NASA

Bolden attacks the “myths” about NASA’s new plan

NASA administrator Charles Bolden spoke Tuesday at the Washington Space Business Roundtable (WSBR) flagship luncheon, held as part of the Satellite 2010 trade show just outside Washington, giving perhaps his strongest defense to date of the agency’s new plan announced a month and a half ago. While part of his speech was a generic overview of the agency’s various programs, he spent part of the speech, as he put it, “dispelling some of the myths that have sprung up about NASA’s future.”

“My first message to you is that this budget is good for NASA because it sets the agency on a sustainable path that is tightly linked to our nation’s interests,” he said, noting the increased overall budget for the agency and the opportunities it provides to the private sector to be involved in the agency’s future plans. It was also, he said, necessary to break with the past. “The Constellation program was on an unsustainable trajectory,” he said, a conclusion reached by both NASA leadership as well as the White House. Constellation would not have allowed humans to return to the Moon “until some time after 2030″, and only by making steeper cuts elsewhere in NASA, such as terminating the ISS in 2015. “Some have argued that the Constellation program was the symbol of American leadership in space. I think they’ve been misled,” he later said. Those additional cuts, and extended reliance on Soyuz, “is not American leadership in my book.”

“The president recognized that what was truly needed for beyond LEO exploration was game-changing technologies; making the fundamental investments that will provide the foundation for the next half-century of American leadership in space exploration,” he said. “In doing so, the President put forward what I believe to be the most authentically visionary policy for real human space exploration that we’ve ever had.”

Bolden reiterated that Mars was the “ultimate destination” for human space exploration, but that “we don’t have the technological wherewithal to safely get humans there yet, and I think everybody in this room understands that.” He aslo defended NASA’s plans to develop commercial crew and cargo capabilities, noting that commercial providers are already used to launch “our most valuable payloads”. “My guess is that the American workers who have successfully built and launched the Atlas 5 20 times in a row would probably disagree that US commercial spaceflight is untried and untested.”

In a brief Q&A after his speech, he said that he sees access to LEO “as something that belongs in the commercial sector.” “Commercial is about making money,” he continued, “and I think there are incredible opportunities for money to be made with commercial access to low Earth orbit.” NASA was willing to pay for to transport crews to the ISS, and perhaps later, he suggested, even manage access to the station as the agency tries to get out of more routine operations. “We at NASA want to get our of the operational business,” he said. “We don’t want to manage low Earth orbit anymore. We want to use it, but we want to give it over to commercial entities who can use it for profit. I know that’s hard for some people to grasp.”

40 comments to Bolden attacks the “myths” about NASA’s new plan

  • […] NASA administrator Charles Bolden might not think that Constellation is “the symbol of American leadership in space”, some members of Congress disagree—or at least see Constellation as a symbol of economic […]

  • Mark R. Whittington

    If going to the Moon by 2020 was “Apollo on steroids” then going to Mars by–when? 2035? Bolden is a little vague about that–is “Apollo on Crack.”

    In a way a multi-decade humans to Mars project is the perfect jobs program. One doesn’t even have to think about accomplishing anything for about twenty or thirty years, but one can do a lot of stuff and employ a lot of people in key states and districts.

    Of course this supposes that the whole thing can be sustained over the next few Presidencies and Congresses.

  • StopHatePosts

    “Apollo on Crack.”

    Mark,

    Could you stop these kind of posts. It’s obvious from your posts that in your eyes Obama, Bolden, etc. can do no good. With the latest post you’re bordering on discrimination. What brought the word ‘Crack’ up in your mind? I wonder if you would have said the same if a white republican president and administrator would have presented the new budget proposal. But of course they never would….

  • Major Tom

    “If going to the Moon by 2020 was ‘Apollo on steroids'”

    Constellation wasn’t getting to the Moon by 2020. It wasn’t “Apollo on steroids”. Per the Augustine report, Ares V wouldn’t have been ready until 2028 at the earliest and there still wouldn’t have been a lunar Orion, EDS, or Altair to get the Moon even then. Constellation was Apollo on Geritol and placebos. There wouldn’t have been a lunar landing until the late 2030s, if ever.

    Under NASA’s roadmaps from the new budget plan, human exploration missions start before 2025.

    “then going to Mars by–when? 2035? Bolden is a little vague about that”

    No, he’s not. Per his speech, Bolden is clear that the technology for human Mars missions doesn’t exist. That has to be developed before a human Mars date is known.

    Don’t make things up.

    “In a way a multi-decade humans to Mars project is the perfect jobs program.”

    It’s a no-brainer to pursue a multi-decade program that puts U.S. astronauts at Mars and other destinations over the previous multi-decade program that would only have put U.S. astronauts on the Moon (again).

    “Of course this supposes that the whole thing can be sustained over the next few Presidencies and Congresses.”

    Well, duh…

    A program like the new budget plan that gets actual HLV and exploration hardware under development before the next election has a much greater chance of having that hardware survive the next election than a program that gets no exploration hardware under development and wastes half a decade and billions of dollars building the nation’s fourth, intermediate-lift LEO launcher.

    FWIW…

  • googaw

    Iceland is bankrupt. California, Portugal, Italy, Greece, and Spain are nearly so. Moody’s is warning that it may have to reduce the U.S.’s AAA credit rating on its debt, formerly known as “the risk free asset”.

    Machines are far cheaper than HSF and getting less expensive every year. There will be plenty of robots going to Mars in our generation, but no people. A manned Mars mission is grand for motivating technology research, but otherwise it’s a useless fantasy. Likewise, astronauts can’t do what may need to be done on the moon at reasonable costs, while robots and teleoperated machines usually can.

    HSF is far less useful than the money we currently spend on it and its budgets will be reduced accordingly. Get used to it.

  • Robert G. Oler

    Mark R. Whittington wrote @ March 17th, 2010 at 8:20 am

    One doesn’t even have to think about accomplishing anything for about twenty or thirty years,..

    you have just described Ares and Orion going back to the Moon.

    you betcha

    Robert G. Oler

  • Robert G. Oler

    StopHatePosts wrote @ March 17th, 2010 at 10:28 am

    I dont think Mark is a racist, he is just a right winger who is determined to validate his judgment of Bush the last by insisting that every turd thing Bush did, as it is being undone is really Obama’s fault.

    In Mark’s “world” he really believes the Chinese are going to take over the Moon, much as he use to claim Saddam was going to attack us with balsa wood airplanes carrying nuclear devices….and the Iraq war would pay for itself…well just substitute anything Bush the last said ….

    Robert G. Oler

  • “I dont think Mark is a racist, he is just a right winger who is determined to validate his judgment of Bush the last by insisting that every turd thing Bush did, as it is being undone is really Obama’s fault.”

    Totally agreed. I’m a lefty myself, but I don’t buy a lot of the veiled racism conspiracy theories put forward by the left. I don’t think the whole of the right is any more racist than the left is out to cancel NASA or kill gramma. It distracts (even further) from the reasonable arguments that actually can be made on the subjects. I’m no Whittington fan, but I won’t go so far as to demonize him unjustifiably.

  • Bob Mahoney

    Agree. In fact, suggesting that he was trying to be racist by referencing Crack is racist in its own subtle way. When I first read his choice of words the only thing that crossed my mind (especially as a writer) was the notion of a worse (and mind-altering) drug than steroids. It seems to fit what he was after (my impression, mind you) better than, say, cocaine, LSD, or heroin would have. Purely in terms of word choice, It has the right flair to fit the point he’s suggesting.

  • Robert G. Oler

    aremisasling wrote @ March 17th, 2010 at 1:14 pm

    yeah, there is no one on this forum who is more dissapointed in the direction that Mark W’s space politics (and his politics in general although he always was far right of center) have evolved…but he is no racist and to claim that is “sad”.

    Politics should be about issues, and the minute that “race” or other “hot button issues’ (like the birth certificate which is a stalking point for race) are brought into the discussion it should be like bringing up Hitler…you are automatically put in the “your a nut” category.

    The problem with the right (and left…and it shows even in the space debate) is that frequently the people who have the most tenuous grip on the facts and issues resort to that.

    There was, for instance no way to refute the charges that Al Gore leveled in his San Francisco speech on the Iraq invasion other then by attacking him personally. The attacks on Garver are simply dispicable…

    but when those attacks start they show the weakness of the “case” those doing the attacking have.

    Mark (and Paul Spudis and others) are wrong on the Chinese going to take over the Moon (there is no evidence) they have I think misjudged the politics of cancelling Constellation …and I think that they are wrong about the future of commercial flight. But we can have that debate without personal charges. At least I can.

    Robert G. Oler

  • Robert G. Oler

    googaw wrote @ March 17th, 2010 at 11:41 am

    yeap

    Robert G. Oler

  • […] Bolden’s presentation yesterday to the Washington Business Roundtable luncheon in, Bolden Attacks The “Myths” About NASA’s New Plan, during which the Administrator offered up a defense for NASA’s “new” […]

  • Kris Ringwood

    First ,thanks for quoting the whole text instead of the usual selective bits. This confirms my original positive feeling- culled from reading The Economist’ description. Most of what Bolden says is on the money for an agency that lost its way with VSE/ESAS/ARES and almost ground to a halt in consequence. But there are two things missing:-
    1) the failure to acknowledge the R&D NASA has been conducting since July 1958 on the very subjects he considers we still need research on. Is all that data, and the conclusions derived therefrom, going to be scrapped? Or once more, be repeated at unnecessary expense- considering the real lack of technical progress: except in computing and electronic memory capacity – since. I was following things then BTW and remember it all well; even got involved in it in a modest capacity over in UK.
    2) another failure to acknowledge it doesn’t need the development of advanced technology to send men to the planets. In any case, via VASIMR we already have that in the pipeline. We simply need the means to get it and the requisite payloads on their way. For that, if we lose our current HLV capability, we are going to pay dearly down the road- as we are now for ARES because we stupidly scrapped the Saturn V and most of it infrastructure; as well as NERVA.

    These caveats plus the somewhat contradictory pronouncements of Garver lead me to believe that NASA has in effect been emasculated and is destined for no more than a support role for an industry that either fails consistently, but continues to make a profit regardless, or new participants who have only stayed afloat with shots of government money.

    Unless that is, any further research builds on what has gone before, rather than a clean sheet; and what HLV assets remain are “evolved” into a conventional HLV capacity able to accommodate variable types and designs of payloads for the missions described in the speech. All of which can be done by the major Aerospace contractors IMO w/o the heavy hand of NASA stifling creativity: as so graphically indicated in the Encyclopedia Astronautica-a NASA recommended website BTW!

  • Patrick

    Don’t use too broad a brush–I bet most conservatives who actually think about their principles (as opposed to Republican congressmen) will support the plan.

    “Right wing” = “benighted idiot” is not a useful idea, but it is so stone-cold buried in so many people–who may not even be aware of it, as in the whole “I bet if Obama was a white Republican, yada yada” thing. The implication being that conservatives will inevitably behave that way for the usual suspected reasons. Did you really mean to imply that?

  • red

    Mark: “If going to the Moon by 2020 was “Apollo on steroids” then going to Mars by–when? 2035? Bolden is a little vague about that–is “Apollo on Crack.”

    As Major Tom noted, Constellation was on a path to get to the Moon by 2035 or later, not 2020. Constellation could barely get Ares I/Orion to LEO by 2020. You’re confusing words in a document with what Constellation really is.”

    Mark: “In a way a multi-decade humans to Mars project is the perfect jobs program. One doesn’t even have to think about accomplishing anything for about twenty or thirty years, but one can do a lot of stuff and employ a lot of people in key states and districts.”

    All indications are that the intended path to Mars is through a lot of other useful destinations, like lunar orbit, Earth-Moon Lagrange points, Earth-Sun Lagrange points, NEOs, the Moon’s surface, Mars orbit, and Mars moons. That is a lot of accomplishments on the path to Mars. Personally I’d focus more on getting to and making the most of what’s close by and achievable than worrying much about Mars now, so it’s not as if I’m 100% behind the emphasis on Mars without much talk of the destinations along the way, but clearly accomplishments are intended along the way (starting with technology demos and then Flexible Path destinations). We will know long before we get to Mars whether we’re dealing with a Constellationish program that just employs a lot of people in key states and districts.

    Remember that Constellation has no accomplishments before it gets to the Moon in 2035+. Ares I/Orion might get done by 2019, but this is a non-useful milestone because there is no ISS to go to by that time (because of Ares I/Orion development costs), and Ares I/Orion by themselves can’t do useful work.

    Mark: “Of course this supposes that the whole thing can be sustained over the next few Presidencies and Congresses.”

    The new NASA proposal is highly sustainable. It doesn’t completely break down like Constellation with minor budget fluxuations. If the budget is down one year, you do a couple fewer technology demos, or launch a couple fewer HSF robotic precursors, or do a little bit less general space technology work, or drag out the HLV work, or use the ISS a bit less. The damage is isolated; the whole of NASA remains intact.

    Constellation, on the other hand, would have very little chance of making it through what we should anticipate to be a tough budgetary future for NASA and actually getting to the Moon.

  • Mike Puckett

    “Machines are far cheaper than HSF and getting less expensive every year. There will be plenty of robots going to Mars in our generation, but no people. A manned Mars mission is grand for motivating technology research, but otherwise it’s a useless fantasy. Likewise, astronauts can’t do what may need to be done on the moon at reasonable costs, while robots and teleoperated machines usually can.

    HSF is far less useful than the money we currently spend on it and its budgets will be reduced accordingly. Get used to it.”

    Really Googaw, beyond GEO except for a few solar monitoring sats at L points, what do we really ‘need’ machines for either? Do we really ‘need’ to have a Hubble Space Telescope? Do we really ‘need’ to reconoiter Mars or the Jovian system if we are not going there?

    The only thing we ‘need’ to do in space is colonize it. Anything else is just tele-astronomy mastrubation for the direct benefit of the very few and we dont ‘need’ it. The same financial arguments you make against human spaceflight can easly be made against your precious drones.

    No matter how cheap and efficient they are, unless they are materially helping pave the way for eventual human settlement, there is zero quantifiable need for them either. You can easily be hoisted on your own petard. Get used to it.

  • First off ignore the Augustine study…it’s just biased BS designed to kill off all existing NASA spacefight assets. There is no good reason we can get Ares I/Orion flying by 2015. We just need to get it done. The fact it won’t get done is just because Obama doesn’t want it done.

    “VASIMR we already have that in the pipeline”

    Now all we need is the nuclear reactor to be developed to power it.

    “Remember that Constellation has no accomplishments before it gets to the Moon in 2035″

    No truth in that date…stop making things up!

    Mark R. Whittington is just great! Keep up the good work.

  • red

    Mike Puckett: “beyond GEO except for a few solar monitoring sats at L points, what do we really ‘need’ machines for either? Do we really ‘need’ to have a Hubble Space Telescope? Do we really ‘need’ to reconoiter Mars or the Jovian system if we are not going there?”

    You mentioned heliophysics missions, and of course there are the Earth observers. That’s 2 of NASA’s 4 robotic science areas that have solid practical reasons for being.

    Outside of HSF reasons, planetary science missions can be justified somewhat indirectly in terms of providing a context for practical studies of Earth. Another justification can be found in studying the potential NEO threat. Both planetary science and astronomy missions (as well as the other 2 sorts) can be in part justified in terms of maintenance of skills and capabilities needed by the military and commercial space (i.e. launchers, satellites and their subsystems, remote sensing instruments, etc). Raw science data also has a certain usefulness. Do all of these justifications (without the HSF component) add up to the current budgets? I don’t know.

    These HSF vs. robotics debates are worsened by the ESAS/Constellation approach, which had HSF raid the robotic science budget. The 2011 budget fixes that old battle by

    – repairing the robotic Earth observation budget

    – creating a strong line of robotic precursors specifically designed to look for and test resources to be used by astronauts, and to understand hazards to astronauts

    – aligning the launch vehicle support for HSF and robotic missions to be mutually supporting (i.e. Taurus II, Falcons, Atlas V, Delta IV, and perhaps others can launch both HSF cargo/crew missions and robotic satellites)

    – investigating capabilities in the technology development budgets that can apply to both HSF and robotics (eg: in-space refueling, satellite servicing by astronauts)

    – heading towards a Flexible Path plan that aligns HSF and robotic missions (through satellite and observatory assembly and servicing by astronauts, telerobotics by astronauts, HSF missions that work with robotics to do sample returns, etc)

  • red

    John: “First off ignore the Augustine study…it’s just biased BS designed to kill off all existing NASA spacefight assets.”

    Are you suggesting that all of the well-known experts on the Augustine Committee with all sorts of different backgrounds all came together in some sort of conspiracy? The OSTP that started this conspiracy must have also been in on it, too, right? NASA’s leadership must have been in on this consiracy as well, I suppose. The Aerospace Corporation must have been in on it, too. It’s strange that their results were so similar to other studies by groups like the GAO. GAO must be in on it, too.

    That’s a pretty amazing plan. Here I was thinking that the Augustine Committee was just formed to address the points on its charter, and that it did just that.

    John: “There is no good reason we can get Ares I/Orion flying by 2015. We just need to get it done.”

    That sounds like wishful thinking. I think we’ll need to see more justification than that. Can you point to any independent studies of Ares I/Orion that state that we can get Ares I/Orion flying by 2015? If not, why should be think it can be done? Even if it can be done, what is the point, if we have to ditch the ISS by 2015 in order to afford developing Ares I/Orion?

    John: “The fact it won’t get done is just because Obama doesn’t want it done.”

    I can’t read Obama’s mind, but I imagine he would be totally ok with it if Constellation weren’t completely off the rails. If he could just leave Constellation alone, and use the new $6B to bolster Earth observations, Aeronautics, and some innovation and education work that fit in with his broader policy concerns, I suspect that he’d do that. Why would he turn over that bee’s nest if he didn’t have to?

    Constellation’s horrible shape doesn’t allow us to let it continue.

    John: ““Remember that Constellation has no accomplishments before it gets to the Moon in 2035″

    No truth in that date…stop making things up!”

    From the Augustine Committee final report:

    “Option 1. Program of Record as Assessed by the Committee, Constrained to the FY 2010 budget.

    This option is the program of record, with only two changes the Committee deems necessary: providing funds for the Shuttle into FY 2011 and including sufficient funds to deorbit the ISS in 2016. When constrained to this budget profile, Ares I and Orion are not available until after the ISS has been de-orbited. The heavy-lift vehicle, Ares V, is not available until the late 2020s, and there are insufficient funds to develop the lunar lander and lunar surface systems until well into the 2030s, if ever.”

    “In short, this program operates within current FY 2010 budget constraints, but offers little or no apparent value.”

    We have a NASA budget increase, but we also have increases in non-HSF areas, so this is a reasonable approximation of what we can expect from the POR if it’s kept.

  • Alan

    There was a plan. Now there is no plan. Studies are not plans. It’s good for NASA because they can study. It’s bad for America because we aren’t going anywhere.

  • Vladislaw

    Alan wrote:

    “There was a plan. Now there is no plan”

    There was a plan with no funding, I have a book shelf filled with books of plans for various types of projects. I have not built all of them because I could not afford to.

    A budget, by definiton, IS a plan. A plan on what projects will be provided funding.

    So now that we can agree there is a plan, we have to determine if you are for or against that funding plan of projects.

    Space Technology:
    http://www.nasa.gov/pdf/428439main_Space_technology.pdf

    Exploration Systems:
    http://www.nasa.gov/pdf/428356main_Exploration.pdf

    Space Operations:
    http://www.nasa.gov/pdf/428432main_Space_Operations.pdf

    You should read those documents carefully and make notes of every project that gets funded you disagree with and why.

  • Alan

    The Augustine commission said 3 billion more a year was needed to make it work. They’re going to spend nearly that with nothing to show. A budget for studies is not a plan to get us back to the Moon and then on to Mars. We’re going nowhere.

  • red: My suggestion is to layoff a lot of NASA managers with an SRO and give the contractors clear goals, incentive based contracts, and let them go to it and I think that what I’ve said can be accomplished. I don’t think that Augustine considered that. Baiscally I’m using the commercial peoples argument against them. The problem isn’t the Ares.. its the bureaucracy. Cut that rather than the program.

  • googaw

    unless they are materially helping pave the way for eventual human settlement

    This is an easy target. Space colonization is a very long-term goal and today’s HSF in no way shape or form paves the way for it. We could go without HSF for half a century more, probably even a century, and it would not delay space colonization by a nanosecond.

  • Robert G. Oler

    John wrote @ March 17th, 2010 at 10:27 pm

    First off ignore the Augustine study…it’s just biased BS designed to kill off all existing NASA spacefight assets. There is no good reason we can get Ares I/Orion flying by 2015. We just need to get it done. The fact it won’t get done is just because Obama doesn’t want it done…

    I dont think it can. If asked, I would decline the “challenge”.

    Ares 1 is based on a flawed launch vehicle equation. There is to little first stage and the second has to do to much…both first and second require everything to come in on “performance” when both the first and second stage are already being “stretched”. There is no guarantee that any of this will work…and in the case of the upgraded J2…there is an enormous amount of work to do.

    Then there is the project management. There is little of value in either the contractor setup or the setup at NASA.

    Not even a “Rickover” figure, one who could come in and have absolute authority over the government workforce, and get the contractors going…could in my view make it work.

    I would much rather be tasked with “human rating” the Delta…I think that could be done in under two years …In fact with a LAS IF I were Charlie I would have no qualms about putting people on it “as is”.

    now

    Robert G. Oler

  • Brad

    Vladislaw

    Very interesting info, thanx for links.

    “A budget, by definiton, IS a plan. A plan on what projects will be provided funding. So now that we can agree there is a plan, we have to determine if you are for or against that funding plan of projects.”

    Well 3 billion for HLV technology is a waste.

    But what I found most troubling was this…

    “ISS will be extended beyond 2016, likely through 2020 or beyond, to fully utilize the orbiting facility as a basic research facility, a testbed for exploration technology development and demonstrations, and a market/destination for commercial crew and cargo transportation services. The FY 2011 budget
    provides $2.5 billion in additional funding to support these robust efforts, and to initiate activities to increase ISS functionality.”

    The desire to keep ISS flying ‘through 2020 or beyond’, combined with a lack of an Orion substitute for deep space missions, confirms to me that NASA isn’t planning on sending men anywhere beyond ISS for at least the next ten years.

    And when Bolden’s public statements about HLV are taken into account it seems likely that NASA won’t send men anywhere beyond ISS for the next twenty years.

  • red

    Brad: “The desire to keep ISS flying ‘through 2020 or beyond’, combined with a lack of an Orion substitute for deep space missions, confirms to me that NASA isn’t planning on sending men anywhere beyond ISS for at least the next ten years.

    And when Bolden’s public statements about HLV are taken into account it seems likely that NASA won’t send men anywhere beyond ISS for the next twenty years.”

    Let’s assume all of that is true. Even then, it’s also true of the current Constellation program. For example, even if we assume no HLV is finished until, say, 2028, that’s the same as the Constellation plan, per Augustine.

    However, with the new plan, instead of getting nothing in the meantime, we get a whole lot of useful things in the meantime: a line of robotic precursors, multiple commercial crew vendors, numerous exploration technology demonstrations like propellant depots, inflatable habitats, and on and on, a strong Earth observation program, actual use of ISS, more ISS capabilities, ISS to 2020+, a strong general technology program, an HLV effort with useful non-HLV potential like a U.S. RD-180 class engine, an upgraded KSC, a human research program with a 42% boost … and all of that is just in the first 5 years. That gives the U.S. back or solidifies its #1 position in non-exploration space activities, and lays a very solid foundation for exploration.

  • Alan

    We’re talking about getting to the Moon and Mars, not the ISS or Earth observations. NASA’s been studying the Moon/Mars program for years and years. Either you build it or you don’t. Hardware gets you into deep space, not more studies. Never confuse movement for action. It’s time for action, not bureaucracy.

  • stephen

    The desire to keep ISS flying ‘through 2020 or beyond’, combined with a lack of an Orion substitute for deep space missions, confirms to me that NASA isn’t planning on sending men anywhere beyond ISS for at least the next ten years.

    Well we spent billions of dollars on it, we might as well use it for something useful. Otherwise, it’s like a kid building a fort:

    “Well, that was fun. Let’s blow it up!”

  • Vladislaw

    Brad wrote:

    “The desire to keep ISS flying ‘through 2020 or beyond’, combined with a lack of an Orion substitute for deep space missions, confirms to me that NASA isn’t planning on sending men anywhere beyond ISS for at least the next ten years.”

    If you have monitored what I have wrote on here since President Bush announced the Vision for Space Exploration, (VSE) and then Griffin’s plan to execute it with the ESAS I never believed we were going to send people beyond LEO on anywhere near the timelines as expressed in the VSE.

    As you read through the VSE and how each item was executed by Griffin it appeared that EVERY single choice that would add expense and time to the project was the winning choice.

    Under the VSE, Nasa was not supposed to build any new launch capabilty for the CEV, it was supposed to be launched commercially. It was supposed to do fuel depots, in orbit assembly, in space propulsion, new power systems. President Bush actually thought the moon was reachable in 2015. Under the program of record the moon is TWO decades away.

  • In fact with a LAS IF I were Charlie I would have no qualms about putting people on it “as is”.

    Charlie’s smarter than you. He knows that an LAS is useless and expensive deadweight without a good failure onset detection system to tell you when you need to use it in a timely manner. Delta doesn’t currently have one.

  • Donald Ernst

    Obama is not even going to be around after 2012 and his congressional support is gone come november. Considering the fact NASA was going to be accomplishing little of anything anyway in this time period I dont see what the fuss is about. Hopefully after Obama we will have a real effort to develop domestic based commerical launch capabilities, BTW we are already purchasing commerical services to launch ISS crews, it’s just we are purchasing them from the Russians.

  • googaw

    stephen:
    Otherwise, it’s like a kid building a fort: “Well, that was fun. Let’s blow it up!”

    This is the kind of philosophy we get when there is no economic accountability.

  • richardb

    Bolden said ““Commercial is about making money,” he continued, “and I think there are incredible opportunities for money to be made with commercial access to low Earth orbit.” NASA was willing to pay for to transport crews to the ISS, and perhaps later, he suggested, even manage access to the station as the agency tries to get out of more routine operations. ”
    What incredible market is he talking about? The only market I know of is the USG’s ride to the station and the station itself.

    Maybe the market is all the science projects the crew could be doing. But so far there is little of that being done. In most companies R&D is an expense, not a market maker.

    Maybe tourism to the station?
    Would SpaceX risk the company to build a business around competing with the Russians for lift to the ISS?

    Perhaps he’s talking about the Bigelow station? How does that help utilize the ISS though?

    I’d like Bolden to describe this dazzling market he’s talking about.

    I don’t think he can. In fact, unless the USG guarantees business and profits, nobody will invest in it. That is also known price fixing in the commercial world.

    No wonder Congress is frustrated with the Nasa plans. They don’t make much sense.

  • silence dogood

    I want to make a t-shirt that says:

    “My country went to the moon,
    and all they brought back
    for me was this stupid t-shirt.”

    Any takers?

  • googaw

    richardb, Bolden is just recycling the old propaganda that was used to sell the ISS as “infrastructure” in the first place.

  • Robert G. Oler

    Rand Simberg wrote @ March 18th, 2010 at 11:20 am

    hopefully he can read better then you! A LAS implies a failure detection system…pay attention.

    Robert G. Oler

  • Robert G. Oler

    Donald Ernst wrote @ March 18th, 2010 at 12:25 pm

    Obama is not even going to be around after 2012 and his congressional support is gone come november. ..

    and you know both those things how?

    Ah ideology

    Check in about August for the later, the former…well 2011.

    Robert G. Oler

  • Donald Ernst

    How do I know both those things, well it’s simple because the Democratic party is going to commit suicide on Sunday March 21st.

  • Fred Cink

    To Robert G Oler, the cool aid stains on your Cheer Leader’s For Obama Sweater are looking a little tacky. How about some real coments other than RHA RHA RHA. I dont think space policy should be based on preserving jobs in someone’s district just because thats the way it’s been since LBJ brought home the bacon to Houston. But It DOES keep jobs and income (and income taxes) LONG after (and before) a booster flies out of sight. All the advanced tech like VASIMIR to Mars and ISRU once there in 5,10,15or probably 50 years isn’t going to do squat without access to LEO. Show me some MEANINGFULL support by this admin for x38/ Dreamchaser on Atlas V or Delta 4 or your argument is, dare I say, ideological.

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