting the tax payer funds as a make work program instead of attempting to accomplish something,,

    you still dont understand pork.

    Pork is when something is done which is of value only to the folks who are directly affected by the federal spending in a narrow constituency of political officials.

    An example of “pork” is John Murtha inserting into the FAA budget a requirement that a second runway be built at the airport in his hometown…when the one runway that was at the airport (and instrument qualified) was more then adequate. (more then adequate).

    Earmarks are another case of pork…but who is counting.

    The metric you seem to have is “accomplishing something”…well it all depends I guess on what that something is.

    I dont view returning to the Moon for a few NASA astronauts in about 20 years…as accomplishing anything of value. you might I dont.

    Robert G. Oler

  • Robert G. Oler

    Marcel F. Williams wrote @ February 1st, 2010 at 3:01 pm

    However, the Augustine Commissioned claimed that the directly shuttle derived vehicles were also too expensive– while NASA and the DIRECT folks claimed that they weren’t..

    As I have noted on more then one instance (the latest when the claims were made about the HLV and what was being said on NASAspaceflight.com)…

    the burden on anyone who would propose a shuttle derived vehicle of any sort is to show that one gets the technology development (and I agree that there is a lot there) without the cost of the current shuttle infrastructure.

    I agree that IT CAN BE DONE…but I dont see any instance where it has been done. So for instance…if one is going to use “solids” on a SDHLV (shuttle derived heavy lift vehicle) the trick would be to show that the mamouth workforce that comes with the solids doesnt stay with the solids…

    What makes Musk unique is that he has built a vehicle which keeps “manpower” cost to a minimium. Any HLV is going to have to have low operating cost or it isnt affordable.

    Robert G. Oler

  • @ richardb

    In Israel, Bolden talked about extending the life of the ISS to 2028. So that should keep this private companies on the government dole for another 8 years with another $16 billion a year going to support perhaps one or two private companies hand picked by the Federal government.

    Bolden also talked about the possibility that there may be no NASA astronauts anymore! And that could mean no civil US government entity in space. Ironically, that would probably lead to a US military presence in order to protect corporate interest– unless private companies end up hiring ‘Blackwater Aerospace’ (Didn’t we see them in Avatar?) to protect their interest for the evil Russians and Chinese out there:-)

  • Artemus

    It would be better for NASA to have a vision with no budget, instead of what we just got, which is a budget with no vision. They might as well just fold it into the NSF.

    There is now no human spaceflight objective beyond servicing ISS for a few years. I don’t care whether you are a NASA civil servant, a young SpaceX go-getter, or just a “space cadet”, that is not a good thing. No objective means Uncle Sam has no payloads for you. The government vs. commercial debate is noise. It wouldn’t matter if a solid gold asteroid were discovered; there would still be no business case for going to it.

    Folks, it’s over.

  • Paul

    The problem isn’t the proposed budget, the problem is that we never developed a successor to the shuttle, so we ended up putting together a program that never had the time or money to get it right.

    The budget just shows what should have been obvious for years… After the shuttle – it is over. We just don’t have the capability to do anything for another decade or so. Let’s all just face the facts. It doesn’t matter what the budget says or what you want to call it. IT IS OVER… for now.

    We blew it, we didn’t plan for the future. Now, we’ve got to go back to square one, and build a program that makes sense. If you want to give it a fancy name to make you feel better then go ahead call it “Globular Cluster” or some other name.

    So the choice was easy — Keep flushing money down the toilet building Ares I (which when finished would give us access to LEO just about the time ISS is gone putting us right back in about 1979) or scrap that plan and build a proper foundation that gives us capability to do real things in space outside of LEO.

    The only thing I have a problem with is the HLV development. I think it should have been the primary focus. We should drop almost everything and build a man-rated HLV to get us back to where we need to be, and where we can begin talking about where to go.

  • frotski

    What I loved about the teleconference was “Sorry, we don’t have any dates for beyond LEO, Constellation gave dates and see where they are. We don’t want to promise any dates and then slip them. We just want to study heavy lift technologies for a while”

    Blah, Blah, Blah.

    Why did Constellation give dates then? Just say we don’t know when it will be ready? That seems good enough for today’s administration putting forth the new vision.

    “Sometime in the future” seems to be a good enough answer.

    Why didn’t someone in Constellation management think of that sooner? :(

    So, basically we already studied what we want to do and where we want to go and came up with technology to DO IT.

    But, the new plan is not to do ANYTHING ANYTIME SOON, but start studying for something we might do one day (obviously because there are NO DATES).

    So, let’s recap, we could do a mission to the moon or flexible path or whatever NOW and have technology to do it. But, instead, let’s not actually DO anything until we find a way for a space ship to levetate via bovine excrement. THEN, and ONLY then, when we have found the holy grail of engineering greatness that has eluded us for centuries will we actually put money into going beyond LEO.

    Well, that’s my take on it anyways…

  • MrEarl

    Why dose an R&D scientist make a lousy lover?
    He never dose anything except sit at the edge of the bed telling her how great it’s going to be when he’s finished.

  • Anthony Kendall

    Let’s just look at the facts here:
    * Ares I program cancelled, result: wasteful and duplicative NEO capabilities eliminated
    * >$250 million/yr in HLV research and development, result: far more than in previous budgets, likely accelerated HLV development in future years if desired
    * Greatly increased funding for commercial manned launch provides, result: development of new capacity for commercial launch industry, potentially much greater return on investment due to private industry’s many advantages
    * Increased earth sciences funding, result: more data to answer important questions on critical problems we have here at home
    * Increased robotic and telescope funding, result: more of what has been effective for NASA for the last 30+ years
    * Extension of the ISS mission, result: relatively inexpensive continuation of a massive prior investment, potentially good science returns

    NASA’s Constellation program was a massive program with little likelihood of long-term success. The Augustine commission qualified their statement about its success with “given sufficient funding”, well that wasn’t going to happen under this or any other administration. That program would have sucked the life out of HSF, and eventually NASA–hell, it already was.

    Put away the partisan sunglasses for a moment, folks, and look at where we were headed. It was a dead end. Now, we may not have a target, but at least the road is open ahead. That’s not perfect, but it’s a huge improvement.

  • John Malkin

    Technically couldn’t a commercial company take over development of Ares I if they thought it was a viable solution? Something like Bigelow using NASA’s TransHab program technologies. I’m sure even ATK couldn’t rationalize developing the Ares into a commercial vehicle. I can’t really see it crossing over to anything. It’s really a single use rocket which was pointed out by the Augustine report.

  • MrEarl

    Sorry, couldn’t help myself.
    When I looked at the budget outline with all the listing of technologies NASA will be investing in I couldn’t help but think an exploration plan would include all these things too.
    What this administration has done is taken away the reason to develop all these technologies by taking away human space exploration. Without an over arching goal like the Moon, Mars and Beyond those research efforts will fizzle out then die.

  • Robert G. Oler

    richardb wrote @ February 1st, 2010 at 2:53 pm

    So let me ask all the happy campers out there:
    What do we after the ISS splashes down circa 2020?

    the only way I think that ISS does not splash down, is if there is something commercial which keeps it afloat.

    Space activist act as if human spaceflight and exploration is just one of those things that is done and doenst have to return anything other then the joy of doing it (some flags etc)

    there is NOTHING in the American infrastructure which gets that much money and returns that little. I dont know what is going to follow ISS, I am willing to let the market have a go at determining that.

    Robert G. Oler

  • Robert G. Oler

    MrEarl wrote @ February 1st, 2010 at 4:22 pm

    What this administration has done is taken away the reason to develop all these technologies by taking away human space exploration. ..

    so in you’re world a program that is doing nothing but keeping people employed and consuming dollars is human space exploration?

    Robert G. Oler

  • richardb

    Ok, given that US manned space program has no follow on mission outside of the ISS, how long before members of Congress propose terminating US sponsorship of the ISS at 2015, the date we are obligated to support it under the treaty we signed for the ISS’s operation?
    I can’t see any reason to fund it beyond 2015 since we will have no new program of record replacing Constellation. Its hard to think of worthy justifications for circling the globe 18 times a day when there is no future use for their research.

    ISS isn’t the only mission Obama has put in jeopardy. All the “follow the water” missions Nasa has proposed are also questionable since there is no intent to send Americans beyond about 250 miles from the earth’s surface.

  • Robert G. Oler

    richardb wrote @ February 1st, 2010 at 4:29 pm

    Ok, given that US manned space program has no follow on mission outside of the ISS, how long before members of Congress propose terminating US sponsorship of the ISS at 2015, the date we are obligated to support it under the treaty we signed for the ISS’s operation?..

    probably never.

    Very quickly there will be new agreements signed on ISS between the various countries…this will include some of the concepts of resupply, and one hopes how the various countries will use their segments of the vehicle (and combined ops) to press economic advantage.

    you’re statement is a straw man.

    There was no mission that was going to happen under Ares/Constellation even if Obama had two terms that was going to send people outside of LEO…

    the only thing that has been stopped is the massive jobs machine that was pretending to do exploration…

    Robert G. Oler

  • Robert G. Oler

    frotski wrote @ February 1st, 2010 at 3:50 pm

    So, let’s recap, we could do a mission to the moon or flexible path or whatever NOW and have technology to do it…

    no we dont so we cant. Sorry

    Robert G. Oler

  • @ frotski

    This budget is basically a mission to nowhere. And it pretty much sets NASA up for significant budget cuts in the future years and may even end our national civilian manned space program as Bolden has speculated. But we could end up with the US military filling that void– in order to protect national security.

    By hurting NASA’s ability to pioneer the New Frontier, China, Russia, Europe, India, Japan, and the international private commercial launch companies are the real winners here. And none of these entities are necessarily loyal to the interest of the American people!

  • richardb

    No strawmans from me. There was a program of record fully supported by the US Congress even after the Augustine Report came out. They knew Ares I was going to be delayed and they knew that the current budget top line was insufficient but still they supported it with a budget just a few months ago. Augustine said Ares I would work but it needed alot more money to become useful. What govt space program doesn’t?

    Now with this budget there is a roadmap to nowhere. So I don’t doubt that a growing chorus of Congress will question the reason we are funding the ISS when we have nothing to use the information for.

    For that matter explain to me the payoff to pay for all of NASA’s future “follow the water missions”? These missions were partially justified by the hope Americans could land on the outer planets and use the water for survival and rocket fuel. Obama just called into question the value of those missions too.

    I don’t begrudge Obama the duty to cancel a failed program, but to do it and propose no replacement is a terrible decision IMHO and I fear it will gut NASA. We’ve become the Portugal of the 21st Century.

  • Major Tom

    “So that should keep this private companies on the government dole”

    The “dole” refers to welfare. Paying for capabilities and services is not welfare. The government is a customer like any other customer.

    “Bolden also talked about the possibility that there may be no NASA astronauts anymore!”

    No, he talked about defending the existence of the astronaut corps during the gap (which actually makes no sense, because NASA still needs astronauts for ISS, regardless of how they get there).

    FWIW…

  • Robert G. Oler

    richardb wrote @ February 1st, 2010 at 4:55 pm

    No strawmans from me. There was a program of record fully supported by the US Congress even after the Augustine Report came out…

    there is no reason to suspect, using the logic of your statement, that Congress which happily supported a failed program, one that was going to need dollars that dont exist (or are not yet printed)…will continue to support projects that are working, doing something and cost less.

    the trick in this effort is to get away from the “program” mentality, where things exist for no real reason, are not producing results, and yet just keep people employed.

    Who knows what will come next after ISS…when Boeing built the 707 it really had no idea what was coming next. The market dictated that.

    Robert G. Oler

  • Robert G. Oler

    Marcel F. Williams wrote @ February 1st, 2010 at 4:40 pm
    and the international private commercial launch companies are the real winners here…

    not if SpaceX can do what it says…then they take all the launch business.. it is that simple

    Robert G. Oler

  • Major Tom

    “It would be better for NASA to have a vision with no budget, instead of what we just got, which is a budget with no vision.”

    It would be best if NASA was actually developing exploration capabilities and hardware, regardless of budget and vision.

    Pretty pictures, inspiring words, and dates don’t mean much for human space exploration when the taxpayers’ exploration dollars aren’t going to exploration and are being used to build the nation’s fourth mid-lift LEO launch vehicle instead.

    “There is now no human spaceflight objective”

    The objective is the solar system.

    “beyond servicing ISS for a few years.”

    Ten years plus is more than “a few years”.

    “No objective means Uncle Sam has no payloads for you.”

    Simply not true. Even if all human space flight activities were zeroed out today, Uncle Sam would still have a couple dozen payloads that need launch per year.

    FWIW…

  • Daniel C

    @richardb:

    I think you are purposely misrepresenting the Augustine Report. I read all of it. I have it in front of me right now. NASA may have the technical capability to eventually, some day, complete Constellation, but it is the wrong program. The panel compares Constellation against various other options and score them on 12 criteria. Look at the charts. Option 3 is Constellation with the higher budget. You’ll see that Constellation ranks lower than the other options in almost all criteria. In particular, options 4A and 5A are better than Constellation on ALL the criteria. So no matter which criteria are most important to you, there are options better than Constellation.

  • Robert G. Oler

    richardb wrote @ February 1st, 2010 at 4:55 pm
    We’ve become the Portugal of the 21st Century…

    for that to be accurate there has to be 1) a new world of the 21st century and 2) some nation to make money from the “new world”.

    Ie there has to be a Spain.

    sorry dont see it

    Robert G. Oler

  • Space Baby

    Seems like Obama could have folded certain aspects of Constellation and an HLV program into the Air Force budget where the money and pork really is. Then it would be out of the domestic budget and he could appease the space-frightened left and NASA welfare districts of the southern right.

    Hmmm, on second thought, do you really think that the USA is going to sacrifice a presence in space while the Chinese commercialize or militarize LEO and the moon. Just read George Friedman’s “The Next 100 Years: A Forecast for the 21st Century” and get a fascinating look at how the Guvmnt strategizes way far ahead like a chess game.

    Accordingly, there is no way that the US is going to give up preeminence in space. Translated, this means we can eventually expect lots of moon landings, a lunar base, and HLV’s and space stations–albeit secret and military, which sucks and may foment crises, anyhow. For example, read about the Air Force’s 40 year plan here: http://www.alternet.org/story/145370/robots_will_soon_do_all_our_killing_for_us?page=entire

    Geekmates, there is going to be heaps of technology transfer from the military to civilian space programs, eg, adaptive optics and lots of the aforementioned robotics and aeronautics. If that’s what it takes, its a bitter pill I’d swallow. Or better yet, don’t we need a defense shield against asteroids. Maybe we can finagle missions to asteroids and even Mars under this rubric (Mars or its moons are scientifically well situated for that!). Heck, probably a well-funded black program doing this already. Wait, I’ll check ATS forums to see…

    SB

  • Major Tom

    “Why did Constellation give dates then?”

    Constellation didn’t “give dates”. The Bush II Administration set them — ISS transport demo by 2014 and lunar return by 2020 — and Constellation failed to meet them, by a half-decade and decade, respectively.

    “… we could do a mission to the moon or flexible path or whatever NOW and have technology to do it.”

    No we don’t. We don’t have an HLV, we don’t have an in-space stage, we don’t have a lander, etc., etc. Constellation failed to invest in any of that.

    “But, instead, let’s not actually DO anything until we find a way for a space ship to levetate via bovine excrement.”

    No, let’s invest so that we have an HLV, in-space propulsion, and other key capabilities in hand or well underway before setting dates we can’t meet.

    FWIW…

  • common sense

    “Constellation didn’t “give dates”. The Bush II Administration set them — ISS transport demo by 2014 and lunar return by 2020 — and Constellation failed to meet them, by a half-decade and decade, respectively.”

    Those dates were so very unrealistic that to meet them NASA would have had to change the way they do their work. The O’Keefe spiral approach had the merit to incrementally respond to these dates and it may have worked. Griffin’s ESAS and Ares/Orion was the very worst thing that could happen to NASA. It disregraded the work of the pre Phase 1 contractors and imposed an architecture that had been studied for 90 days. This is what happend when someone “believes” his approach is better because of a 90 day study: The capabilities did not exist to make the program successful and anyone a little honest working on the program would tell you.

  • Daniel C

    richardb wrote:

    So let me ask all the happy campers out there:
    What do we after the ISS splashes down circa 2020?
    What does this hoped for commercial launcher do then?

    If you read the Augustine Panel report you will see a discussion of our options. It is precisely this sort of considerations that lead to the cancellation of Constellation. For example:

    1) The panel recommends work on developing in-space propellant transfer so there can be fuel depots in space. Fuel is a huge part of the weight of any exploration vehicle, but it is not a sensitive cargo. Developing this technology would be a game changer for human space flight.

    2) Commercial space vehicles would facilitate the development of the space tourism industry. Bigelow wants to develop a space hotel and would be a natural customer for the space taxi.

    Why would SpaceX build, on commercial terms, a very expensive system that will be used by one sure customer for just a couple years and then mothballed for lack of customers?

    SpaceX is already building these systems. Clearly they thought they had a business case even before the FY11 budget. The FY11 budget simply improves the situation for SpaceX.

    The simple fact is this budget doesn’t have a new start to a follow on to the ISS. No new program just vague “game changers” for no particular purpose. Given how long any manned space project takes, I would guess even a new start would take 10 years to complete.

    The Apollo program landed people on the moon 8 years after Kennedy’s speech, and back then we hardly knew anything about human space flight. At the time of Kennedy’s speech, the US had only flown a human into space once, only 20 days before. I think that today, 50 years later, we should be able to do it in a little less than 10 years.

  • @Major Tom

    “No, he talked about defending the existence of the astronaut corps during the gap (which actually makes no sense, because NASA still needs astronauts for ISS, regardless of how they get there).”

    Apparently you didn’t watch Bolden’s lengthy interview last week in Israel about the future of NASA!

  • Major Tom

    “I’m sure even ATK couldn’t rationalize developing the Ares into a commercial vehicle. I can’t really see it crossing over to anything. It’s really a single use rocket which was pointed out by the Augustine report.”

    ATK provides the SRB for the first-stage, but payments to/partnerships with a consortium of companies and payments to government facilities would be needed to field Ares I commercially.

    And you’re right, Ares I can’t launch anything to orbit besides Orion (unless you add a stripped down Orion to provide the injection stage for something else).

    FWIW…

  • Some people mentioned China as a competition.
    Seriously, the only way to compete with a country that has 4 times the brains of the US, is to make more babies. Because brains are the fuel of superiority. If you seriously want to keep NASA ahead of CNSA (Chinese National Space Agency), then stop reading blogs on the internet and make babies. Otherwise CNSA will be number one by 2050, no matter what.

    Constellation vs ISS
    Constellation would be a series of about ten missions to the moon, 4 people each, each staying about a week on the surface of the moon.
    Science return: moon geology
    also: a heavy lift Ares V only useful for moon adventures.
    The additional demanded 3 billion a year won’t even fund the basement of a permanent moon base.
    By the way, we still have a few hundred kilograms of pristine moon dust in our bunkers.

    ISS on the other hand has some value:
    permanent presence in space for 6 astronauts permanently for many years.
    Science return: material science, medical science and social science

  • richardb

    The Portugal of the 21st century is how the Portuguese turned away from exploration and watched as others bypassed them. Its an fitting analogy.

    Daniel C, no I didn’t lie about the report. People are claiming that Ares I was unworkable or indeed couldn’t work going back to the Direct team. I said Augustine made no such claims and testified to Congress it would work and was experiencing common growth pains. I have never said it was “the best”. It was the program of record though and now there is nothing.

    Major Tom, The ISS is guaranteed US funding under treaty til 2015. Its up to the US Congress and President to decide to go further. Obama and Bush said 2020, but now with no long term program for sending Americans into space, all bets are off.

    Robert G, when you said “the trick in this effort is to get away from the “program” mentality, where things exist for no real reason, are not producing results, and yet just keep people employed.” you obviously don’t realize that this budget is precisely what you rail against. Its funding billions over many years for nothing in particular. Probably having industrial base considerations for the propulsion work, ie make work just to keep the expertise. Its just the type of programs that could be cut by Congress.

    Consider all the industrial heritage and knowledge we’re giving up.
    Solid rocketry with the SRB
    J2-X
    Michaud and its materials engineering
    Dozens of engineering disciplines
    Orion capsule design, engineering and fabrication
    Thats alot to willing give up for nothing in return.

  • common sense

    Yes the comparison with Portugal is a fitting one indeed. Portugal?… Oh boy!

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_infant_mortality_rate

  • Artemus

    “Simply not true. Even if all human space flight activities were zeroed out today, Uncle Sam would still have a couple dozen payloads that need launch per year.”

    Human spaceflight is what we are talking about here. The choice was to do it slowly and expensively, via Constellation, or not at all. Private business is not going to be sending anyone beyond LEO (and LEO is questionable) for the foreseeable future. There is no return on investment for it. The enthusiasm and publicity about private spaceflight over the past few years was well-intentioned, but in the end all it did was give cover to Obama by letting him make like he’s “passing the torch”.

    Well, it was fun while it lasted. Maybe I’ll take that new bullet train out to Disney World and ride Space Mountain, and dream of the old days, when it was all real.

  • Robert G. Oler

    richardb wrote @ February 1st, 2010 at 5:45 pm

    The Portugal of the 21st century is how the Portuguese turned away from exploration and watched as others bypassed them. Its an fitting analogy.
    ..

    but no one else is doing exploration with humans. There is a lot of talk abut the PRC is barely at Gemini IV era.

    “Robert G, when you said “the trick in this effort is to get away from the “program” mentality, where things exist for no real reason, are not producing results, and yet just keep people employed.”you obviously don’t realize that this budget is precisely what you rail against.

    …..

    I dont see that because I dont find a lot of value in the things you mention.

    None.

    To have value in This Republic things either have to do some task which government is directly tasked to do…or to have commercial value.

    I see value in a B52 because it does things no other airplane can do…and does it fairly cheaply (at least in relative value) …I dont see value in an F22…it is an airplane without an opponent and it is far to expensive compared to alternatives.

    I dont see much value in almost anything that NASA has developed under the Ares/Constellation program…there is in my view NO National urgency in going to the Moon again, there is no use for the entire system at NASA…it has developed nothing in launch technology that is commercially useful or even helps defend The Republic.

    I see in the commercial effort a method to allow the genius that is America, the free enterprise system to work in human spaceflight. I see enormous urgency in that.

    Robert G. Oler

  • Daniel C

    richardb wrote @

    Augustine said Ares I would work but it needed alot more money to become useful. What govt space program doesn’t?

    An efficient one. All programs cost at least some money, but an efficient program delivers more for less money than an inefficient one. The Augustine Panel said that the commercial sector would be more cost effective than the Ares I, that it would give the US access to LEO sooner and in the process leave the US better prepared for exploration.

    Now with this budget there is a roadmap to nowhere.

    This program accelerates the development of key technologies such as in-space propellant transfer and an HLV. I think this is better than some dreamy goal with no sensible plan to achieve it. Constellation would not put humans on the moon until well into the 2030s if ever – according to the Augustine Panel. That’s not a roadmap.

    So I don’t doubt that a growing chorus of Congress will question the reason we are funding the ISS when we have nothing to use the information for.

    Congress funds a lot more fundamental research than the ISS. And Congress has already been funding the ISS, and indeed, the shuttle program for decades without any particular plan to go beyond LEO.

    For that matter explain to me the payoff to pay for all of NASA’s future “follow the water missions”? These missions were partially justified by the hope Americans could land on the outer planets and use the water for survival and rocket fuel.

    To me the justification was always scientific research and the search for life outside earth. The Cassini spacecraft went to Saturn. Do you think that was a precursor for human exploration of Saturn? New Horizons is on its way to Pluto. Do you think that’s a precursor for human exploration of Pluto? What about the probes to Venus? What about the Voyager spacecraft which left the solar system? The reason we keep sending probes all over the solar system is not because we are planning to build a house there but because we want to do scientific research.

    In any case, no program will get us to Mars very soon, but increasing our robotic missions to Mars will provide invaluable information for when we do get to the point of considering a Mars mission.

    I don’t begrudge Obama the duty to cancel a failed program, but to do it and propose no replacement is a terrible decision IMHO and I fear it will gut NASA. We’ve become the Portugal of the 21st Century.

    I think you are being overly dramatic. NASA will not just suddenly disappear. I actually think that Obama’s plans could make NASA a lot more efficient by eliminating much of the internal bureaucracy inherent in all big government agencies. I think it’s time that space transportation move out from big daddy government and move toward the marketplace. This shift has to happen sooner or later. We would not have the aviation industry we have today if aviation was still controlled by the US government. We will not have a vibrant space industry until we start to rely more on the private sector. The move from the government to the private sector can be intimidating, but it is the only way to really make progress in space.

  • NASA Fan

    I’ve been in and around NASA for over 20 years. There is a long history of, when budget cuts come, R&D and technology development budgets that get hit. This is a NASA/Government dynamic.

    Now it looks like NASA is going to be in the R&D biz towards advancing rocket technologies, in orbit technologies, and the like. And since there is a vague sense of some future someday maybe Flexi-punt mission, I fully expect that whatever R&D dollar amount eventually gets agreed to for FY 11, you will see it suffer the death of a thousand small cuts.

    Don’t be surprised to see an new mission directorate charged with HSF R&D, then over time get whacked, slowly at first, then totally. There used to be a Code X, or was it Code R, at HQ charged with new technologies/R&D. Not anymore.

    I expect as well that whatever the projected multi-year budget is for this R&D effort, that too will not materialize (just like the Cx monies never materialized).

    Also, JSC is an operations culture. Not an R&D culture. JSC flies missions and does engineering in support of mission operations. I wonder if they will be able to adjust to an R&D environment. Thoughts anyone on that?

  • Wodun

    Sad days for the USA.

    There is no plan for the future. There is no future without a plan.

    Cutting constellation could have been a good idea but only if it was replaced by a better plan.

    Words cannot express how disappointing this is.

  • Major Tom

    “Obama could have folded certain aspects of Constellation and an HLV program into the Air Force budget where the money and pork really is”

    USAF has no requirements for an HLV or human space flight.

    FWIW…

  • omi

    Well this is a let down guess it is a new dark age for America 2020+ (Just hope Palin doesnt become president :))

  • nonymouse

    eh, NASA Fan… I see this as an MSFC win / JSC loss, no?

  • richardb

    I haven’t seen much about the 2.5 billion to close out Constellation. Is that new spending or is it taken from what Constellation would have spent anyway?

    Either way, I think its possible that Congress will cut Obama’s topline request by 2.5 billion anyway and make Nasa eat those costs. I think its delusional to believe Congress, after supporting Constellation since 2005, will allow it to be canned and then turn around and increase NASA’s budget as a nice reward. Delusional.

    In any event, the day Bolden goes to Capitol Hill to testify about this will be must see TV. DVR will be tuned to C-Span that day.

  • Major Tom

    “Apparently you didn’t watch Bolden’s lengthy interview last week in Israel about the future of NASA!”

    I did. You didn’t. Per Mr. Foust’s earlier post:

    “Bolden suggested that the gap between the shuttle and its successor will give ammunition to some that NASA should, of all things, scrap its astronaut corps. ‘I can guarantee you that there will be debate as to whether NASA needs to have astronauts,’ he said. ‘I can just see it coming in the United States, you know. I wish it were not going to come up, but it will come up: ‘You don’t have a space shuttle, you’re not flying a vehicle, so why do you need astronauts?’ I get asked those kinds of questions all the time.'”

    Again, he talked about defending the astronaut corps during the gap. He didn’t say that the astronaut corps would cease to exist, which can’t happen anyway, because the corps is needed for ISS.

    FWIW…

  • Robert G. Oler

    NASA Fan wrote @ February 1st, 2010 at 6:35 pm

    Also, JSC is an operations culture…

    This is the real problem.

    JSC is no more an operational culture then I am the King Of The US.

    If they were “operational” then someone would have figured out in developing the system for Ares/Constellation that 1) it has to be affordable and 2) it has to do something of value …

    If they were “operational” then Columbia and Challenger would have never happened.

    Look the problem is that NASA is neither an operational nor research culture. Someone has to figure out which NASA is going to be (seems we are leaning to research) and then cleanse the agency of all the leaders who cannot get on with the plan…

    Robert G. Oler

  • Major Tom

    “Human spaceflight is what we are talking about here.”

    Your earlier sentence said “payloads”, not “human space flight”. That’s what you were talking about.

    “The choice was to do it slowly and expensively, via Constellation, or not at all.”

    It wasn’t going to happen at all with Constellation. Do you really think every future White House and Congress between 2010 and 2040 would rubber stamp a human lunar return program, especially one with multi-billion dollar overruns and decades-long delays? That’s at least five Presidents and 15 Congresses away.

    “Private business is not going to be sending anyone beyond LEO (and LEO is questionable) for the foreseeable future?”

    The budget does not propose waiting on the private sector to fund beyond LEO spaceflight. The budget proposes contracting with industry to develop the necessary capabilities. The two are not the same.

    FWIW…

  • Major Tom

    “When I looked at the budget outline with all the listing of technologies NASA will be investing in I couldn’t help but think an exploration plan would include all these things too.”

    But the old exploration plan didn’t. All (or nearly all) the budget was going to Ares I/Orion for most of this decade, followed by Ares V spending with no in-space hardware for most of the next decade.

    The choice is between an fake exploration program, with little to no actual exploration hardware underway for years to come leading to unachievable targets and dates, and a real exploration program spending billions of dollars on exploration hardware now.

    It ain’t perfect, but I’ll take the latter over the former any day.

    FWIW…

  • Vladislaw

    “By hurting NASA’s ability to pioneer the New Frontier, China, Russia, Europe, India, Japan, and the international private commercial launch companies are the real winners here.” – Marcel F. Williams

    could you please provide a list of all the privately owned and operated international commercial launch companies and what country they are located in? By private i take it you mean they are not subsidized at all by their governemnt.

  • Major Tom

    “There is a long history of, when budget cuts come, R&D and technology development budgets that get hit.”

    Not really. NASA’s topline budget does get cut, but it’s an irregular occurence.

    There’s a more consistent history of human space flight development and operations overruns eating research and technology budgets alive.

    “Don’t be surprised to see an new mission directorate charged with HSF R&D, then over time get whacked, slowly at first, then totally.”

    Read the budget documents. There is no new mission directorate. Exploration Systems is managing the new exploration programs.

    “Also, JSC is an operations culture. Not an R&D culture. JSC flies missions and does engineering in support of mission operations. I wonder if they will be able to adjust to an R&D environment. Thoughts anyone on that?”

    Institution should follow program, not the other way around.

    FWIW…

  • Major Tom

    “Sad days for the USA.

    There is no plan for the future. There is no future without a plan.”

    Getting commercial crew, HLV development, key exploration technologies, robotic precursor missions, and human factors research underway now, instead of a decade or two from now, is not a plan for the future?

    And sad?

    Really?

    “Cutting constellation could have been a good idea but only if it was replaced by a better plan.”

    A plan that invests in exploration hardware now instead of a decade or two from now is bad?

    Really?

    “Well this is a let down guess it is a new dark age for America 2020+”

    Having commercial crew operational, HLV development, and major space-based exploration technology demonstrations complete or near-complete this decade will create a “dark age for America” next decade?

    Really?

    FWIW…

  • JSC

    @Major Tom, JSC actually performs a lot of research. You might want to go to their website and find a site map. There are many buildings and almost all of them are research/test labs. For example, you may recall that the group of scientits who recently proved the biological origin of the martian meteorite fossils work at JSC.

  • Major Tom

    “I haven’t seen much about the 2.5 billion to close out Constellation. Is that new spending or is it taken from what Constellation would have spent anyway?”

    The only “new spending” in the budget is the increase over last year. How you perceive it’s allocated is up to you.

    “Either way, I think its possible that Congress will cut Obama’s topline request by 2.5 billion anyway and make Nasa eat those costs.”

    Why? That’s $2.5 billion that would go to contractors in their states and districts.

    “I think its delusional to believe Congress, after supporting Constellation since 2005, will allow it to be canned and then turn around and increase NASA’s budget as a nice reward.”

    The increase is only $200 million and change. It won’t fundamentally change the White House’s budget proposal if Congress doesn’t provide it. The key is getting the billions of dollars in Constellation funding redirected. And as has happened historically (Apollo, STS, Freedom, ISS, VSE), Congress is likely follow the White House because there’s no way all the NASA representatives and senators in Congress could develop and agree to their own alternative plan. It’s either agree to and get behind the White House plan or watch other members of Congress reallocate those NASA dollars away from NASA districts and states.

    FWIW…

  • Major Tom

    “@Major Tom, JSC actually performs a lot of research.”

    I agree. They (you?) already do.

    But regardless, in response to the other post, institution should follow program, not the other way around. If JSC (or any other field center) needs to do more research and less operations (and some development in between), then the shift should be made. Institutions have to evolve to meet new goals and changing environments. Building programs just to fit an old institution is a recipe for programmatic failure and institutional obsolesence.

    There’s a saying that armchair generals talk strategy while real generals talk logistics. I think a civil space corollary is that fake exploration plans talk dates and architectures while real exploration plans talk institution and capabilities.

    FWIW…

  • Ferris Valyn

    Vladislaw – Hey, its great to see you again. We’ve been wondering where you were. Hope to see you over at Dailykos soon

  • Idiot Alert

    Well, it was fun while it lasted.

    It didn’t last because of a lot of as_h_les just like you. It’s all about you.

    But you had your fun, that’s what’s important. It’s all about fun in your world.

    In Obama’s world, and the people who support this program, it’s about the United States of America, in the present, and it’s continuation into the future.

  • Major Tom

    “a lot of as_h_les just like you”

    There’s no need to call other posters’ names or use profanity. They directed no such inflammatory language towards you.

    Stop it.

  • Idiot Alert

    Stop it.

    No thanks. It’s very effective.

    Ding dong the stick is dead.

    Hahahahaha hahaha ahaha!

  • NASA Fan

    The meat and potatoes of the work at JSC is Operations. Yes there is research done there. Yes there is some flight hardware development. But by and large, the institution is set up to handle Shuttle Operations and ISS Operations. The engineering and management is geared toward that paradigm.

    Take that work away, and it is a challenge to keep everyone employed.You’d probably have to close the center.

    IMHO the reason why Cx failed is that JSC is NOT a flight development center. They are great at managing mega ‘operations contracts’ and the engineering that supports that effort. There is a totally different paradigm to managing a flight development program on a fixed budget: Just ask JPL, GSFC, LaRC, APl, etc.

    And while institutions should follow the program, if you want quick results for your rocketry R&D dollars I’d got to MSFC or GRC; where they do more research than JSC.

    In the end, Obama’s plan is probably the best thing for HSF for the planet. Not in the short term, but perhaps in the long term. Clearly, it is easier for Elon Musk, and other deep pocketed CEO’s, who only need to satisfy the concerns of themselves and some board members, to carry on a sophisticated long term flight development program, than it is for the Government/Congressional/NASA. Satisfying the concerns of the republic, all 300 million of us , makes it difficult to sustain such a long development program.

    NASA’s HSF job now is to create the market (that satisfies the Republic’s desires) so that CEO can follow with their free enterprise and competition.

    ISS is the first market place. It remains to be seen if NASA can create another one out of the Flexi-punt option.

  • GuessWho

    From my perspective, this “new” approach is not all that new to NASA. Oh to be sure, we have injected the “commercial development” aspect which is just a retread of what DoD did some 15 years ago (more later). NASA is to now focus on technologies that will enable exploration in the future. This is similar to the mantra associated with the Nuclear Space Initiative announced in 2002 that has as its goal to develop the technologies to enable nuclear electric propulsion so that mission planners would have a new tool on the shelf to use for future missions. This effort quickly collapsed as the need to spend a lot of dollars with no mission pull made it a tough sell to Congress. Thus Prometheus/JIMO was born and the mission pull was established. Only problem was that the technology push became focused, mission specific, and too expensive. Cancellation was predictable. Before NSI/JIMO/Prometheus, it was the In-Space Transportation Program that was going to advance both initial lift as well as advanced in-space propulsion technologies. LoX-H2 was the golden child for lift along with space tethers and solar sails for in-space exploration. Another case of technology push with no focus on any mission to define real system and performance requirements resulted many parallel efforts with no clear goal. Lift failed because it was expensive and couldn’t be tied to a near-term mission. Tethers and sails were relegated to small lab experiments because they couldn’t deliver technically, failed in flight tests, or couldn’t actually support a mission in any reasonable amount of time or budget. No mission pull, wandering technology development, predictable cancellation (or slow death due to neglect). Sorry this movie is shaping up to be a rerun.

    Back to earlier point on DoD. Fifteen years (+) ago,DoD was too big, too cumbersome, and too inefficient in executing its charter. DoD went the route of outsourcing mission capabilities, above and beyond production of military hardware, to “commercial industry” on a services basis. Now the pendulum has begun swinging back the other direction as Gates announced in April of 2009 DoD’s intention of reducing “commercial service contractors” in favor of Govt. staff. Seems it was perceived that DoD had lost too much expertise to oversee those evil contractors who didn’t always deliver what the Govt. couldn’t clearly define. Is this where NASA will be in a generation?

    While I really prefer Govt. get out of the way of what private industry can readily provide, there needs to be a balance. Commercial interests and timescales are usually significantly different than national priorities. As many have asked, and rightfully so, is manned space flight beyond just a select few visiting the ISS a national priority? This current incarnation, from my perspective, doesn’t address that question, but merely punts it down the road as it tries to define the needed technologies with no clear idea of what those technologies need to accomplish and why.

  • omi

    Wheres some suggestive dates and missions for the so called HLV? Will it even take off…, not much talk on flexable path neither so is it any wonder if some of us think NASA is gonna be killed off post 2020 and thinking worst case scenarios?

  • Storm

    Richardb,

    “So let me ask all the happy campers out there:”

    “What do we after the ISS splashes down circa 2020?”

    Why should the ISS end its mission(s)? As modules grow too old, they can be replaced one by one so as to keep the floating lab in good condition. I have confidence that it will become more affordable through the expansion of commercial launches and commercial launches. It also provides a strong international sense of cooperation. It will also be more affordable over time to supply as, first NASA, then commercial ISRU will tug water and other resources back to the ISS via plasma tugs from low gravity wells all over the solar system. Not only that but samples for study will be available from many different areas, giving solid evidence of what resources there are. Mission to Phobos would be a AI Robotic Precursor in this regard. Even if ISS is de-orbited others will quickly follow with Bigelow.

    “What does this hoped for commercial launcher do then?”

    The commercial launcher provides human access to LEO whereby they can reach ISS indefinitely as well as plasma tugs that can take them even further if needed. The space tugs would could eventually be fueled by water located and stored through the IA ISRU equipment I was talking about at some later time. The plasma technology eventually goes nuclear and takes humans from LEO to Mars 2030 with International partners who suddenly find it much more affordable and fast, which certainly the way to go when your getting bombarded by cosmic rays.

    “Why would SpaceX build, on commercial terms, a very expensive system
    that will be used by one sure customer for just a couple years and then mothballed for lack of customers?”

    Because they dared to hope that our species would have the tenacity to reach out for paradigm shifts that will spring-board us into deep space sustainably since Congress doesn’t have the foresight to fund huge NASA budgets required to get us into deep and expensive gravity wells.

  • Curtis Quick

    I am feeling a bit lost in space at this moment. I am, in general, glad for the cancellation of Ares as I think it would not help human spaceflight as much as it would line pockets and I am glad to hear that $5 billion is supposed to be spent on helping commercial manned spaceflight get on its feet. However, I am left to wonder at this. In Mr. Bolden’s Monday budget announcement he mentioned only $50 million was being made available to commercial interests. This is the cost of one seat on a Russian rocket. It hardly seems helpful to kick start an industry. Can anyone comment on this seeming disparity? Could this new commercial spaceflight initiative be all talk and no dollars?

    Curtis Quick

  • Storm

    “Sad days for the USA.”

    Only if NASA strips the funding for earmarks!

    “There is no plan for the future. There is no future without a plan.”

    There is a plan, but it’s not Apollo. It’s just just a little more complicated because it requires revolutions in propulsion, robotics, ISRU, and life support systems for a high radiation environment. The previous plan was to blast Oscar the Grouch in his garbage can to the Moon. Better than nothing, but short of our full potential. This plan is solid in that it provides the stepping stones, not only to get humans to the Moon cheaply, but to mars, moons, and asteroids as well. You see, instead of saying, “I want to go here”, this plan says, “lets have the infrastructure to go anywhere we can find the resources to sustain our space development.”

    As far as I see it, providing Congress approves, this is a bright new age of technology demonstration for exploration, defense, and business.

  • Wodun

    @ Major Tom

    You said:
    “Sad days for the USA.

    There is no plan for the future. There is no future without a plan.”

    Getting commercial crew, HLV development, key exploration technologies, robotic precursor missions, and human factors research underway now, instead of a decade or two from now, is not a plan for the future?

    Response: Getting to the ISS via private companies isn’t a plan, it is being forced on us by circumstance. Using this method is a good idea IF it frees up NASA for larger missions. A trip to a Lagrange point, the Moon, Mars, Europa, ect. Currently there is no plan or vision beyond maintenance for the ISS and studying climate change.

    HLV research is great but a mission to build the HLV around would be beneficial. The Ares V might have been a few years down the road but no farther away than the unknown one you are so excited about.

    Constellation could have been put on track with the meager investment of $3 billion a year over the next several years. If you think that the Ares I was a pos, then what would you replace it with? YOU probably have an answer. Obama, however, doesn’t have a clue.

    What good are any of the things you mentioned if we don’t know where we are going or what we want to do when we get there? That is where planning comes in. I would take it one step further and say we need a vision and an over arching strategy to make that vision a reality.

    Also, the things you mentioned are not a “plan” although they could be considered elements of a plan.

    You said:
    And sad?

    Really?

    Response: Yes it really is sad that we don’t have a vision, strategy, and plan for our future in space. Maybe you thought the old plan sucked but this is not a step forward it’s treading water at best. The rest of the world isn’t standing still.

    You said:
    “Cutting constellation could have been a good idea but only if it was replaced by a better plan.”

    A plan that invests in exploration hardware now instead of a decade or two from now is bad?

    Really?

    Response: What was the reason that the HLV was being put off until later? Bush wanted to develop a system to fill the same role as the space shuttle but at a lower cost and increased safety. It is fairly reasonable to want the ability to put personnel and equipment into space without relying on a third party.

    The Russians used to charge us $25 million for a person to take a trip to the ISS. Now they charge us $50 million per person. Its a good bet that the price will fluctuate based on the urgency of our needs and geopolitics.

    Now it seems to me that if Ares I wasn’t the right platform and that the same role could be filled by the private sector then we could skip that whole segment of Constellation and jump right into developing the Ares V instead of scrapping the whole plan. That is if the concern was the immediate development of an HLV.

    Maybe you don’t like the Ares V or don’t think we should go back to the moon. I’m cool with that. But developing an HLV without a purpose isn’t a solution.

    So I stand by my statement that there is no future without a plan and that we currently have no plan for the future and that this makes me sad.

  • John Malkin

    There is a plan to send cargo and crew to IIS and develop better technologies for beyond LEO which is the recommendation by the Augustine committee. The approach to use proven technologies for operational vehicles is being leveraged for commercial crew and it should be the same for HLV. Develop the technology first than the vehicle. Trying to do both at the same time is why these programs get out of control.

    The other problem is scope creep. A lot of times when you mix civilian and DOD you get a mess. Shuttle is an example of a civilian and DOD partnership.

    For robotic missions, how much hardware is developed in house? Is it NASA employed engineers or subcontractors? How does this compare to HSF?

  • richardb

    Mr Malkin, you said “Develop the technology first than the vehicle. Trying to do both at the same time is why these programs get out of control.”
    Not true in the case of Ares I or Ares V. For both the entire stack was a derivative of existing, flown designs. Very little technology to develop.
    Like any program, when its strung out with inadequate early funding, costs tend to balloon. Throw in typical government red tape and politics, costs really balloon.

    Now in the case of SpaceX, Xcor and all the others, we’re starting with startup companies learning as they go. Designing things they’ve never designed before. Manufacturing things they’ve never built before. Flying things they never flew before. Supposedly Congress will be fine with this and shower these companies with billions of dollars in incentives.

    I can’t see what could go wrong. Hey anybody know how much money Elon Musk is losing with Tesla lately? I’ve read Tesla’s lost over $200 million. Hope that doesn’t bleed over to SpaceX having not so deep pockets. Course he is getting money from the government from that ol Stimulus bill we’ve heard so much of. Not that this makes him any different in getting corporate welfare like ATK gets.

  • MrEarl

    I’ll admit, I may have been in panic mode with the release of the NASA budget for FY2011. It’s not because I was a fanboy of the Constellation program of record. It’s been argued to be the savior of exploration and the death of it with equal justification an fervor; but it was the only concrete path that we had out of LEO. Maybe what was being proposed was a new direction. So I went back to the Fact Sheet and supporting document the White House released yesterday and the administrator’s statement. Even with it’s support of commercial crew transport to the ISS, (which is the perfect place to get commercial entities more involved in the design, construction and operations of HSF) this budget is a huge step backwards for US human exploration beyond LEO.
    Let’s take a look at a few examples:

    “Research and development to support future heavy-lift rocket systems…….”
    There has been tons of research done on heavy lift with the latest available technologies. I don’t think 5 more years of study is going to bring significant ROI by lowering launch costs significantly. It’s well past time to pick a concept and stick with it.

    “A vigorous new technology development and test program that aims to increase the capabilities and reduce the cost of future exploration activities.
    $1.2 billion for transformative research in exploration technology that will involve NASA, private industry, and academia, sparking spin-off technologies and potentially entire new industries.”
    Sorry but there are no specifics here and from the wording seems to be a $1.2 billion payoff to get Boeing, LockMart and others to fall in line.

    “..create the 21st Century launch facilities and infrastructure needed at Kennedy Space Center, transforming the facility to more effectively support future NASA, commercial, and other government launches.”
    Call me cynical but this sounds like the razing of the VAB and Launch Complex 39 with nothing to replace them.
    From Bolden’s statement we get this:
    “Next, the president has laid out a dynamic plan for NASA to invest in critical and transformative technologies. These will enable our path beyond low Earth orbit through development of new launch and space transportation technologies, nimble construction capabilities on orbit, and new operations capabilities. Imagine trips to Mars that take weeks instead of nearly a year; people fanning out across the inner solar system, exploring the Moon, asteroids and Mars nearly simultaneously in a steady stream of “firsts;” ”
    When a nation can’t even launch a person into low earth orbit, (which after the last shuttle flight the US will not be able to do for an indeterminate amount of time) it’s strains belief to hear stories like, “ people fanning out across the inner solar system,”.
    “Transformative technologies” sounds like Bolden want to start our trip into the solar system on the Queen Marry 2 instead of the Mayflower. What is a solid goal of these technologies? Bring launch costs down by a factor of 10? Is it reasonable to expect to bring Mars transit time down to a few weeks anytime in the near future?
    Advancements in human space flight must be made by evolution not revolution. It isn’t glamorous but small steady improvement in rocket engine design, materials and procedures are what will start us on our path out of LEO.
    I believe that without an over arching goal and a reasonable time frame these individual projects would be picked off in future budget years to go to other programs or agencies or deficit reduction.

  • Some folks above have talked about closing JSC. I guess they feel that would be a terrible thing. Now, I worked at JSC for seven or eight years, and enjoyed my time there, but while I was still there, working there, I did a trade study with the question “If NASA were to close one ‘space’ center and one ‘aeronautics’ center, which made the most sense.” The answer on the space side was JSC. It’s there because LBJ (and other powerful folks in Washington) wanted it there. KSC launches stuff, Huntsville tests rocket engines, Goddard does the uncrewed stuff, JPL is JPL, and they’re only kinda a NASA Center. Closing Fairmont wouldn’t do anything, and at the time, Michoud was in charge of the ETs. JSC’s functions could be transferred to other Centers (mostly KSC) because it was an operations and control and astronaut training site. No launch towers or test stands to move.

    Do I think they’ll close JSC? No. Politically it’s a non starter. But if there were a “NASA Center Closing Commission” like the military’s base closing commissions, it would be on the block.

  • Storm

    Wodun, MrEarl, Richardb:

    I liked the Constellation program just as much as you guys – probably more. The problem is that this “meager” 3 billion increase wasn’t so meager in the eyes of Congress, and it doesn’t seem it ever will. In other words Congress doesn’t have the vision to put enough of the USA budget toward the transportation systems to help humanity leap from its cradle. That is the simple truth. You guys know this. Now why was this program too expensive? What was the cherry on the cake? It was the deep gravity well on the moon that NASA couldn’t afford with Apollo era technology. It could build these huge rockets that had one advantage: They could go to the Moon, and with some modification they could go even further somewhere down the line. But they were not going to get the funding to build the lunar lander. It was a dream that was not to be. Even Bush II didn’t support his own plan with the needed budget levels, much to my frustration. So instead of crying over my deep gravity well funeral this new program is looking at the reality of Congress’s lack of vision and funding and saying, “lets develop a transportation paradigm shift so that it will be affordable, not only for government, but for private industry as well, to go, not only to low gravity well objects, but also to deep gravity well objects. The answer is plasma rockets and space refueling.

    Now look at what the rest of the world is doing: In the immediate future Russia is planning a sample return to Phobos. India and Russia are planning a rover on the moon. Other nations are planning robotic rovers on the Moon. The new NASA plan meats these challenges by:

    1: Leroy Chiao’s possible plan for phobos sample return mission
    This plan would meet and beat the challenge from Russia, because his planned lander could land, then take off for Deimos. I don’t want to get too far into this, but do you guys have any idea of the security implications of this kind of technology. Do you understand where the “high ground” is?

    2: NASA plan for remote control ISRU. Why add to the expense of the mission by adding humans when they can stay out of the gravity well and send in the robots, which can do the “ground work”.

    3. NASA’s plan to send a laboratory to Mars is similar, but will rely more on automation and AI- another important step for understanding what’s in the ground.

    Constellation would have starved us of resources to get these various projects completed and would have landed humans in one expensive place. Other nations, as a whole, would have been in a position to get ahead in these various other projects they’re working on. Now you may say, “But China is going to land people on the Moon before we do”. The answer to this is that we don’t have concrete knowledge of this plan, and if they do, they will do it by sending multiple launchers in space instead of sending a super expensive mega-launcher like Ares. If we are going to compete with other nations, especially who like to claim sovereignty on everything within spitting distance, we had better do it cost effectively so we can sustain those missions. We need to recalibrate so our new cost affective approach can keep sending people there to establish a permanent base without eating up all the resources that would keep us from answering the other challenges like Mars, Phobos, and Lagrange points.

    This is a multi-faceted approach. Will it completely pay off by 2020? No, but does it need to? It promises a much richer reward by 2030. Of course there will be important milestones like the Phobos mission in 2016, and private launcher to ISS and beyond after 2015. Imagine how plasma rockets will revolutionize in-space transportation. It would make it more cost effective and safer. It boggles my mind why you would favor a missions that wasn’t being funded, and would eventually leave our nation behind, not only in exploration, but also in defense capability.

  • Major Tom

    “this budget is a huge step backwards for US human exploration beyond LEO”

    Before making such statements, you should actually read the budget documents. Relying on an overarching five-minute speech from the NASA Administrator for plan and goal details is not going to give you what you’re looking for.

    Copying from a prior post, here’s some extracts from the budget summary document:

    The flagship component of the Exploration Technology and Demonstration Program is clearly tasked with demonstrating “in-orbit propellant transfer and storage, inflatable modules, automated/autonomous rendezvous and docking, closed-loop life support systems” (among other capabilities) via “projects that are generally funded at $0.4-$1.0 billion over lifetimes of less than 5-years.”

    The enabling component of the Exploration Technology and Demonstration Program is clearly tasked with demonstrating “in-situ resource utilization and advanced in-space propulsion” (among other capabilities) via “smaller scale (less than $100 million generally) and shorter duration projects that are competitively selected.”

    The Robotic Precursors program is clearly tasked with sending “robotic precursor missions to the Moon, Mars and its moons, Lagrange points, and nearby asteroids to scout targets for future human activities, and identify the hazards and resources” using project “that are less than $800 million in life-cycle cost.”

    Etc., etc.

    You may still not like these details, but you should make sure that you’ve absorbed more than one speech before passing judgement on the entire plan.

    “I believe that without an over arching goal and a reasonable time frame”

    The overaching goal is the solar system. The timeframe is ASAP.

    “these individual projects would be picked off in future budget years to go to other programs or agencies or deficit reduction.”

    Picking targets and dates didn’t save NASA’s post-Apollo Mars plans, SEI, or Constellation. We’ve spent four decades trying to reinvent the Apollo miracle in the absence of the Cold War rationale that drove Apollo. It’s far past time to try something different.

    “I’ll admit, I may have been in panic mode with the release of the NASA budget for FY2011.”

    Forgive me if this sounds insulting, but I think you’re still in panic mode. We (myself included) need to grow up and stop acting like insecure babies just because we don’t have a target named and a date set. We know what the targets are for human space exploration in the solar system. And there’s no reason not to try to get to them as capably and as soon as possible.

    FWIW…

  • Major Tom

    “Not true in the case of Ares I or Ares V. For both the entire stack was a derivative of existing, flown designs.”

    Ares I/V used old technology, but little heritage. The SRBs were 5- or 5.5-segments, instead of the 4-segments used by Shuttle, with different propellant mixes and entirely different propellant geometry. The Ares I was flying an SRB without an ET, requiring thrust oscillation systems of a scale and complexity never seen on any other launch vehicle. To produce enough thrust, the Ares I SRB needed a composite nozzle longer than any previously built. Although based on the J-2, the J-2X needed to produce substantially higher thrust requiring a complete redesign of hundreds of components. Even the Ares I parachutes pushed the limits of parachute design.

    It may have been old technology, but very little was copied from earlier, proven designs, requiring extensive and expensive reengineering and testing, often with very thin margins. And if you’re going to go to that kind of trouble, you should seek to incorporate new, better technologies instead of reinventing the wheel.

    “Like any program, when its strung out with inadequate early funding, costs tend to balloon.”

    No. The NASA budget didn’t meet VSE commitments, but Constellation received additional, not inadequate, funding. If you look at the old FY 2004 VSE budget and compare it to more recent budgets, NASA’s Exploration Systems Mission Directorate received MORE (not less) funding than what was promised.

    Here’s what was promised in the FY 2004 budget:

    FY 2004 $1,646.0M
    FY 2005 $1,782.0M
    FY 2006 $2,579.0M
    FY 2007 $2,941.0M
    FY 2008 $2,809.0M
    FY 2009 $3,313.0M

    Total $15,070.0M

    And here’s what ESMD actually received in each fiscal year:

    FY 2004 $2684.5M
    FY 2005 $2209.3M
    FY 2006 $3050.1M
    FY 2007 $2869.8M
    FY 2008 $3299.4M
    FY 2009 $3505.5M

    Total $17,618.6M

    The total difference is $2,458.6 million. So the Bush II Administration and prior Congresses provided almost $2.5 billion more for ESMD than what the Bush II Administration promised in FY 2004 to develop systems and technologies to return to the Moon. This doesn’t include the $400 million that ESMD received in the Recovery Act (passed after the Bush II Administration), which would increase the total difference to $3 billion.

    The problem is not Constellation underfunding. The problem is that Ares I/Orion technical issues and schedule slippage ballooned costs from $28 billion to something on the order of $35-40 billion.

    “Now in the case of SpaceX, Xcor and all the others, we’re starting with startup companies learning as they go.”

    Same holds true for NASA, which hasn’t designed and developed a launch vehicle since the 1970s. Even Griffin admitted that one of the rationales for Ares I was for the NASA workforce to relearn launch vehicle design and development.

    The same does not hold true for LockMart, Boeing, ULA, and OSC.

    “Hey anybody know how much money Elon Musk is losing with Tesla lately?”

    Tesla is holding an IPO. If it goes like other IPOs, Musk is going to make a lot of money off Tesla.

    FWIW…

  • Major Tom

    “If you think that the Ares I was a pos, then what would you replace it with?”

    A competitively selected commercial crew program, as the new budget proposes.

    “A trip to a Lagrange point, the Moon, Mars, Europa… What good are any of the things you mentioned if we don’t know where we are going”

    But you do know where we’re going. You just said so — “Lagrange point[s], the Moon, Mars, Europa.” You (and NASA) know what the destinations for human space exploration are in the solar system. (Actually, likely not Europa given the radiation environment — substitute NEOs and Phobos.) We’ve all known for decades now. Why do we need a President to tell us? If the President provides the funding to develop the capabilities, what prevents NASA from going after these targets in as logical, capable, and fast an order as possible?

    Why are we still acting like babies that need to be told where to go? We know where to go. And now we may actually fund the capabilities to do so. Don’t let a President you don’t even like dictate the schedule. Take the money and get on with it.

    Time to grow up…

  • richardb

    Storm, I really don’t bleed the loss of Ares I, its the loss of VSE that I mourn. Man that was a bold vision!

    Yesterday Admin Bolden laid out a vision full of feel good phrases such as “game changing”, “transformational”. Those are our new destinations, a place called feel good. Imagine it and you’re there.

    I don’t believe Congress will pay for his happy talk either. Nor do I believe these untried start ups will succeed without massive cost overruns and further blown schedules.

    Further I think Obama knows Congress won’t go for this blather. He’ll win on cancelling Constellation and lose with his new program of airy nothing.
    He pockets the end of Nasa’s human space program and its costly funding.

    To put all of this in perspective, yesterday the Department of Energy won approval from Obama for 54 billion dollars in loan guarantees, up from the 18 billion in current year funds, to subsidize the construction of nuclear power plants. Putting your tax dollars to work so fat cat companies can get around all the government red tape that killed that business 30 years ago.

  • Major Tom

    “Yesterday Admin Bolden laid out a vision full of feel good phrases such as ‘game changing’, ‘transformational’.”

    Don’t rely on a five-minute speech for details. Read and comprehend the budget documents before passing judgement. Debate actual program content, not buzzwords.

    “Nor do I believe these untried start ups will succeed without massive cost overruns and further blown schedules.”

    Versus the decade-long slips in Ares I/Orion and Ares V availability? Or the two decade-long slip in Constellation’s human lunar return?

    Please…

    “He’ll win on cancelling Constellation and lose with his new program of airy nothing. He pockets the end of Nasa’s human space program and its costly funding.”

    If the White House wanted to do that, they’d have redirected the cancelled Constellation funding outside NASA, instead of keeping it inside the agency and adding to it, in yesterday’s budget release.

    Enough with the goofy conspiracy theories.

    “I don’t believe Congress will pay for his happy talk either.”

    Congressmen don’t care about “talk”, good or bad. Congressmen care about taxpayer dollars going to NASA workers in their districts and states.

    “To put all of this in perspective, yesterday the Department of Energy won approval from Obama for 54 billion dollars in loan guarantees, up from the 18 billion in current year funds, to subsidize the construction of nuclear power plants.”

    Loan guarantees only require the federal government to budget cents on the dollar. The government only has to budget for the likely failure rate of the businesses being guaranteed, which is usually only a small fraction of the total amount being guaranteed. That $54 billion likely only requires $5.4 billion in budget (or less).

    FWIW…

  • Major Tom

    “However, I am left to wonder at this. In Mr. Bolden’s Monday budget announcement he mentioned only $50 million was being made available to commercial interests. This is the cost of one seat on a Russian rocket. It hardly seems helpful to kick start an industry. Can anyone comment on this seeming disparity? ”

    That $50M was provided under the Recovery Act (sometimes called the “stimulus bill”) that was passed late last year. It was suppossed to be a larger amount, but Constellation supporters in Congress redirected the rest to that program before Constellation was cancelled in yesterday’s 2011 budget rollout.

    It’s a small downpayment on capabilities that will be further developed under NASA’s new, multi-billion dollar commercial crew program in the 2011 budget.

    FWIW…

  • Major Tom

    “Augustine said Ares I would work but it needed alot more money to become useful. What govt space program doesn’t?”

    Off the top of my head — Clementine, LRO, NEAR…

    “Now with this budget there is a roadmap to nowhere.”

    The solar system is “nowhere”?

    “So I don’t doubt that a growing chorus of Congress will question the reason we are funding the ISS when we have nothing to use the information for.”

    Congressmen care about whether the ISS budget is going to their states and districts. They don’t care whether ISS is leading anywhere. If they did, they would have cancelled it during the program’s two decades of existence prior to the VSE.

    “For that matter explain to me the payoff to pay for all of NASA’s future ‘follow the water missions’? These missions were partially justified by the hope Americans could land on the outer planets and use the water for survival and rocket fuel.”

    No, these missons are justified on the basis of science, not human space flight. They’re research missions pursuing evidence for liquid water on Mars, Europa, and other locations as a marker for potentially habitable environments beyond Earth that could have supported the development of extraterrestrial life. The presence of liquid water is the common denominator of all habitable environments on Earth. If we find liquid water in environments beyond Earth, those are the leading candidate environments for finding life beyond Earth.

    These missions have little to nothing to do with human space flight. In fact, you wouldn’t want to send humans into such environments due to the risk of back-contamination.

    FWIW…

  • Major Tom

    “Ah, Major Tom, I was being less specific about missions and more about how those programs gyrated around and didn’t produce much visible anything.

    The Q? is why do you need heavy lift form NASA without a mission profile?”

    To launch human exploration missions into the solar system. The requirements for an HLV are drawn from multiple DRMs to different targets, like these:

    http://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2010/01/taking-aim-phobos-nasa-flexible-path-precursor-mars/

    http://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2010/01/nasas-flexible-path-2025-human-mission-visit-asteroid/

    http://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2010/01/manned-mission-to-construct-huge-geo-and-deep-space-telescopes-proposed/

    FWIW…

  • MrEarl

    I’m glad some one brought up loan guarantees for nuclear power plants.
    To highlight the fact that this administration dose not think things through they also cut all funding for the Yucca Mountain nuclear storage site. So where is all this waste from the new reactors going to go? Obama doesn’t care, this is a favor to Harry Reid and he’ll be out of office for years before the new reactors come on line.
    Thanks for another mess left for our children to take care of.

  • Storm

    Major Tom,

    I respect your opinion, but I say follow the water for human space development as well. ISRU is in the budget, so there must be a broader goal than just finding life.

  • common sense

    @MrEarl:

    Don’t you ever get tired of trying to be “right”? Most of what you say comes out of your fertile imagination and the rest is just an anti Obama stance. You criticize if the WH does something and if they don’t do anything. Why don’t you run for office and show us how great you’d be? You can try and run for NASA Admin first.

    “Advancements in human space flight must be made by evolution not revolution. It isn’t glamorous but small steady improvement in rocket engine design, materials and procedures are what will start us on our path out of LEO.”

    Statements like these make no sense whatsoever! How do you know? Do you work in this business? Show me how the Wright brothers proceeded along the lines you are describing. How about Mr. Ford? Did he do small and incremental steps towards mass production of vehicles? Did Boeing do small incremental steps towards mass transportation? What about Kelly Johnson and its A-11/12 and SR-71? What about the F-117? All small incremental steps? The former Constellation program did nothing as you describe. Nothing.

  • common sense

    Forgot to add the Apollo program, yes Apollo! Small and incremental steps????

  • Major Tom

    “I’m glad some one brought up loan guarantees for nuclear power plants.
    To highlight the fact that this administration dose not think things through they also cut all funding for the Yucca Mountain nuclear storage site. So where is all this waste from the new reactors going to go? Obama doesn’t care, this is a favor to Harry Reid and he’ll be out of office for years before the new reactors come on line.
    Thanks for another mess left for our children to take care of.”

    This has nothing to do with space policy. Are you here to discuss space policy or are you here to bash politicians?

    If it’s the former, then stay on topic. If it’s the latter, then take it elsewhere.

    Cripes…

  • Major Tom

    “I respect your opinion,”

    I wasn’t expressing an opinion. Those are the facts of how science missions, especially planetary missions to potentially life-bearing targets like Mars and Europa, are justified.

    “but I say follow the water for human space development as well. ISRU is in the budget, so there must be a broader goal than just finding life.”

    Absolutely. But you’re not going to want to follow the same water. You don’t want astronauts bathing in and drinking potential Martian nanobacteria, for example.

    FWIW…

  • Storm

    Major Tom,

    “I wasn’t expressing an opinion. Those are the facts of how science missions, especially planetary missions to potentially life-bearing targets like Mars and Europa, are justified.”

    Yes, but this doesn’t mean the overarching goal to the President’s space policy adheres to finding nanobacteria. The overarching goal is not within the confines of the NASA jurisdiction in spaceflight. The overarching goal encompasses the government’s efforts as a whole, and NASA’s job is to facilitate that. The overarching goal is to preserve our Nation, and our species, and then go to the stars. Every department of government strictly adheres to this policy as a whole, or so it should, otherwise they are not doing their job.

    DOE, Airforce, NSF, NASA all have a common goal as I see it, and I’ll see to it if needed.

  • Major Tom

    “Yes, but this doesn’t mean the overarching goal to the President’s space policy adheres to finding nanobacteria.”

    I wasn’t talking about the overarching goal of the of the nation’s space policy — just the research justification for certain programs in the Science Mission Directorate.

    FWIW…

  • Storm

    Ah yes, right. Finding microbes in our solar system is a big priority for the Mars Lab, the proposed Europa Mission, and so on. But what is unprecedented about the President”s new directive is the greater emphasis on gathering a complete survey of the Solar System”s resources, particularly water. It is good to have a thorough survey of the Solar System before we spend all the money at hand to send humans to one location. What a blind policy that would have been to sustain – Constellation I mean.

  • Storm

    I’m surprised Constellation supporters didn’t bring up the recent finding of water on the South Pole of the Moon to argue their case. The Moon still beckons people. There are many reasons to go there, and those will not cease to be the case.

  • Major Tom

    “I’m surprised Constellation supporters didn’t bring up the recent finding of water on the South Pole of the Moon to argue their case.”

    The LCROSS water is present in very, very small amounts compared to the amount of regolith and other materials displaced by the impact. It would require too much mining and/or heating equipment to recover useful amounts of water. A lunar program would be better off shipping propellant and water from Earth.

    That said, there may be higher concentrations of water ice elsewhere on the Moon, and that’s a good a reason to send some multi-ten and multi-hundred million dollar robotic missions as the new budget proposes. But we can’t justify multi-ten and multi-hundred billion human lunar efforts on the basis of this resource. At least not yet.

    FWIW…

  • Storm

    Yes and carbonaceous chondrites can contain up to 20% water as well. Given that so much fuel is spent getting out of the gravity well of large bodies, and considering that Plasma rockets such as the VLASMR type probably wouldn’t be suitable for such high thrust applications it would make sense to see if there were asteroids, or comet debris lurking out, at least in the inner solar system, if not, then beyond. Deep Impact revealed 11 million pounds of water in 300X100 ft hole that it blew out of Comet Temple. 11 million pounds, while less icy than though, would probably be enough to keep ISS in orbit for a while.

  • common sense

    @Storm:

    “Yes, but this doesn’t mean the overarching goal to the President’s space policy adheres to finding nanobacteria. The overarching goal is not within the confines of the NASA jurisdiction in spaceflight. The overarching goal encompasses the government’s efforts as a whole, and NASA’s job is to facilitate that. The overarching goal is to preserve our Nation, and our species, and then go to the stars.

    The overarching goal of what? NASA? The government?
    1. NASA: Please provide a reference that shows it is its goal to “preserve” our Nation and our species.
    2. Government” Please provide a reference that shows it is its goal to “then go to the stars”.

    “Every department of government strictly adheres to this policy as a whole, or so it should, otherwise they are not doing their job.”

    What are you talking about? Which policy? To go to the stars?

    Unbelievable!

  • Storm

    Well that was an example of an overarching goal. If you wouldn’t have humanity eventually go to the stars, that’s fine, but if you were to ask a NASA official, or even the President if our goal was to some day go to the stars I would be surprised to hear them say no. In fact, much of the R&D being done by our government, whether your talking about new ways to harness energy such as at the National Ignition Facility, or how to sustain life in space at NASA have a direct application toward one day going to the stars.

  • Storm

    Talk about going to the stars, can anyone tell me the status of those proposals for Manned mission to construct huge GEO and deep space telescopes in the Lagrange points? Wow, that would be incredible to see the spectra of earth-like planets. It would be worth a lot more to me to discover a living planet like earth than to find nano bacteria on Europa. Although the Europa mission has got me pretty excited as well. I just don’t know how they will melt through all that ice to get to the liquid water below. Sounds like a bigger challenge than the huge telescope idea.

  • common sense

    ” if you were to ask a NASA official, or even the President if our goal was to some day go to the stars I would be surprised to hear them say no.”

    Then they would really be wrong unlike what you state. It is nowhere in the government’s charter, the Constitution, nor in NASA’s Space Act of 1958 (ammended or not), for NASA to preserve our Nation and for our government to go to the stars. So if you want those to be the “overarching” goals then you have to change the Constitution and/or the Space Act.

    “In fact, much of the R&D being done by our government, whether your talking about new ways to harness energy such as at the National Ignition Facility, or how to sustain life in space at NASA have a direct application toward one day going to the stars”

    So what? It does not mean they will use this R&D to this purpose. The Manhattan project provided energy whose purpose never was to go to the stars now was it? Again, so what?

    Get real! If you want changes then go and vote for someone supporting such goals. Good luck! In the mean time again get real! And try to live with what you are given: Monday it was a huge boost to NASA! What the heck is wrong with everyone?

  • Storm

    “Get real! If you want changes then go and vote for someone supporting such goals. ”

    Actually I’ll just lobby those that are already in office.

    The NASA space act should have mentioned eventual destination for the stars, and when the Constitution was founded, as steeped as our founding fathers were, I don’t think that they could have come up with a realistic goal of going to the stars.

    “So what? It does not mean they will use this R&D to this purpose. The Manhattan project provided energy whose purpose never was to go to the stars now was it? Again, so what?”

    The scientists who study high energy physics for making energy and weapons are spurred by the prospect of star travel, not by blowing up millions of people. Take that to heart.

    Can you just get back to poking holes in Major Tom’s HLV plans? Or did we get to this point because we don’t really know what the plans are? When will we know these plans? The Huge Telescope proposal involved the use of Ares Rockets. I guess we could substitute Delta IV to carry the mirrors and Falcon 9 and Dragon to get the astronauts in orbit? Then tug the astronauts out to L1 with the VLASMR?

  • Storm

    Ok, good, you don’t have a answer. Then shuttle derived HLV it is. Ares- a complete waste of tax payer money imagined by a party who would rather make potato chips than microchips (it figures out all too clearly). The party that would strip down an antimatter propulsion mechanism to make an antimatter bomb. Yours truly folks: The Republican Party. Gotta love em.

  • Storm

    @Common Sense

    I’m sorry I didn’t mean to attack the Potato(e) Chip Party. I was just fuming over being smeared with the “Democrat Party” quotes. But I wanted you to get on point about how the continuing Ares Rocket Program could get our payloads in space on time and on budget while allowing a flourishing of other scientific goals that need to be pursued to explore our universe such as the Huge Telescope (for lack of a better name) which never would have been thought possible til the cancellation of Constellation. Its funny to imagine you guys digging around somewhere on the moon for traces of water when there’s millions of gallons in lower gravity wells. (snicker)

  • Major Tom

    “Can you just get back to poking holes in Major Tom’s HLV plans?”

    Whoah — leave me out of this latest exchange. Although I’ve pointed out that the new budget provides HLV funding much earlier than the old Constellation program, I personally don’t think an HLV is a wise investment. I’d much prefer that NASA first spend a couple billion pursuing less costy alternatives for putting large amounts of propellants and other consumables on orbit such as these:

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aquarius_Launch_Vehicle

    http://www.popsci.com/technology/article/2010-01/cannon-shooting-supplies-space?page=

    If I were king, I’d only pursue an HLV when I had no other choice, and I’d just turn to the EELV industrial base if that day ever came.

    FWIW…

  • common sense

    @Storm:

    “The scientists who study high energy physics for making energy and weapons are spurred by the prospect of star travel, not by blowing up millions of people. ”

    How many of them do you actually know? The high energy physics studied at the National Labs is done so to build better, smarter, cheaper weapons. The scientists working these programs are not daydreaming Sci-Fi addicts. Get informed.

    “But I wanted you to get on point about how the continuing Ares Rocket Program could get our payloads in space on time and on budget ”

    I don’t need to and I don’t want to. Ares is cancelled: Ares could not deliver and would not deliver. That is a fact. They were given a chance, a great chance and they messed it up. So is life. Now on to the new program please!

  • Storm

    @Major Tom,

    So perhaps the Shuttle Derived parts that are in current inventory should be kept at hand until they are really needed while Deltas and Atlas’s do the rest. The Administration better get with it and appropriate that funding to a better place. I’ll check your links after this post – thanks!

    @Common Sense
    I know of two scientists (one dead) who envision, or have envisioned their research being used to ply the heavens. The first: Robert Bussard who helped develop Tokamak and Electrostatic Confinement Fusion designs -maybe ICF as well. He is also famous for his interstellar spacecraft designs such as the Bussard Ramjet.

    Gerald Smith who has worked with the Air Force on weapons research as well as antimatter propulsion concepts. Most of it is hush hush, but the basic premise is widely known.

  • common sense

    @Storm:

    So what was the result of their “dreams” so far? And btw if anyone’s work was hush-hush as you say you would know nothing about it. Period.

  • Storm

    So far the antimatter is annihilating with the Penning Trap walls after a couple of months because they can’t get a clean enough vacuum inside the chamber. If this can be corrected (and I’m not saying it will be) then antimatter could be stored to catalyze fusion reactions for smaller propulsion engines, or smaller and more efficient flesh evaporators. And I know Smith would prefer the propulsion mechanism over the orange afro bombs because I’ve talked to him at some length about it at the Joint Propulsion Conference.

  • Storm

    And currently the ICF at the National Ignition Facility is kicking “A”, but is a little too big for a Delta IV (about the size of a football stadium). So I know we’re not ready for Avatar, but I also know that the new NASA budget calls for more basic research into propulsion, which might enable such revolutions. Right now the revolutionary propulsion research seems to be geared toward less radical revolutions in propulsion, which is the way it should be. We just aren’t ready yet. I didn’t say I had a antimatter rocket waiting for the government permits sitting in my garage now did I.

  • Storm

    Major Tom,

    If I were King (lovely thought), I would forget about the nano bacteria and just build an Ares V or Shuttle derived HLV to get those heavy mirrors to the Lagrange points, and spend the rest of the money at the DOE/Airforce on ICF and Antimatter. Of course the cosmic rays must be brutal, especially out side the heliopause, so keep the Space Station up indefinitely, or until we figure out the radiation problems, and tug some water over to ISS from those comets. Then give the rest to Musk. Poor little nano bacteria

  • common sense

    Storm:

    Maybe, just maybe, we are talking past each other. Could be my fault. I am not saying, quite the contrary, that DOE may not have some real exotic stuff for exploration. I am all in favor of cross pollination. BUT if those technologies are of national security concerns they may never see the light of day in a civilian exploration program.

    But where I get all “worked up” if you will is when people mention Shuttle derived anything as the solution to anything. It is not, never was and never will be. Requirements dictate your LV not the other way around. OR you’d have to accomodate for what you get, which was not the Constellation way.

  • Storm

    Common Sense

    How would you feel if Beijing had a bomb that could unleash 20 megatons in a capsule the size of a hand grenade?

    And

    Heavy mirrors for exoplanet discoveries require a heavy launchers unless they make those mirrors in very small segments, which would require more assembly. I’ll leave it to NASA engineers to decide what is the better way to go. Your right, I shouldn’t be presuming requirements for an HLV for such hardware, but mirrors are heavy aren’t they? Or could they use mylar? I don’t think so.

  • common sense

    Storm:

    I could not care less about China in that matter. Why would you? I am tired of the Cold War mentality, we should focus on more pressing matter at hands.

    Heavy mirrors might require an HLV but do you know for sure the requirements for such HLV? Did you run an anlysis? Do you know that Ares or any SD_HLV would work? Okay then. Heavy is not all that counts, size matters as well. And more. But if the cost of developing, building and launching an HLV is vastly superior to that of even building the telescope then what do you think would happen? What should happen?

  • Storm

    Common Sense,

    I don’t think its the national security concerns that keep the nukes off the spaceship. Its the complexity and radiation problems. There is also a stigma about nukes that make them unpopular for civilian tech, but antimatter catalyzed reactions aren’t so dangerous. antimatter isn’t radioactive and either is hydrogen. Deuterium is nasty, but would be present in much smaller amounts if you can nix the uranium. We’re in the radio-active days of nukes in which an accident would be much more deadly.

  • Storm

    Common Sense

    The study that was already completed at NASA mentioned the use of Ares V launchers to assemble those scopes. I’m no major tom and I haven’t done an analysis myself. Maybe I should!

    Perhaps we’re not in a cold war with china, but then why are they building hypersonic missiles to destroy our aircraft carriers?

  • common sense

    Storm:

    Let me ask you then. Where are the telescope(s) blueprints? Does it exist even in plans? Is it sanctionned by the astrophysics/astronomy community? Were they involved in this presentation? If you only answer 1 “no” then you know that this is all hmm paper-telescope as much as Ares V was a paper rocket. Feel good kind of stuff put quickly together to try and save a doomed program. I read a lot of “would” in the text. They can come up with how many astronauts and EVAs would be required for a non existing telescope???

    Maybe I am wrong, am I ?

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