Congress, NASA

The asterisk in Monday’s commercial crew announcement

It was all smiles yesterday morning at the Kennedy Space Center as officials from NASA, Boeing, and Space Florida, along with various elected officials, announced that Boeing would set up operations at KSC’s Orbiter Processing Facility 3 for the eventually assembly of its CST-100 commercial crew vehicles. The focus of the attention was, by and large, the economic impact of that decision, including the creation of up to 550 jobs at the center by mid-decade.

There is one catch to that deal, though, which Boeing hinted at in its own press release with this caveat: “Pending the continued selection of Boeing for future Commercial Crew development and service contracts, and sufficient NASA funding…”. Boeing, of course, has to be competitive enough to win funding in future rounds of NASA’s Commercial Crew Program against competitors like Blue Origin, Sierra Nevada Corporation, and SpaceX. But, as Boeing hints, the NASA funding has to be there in the first place, and the battle over the 2012 budget—where NASA requested $850 million, but the House and Senate have offered only $312 million and $500 million, respectively—is not an optimistic sign.

Sen. Bill Nelson (D-FL), one of the speakers at the hour-long ceremony, mentioned the funding discrepancy. “The House has cut it to $312 million,” he said of the administration’s FY2012 request of $850 million, “and the Senate, along with Kay [Bailey Hutchison], Barbara Mikulski, and a number of others, has gotten it up to $500 million.” He stopped short, though, of calling for full funding for the program. “It’s almost a minor miracle that NASA has not been cut more in its overall funding level,” he said. “Compared to other agencies NASA has fared very well in what we have produced out of the Senate Appropriations Committee.”

Rep. Sandy Adams (R-FL), whose district includes KSC, also spoke in support of commercial crew at the event, calling it “the best near-term hope we have for getting American astronauts, on American rockets, built by an American aerospace workforce, to the International Space Station” in her remarks. “As America takes steps towards the next chapter of space exploration, it is imperative that Congress remains vigilant in its support of the efforts of the Commercial Crew and COTS program,” she said, but was silent on specific funding levels.

The only person to go on the record for full funding for the program in FY2012 was Space Florida president Frank DiBello. “We believe that the president’s request should be fully funded,” he told the Orlando Sentinel. But with the Senate expected to wrap up work as soon as tonight on the “minibus” FY12 appropriations bill that includes NASA, time is running out to add funding for this program.

48 comments to The asterisk in Monday’s commercial crew announcement

  • Boeing is a partner with Bigelow Aerospace, so they’ll have plenty of action beyond just ISS flights for NASA. Bigelow is ready to go, they’re just waiting for Boeing.

  • GeeSpace

    “Pending the continued selection of Boeing for future Commercial Crew development and service contracts, and sufficient NASA funding…”

    Yes, it seems that a lot of commerical space cimpanies need NASA funding (in some form) to be willing to develop their own products,

    Hopefully, that won’t be the case at some midterm point of time

  • amightywind

    $800 million won’t be forthcoming. NASA should down select the 4 CCDev programs to one that will fly. Boeing’s CST-100 is obvious and most likely candidate. Obama’s Nerdspace gravy train stops here!

  • It was funny watching yesterday’s media event, all those Republicans lined up on the dais trying to take credit for something they’ve opposed the last two years.

    The only one with any legitimate credentials to be on that dais was Senator Bill Nelson, whose remarks were rather candid about SLS. He was pretty clear that SLS was the compromise with Hutchison and the other congressional porkers that got CCDev approved.

    The entire event is on YouTube at:

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4bj831dCzVk

    It runs about an hour. Nelson speaks towards the end.

  • GeeSpace wrote:

    Yes, it seems that a lot of commerical space cimpanies need NASA funding (in some form) to be willing to develop their own products,

    Because NASA asked them to build it for NASA. Seems NASA should pay for it.

  • Dennis

    I think of all the companies that should be supported are both Boeing and SpaceX, who at least seem to have a handle on the situation. Boeing has proven itself many times, but SpaceX must still show itself capable.

  • wappeldoo

    amightywind: Selecting a single “winner” at this point would just remove the incentive the competitors currently have to keep costs down. Once Boeing (or SpaceX) got selected, it’s incentive would reverse: get as much out of NASA as possible. So long as you have at least two commercial options, NASA can always threaten to go with the cheaper choice if costs start to creep up.

  • wappeldoo

    *its, not “it’s”

  • amightywind

    Selecting a single “winner” at this point would just remove the incentive the competitors currently have to keep costs down.

    The US is without a launch capability capability to ISS and we are bumming rides with despots from Russia. Our relations could sour very quickly. The situation is urgent. To heck with your market sensitivities. Playing one contractor off against is a luxury the policy dandies at NASA cannot afford. Speed of development and certainty of success are more important than creating the perfect competitive environment. We need some good old fashioned Apollo style can do management.

  • Martijn Meijering

    He was pretty clear that SLS was the compromise with Hutchison and the other congressional porkers that got CCDev approved.

    You sound positive about Nelson. It has been my impression that he is one of the worst porkers and SLS-supporters himself.

  • BRC

    “We need some good old fashioned Apollo style can do management.”

    Then find out where they have been secretly storing Werner Von Braun’s clone, and free him!! (then let loose Günter Wendt’s copy, as a back-up)

  • GeeSpace

    Stephen C. Smith wrote @ November 1st, 2011 at 8:51 am

    Because NASA asked them to build it for NASA. Seems NASA should pay for it

    Stephen, of course customers need to paid commercial space companies for services and equipment used.

    What I am saying is that I hope (in the not too distance future) many, many commercial space companies will have more customers than only NASA. Such as Space X is dolng or trying to do

  • @ almighty:

    “$800 million won’t be forthcoming. NASA should down select the 4 CCDev programs to one that will fly. Boeing’s CST-100 is obvious and most likely candidate.”

    You really hate space access redundancy (that isn’t Russian), don’t you?

  • Byeman

    “We need some good old fashioned Apollo style ”
    Which is Soviet style design center management.

  • vulture4

    Every Republican legislator from the Space Coast, including State Senator (and US Senate Candidate) Mike Haridopolos, and even Democratic Senator Nelson have been fighting Commercial Crew from the inception and pushing SLS, while Obama and Garver have had to fight every inch of the way for Commercial Crew and still do not have adequate funding.

    But you can bet our well-paid legislators will all be standing in line to claim the credit (and in the case of the GOP, continue to blame Mr. Obama for making us dependent on the Russians) when Commercial Crew finally succeeds and really does create jobs while “Griffin on Steroids” collapses under its own weight.

  • E.P. Grondine

    Good morning AW –

    The back-up for US manned LEO support is not going to be Liberty.

    I keep telling you that Musk does not need government subsidies, but simply wants a level playing field. If ATK can’t handle that, too bad.

    They’re a crummy company that could not deliver their launcher on time on on budget, a pretty crummy launcher at that. Personally, I resent ATK transferring US fuel baffling technology to France for free – Ariane is a commercial competitor with US launch companies.

    I’d quote Saunders Kramer here for you, AW, but then Jeff doesn’t permit that kind of language.

  • John Malkin

    Stephen C. Smith wrote @ November 1st, 2011 at 7:22 am
    Boeing is a partner with Bigelow Aerospace,

    Bigelow is on record stating that he would like at least two domestic options for redundancy and he feels more is better. So something like Russia’s problem doesn’t happen to him and his customers.

    Note supporting Boeing requires support of both Boeing and ULA since Boeing is only building a capsule. Also ULA is supporting almost all the CCDev competitors. ATK has a rocket with no capsule and nobody wants to use them at least domestically.

  • Coastal Ron

    amightywind wrote @ November 1st, 2011 at 10:00 am

    The US is without a launch capability capability to ISS and we are bumming rides with despots from Russia.

    Republican President George W. Bush didn’t seem to care – why didn’t you speak up then and blame Bush 43 for this situation?

    To heck with your market sensitivities.

    You’re saying capitalism doesn’t work in these situations, so you’d like the top authority to have king-like powers to choose a winner and eliminate competition? You’re showing your colors comrade.

    If Congress truly thought this was an emergency they would be agreeing with the Obama Administration on fully funding CCDev, or probably even accelerating the funding to match what Boeing and SpaceX has said they can do.

    But Congress isn’t doing that, and if anything they might even cut the funding, so your Republican comrades in Congress don’t seem to agree with you. Ironically the only relevant person in Congress that would agree with you about the accelerated funding would be Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, which is truly hilarious for you!!

  • Time has posted an article by Jeffrey Kluger claiming that NASA is going out of business, which is why they’re “selling off” parts of KSC:

    http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,2098363,00.html

    What a bunch of garbage. This reporter should be fired.

  • MrEarl

    What keeps getting lost in this debate going on throughout the country and on Capital Hill are two facts:
    1: NASA, DEA, FBI, etc. are not bankrupting the nation. Their total percentage of the budget is relatively small. While waist should not be condoned in any agency, the elimination of ALL waist and cuts to the budgets of these types of departments and agencies will only make a small dent in government spending.
    This government is going broke through a combination of unrealistic spending on entitlements and defense paid for through borrowing against our future causing repayment on that debt to choke us.

    2: The way out of this situation is not simple.
    50% will have to come from budget cuts in entitlements and defense spending and tax increases, with most coming through cuts.
    The other 50% will have to come from growth in the economy. Government can help this by providing stable monetary and regulatory policies designed to give businesses a sound stable footing to grow their businesses and create new ones. The other way government can help economic growth is to encourage endeavors like CCDev and to shoulder a big share of the risk in ventures like beyond Earth exploration (yes SLS and MPCV) that could develop new markets and technology to drive our economy in the future. Votes to cut these things are votes to relegate future generations of Americans to a declining standard of living.
    To those who say we can’t afford to invest in these things I say we can’t afford not to.

  • Coastal Ron

    GeeSpace wrote @ November 1st, 2011 at 11:24 am

    What I am saying is that I hope (in the not too distance future) many, many commercial space companies will have more customers than only NASA.

    I’m sure all of the CCDev participants have done the math and understand that if they get a NASA contract for the ISS crew transportation it will only cover their bare costs, not lead to an expanding market.

    What they are likely counting on, and what Boeing and SpaceX have stated publicly, is that they can expand the market beyond just NASA’s bare needs. That would involve Bigelow’s proposed space station business, but it would also include other possible business ventures.

    This type of business risk, one that relies on creating a new market, is pretty standard in business, so it’s not like this has never been done before. Just look at Virgin Galactic as one example of how to create a new market, and they are relying predominately on the leisure market versus the transportation market for CCDev.

    Just like it took 18 years from proposal to construction complete for the ISS, it’s going to take a few years to get Commercial Crew going – possibly even more if Congress doesn’t see the need to stop paying Russia for taxi trips. We’ll see what Congress proposes.

  • amightywind

    If ATK can’t handle that, too bad.

    If anything I am advocating for Boeing because I think their configuration has the most credibility or the CCDev 2 proposals.

    Republican President George W. Bush didn’t seem to care

    The situation was tolerable knowing the shuttle hiatus would be short and the ISS would be abandoned in 2015. Obama extended the ISS zombie past 2020 and killed the replacement program leaving us with the petty program we have now. No, GDub should be praised for his leadership in reforming NASA, as the Bolsheviks should be scorned for sabotaging his plans.

    Virgin Galactic as one example of how to create a new market

    Servicing for a Bigelow space hotel would be. ISS servicing is not. CCDev is like contracting out for supplying McMurdo station, and furnishing the contractor with the planes.

    The way out of this situation is not simple.
    50% will have to come from budget cuts in entitlements and defense spending and tax increases

    No tax increases, minimal defense cuts, steep spending cuts. (Any of you self-styled Tea Partiers willing to back me?) Growth is essential to all budget items going forward. This is what next year’s election will be all about. Freedom versus the decrepit American Eurostate.

  • GClark

    “…steep spending cuts.”

    Specifics please. Devil, details, etc.

  • Coastal Ron

    amightywind wrote @ November 1st, 2011 at 2:42 pm

    No, GDub should be praised for his leadership in reforming NASA

    Yes, the Republicans in Congress loved his handling of his signature exploration program (CxP) so much that they cancelled it as soon as he left office. And they may do the same with his signature science program, the JWST. Yep, no mightier praise than a cancellation. ;-)

    Servicing for a Bigelow space hotel would be.

    You don’t know much about what’s going on, do you?

    Bigelow is not building space hotels, he will “provide affordable options for spaceflight to national space agencies and corporate clients.

    Maybe you should educate yourself more about the topics at hand…

    ISS servicing is not.

    Your ignorance of how the world works is pretty amazing. How do you think any government laboratory functions – that supplies magically appear? How could any supposed capitalist not know about supply and demand as the foundation for our economy? The ISS needs supplies and crew transportation, and though NASA could do it themselves private companies can do it less expensively.

  • Rhyolite

    “We need some good old fashioned Apollo style can do management.”

    Old fashioned Apollo style management required blank check budgeting. That’s not going to happen nor is it even desirable. HSF isn’t going to become practical until we learn to do it on a (relative) shoestring budget.

  • amightywind

    Specifics please. Devil, details, etc.

    Means test SSoc making it an anti-poverty welfare program. Implement Ryan’s medicare and medicaid reforms. Freeze non-defense discretionary budgets, including NASA, at 2008 levels until the budget is in real balance. That would imply significant layoffs of government workers at all levels.

  • John Malkin

    amightywind wrote @ November 1st, 2011 at 2:42 pm

    Servicing for a Bigelow space hotel would be. ISS servicing is not. CCDev is like contracting out for supplying McMurdo station, and furnishing the contractor with the planes.

    NASA isn’t buying the vehicles in CCDev, it’s buying a service. That is the point of Commercial Crew. The vendors can re-use THEIR vehicles as much as they want as long as NASA gets safe service.

  • Charles Grimm

    Just to do the numbers, 550 jobs at a cost of $130,000 fully burdened (what a deal!) is $7.1 megabucks/year. For 5 launches per year, that’s about 1.5 mil per flight. 2 launches is 3.5 mil.
    Just tracking the standing army, when it gets too big, the profits disappear.
    CG

  • CCDev is like contracting out for supplying McMurdo station, and furnishing the contractor with the planes.

    What an idiotic attempt at an analogy.

  • John Malkin

    amightywind wrote @ November 1st, 2011 at 2:42 pm

    If ATK can’t handle that, too bad.

    If anything I am advocating for Boeing because I think their configuration has the most credibility or the CCDev 2 proposals.

    You gave up on ATK and Ares I Hybird? They will get billions for SLS anyway so those jobs are safe for now.

  • John Malkin

    @amightywind

    Thank you for supporting my hometown Boeing. :)

  • amightywind

    Thank you for supporting my hometown Boeing.

    If you are from Charleston, you’re welcome. If you’re from union-addled Seattle, not so much.

    You gave up on ATK and Ares I Hybird? They will get billions for SLS anyway so those jobs are safe for now.

    I am for the Constellation architecture capability or something that is roughly, functionally equivalent.

    … it’s buying a service.

    Then the cost of the first SpaceX resupply mission is $500 million and counting. Makes the shuttle seem like a good deal.

    What an idiotic attempt at an analogy.

    I thought it clever. I hope it helped you to see the situation more clearly.

  • I thought it clever. I hope it helped you to see the situation more clearly.

    It helped me see more clearly the situation that you are an idiot, though the issue hasn’t really been in doubt for many months.

  • Robert G. Oler

    MrEarl wrote @ November 1st, 2011 at 1:44 pm

    What keeps getting lost in this debate going on throughout the country and on Capital Hill are two facts:..

    those are not bad realities, but on just a space note.

    The reality is that unless the cost of human spaceflight comes down then human spaceflight is going nowhere fast…and while there are some technology issues in cost; the main one is people…and cutting the standing army that SUPPORTS human spaceflight is a large driver of the cost.

    I dont know what the people on orbit vrs the people on the ground number for the space station is but I bet its 1 to 1000…

    I agree on your general budget thoughts RGO

  • John Malkin

    amightywind wrote @ November 1st, 2011 at 4:04 pm

    I am for the Constellation architecture capability or something that is roughly, functionally equivalent.

    These are official numbers from Michael D. Griffin, Administrator.

    By Mission Directorate

    Constellation Systems FY2007 (3.2B) FY2008(3.0B)
    FY2009 (3.5B) FY20010 (3.8B) FY2011 (7.6B) FY2012 (7.9B)

    We wish Congress would open the floodgate and money would pour over NASA but it’s not going to happen.

    Show me the money or give me a real plan. Stop the useless rhetoric.

  • DCSCA

    @Stephen C. Smith wrote @ November 1st, 2011 at 12:24 pm
    “Time has posted an article by Jeffrey Kluger claiming that NASA is going out of business, which is why they’re “selling off” parts of KSC…This reporter should be fired.”

    =yawn= Jeffrey Kluger co-authored ‘Lost Moon’ w/Jim Lovell, fella, and was involved w/t production of the film, ‘Apollo 13.’ You can check out the BO gross WW on your own but it remains an astronomical figure. He even had a cameo in the flick. And he also penned the 40th anniversar cover story on the Apollo moon landing in 2009.

  • John

    Rhyolite wrote,

    “Old fashioned Apollo style management required blank check budgeting.”

    CxP was blank check budgeting. (ATK)
    With that initial 10 billion we would have had a reliable and reusable crew/cargo ->HLV without SRB’s.

  • Rhyolite

    “Just to do the numbers, 550 jobs at a cost of $130,000 fully burdened (what a deal!) is $7.1 megabucks/year.”

    Your decimal point is in the wrong place.

  • Beancounter from Downunder

    ‘amightywind wrote @ November 1st, 2011 at 4:04 pm:
    Then the cost of the first SpaceX resupply mission is $500 million and counting. Makes the shuttle seem like a good deal.’

    Don’t normally respond to trolls but this one’s too good an opportunity. Here’s a question for you awind: what did Shuttle cost even if it didn’t fly? Per month that is because there were periods of months when she didn’t. LOL
    Perspective is everything.

  • Beancounter from Downunder

    Notice that SpaceX is still advertising for qualified high tech positions. Somewhere in the order of 160 positions not including a half dozen intern spots. Doesn’t look like a company suffering doubts about any aspect of their business at all. Really looking forward to the COTS 2/3 mission. Should really be something.

  • amightywind

    Doesn’t look like a company suffering doubts about any aspect of their business at all.

    Why should they? They aren’t spending their own money. Solyndra had a lot of folks on the payroll too.

  • Justin Kugler

    You are entitled to your own opinions, but not your own facts. The facts are that SpaceX has raised more of its own capital than NASA has put in.

  • Aremis Asling

    “The situation was tolerable knowing the shuttle hiatus would be short and the ISS would be abandoned in 2015.”

    The 2015 date was never expected to be the date ISS splashed down, it was merely an initial date in anticipation of future extensions. No plan was ever set forth hinging on the budgetary benefits of sinking ISS. Given that even at the dawn of VSE the ISS wasn’t expected to be complete until 2010 (hence the decided upon date for STS sundown) that would have been a remarkably bad budgetary decision. Given that Europe, Japan, Canada, and Russia all had contingency plans to keep all of their assets flying in the event we splashed ours down, it would have been exceptionally bad planning that would hand yet another capability to the sole ownership of other nations. This ISS splashdown fantasy of yours is getting more and more detached from reality as time goes on.

    “No tax increases, minimal defense cuts, steep spending cuts. (Any of you self-styled Tea Partiers willing to back me?)”

    Thats the Republican Party line, not the TEA party. The TEA party backs hefty defense cuts as well. They also support commercial crew and oppose Big Government Rockets. I wouldn’t expect them to jump in line with you, windy.

  • Coastal Ron

    amightywind wrote @ November 2nd, 2011 at 8:39 am

    They [SpaceX] aren’t spending their own money.

    Do you do ANY research before you post? SpaceX does not have any government loans.

    I wonder if you feel the least amount of shame for making stuff up, or if your obsession with Obama is driving this?

  • common sense

    “Do you do ANY research before you post?”

    No. Never. Way too difficult while I am creating value money for my clients: I actually print bills in my basement.

    “SpaceX does not have any government loans.”

    Well this is all mumbo-jumbo for subsidies and they got a lot of subsidies. All of them, that’s what they do. They get subsidies and take all the money away from our dearest contractors who are losing their rightfully and painfully earned sole source contracts.

    “I wonder if you feel the least amount of shame for making stuff up,”

    Nope.

    ” or if your obsession with Obama is driving this?”

    Oba-who?

  • BeanCounterFromDownunder

    Dennis. Boeing have never operated under something like CCDev before. SpaceX has already proven that they can deliver in terms of actual flight hardware. Dragon has flown to leo and successfully returned.

  • Dennis

    Yes, but one flight does not make a manned spacecraft. Im the first to a I hope his next and up coming mission will be a complete success, but SpaceX is still in the experimental phase.

  • Coastal Ron

    Dennis wrote @ November 3rd, 2011 at 11:01 am

    Yes, but one flight does not make a manned spacecraft.

    At least SpaceX has real hardware they are testing. So far the SLS/MPCV is still in powerpoint or preliminary testing mode. Even when the SLS/MPCV does fly, it will change hardware configurations after each flight, so no full-up flight heritage will be able to be established for a long time.

    By comparison, SpaceX will be flying the same rocket and will be flying 12 of the same configuration of capsules, so they will have a lot of flight heritage to base their crew configuration on.

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