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Can Commercial Space Tech Get Off the Ground?
coondoggie writes "While NASA's commercial partners such as SpaceX and Orbital have made steady progress in developing space cargo transportation technology, they have recently fallen behind their development schedules. Combine that with the fact that the most critical steps lie ahead, including successfully launching new vehicles and completing integration with the space station, and you have a hole that will be tough to climb out of. Those were the two main conclusions of a Government Accountability Office report (PDF) on the status of the commercial space world this week. The GAO went on to say that after the planned retirement of the space shuttle in 2010, NASA will face a cargo resupply shortfall for the International Space Station of approximately 40 metric tons between 2010 and 2015."
Speaking of SpaceX, reader Matt_dk sends along an update on the company's Falcon 9 flight efforts. "Six of the nine first stage flight engines have completed acceptance testing and all nine flight engines are on schedule to complete acceptance testing by mid-July."
Yes.
The main problems are that NASA because of "security reasons" can't give out a lot of the taxpayer funded research that would help these companies get off the ground. So, what took NASA many years to do doesn't have to be reinvented by a private company. Really, the fact that any private craft could get into space would have been a remarkable feat just thirty or forty years ago.
Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
Ultimately it's going to be commercial factors that help drive human space exploration. While a "Star Trek" universe where the sole mission is to go out and explore is a great idea, right now economic factors will need to be behind the wheel, and getting some commercial ventures off the ground will help drive up space flight.
The musings of just another geek and his junk.
You have to get to very high velocity - that implies a lot of fuel, and very exspensive craft that can survive the high velocity
It's hard to do repair, so you have to spend a lot for high reliability equipment
Space is a harsh environment - you have temperature extremes, radiation, vacumn welding
many people get the low gravity equivalent of car sickness
although it is not publicized by nasa, in low gravity, liquid containment - like when you go to the bathroom - is difficult;' as a result, there is a lot of intestinal illness in space (think about that !)
The take home is that space is, and always will be, very $ relative to ground; therefore there has to be some compelling reason to go to space.
Sadly, there are few compelling reasons.
I have been doing biotech high technology startups for 20+years, and aside from the .dom boom era, there is very little money or enthusiasm for gee wiz technology
If not then it's never going to be space tech, is it. It will be tech tech.
Get all of your dumb space puns out of the way here
It depends. Can the Commercial Space Technology get enough momentum to support the project? Can the companies behind these projects meet the orbiting budgets required to fund such a task? One needs to fuel the explosive innovation of space travel. Setting up commercial space technology is exactly rocket science, you know. Only dedication and large amounts of money can get these projects off of the launch pad.
I think part of the limitation is the atmosphere in high schools about space and space travel. In the 60's, children dreamed about space travel; warp to today: it's almost as if we've headed with an incredible velocity to escape assignments and discussion about the space program.
Why can't we do it now?
Salvage 1 - http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0078681/
If the government sees the gravity of the situation, the industry might get a boost.
The problem is that the analysts make it sounds like industry is shooting for the moon, and that makes financiers look at the private industry folks like they're from Mars.
Heaven forbid that multiple governments are needed to fund a private endeavor. It could force the executives into shuttle diplomacy.
The US Government, and especially NASA (and other agencies who have an interest in space), don't really have a strong imperative to see commercial space succeed. These ventures are often seen as intruding into areas that are rightfully NASA's. For get about national interests... its all about power for those in power.
âoeAny society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both.
Geez, here we go again.
Yes, the bottom line is that getting to space is really, REALLY expensive. Which in turn means that exploiting resources up there is almost certainly not going to be economically feasible for the foreseeable future.
If you believe that, I have an asteroid belt you may be interested in purchasing.
(Said entirely for comic effect... I actually think commercial space tech will do just fine. So. How about $70 trillion for that asteroid belt? It's hardly used and only a few billion years old.)
The take home is that space is, and always will be, very $ relative to ground; therefore there has to be some compelling reason to go to space.
Sadly, there are few compelling reasons.
I am compelled to disagree with this.
There are plenty of compelling reasons to go into space:
Growth of the species - Humanity is expanding in population very quickly. Eventually, assuming that holds, the planet will reach the point where sustaining that population is impossible, even with advances in technology. Your choices, then, are either to limit/reduce the population (sterilization, limitations on childbearing, war, disease, organized extermination, etc) or expand off the planet. The second option seems a little more friendly and ethical.
Survival of the species - There are several things which can cause the population to be essentially wiped out. Asteroid impacts, war, deadly pandemics, biowarfare (which I personally consider the greatest threat at the moment), and so on. It's possible that some may survive these things by digging deep underground, but I doubt enough infrastructure and population will survive to maintain society as we know it. The best long-term solution I can see is to expand off-planet and establish self-sustaining colonies. You don't keep all of your company's data and server hardware in one location, do you? The same should hold with humanity as a whole.
Additional resources - This fits with the first point. There is only so much stuff available to us on this planet. Whether we use it all up, or decide to preserve it, we will eventually reach the point where we can't use any more. What are we to do at that point? Well, I see a whole bunch of stuff sitting up in space just waiting to be used. Now before anyone starts, I am not promoting the "strip earth bare and trash it, then move on" approach. Instead, I'm promoting the "let's make use of all those barren rocks out there so we don't have to trash earth" approach.
Overall, unless we're going to take that self-ridiculing, defeatist position that humanity should draw down into a little ball and live the remainder of its existence shut in from the universe as a whole, like a pathetic and sick individual afraid to even get out of bed*, we will have to go into space eventually. It's just a matter of time. The only question is "when?"
Some will argue that it's too expensive, that we should wait until we have better technology. But how will we get that technology in the first place? It doesn't just fall into your lap one afternoon; you have to work for it. Imagine if we'd decided 100 years ago that trying to develop airplanes was stupid, that airplanes at the time were too dangerous and impractical, and that we should wait until we had technology like the 777 oir A380... I'll tell you right now, we probably wouldn't be to that point for a couple hundred more years. You don't learn how to build entirely new stuff or do new things by sitting around dreaming about it or making powerpoint charts... you learn by doing that stuff as best you can, learning from your mistakes, and doing it again. Lather, rinse, repeat.
Yes, doing it is expensive. But it's worth it. The only reason it seems like it's not is that the payoff takes a little longer to come. Corporations don't undertake it because the shareholders probably won't see the benefit within their lifetimes. Governments don't do it because they don't think beyond the next election. Joe Public doesn't think about it because his attention span lasts for 20 seconds and all he's interested in is what keeps him entertained. The benefit is there, but it might be a few generations before it's realized.
Remember, too, that money spent on developing this stuff isn't just launched away into the sun or something. It stays on earth, paying the engineers and mechanics and managagers (spit) that work on it. It fosters a need for more engineers and mechanics, driving bet
The meek may inherit the earth, but the strong shall take the stars.
Ah, but for more than 37 seconds? And about that great ball of fire....
Just to clarify, if you RTFA you will find that SpaceX has completed all the milestones so far on time, and they are looking at a 2-4 month schedule slip on future milestones. Now, obviously we'd much rather not have the schedule slip, but in the world of NASA contracting that is like... totally nothing. I have to say that, as a confirmed space nut, SpaceX really impresses me. If they manage to deliver on a third of what they're talking about, they'll completely change the game--and they've done enough truly innovative stuff already that I think they might actually deliver on most of it in the long run.
Imagine a fully reusable launch vehicle, and a mostly reusable orbiter, making access to LEO or GTO cost in the hundreds of dollars per lb., instead of thousands... that's what Elon Musk is talking about in the long run, and I think he just might actually pull it off.
"He who would learn astronomy, and other recondite arts, let him go elsewhere. " -- John Calvin, commenting on Genesis 1
a billion objects?? That's WAY more than the northern hemisphere. Why is all the cool shit always in the southern hemisphere? Plus the toilets flush in the other direction.
Until getting into space becomes cheap enough to be used for more than big industry satellite ventures and adventures for the stupidly rich, no. Until then there will not be much commercial space flight, at least in the sense the headline implies. Once we have a way to get to space that doesn't involve immense cost and burning insane amounts of fuel, yes, we'll have awesome space tech.
Where's the damn space elevator already? Stupid sci-fi books getting my hopes up.
Porquoi?
Over the decades eleven countries have built rockets and orbited satellites. Private companies capabilities must be approaching the smaller countries by now.
No, it's a logically impeccable statement to say that commercial space tech. can get off the ground. If it doesn't then it must be something else entirely.
In this TED talk http://www.ted.com/talks/burt_rutan_sees_the_future_of_space.html , Burt Rutan makes a very compelling argument for the Commercialised space industry.
Participatory Governance : The only feasible option for a real democracy, where everyone really does have a say.
The article subject line is misleading. One thing is certain, the commercial space business will not go back to where it came from, the blossoming has passed the point of no return. Given time, it will get off the ground. Given time, pigs will fly too, and birds will breathe nitrogen.
It's rare to see people in business with a passion for doing something -- something other than making obscene piles of cash, that is. In this environment, it's all about the fast buck and fuck the rest. Complain all you want about government inefficiency and waste, they seem to be the only ones with pockets deep enough and time-frames long enough to contemplate truly big projects. Something like the Panama Canal, it needed a government to make it happen; it also needed a government's military resources to knock together the right heads. Look at how many rockets we had to blow up with the early space program just to get the failure rate down to something approaching acceptable? If this were a purely private project, it would have been canceled years before success.
Companies are very good at addressing short-term concerns for short-term gain. Want paperclips? Companies can make you paperclips. Want fashion? Ipods? Flatscreen tv's? Companies can do that. Want a green economy? Government is going to have to lead the march and drag private industry along kicking and screaming.
Industry's only interest is self-interest. Maximize shareholder wealth, that's the imperative. Government's role is to do the people's will and make sure that social concerns are met. Companies doesn't care about pollution, doesn't care about poisoning the water and the sky. Any efforts by government to address these concerns will be actively lobbied against and subverted.
Now to be fair, there are exceptions out there like SpaceX and Scaled Composites but they only underline how difficult it is to go it alone on such huge projects. Of course, when government sponsors things you end up getting defense conglomerates sucking at the teat and disasters like this new Constellation manned launch vehicle boondoggle. I hope they can pull it together but things sound pretty grim. It'd be nice if SpaceX can prove they have the chops and government can reinforce that success by steering business their way.
Kwisatz Haderach
Sell the spice to CHOAM
This Mahdi took Shaddam's Throne
Yes, new.space can succeed. It will require more than just NASA's cash to happen. It will require new payloads and new businesses to utilize these launchers.
Commercial/semi-commercial launchers such as Ariane, Proton, Delta, Atlas, Zenit, Pegasus etc have been flying commercial communications and imaging satellites for decades. The question is whether new types of businesses can emerge to create new markets for more launches.
gigantino.tv - Heavy but weighs nothing.
I think that's the case.
It really boils down to two things; a) engineering conservatism - what we've done so fat mostly works and nobody really raises a stink, and b) the extremely low total number of design generations and flight hours - making it hard to get valid statistics.
The cost of the fuel itself is a vanishingly small proportion of the actual cost of launching a rocket. Most of the cost of a launch is tied up in two things: the very expensive hardware that you're throwing away because it's not at all reusable, and the incredibly ponderous administrative and logistical hassles that go into getting a rocket assembled and ready for launch. SpaceX plans to make the Falcon-9 fully reusable eventually, and they already have significantly less administrative overhead than "traditional" launch operations. Whether $300/lb. to orbit is obtainable is, of course, questionable. But I don't think you can say that it's flat impossible, and you certainly can't say it's flat impossible because of fuel costs. That just demonstrates ignorance.
"He who would learn astronomy, and other recondite arts, let him go elsewhere. " -- John Calvin, commenting on Genesis 1
One word-Arianespace
http://www.arianespace.com/index/index.asp
It's not so much the technical challenges that keep private firms grounded. It's the demand for documentation. Every little bolt of a spacecraft needs to be certified. But if the demand for certification is bypassed, amazing things happen. Take a look one this project created by two danes, who want to send a person into space. http://www.copenhagensuborbitals.com/index.php They have set a simple goal, they want to launch a manned rocket into space(define as an altitude of 100km+), which will do a zero g parobola before returning to earth. They have already tested their engine design on several scaled models. And so far their rocket design have performed very well. Their project is a non-profit project supported by sponsers and a lot volunteers. Going into space is easy... dealing with the official red tape.... that's another story indeed.
Competition will spur new designs, and the push for safety will make them good.
I think new space can succeed ! http://www.artmineur.fr/
You don't mine stuff for the purpose of making other stuff (except indirectly). You mine stuff to make money. And there's still no economic reason to build spacecraft, habitats, etc, in space... so no one up there is going to be buying your mined materials.
Those metals are not that much more common in the asteroid belt, Mars, etc. And given that the asteroids are spread out over an absolutely enormous volume of space, just finding said metals is going to be exceedingly difficult (and expensive). And again, you still have to develop the technology required to do space mining and refining, and get bulk quantities of stuff back from space (without burning it up in re-entry).
If space-based mining of platinum type metals is required for a hydrogen economy... we're probably not going to have a hydrogen economy. It'll be too expensive.