Draft NASA Funding Bill Cancels Asteroid Mission For Return To the Moon

MarkWhittington writes "A draft version of the 2013 NASA Authorization Bill nixes any funding for President Obama's asteroid retrieval mission and instead directs NASA to return astronauts to the lunar surface as soon as possible, funding of course permitted. The NASA bill is currently working its way through the House Science Committee. Thus far the Senate has not taken up NASA authorization. However the cancellation of the asteroid retrieval mission and an insistence on returning to the moon, which both President Obama and NASA Administrator Charles Bolden have opposed, would place Congress on a collision course with the White House should that version of the bill be passed by both houses of Congress."

Comments

Re:The important word is "should"

[I'm New Around Here]

This will not get through the Senate.

Yeah, this does seem like political games just to make Obama look bad somehow. While I would love for this country to get back to the moon, we won't get there anytime soon. A mission to an asteroid seems like it would be much cheaper and quicker to accomplish. Let's get that done first. Worry about a lunar lander and re-launch vehicle later.

Oink oink oink

[alen]

Pork barrel for the 21st century
I'm sure the work will be spread out among every important congress person's districts

Re:The important word is "should"

[Anonymous Coward]

And it shouldn't. Going back to the moon is sexier and great for the ego, but working on capturing asteroids is more useful. But most Americans prefer things very simple. They think the moon is a planet and full of resources while an asteroid is a ball of sand like you see at the beach. It doesn't matter that that sentence contains many wrong things; it's simple and aligns with an ignorant masses level of common sense. The bottom line is people will say Republicans want to go back to the moon and reap the great benefits while Obama wants to visit a stupid rock. Never mind that "stupid rock" could contains trillions of dollars worth of resources and even some unknown/unavailable/rare materials.

NASA's mission

[It doesn't come easy]

Not sure how any serious engineer or scientist works at NASA these days. NASA's mission changes quarterly (or more frequently), subject to political whim. I think our only real hope in the practical exploration of space lies with commercial enterprise. Which, truthfully, isn't that bad a deal. Of course, we still don't have any viable commercial enterprise working yet (lots of startups but nothing concrete at this point). A friend of mine is a scientist who worked at NASA for 12 years. He bailed about 10 years ago because of the political interference and now works at a university on the west coast. Smart man.

Re:NASA's mission

[jasnw]

Simply put, they stick around because it's a good-paying job in an economy where there aren't that many available. Your friend bailed 10 years ago, back when jobs for people in these fields were a lot more plentiful. NASA became a giant jobs-and-pork operation years ago, and was one of the original "welfare for whitecoats" agencies (whitecoats as in lab coats). Any engineer or scientist with a NASA job these days hangs on as long as they can. Mortgages gotta be paid, and kids gotta be fed.

Re:NASA's mission

[PsychoSlashDot]

I think our only real hope in the practical exploration of space lies with commercial enterprise. Which, truthfully, isn't that bad a deal.

Commercial R&D and exploration serves one purpose: to enrich the stockholders' portfolio. Yes, there's a trickle-down effect in that any technological or intellectual advances will become available to the public eventually, but at a cost whose primary concern is profit. That profit will be a margin applied to the research phase and the manufacture.

Public investment in R&D and exploration is to the direct benefit of the entire nation and its allies. Derivative products will eventually be sold for a profit but the profit margin will only be expected to cover the manufacture costs, not the research phase.

Ultimately we pay for everything we have, at the store or via taxes. The question is: do you want to pay profit mark-up on the research?

Re:NASA's mission

[AmiMoJo]

You should run it more like the EU runs projects like the LHC or ESA.

Re:NASA's mission

[SteveFoerster]

No kidding. I always figure these "why don't they just..." suggestions are from people without families. Seriously, that changes everything.

Re:NASA's mission

[Immerman]

Heck, all matter is mostly empty space. To scale, the vast empty reaches within an atom make the solar system look positively crowded. Cleary nothing of interest exists at all.

Re:NASA's mission

[benevixit]

Not sure how any serious engineer or scientist works at NASA these days.

I work at a NASA research lab, and find it a rewarding way to spend my time... I've seen exoplanets through the eyes of space telescopes. I've invented AI algorithms and then flown them on smart satellites. My code has run on a rover traversing the surface of Mars. I agree that commercial enterprise has a role to play - but for all its imperfections, NASA is still a pretty remarkable institution at this particular moment in human history.

Re:NASA's mission

[PsychoSlashDot]

In other words, commercial R&D has to be useful. And the profit "cost" yields a strong incentive to insure that the R&D has positive return on investment. These are huge advantages over government R&D which neither has to be useful or provide more benefit than cost.

In other words commercial R&D has to be obviously profitable, in a short-to-medium term. It can't be tentative or exploratory, curious or inquisitive. It must be about earning, with no regard for learning.

In other words, tremendous costs, paltry returns, and the real R&D gets disguised as "derivative products".

You made that up. There is ZERO requirement for public-funded R&D to be more expensive than commercial, less productive than commercial or in any way shady.

Of course. The real question is why do you think public research has any advantages at all? For example, when I pay at the store, I pay directly for the R&D and other costs that go into the stuff that I use. If I pay taxes, then they get burned on whatever the elite who controls that spending happens to decide is most useful for themselves with a modest portion used for face-saving stuff like NASA's high profile missions.

The real question is why you trust corporations, which have absolutely no pretense of benevolence. Ask yourself, if drug companies could cure serious ailments, would they? I don't assume there's a conspiracy and that cures are literally avoided so long-term expensive treatments can be sold, but I don't assume there isn't such a conspiracy. I can't tell. Because they people directing, funding, and reviewing the research are the people who have the most to lose if cheap options are found. Non-profitable options. The only reason for a company to seek cheap alternatives is in a competitive market, where some other company is eating a slice of the pie.

With government R&D there's separation (ignoring lobbyists for a moment) of the direction of research relative to the results. The fact that companies do lobby government is pretty strong evidence that said companies are determined to influence outcome.

I have no say on what NASA spends money on (or more accurately, I can say plenty, but no one in charge of the spending listens). I have plenty of say on what I buy at the store. My money there speaks louder than words. The store is far more democratic and responsive than the space-industrial complex fueled by unaccountable public funding can be.

Your ability to dictate company behaviour is an illusion, citizen. It's the identical illusion to "you tell NASA what to do by writing to your congresscritter and voting". Identical. You as an individual have an irrelevant influence on both situations. You think your buying habits matter. They don't. Take a look at glorious situations like... EA. They crap out the latest SimCity and... too bad. Sure, some folks boycott them, but it doesn't actually register on the PowerPoint presentation for quarterly earnings. Take a look at Apple. "You're holding it wrong." Seriously? But the masses keep buying the fondleslabs no matter that you kick and punch and hold your breath like a three-year-old in protest. These companies are screwing us around. And we - as individuals - have no influence on them. Only when freak moments of mass unity happen is there any hope for influence. Like... voting.

NASA's job is learning. No making your taxpayer/shareholder wallet fat from selling more widgets. I don't trust you to influence them, frankly.

Re:NASA's mission

[tsotha]

We had already demonstrated ICBM capability long before we went to the moon. The Russians never went to the moon... did we doubt they could nuke us?

If people had their priorities straight...

[kk49]

We would do both...

This is not the way

[ildon]

Scientific missions should not be determined by political whims.

This is awful

[onyxruby]

Going to the moon is one of the greatest things the United States ever did. The impact in terms of net benefits for science, technology and any number of things is amongst the best in history. However that has all been done decades ago and we have largely reaped the benefits from doing so. I'm not sure what real benefit we could gain by sending manned missions back to the moon at this time. Remember there are good reasons the Apollo program wrapped up.

Taking things to the next step, asteroids, and tackling everything involved, from science to mining needs to be the next great step. Working through the technological challenges involved in doing this would have tremendous benefit to society. The bottom line is there is far more to gain from taking things to the asteroids than the moon.

The moon, we've been there, nice place, time to move on to the next big thing.

NASA needs 10 year goals that can't be changed.

[asm2750]

As much as I would love to see NASA establish a colony on the Moon or capture an asteroid and move it to Lunar orbit, Congress and the President are constantly changing NASAs goals every year or two or slashing funding, and thats hurting the agency. NASA needs goals and funding that is locked in and cant be altered until the primary objective is achieved. Take the Apollo program which lasted 10 years or so and got us to the moon. Ever since then every president or congress session has changed NASAs goals and slashed funding that it makes it impossible to get anything fruitful done like the SLS and returning to the Moon and the eventually Mars.

Realistic?

[mlookaba]

from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_program#Program_cost:

"The final cost of project Apollo was reported to Congress as $25.4 billion in 1973"

According to http://www.westegg.com/inflation/ that would be $129.47 in 2012. Now obviously we have the benefit of relatively inexpensive technology to help offset that. However we also have the burden of stricter safety standards and more expensive "available" technology as opposed to "required" technology. Hopefully the government would be pragmatic enough to select the "appropriate" level of safety. That means quantifying the numeric value of a life (factoring in all the publicity involved, future projects, etc) which is something people don't seem willing to do. I suspect that NASA is very gunshy about repeating a shuttle type disaster, and would not be able to give an upper bound to that number.

All it all, it seems pretty farfetched that this will happen to me.

Re:The important word is "should"

[Gamer_2k4]

But most Americans prefer things very simple. They think the moon is a planet and full of resources while an asteroid is a ball of sand like you see at the beach.

I don't think most Americans believe that at all. I think it just boils down to what you said in your second sentence - putting humans on the moon is way sexier. WE want to be the ones doing the exploring, not some computerized device.

Re:The important word is "should"

[khallow]

Space station technology is what they should be working on, in particular self-sustaining environments.

Where are they going to get the mass for those "space stations" from? Asteroids remain one of the better sources of material for anything we do in space. Might as well figure out how to mine them.

Re:The important word is "should"

[mbone]

> A mission to an asteroid seems like it would be much cheaper and quicker to accomplish.

Can you elaborate? It's farther. It's more dangerous (less is measured/known/visible, I believe). There's a lot more chance of well, getting his by micro meteorites up to big ones. Sample collection is going to have to be via new method(s)...I'm just trying to figure out what's the easier part. I agree it would give better return value. But if it was done quicker and cheaper, I'd be very pessimistic about anyone coming back.

OK, energetically, there are asteroids that we could could reach for roughly the same delta-V as going to the Moon, and coming back. (To put it another way, that Apollo could have reached with the Saturn V.) So, energetically, it's a wash, at least for the NEO we would be going to first.

In terms of technology, we are more or less there for an asteroid - we have demonstrated long duration flights on the ISS, and you don't land on a small asteroid, you dock with one, and that we have technology for. We just need a launch vehicle. For the Moon, we HAD the technology (the Lunar Module), but lost it, and estimates to get it back are in the billions of dollars. Advantage, asteroids. Plus, it turns out landing on the Moon and on Mars are rather difficult, so there is no synergy advantage in terms of going to Mars if we develop a Lunar Module first. Again, advantage, asteroids.

(I believe that avoiding that LM cost/development time was the "cheaper and quicker" the OP was referring to.)

Sample collection is well in hand, and not really a problem for either Moon or asteroid. That's a wash.

Now, going to an asteroid for 9 months is indeed more dangerous than going to the Moon for 9 days. No doubt. However

- if we are ever going to get to Mars, we have to develop the capability to do long duration deep space missions. Going to an asteroid is no more dangerous (or not much more dangerous) than just going out there and coming back, with much more return.

- When we do go back to the Moon, we are likely to go to stay. It is by no means clear that going to an asteroid for 9 months is more dangerous than going to the Moon for 9 months.

So, for the danger aspect, I regard as a wash, except that the asteroid mission would have real synergies.

So, IMHO, the advantages for the Moon are week and iffy, while the advantages / synergies for an asteroid are real and solid.

Also, there is a LONG history of commercial development riding the back of initial government investment. NASA going to an asteroid would jump-start commercial asteroid mining.

Re:The important word is "should"

[dpilot]

It's the Obama administration's idea, so it must be wrong. Just like when Obama has picked up old Republican ideas and tried to push them, they become wrong.

Sometimes I wonder it Obama's support of NSA domestic spying is just a clever way to get Republicans to come out in favor of personal privacy. It wasn't that long ago that the Republicans clearly stated that there was no right to privacy enumerated in the Constitution. Now because it's against Obama, they're thumping the privacy tub really hard. (Though I'll bet they still don't think any right to privacy applies to gay conduct, even in one's own home.)

But unfortunately I've lost sufficient faith to think that that's what he's doing, The "mini-me" cartoon seems scarily accurate, and makes today's Republican Congress-critters seem all the more buffoon-ish.

Re:The important word is "should"

[__aaltlg1547]

If it contains trillions of dollars worth of "rare Earths" we're going to need a new name for those elements.

Space is Full of Energy

[DanielRavenNest]

What hardly anyone understands is that space is full of abundant energy.

The world's fossil fuel (oil, coal, and natural gas) reserves are equal to 7 trillion barrels of oil, and one barrel contains 6 x 10^9 Joules. Thus we have 42 x 10^21 Joules of fossil fuel energy. The area within the Moon's orbit (384,000 km radius) has 38 x 10^21 Joules of sunlight passing through every minute, nearly as much....Every Minute!

Asteroids and the Moon are sources of raw materials, but the energy is what enables you to do something with it, and solar energy in space is easily extracted.

Re:The important word is "should"

[deadhammer]

Asteroid capture and mining is potentially lucrative but completely unknown in terms of economy, safety, proper technique, etc. Generally what governments excel at is exploration of unknowns. You think there would BE private space flights and planned space stations if NASA and the USSR hadn't gone up first to see if, oh, people could even survive in zero-G, let alone get up there and back? Is it inefficient? Sure. But governments can take risks that private agencies, with shareholders that demand risk prevention, can't. Once the maps have been made, so to speak, then you can get the massive influx of private sector enterprise.

In other words, it's an investment.

Logic:

[J05H]

Asteroid retrieval is about $1-2 Billion spread over a decade. Single moon landing is at an order of magnitude higher at $10-20 Billion with unknown duration. This is what happened with Shuttle and Station and appears to be happening with SLS: they eventually sucked cash out of other NASA programs while legislators direct even more resources into those single projects as if 10,000 people working together can't manage more than one task.

We should go back to the Moon but that should not prevent us from also snagging an asteroid. The funny thing is that the returned asteroid was planned to go into Lunar or very eccentric high orbit, either would have been a great shake-down cruise for Orion before going to the Moon.

We need to wipe out CONgress and restart

[WindBourne]

First off, this nightmare that is ongoing with NASA, is NOT NASA's fault, but the fault, of the God Damn neo-cons that are running the house.
The majority of those shits are looking to keep NASA as a Job's bill. They do not care whether we go to the moon or not. THey want to spending our money on SLS which is mostly situated in neo-con districts( I note that a few dems back this as well, but they are pushing for both SLS and private space; spend, spend, spend).
So, what is insane about this? We will spend 20B for a launch vehicle that is mostly based on 60's/70's technology and design and will give us exactly ONE launch vehicle (though with several different designs). Since this vehicle will launch so infrequently, it will cost us 1.5-3B PER LAUNCH. Yes, it will cost as much or more than the shuttle did ( 1.5B per launch was the final price that we paid to send 7 ppl and 24.5 tonnes into LEO; that included the .750B per launch and then another .750B rebuilding the craft for another launch ). It is INSANE that we spend that kind of money.

So, what is the sane Alternative? The one that Obama, dems, and even the tea-party is pushing: We need PRIVATE SPACE.
If we spend less than 2B over the next 2-3 years, we can have 3 launchers that will carry 7 ppl into leo (dragon rider/f9, atlas V with either cst-100 or dreamchaser). With this, we are guaranteed that we will NEVER lose cargo or human access to space again.
BUT, it gets better. Bigelow Aerospace has a SSA with NASA that both are working on getting private space to the moon BY 2020. It will costs less than the 20B that neo-cons are trying to force on NASA. Most importantly, by allowing NASA to pursue the asteroid AND help private space, we gain:
1) multiple launch vehicles so that we never lose space access again.
2) multiple tugs/fuel depots, that will include electric tugs (suitable for moving equipment/sats) and chemical tugs (suitable for moving ppl, or starting missions to extra solar).
3) multiple space stations at various altitudes in orbit, along with friendly nations helping to fund this.
4) a lunar base by 2020, again, with friendly nations helping to fund this (by paying the private companies money to put ppl on the surface).
5) Man on Mars by 2025.
6) learning on how to move asteroids around, and hopefully, prevent a large impact on earth. In addition, this technology will then allow private space to mine other asteroids.

And if we do this smart, we will then create a COTS-SHLV, in which we hold a contest for 2 launch systems to carry a minimum of 150 tonnes to LEO, for which we give 5B each to develop it. In addition, later one, we offer up 2 competitive contracts in which company will carry a minimum of 150 tonnes to LEO for no more than .5B / launch, and they will get 2 launches/ year for 3 years. Also, whoever has the lower amount will get 3 launches/ year. IOW, you can get 50% more launches by being a GOOD low bidder (i.e. has to be realistic). You will note that we will spend 2.5B/year on sending up equipment for 3 years.

You will note that the above spends just about the same as what the neo-cons want to spend on just building a rocket. BUT, if we do the above correctly, we will have NASA focus on just going to an asteroid, but also helping private space get BEO, and hopefully, NASA will be able to R&D new tech, such as nuke engines (we lead the world on this and our tech from the 60s is STILL ahead of what everybody else has).

With above approach, we convert NASA back into what it was before neo-cons turned them into a jobs program for themselves, get private space from being a cost center into a taxable item, and get ourselves BEO.

BUT, these god-for-saken neo-cons need to be stopped.

Re: new capability

[__aaltlg1547]

Why isn't anyone tapping into Moore's Law for the moon?

Maybe because moon bases and rockets mostly aren't made of transistors.

Re:The important word is "should"

[LifesABeach]

Putting money on Moon related projects has helped everyone, and accelerated human achievement better than any program that uses money to subsidize greed.

what should NASA do?

[bzipitidoo]

I'd like to see this:

• James Webb telescope, plus telescopes at L4 and L5
• orbiters for Uranus and Neptune
• rovers on every big rock hospitable enough for them to last a few months. Maybe Ganymede, Callisto, Europa, and Mercury for starters.

Also, let's cancel the ISS. Not sure about Biosphere 2 style research. We will want to do that eventually, but right now I don't think we really know enough to know where to look. We also know about a lot of problems for which we don't have answers, such as cosmic rays. But if we could concoct a way to turn Mars regolith into soil, perhaps by introducing mixes of appropriate bacteria, then grow plants in that environment, that would be a step towards eventual colonization.

I'd love to see an interstellar probe launched, but that is far beyond our current technology. We just can't do it.

Re:The important word is "should"

[dpilot]

If you've followed Jon Stewart more, you'd know that he's painfully aware of this. On several occasions he has rather angrily taken the mainstream media to task, primarily with the tune, "I'm a comedian, why aren't YOU covering this stuff the way it ought to be!"

Jon Stewart is the Court Jester of our day. (Which is a bit more than one might think, if you look up more of the role of the Court Jester in medieval times.)

Re: The important word is "should"

[WindBourne]

Thats because you are wrong with your 'facts'.
First off, Russia is not an enemy. Get over it. We won.
Secondly, Russia space budget is not going up 7x more than NASA's, let alone 17x. Russia said that they would spend X amount, but, in small print, it came out that it was over a very long time. IIRC, Roscomos will spend ~170 billion rubles (about $5.5B). In 2015, they will have raised it to around 200 b rubles (less than $7B).
To be fair, that is a lot of money for Russia. However, it still does not approach what we will Spend. In addition, Russia wants to stay as a partner with us for going to the moon. So do the other ISS partners. And since private space is going, hopefully, we will see loads of work on-going in about 2 years.

OTOH, you have every right to be concerned about China. China's space program is a PURE MILITARY project. In addition, they are working hard to keep it all closed.

Re:The important word is "should"

[mbkennel]

Doing exactly the same thing again does not get +5 more.