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NASA Plan to Return to the Moon
sjoeboo writes "NASA briefed senior White House officials Wednesday on its plan to spend $100 billion during the next 12 years building the spacecraft and rockets it needs to put humans back on the Moon by 2018.
The U.S. space agency now expects to roll out its lunar exploration plan to key Congressional committees on Friday and to the broader public through a news conference on Monday."
The big changes since the inception of the program have been:
IMHO, Bush's administration has done a reasonable job of making sure that we are on a viable track to returning to the moon and reaching Mars. My hope is that the next President who shows up doesn't dive in and try to change everything. The plan is good. It only needs some nursemaiding, not micromanagement from on high. Thankfully there's a great deal of pressure to replace the Space Shuttle, so the future President may be willing to just let NASA do their job.
(FYI, Wikipedia has been keeping extremely good track of CEV Development as it happens. While Wikipedia is not a news source, this particular article is a good place to go for the latest status of the project.)
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What happened to Mars by 2015?
With Bush set to drop $200 billion on Katrina, finding money for going to the moon is going to be difficult. However, with the Chinese headed into space again, maybe they can argue it for national security.
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Nice to see that with modern 21st technology, we can make it to the moon in only thirteen years, as opposed to the long eight year program it took forty years ago.
The cake is a pie
It only took us 9 damn years to get there in the first place! Now that we already have the technology to make it there, they want 13 years?! Fuck that shit. Thye should be able to get there in at most 5 years. I'll bet $100 NASA's beaten by the Chinese or Burt Rutan. Any takers?
What is your penile percentile?
Everyone knows the moon landing were faked.
Besides, I would think that $100 Billion is too much. The price of motion picture special effects has come down a lot since the 60s.
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Congress won't fund these guys well enough to put people in low earth orbit safely, and they want to go back to the Moon?
-JDF
They have no reason for going to the moon. At least Apollo had a reason, the space race against the evil commies, but this time, not even that much. No doubt we'll go there a few times and stop again.
Moon colonies would be great, from a science fiction point of view, but without an actual practical reason that involves real colonists with real practical uses, this new moon plan will be just another short sighted waste of time and money. I'd rather that money was spent on technology that had actual uses for most people. Don't preach to me about spin-offs. There would be just as many spin-offs from orbital hotels or quiet and environmentally friendly hypersonic transports or practical electric cars with batteries to go 500 miles.
Infuriate left and right
we already went there once with FAR inferior technology (or did we ?.. cue tin foil hat) ... it shouldnt take us 12 years to do it again ..
All the rockets they need are stored in the kenedy space center museums.. gettem out.. dustem off and lets go already !
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Just watch. All this will be brought to nothing by the unmanned space flight mafia. It's just too attractive politically to push for unmanned space flight where there are no risks. We're slowly becoming a race of cowards when it comes to exploring new frontiers.
The owls are not what they seem
I don't care whether you define that "this decade" as starting in the year 2000 or the year 2005... ...if NASA could do it within a decade in the 1960s, why can't they do it within a decade now?
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While it's good to see NASA seriously looking into returning to the Moon, I think the money would be better spend in focusing on sending robotic missions. Not only would it be more cost effective, but it could have just as great a scientific return, and would spur the development of a technology that would have huge spin off benefits here on earth.
I'm also all for a more agressive effort to explore Mars robotically. But the idea of sending humans there so soon seems very foolish to me. Why? There's little benefit to having people do the exploring, when an advanced robot could do the job better, safer, and faster.
In theory, there's no difference between theory and practice. In practice, there is.
For those who lived in a cave for a while and haven't been here yet.
Say what you will about Bush, he deserves a lot of it (and I even voted for him), but emphasizing manned space exploration will pay off big-time for general space science in the long run.
If we can get launch costs down (the best way to do that short of a miracle breakthrough is frequent launches) and a *productive* human outpost that is capable of 'living off the land', we'll get amazing robots assembled in space that don't have these severe mass limitations we get down here. If you can assemble your rocket engine from lunar materials, of course you can build a whiz-bang robot explorer.
It should be illegal to say that freedom of speech should be limited.
If you look about halfway down, you'll see that the budget of the CEV is far outweighed by NASA's other activities, as well as being less than the amount budgeted for the Space Shuttle.
fsh
Read between the lines.
Not "to get to the moon". Not "to put humans back on the moon". But "building the spacecraft and rockets it needs to".
In 2018, NASA will have spent $100B (or about $8-10B a year, probably around half to 3/4 of its bugdet). At the end of that timeframe, NASA will have contracted out the design and production of a new spacecraft, and some new rockets.
That's it. There's no lunar mission in there. There probably isn't even the planning for a lunar mission in there.
Most likely, the new spacecraft and rockets will either continue to fly into low earth orbit to service the white elephant known as ISS.
To blue-sky for a minute - the timeframe from 2018 to 2024 will be used for planning a lunar mission. The mission will be funded for the timeframe from 2018-2030. By which time, the spacecraft and rockets developed around 2015 will be obsolete scrap.
We're going to divert a lot of funds that could be used for science (which might be OK if we were going somewhere), but the fact of the matter is - just like 30 years ago, unless you count the contracts that'll get farmed out to every Congressional district, we're not going anywhere.
Set a date, any date, as long as it's two or more presidencies away and you basically don't have to come through with your promises, even better, someone else will take the blame.
Basically there isn't the political will to do something like this so they kick it into the long grass and allow schedules to slide, costs to rise until it becomes too expensive and has to be cut.
They're talking 100 billion anyway. They'd be better offering a 100 million prize for an orbital vehicle, half a billion prize for a lunar orbiter, a billion or two for a lunar base etc.
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UTF-8: There and Back Again
"Ten thousand?" Luke gasped. "We could buy our own ship!"
"But who's gonna fly it, kid? You?"
"You bet I could! Ben, we don't have to take this."
No doubt there will be those of the next generation up to the task, but you just don't see the push of science and space at least as I remember when I was going through school (of course the round wheel was the big thing back then). Is becoming an astronaut or rocket scientist as cool as becoming an "American Idol" or a reality TV star?
"Look Lois, the two symbols of the Republican Party: an elephant, and a fat white guy who is threatened by change."
I'm thinking this time, that perhaps we will see some additional leaps of technology. We certainly got enough technology breakthroughs from the space program. Perhaps, even with pesky physics still requiring the same effort to launch payloads into space, we can find a way to create a system that can better sustain itself. The Shuttle failed to create the space presence we should have. This time, let's do it right. Which is what NASA is trying to do.
Sure some of the commercial ventures are making progress, but unless they get some massive capital, I can't see any of them making a serious commitment to a permanant presence in space (and the ISS does not count as a permanant presence, anymore than Skylab or any other tin cans in space would).
What we really need to do is verify if there is water on the moon. If there is, then suddenly the value of the moon skyrockets. After all, with water, you get hydrogen, and oxygen, which means that the sustainability skyrockets. But we can't find out what's really there until we can make a more complete exploration. Sure, there's risks, with abrasive rocks and with radiation. And I'm sure it'd be even better to grab an asteriod and park it in orbit around the Earth, to use as a stepping stone, but the Moon isn't a bad place to start, with a shallower gravity well, and... I don't think we'll be killing any lifeforms if we end up having toxic by products from any productions.
So let's get up there and start looking around!
Of course, my big fear is that somehow, a future president or congress will think that thre are better things to spend the money on, or that having radiation emitting objects in space is bad (bad for what, I have no clue, evidently they haven't seen the sun in a while or something). But maybe this time, we'll stick to it. Here's hoping
"The bass, the rock, the mic, the treble. I like my coffee black, just like my metal" - Mindless Self Indulgence
The waste has been being trapped in Earth's orbit ever since Apollo ended. We have been pissing away billions just to orbit the Earth, something we did over 40 years ago.
We are not going to get anywhere in space until we get out of orbit. Putting a permanent presence on the moon opens more opportunities than any orbital venture ever would. Other than distance the tech involved to live on the moon would be easier that staying in orbit.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
You're deluding yourself if you think the amount of money spent to rebuild New Orleans and the rest of the Gulf coast over the next 12 years will not exceed $100 billion.
We don't have another $100B. For anything.
I wish we did, I want the US to go back to the Moon, especially to leverage all our science, engineering and indisputably pioneering investments. Before other, more ambitious (and less complacent) countries, like China, get up there first. And then, for example, set up giant solar power stations with technology we developed in the USA, from rocketry to photovoltaics. Solar power we'll have to buy with more money we haven't got.
But we've already spent that money. A $300B Lunar/Solar energy platform would make the US a lot safer than the terrorist cesspool we've created in Iraq. A lot more prosperous than the $TRILLIONS in taxes we're cutting on the rich, who don't seem interested in putting Americans on the Moon - not while they're staying rich enough selling us $12:barrel oil for $70.
Here's an idea: we recoup some of those unprecedented profits from American oil companies, that are underwritten by so much American expenses (dollars and military lives, just to get started). We reinvest them in the government space program to install American energy facilities on the Moon. Whoever and whenever we do that, American or otherwise, the American "oil" companies are going to wind up owning the business anyway. We might as well get ahead of the curve, and keep more for Americans. And get it done faster, so the rest of us without our own oil company don't have to suffer through $10:gallon gas before we finally are forced to do it.
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I mean, way back in the 60s it only took 9 years, and look at how technology has advanced since then!
Geez! What's wrong with these NASA scientists these days?
If you disagree with me on social issues, then it's pretty clear that you are a narrow-minded bigot.
The Chinese are certainly interested in putting men on the moon, however, as is JAXA.
The ESA , on the other hand, is looking to go directly to Mars.
We could do this in a short time frame again, but the projects that we're competing against, namely the Chinese, Japanese, and European, are all operating under longer timescales, making ours the most likely to finish first. Also, the current Lunar exploration budget has been designed to require very little in the way of extra funding. They're cutting out other programs that cost losts of money (read Space Shuttle, ISS, and some exploration missions), but the overall budget is very similar.
For these two reasons, it seems liekly that this will actually work, and that we will land men on the moon again in the very near future.
fsh
So in short - I agree with 100%!!!
Evil people don't think they're evil. - George Lucas, Making of Ep III
You're leaning on a tired old worn out notion that even the U Chicago boys would laugh at.
Yes we CAN run out of money. Money is something real and tangible, and we are spending more of it than we've got. The irony is that the CHINESE are buying up our debt. The greater irony is that we're financing our OWN DEBT with our purchases at Wal-Mart. We'll just owe it to China at the end of the day.
We are in the STUPID economy. People don't understand the cost of destruction. They only bring up idiotic economic theories whose real purpose is justify wealth transfer from the poor to the rich.
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They are brutal FASCIST regime now. They've given up the pretext on caring for the welfare of their people.
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The purpose of the space program was to show that we were going to be the uber-advanced space age society that would ultimately win the cold war. The space program was a pageant put on for the sake of countries sitting on the fence between dealing with the Soviets and dealing with the USA.
There is no such war now. If anything we've thrown in that towel since we now have no trouble trading outright with the worlds largest oppresor of people
We don't have to compete with China in this regard. We pretty much figured out that getting OFF the planet is so freakin expensive that you'll bankrupt youselves by doing it too much.
Yes there are resources in space. But there aren't any that are economic to harvest. Space travel is a money pit.
Now if we can get a space elevator online, that might change some of the economics. Getting OFF the planet (and returning) is really the biggest hurdle. I would rather put NASA money into develpment of techologies and materials that a space elevator would require.
In the interim, the "to the moon" plan is OK with it's phase one orbital service vehicle that makes a trip to the moon more like riding a taxi cab instead of a freight train (shuttle).
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That's the one that causes me to have the blood pressure of a morbidly obese chain smoker. Some day people are going to wake up and realize that, well, we are NOT going to solve all the problems here on Earth. Ever. We'll be lucky to solve half. We can't solve problems when society refuses to recognize the true causes, which in many cases is "people are stoooopid." We need to focus on the big ones like energy, somehow eradicating the memes that make people vote for monsters or fly planes into buildings and getting the educational system out of the hands of the ideologues, be they on the Left (feed good education) or the Right (anti-science).
Anyway, it looks like the private space sector might actually be showing some life, so f*ck NASA. I'm updating my resume to send out to Rutan's company and maybe a couple others. I'm going to be there, baby!
What saddens me most is that I don't really have much faith in them anymore. When I was growing up in the 70's, the folks at NASA were my heroes. They were the smartest, most determined, and best people anywhere in the world. I kind of wish I had that back, but at least private industry has given us a few new heroes to live vicariously through.
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
why not buy some high-lift spacecraft from the Russian? It would take NASA 15 years to design a failure-prone spacecraft based on the 1970's designs. We lost the NASA engineers that could produce anything do to age, The present Politically-correct design-persons would screw up a "shit-sandwich"
Back in the days of the Apollo program, going to the moon was something that mankind had never done before. It was something we didn't know if we could do. Hence we were willing to accept risks. We were learning so much new stuff - it was worth it, and more importantly, the public could see that (we were gaining a lot of knowledge).
Mankind has always been willing to accept risks to explore or conquer, the unknown. A bunch of people died trying to climb Mt. Everest for example. But once it was conquered, and done safetly, then when someone died - it became a tragedy. The culture isn't any wimpier then it was back then - simply the politicians have a hard time of justifying the sacrifices to average joe - who simply knows, it was done once safetly. Why shouldn't it be 100% safe now? The general public does not hear about experiment x that went well in space anymore.
On the other hand, if it was something new and unheard of that NASA was doing - like going to another star (I assume the benefits of that would be obvious), I'm pretty sure the general public would accept the risk without much complaint.
There is always a frontier where there is an open and willing mind
They probably could, but why should they?
What pressing reason is there to divert a large portion of NASA's money and manpower to rushing out a lunar vehicle? What would be gained by doing it in 9 years instead of 13? What terrible thing will happen because of that extra 4 years? Why is doing it faster important for anything other than appeasing complainers? There might be a good reason, but nobody's presented it yet.
This isn't a question of "why can't NASA do this"---it's a question of "why would NASA want to do this?"
Remember how space exploration works: "faster, better, cheaper - choose two."
(Right now, it's slated to be cheaper ---0.8% of one year's GDP vs. 8-13%---and better; if you want to swap out "cheaper" for "faster", you'll need to convince someone why it's worth the money. If you want to swap out "better" for "faster", well, just build a really, really big slingshot...)
Wait, I thought Tom Hanks WAS an astronaut!
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Here's a seat-of-the-pants outline of prizes that achieve the goal:
$5 billion:
$5 billion
$5 billion $5 billion $5 billion $5 billion We're not even 1/3 of the way through the budget and we've got a system that can transport the mass equivalent of the Apollo missions.Where we go from here is a choice I leave to you...
Seastead this.
The time has come to put an end to this sort of waste.
So, New orleans would have been better off with no warning of the approaching hurricane at all? Cause, you know, those weather sattelites are just the sort of waste we need to put an end to?
The space program has had few side-benefits in recent years because we haven't been pushing our limits, merely doing things we already knew how to do. If we embrace a new space program with a goal we don't know how to achieve, we will once again reap ten times what we spend. That's what happens when you force yourself to invent new technologies.
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
An illegal war of choice : $200bn and counting
A mishandled natural disaster : $100bn
A permanent tax cut for the rich : $800bn
A trip to the moon like in the '70s : $100bn
Driving your country into bankrupcy : priceless.
Yes, I think that filthy rich nerds will be there before 2018, making all this NASA plan pointless. And probably a private Moon trip will cost 100 million, not 100 *billion* dollars. Perhaps NASA will even give it up and start to contract the private sector to deliver their astronauts and probes. Or so I hope.
Since China plans a moon base in ten years, then NASA can visit them for a nice cup of tea. China will have a week-long orbital flight in three weeks and the Russians are visiting the space station. Americans can look up at the pretty lights in the sky, wave and cry.
We need to get off this rock, and every decade we lapse into introversion is a decade later that man's history of exploitation of the solar system is delayed.
The major benefits I can see are:
- ensure survival against earth killer asteroid hitting in say the next 2 centuries
- increase pressure and funding to build independent robotic mining and factories
- draw minds and effort away from fragmented religion, and towards a unified goal of conquering space
- exploit space-based power generation and develop better water extraction and conservation technologies, reducing pressures to start oil wars and water wars
- get advanced physics research off the planet's surface as soon as possible. One possibile reason for the lack of alien contact is that nature holds a booby trap (or a jackpot) that most cultures hit by accident and everything goes boom. We are already close to primordial densities in particle physics and if it is possible to use advanced space-based resources to quickly and cheaply (say with a self-organizing robotic factory) build a ring in space or on the moon that would be excellent.
- add low-noise observatories on the moon. Currently we are just starting to observe in very noisy RF bands for example.
- develop unified educational program based on integrated science and exploratory culture. A free course of study for any child on the planet, instilling a citizen of the world sense of identity, respect and practical knowledge of science, an imperative to stride beyond man's history of intolerance and enter the next phase of our civilization, develop emotional intelligence, and in general train people so that we can achieve 10 times more efficient exploitation of the world's human resources, with 10 times better health and welfare for the world, and international collaboration to develop key technologies more quickly. Sure there is more to this but obviously there is still demagoguery, genocide, famine, disaster, and demonization in the 21st century. We need to get beyond it and work together.
Many of these things can be done on the planet. But the fact is, our societies are still pretty uncivilized and we need a common project to bind politicians and peoples around the world toward the same goal. It seems that broad, continued, well funded efforts for space science and every connected area - including advances in biotech, robotics, and education for example - could be a spark that begins humanity on exponential growth and saves us from nuclear races and preoccupation with trade deficits and resource starvation. People need to have something to work towards, and we need to provide great salaries and lionize people who go into these fields and go to space.