“…as I believe that government funded human space exploration is a farce and a complete waste of taxpayer funds and government resources…”

Yet advocating that Congress should spend more money to modify the SLS so it can go to the Moon is not a “farce and a complete waste of taxpayer funds and government resources”?

You my friend are very inconsistent.

On the other hand, I believe the poles of the moon and large form factor unmanned launch vehicles are particularly suited for the large scale industrial development of near earth space.

“The overall goal is to make access to space more reliable, routine, and cost-effective, by reducing launch costs 25 to 50 percent over the next 20 years, followed by a greater reduction (>50 percent) as concepts that are currently non-conventional and at a low TRL are fully developed. Improvements in these systems will help maintain the Nation’s leadership role in space capability.”

Maybe I missed it, but I haven’t found any mention of the SLS. Which makes sense, since this is coming from NASA’s Office of Chief Technologist, and they don’t have to be political.

I also encourage everyone to look at the chart on page 19, because that shows what NASA feels it needs to invest in to get ready for future exploration. Or as they put it:

“The Core technologies represent focused areas of technology investment that are indispensable for NASA’s present and planned future missions. Core technologies are the central focus of technology investment and will comprise approximately 70 percent of the Agency’s technology investment over the next four years.“

“In fact, he’s a politician and looks at SLS through geo-political glasses.”

You can say that all you want, but you have failed to explain and support it with any facts. In fact Nelson stated when they created the SLS that it was to save jobs.

ISS cost too much to build but it’s up there now. They’ll keep using it as long as they can.

Except it facilitates indecision, RGO, which only feeds the Magnified Importance of Diminished Vision

In fact, he’s a politician and looks at SLS through geo-political glasses. Get a pair and things will come into focus– you’ll see what he sees. It’s a geo-political signal to the international community– friend and foe alike– and as a by-product, a works program which happens to be a space project odf scale. And if you want to press the silliness of ‘mission’ it’s quite a surprise that you’ve suddenly become a destination advocate. If you want to question ‘need’ you only have to look at the wasted expense of government money on Dragon service to a doomed space platform thaat’s a relic of Cold War planning from the last century– an era long over. It’s a weak redundancy to the decades of successful Progress vehicles.

“With a twenty trillion dollar public debt, government funded space exploration architectures are unaffordable in any form factor.”

Again, that’s not what you originally said, but maybe that’s just you having a hard time communicating your concepts. Regardless, the amount of public debt is not related to government spending – if politicians want to spend money on something, they will. However for space related stuff, politicians have not been convinced to stay focused on spending much money beyond LEO – Constellation collapsed pretty quickly and easily, and there is no evidence that any politician wants to fund any activity on the Moon.

“Five meter rockets have the DoD as anchor tenant so I’m not particularly worried about their demise.”

The DoD doesn’t control Ariane 5, Proton, H-IIB or Falcon Heavy, so there is quite a bit of 5m capability outside of what ULA offers. In any case, you haven’t explained what this has to do with non-DoD space exploration.

“I’m just bringing to your attention the obvious lunar industrialization advantages that large form factor reusable launch vehicles bring to the table with clustered high performance core stages, upper stages and landing engines integrated into a single unit, with the payload being fuel and … the launch vehicle!”

I know you think it is, but since there is no requirement or demand for such a need, it remains to be seen whether what you propose truly is “the right way”. By the time the need arises (which could be decades) the technology and infrastructure of that time may be biased towards a different solution that you haven’t yet considered.

“If you are looking for an aerospace jobs program that actually delivers what it promises, this would be it.”

I’m not. I don’t want my tax dollars going towards make-work programs, I want my tax dollars spent wisely – don’t you?

Look, in my mind the only big change that needs to happen with NASA is that the SLS program needs to be cancelled. Once that’s done, NASA should be able to focus on developing the technologies and techniques that will allow the U.S. to leave LEO in a sustainable fashion. And when I say the U.S., what I mean is NASA is on the leading edge, and commercial companies are following close behind supporting what NASA is doing.

I believe a capabilities-based exploration effort is the fastest, and least costly way for the U.S. to become a space-faring nation, and if companies want to go to the Moon and do ISRU, great, let them test the market and see if they can make a business of it. But pushing NASA to be not only a transportation provider but a mining operation, that is like trying to teach a dolphin to roller skate…