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NASA To Invest In Commercial Crew Concepts
xp65 writes "Today NASA released information regarding its intention to invest $50 million in commercial crew concepts. This new program, known as the Commercial Crew Development or 'CCDev,' represents a new milestone in the development of an orbital commercial human spaceflight sector. By maturing 'the design and development of commercial crew spaceflight concepts and associated enabling technologies and capabilities,' the program will allow several companies to move a few steps forward towards the ultimate goal of full demonstration of commercial human spaceflight to orbit."
and sue Elon Musk...
Topless flight attendants - the question everyone has but doesn't want to ask about zero-g can now be answered.
Why invest in them? Why not just go fully open-source and sell what you use? The commercial industry can learn from your experience and use your proven technology. You'd probably make money instead of spend it.
Any of you familiar with the way the contract system works in the U.S. should agree. The prime contractor (Lockheed Martin, Boeing, etc) will take most of the money and farm out the task to a couple of sub-contractors who will farm their tasks out.
This is a perfect example of how the notion of 'small government' is being used against the citizens that clamor for it.
http://www.maxineudall.com/2010/02/should-economists-be-sued-for-malpractice.html
How about releasing the info to -all- US citizens who paid their tax money for it? Because in the end this will end up benefiting major government contractors (Boeing, Lockheed-Martin, etc) who more or less already have the tech for spaceflight, rather then helping get space tourism, or other commercial spaceflight off the ground.
Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
To figure out how to get people to pay them money? How much money are they thinking they'll get back? It's more than $50 million, right?
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
Everyone is already complaining about it being unfair, but remind me, how much is congress getting ready to spend on Cash for Clunkers again? $50M is chump change. Hell, I can make the argument that NASA's entire budget is chump change these days compared to many other departments and all the other spending that is going on.
I wonder if people opinion would be different if they called it $50 Million in economic research stimulus.
"The problem with socialism is eventually you run out of other people's money" - Thatcher.
This is yet another Stupid NASA Trick. Are they serious? At this level of funding, which wouldn't even pay for the airlock on the Orion capsule, a private contractor is going to "bridge the gap" that NASA created? If NASA hadn't killed promising R&D programs like the X-33 (VentureStar), we would already have replaced the Shuttle with a system which reduced flight costs substantially, improved safety and reliability, has shorter turn-around times, and can fly more often. Which, by the way, is what is needed to help stimulate a growing space economy. It all depends on reduced cost of, and increased reliability of access to orbit. Constellation isn't going to provide that. COTS, (and this new bit, given a new name to keep 'em guessing) are funded at levels so low as to guarantee NASA will never face competition from the private companies which win these bids. This is not a joke, it's a charade.
If the objective were to create a private market for access to space, NASA could do this easily. All they need to do is announce that they will buy payload to LEO delivery services from the private market, at market rates. Right now market rates for a single launch of a modest payload are higher than the total size of this program.
NASA probably spent more than this on artwork and publicity for Contellation / Orion / Aeries.
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DEFUND And Shut Down NASA!
Private Spaceflight NOW!
Government Control OUT!
NASA is like IRAQ - We need an EXIT STRATEGY!
What would they look like if NASA was a private company with publicly traded stock? I wonder if they would be closer to Google or BestBuy... There would be some serious speculation going prior to each shuttle launch and it would be at least fun to watch climb and (free)fall.
M./
How does one manufacture a design?
This summary is so laden with buzzwords and catch phrases that it's very likely that the above comments are right in that it's just an economic bailout to government contractors.
Cash for Clunkers was originally funded at $US 1 Billion. Congress is negotiating this week to add an additional $US 2 Billion to the program. The original intent of the program was to stimulate the auto industry, encourage consumers to buy more fuel efficient cars, while removing older less efficient cars from the roads permanently. Key provisions of the program were compromised during its initial passing, which result in only slight gains with respect to carbon emissions, particularly when the carbon cost of producing the new vehicle is accounted for.
Three billion bucks would have purchased a revived X-33 program, starting over from scratch if necessary. Since the technology developed for the X-33 is still around, it's likely that $3 Billion would get you through the complete construction and flight testing of the X-33, and then started building the first full scale VentureStar vehicle. They would probably cost about $1 Billion each, if you built four or five. We should plan to build these like airplanes. Build one set or "block" of maybe 2 or 3 craft, then do a round of design improvements, retool and build a second block of improved vehicles, say 7 or 8, for a total of 10 vehicles in the fleet.
X-33 / VentureStar : What Really Happened
VentureStar
This would make sense, if the goal were to actually build a more reliable and less expensive access to space. Unfortunately, NASA continues to optimize for unfathomable bureaucratic goals, and misguided attempts to recapture perceived glory of Apollo.
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...to decide to get in on this. If so, we'll wind up further behind than ever.
Omnes tuae crepidines sunt nobis sunt. Ascendo tuum!
Regular readers of my comments will know that I'm highly critical of NASA. However, it's important for enthusiastic supporters of space exploration to understand that private industry, left to its own devices, is not likely (is, in fact, extremely unlikely) to fund the R&D required to build the next generation of space transportation system. Getting to LEO is a big, big project. Much bigger than the trans-continental railways. Private corporations do not have the vision required for long term investment on this scale. They have quarterly numbers to meet, impatient and risk averse investors and managers.
The entire global investment in privately funded launch programs, if combined into a single program, is probably still a bit shy of appropriate funding for a single modern system, say, the Skylon program.
What we need is rational, visionary, intelligent and consistent policy, with consistent and rational funding to back it up. Governments, funding the next generation of launch systems required to get to orbit more reliably and more cheaply (through agencies like NASA, or maybe DARPA) will need to be involved.
But they need to be directed and funded to do the job, and do it with the right goals in mind. The X-33 VentureStar program had the right goals and the right plan for reaching them. (Skylon's goals are similar.) Private industry (Lockheed Martin) was instrumental in helping to define those goals, by the way. The original long range plan for the X-33 program involved a privately operated fleet of launch vehicles, VentureStar. NASA's role was to fund initial risk reduction (technology development) in the X-33 program, and probably subsidize the initial construction of the vehicle fleet at some level (through guaranteed purchases of payload delivery).
X-33 Venture Star (discussion archive in which X-33 engineers participated)
X-33 Venture Star (more archived discussion)
A smart approach would be to fund development of both Skylon (about 12.5 tons to LEO) and X-33/VentureStar (about 25 tons to LEO). The systems are designed to fit different parts of the launch market. They should be developed jointly, so they can use common subsystems, such as compatible payload support for example. The combined systems would begin to create a private launch market, with a much more flexible delivery of payload to space.
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This MAY be useful. Several different concepts for SMALL companies MIGHT be able to re-start RD programs and take them further. In particular, I am thinking that DreamChaser could benefit from this. Likewise, t-space would be a possibility. A possibility is that it would speed up SS3. The thought is that we already have several launchers and are about to gain more. If we have several different crew transports available to us and various launchers, then we will not be locked out of space. 50 million, let alone a portion of it, is not really enough for large companies like Boeing and LMart to do studies, let alone active development.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Yes, it is also truly amazing how many such efforts exist. However, the history of this industry has been one of under-funded efforts which drag on as paper studies and modest R&D technology explorations, which then fold.
list of private space launch efforts
btw... fascinating details on the funding history of this project, thanks.
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They should just give it all to Virgin Galactic. In a couple of months these guys will probably be sending NASA advertisements for an international spaces station commuter shuttle (filmed on location in space). http://www.virgingalactic.com/ http://science.slashdot.org/story/09/07/31/1359243/White-Knight-Two-Unveiled?art_pos=1
Engineers from the project claimed that NASA directed the carbon fiber tank exploration in X-33, over the objections of the engineers. (This should sound familiar. This type of bureaucratic snafu created problems on the Shuttle program.) The program goals could have been achieved with a (low-risk) aluminum-lithium tank, apparently. Furthermore, Lockheed Martin funded additional R&D on the carbon fiber tanks after the cancellation of the X-33. Although the technology wasn't quite ready at the time the X-33 was cancelled, it was relatively close at hand, certainly as compared to long range projects like scramjets. X-33: What Really Happened.
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The accepted submission on this story was pretty good, although here's the one I wrote up, which has a few more relevant links. In particular, the first link, to an article by Alan Boyle on MSNBC, is probably the best summary of this I've seen so far:
NASA Begins Commercial Crew Initiative
NASA is using an initial $50M to 'stimulate efforts within the private sector to develop and demonstrate human spaceflight capabilities.' NASA originally planned to use $150M, which was blocked by Sen. Richard Shelby (R-AL) until it was largely redirected to the ~$35B Ares rocket program based at NASA Marshall Space Flight Center. The Commercial Crew and Cargo Program Office (C3PO) will reward multiple competitive contracts, with the goals of promoting job growth, lowering the cost of spaceflight, and helping reduce the post-Shuttle gap in US human spaceflight capability.
Cinnamon toasty Apple Jacks. They could easily add cereal commercials to their transmissions. Brilliant!
At first glance it might seem that the VentureStar would have been more complex than the shuttle, but that's a mistaken impression. The X-33 program to build a scale flight demonstration unit was funded at less than $US1999 1.5 Billion. For that price, an impressive set of technologies were developed and tested, and they were all quite successful, with the notorious exception of the carbon fiber cryogenic Liquid Hydrogen tank. The vehicle design was actually quite a bit simpler than the Shuttle from many important perspectives. The flight article was very nearly compete. The program would have come in under $2 Billion even if it had been up-funded to replace the carbon fiber tank with aluminum-lithium. The original estimates for the VentureStar were in the neighborhood of $US (1999) 6 Billion to build 4 VentureStar vehicles.
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Thirty years after Armstrong set foot on the moon, we're still hanging around in a tin can that can barely save itself from crashing back to Earth. Surely, NASA must be put in the same league as the Duke Nukem team for pure, wang-pulling jackoffery.
I've calculated my velocity with such exquisite precision that I have no idea where I am.
Why not sell the International Space Station when they are done with it, instead of de-orbiting it?
Couldn't you get 10+ billion for that sucker?