E-mail updates
Follow on Twitter
Subscribe to RSSNASA announces funding to four experimental spacecraft. WESH's Dan Billow reports.
With the shuttle program winding down, the future of American spaceflight may well depend on how starry-eyed tycoons spend their money — and some of NASA’s money as well.
Three of the four companies that are in line to receive $269.3 million from NASA for building future spaceships are privately held, and what's more, they're led by well-off individuals who have at least a hint of intrigue about them. The fourth company, Boeing, is partnering with Bigelow Aerospace, which was founded by hotel-chain billionaire Robert Bigelow and has its own orbital aspirations.
NASA has laid out a plan for paying out the money over the next year or so, with the aim of promoting the rise of a new set of spaceship operators in the post-shuttle era.
In a commentary, George Washington University communication researcher Linda Billings picks up on the fact that hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars are going to ventures that are headed up by folks who already have hundreds of millions of dollars.
"Why do these 'commercial' space companies need government handouts?" she asks. "The awardees are not hard-up start-ups (and these government handouts are not their first)."
It's true that all four companies have received money from the federal government previously, but none of those companies would characterize the payments as "handouts" or "subsidies."
They'd see them instead as payments for services rendered, goods delivered, or milestones achieved along the path that NASA wants them to take. And the $50 million that's been paid out so far under NASA's Commercial Crew Development program, or CCDev, is dwarfed by the $9 billion paid to commercial providers such as Lockheed Martin for the development of NASA's now-canceled Ares 1 rocket and now-downsized Orion crew capsule.
Although the financial details are hard to come by, it's virtually certain that the four companies have already spent far more than they've received for their spaceship projects. It's also virtually certain that not all four projects will make it into orbit. Because NASA is spreading out its bets, failure is definitely an option.
Here's a recap on the four spaceship development projects that NASA will be supporting for the next year under the second phase of the CCDev program. I'll be focusing on these efforts on Saturday during a Second Life chat about the post-shuttle spaceflight era, presented by the Meta Institute for Computational Astrophysics at 1 p.m. ET (10 a.m. SLT/PT):
Blue Origin
Blue Origin's orbital space vehicle is designed to take on trips to the International Space Station.
Blue Origin: The venture getting the least amount of money ($22 million) is arguably the most mysterious of the bunch. Amazon.com's billionaire founder, Jeff Bezos, set up Blue Origin in 2000 to follow through on his childhood dream of going into outer space. He has the country's only privately owned spaceport, nestled amid his 165,000-acre ranch in West Texas — and until CCDev came along, most people assumed he was targeting solely suborbital space tourism.
CCDev made clear that Bezos had higher ambitions: Blue Origin's agreement with NASA, made public in redacted form this week, shows that the company aims to build an orbital launch system capable of getting seven passengers to the International Space Station (or other destinations in low Earth orbit). Its space vehicle would initially be launched on an expendable rocket such as United Launch Alliance's Atlas 5, and eventually Blue Origin plans to field its own reusable rocket.
The suborbital effort is now seen as an interim step along the way to orbit. "The suborbital vehicle will be fully reusable and capable of flying three or more astronauts to an altitude of over 328,000 feet (above 100 kilometers) for science research and adventure," Blue Origin said. "The suborbital booster is currently undergoing integrated testing. ... The suborbital capsule will baseline key technologies for the orbital space vehicle, and is currently undergoing final assembly."
With rare exceptions, the only information publicly available about Blue's plans comes from government documents that must be made publicly available, such as the one released this week. Thus, it's hard to tell how much money Bezos has put into his rocket venture so far. But when you consider the construction costs for Blue Origin's production facility in Washington state, plus its facilities in Texas, plus all the testing it's done to date, it's unquestionably more than the $3.7 million the venture received under CCDev1 plus the $22 million it's due to get under CCDev2.
Blue Origin's partners include NASA's Ames Research Center and Stennis Space Center, United Launch Alliance and Lockheed Martin, Aerojet and the Air Force Holloman High Speed Test Track in New Mexico. The company's agreement with NASA says that Bezos "recognizes that successful development of an innovative space launch capability is a long-term endeavor and is committed to steady funding for development efforts to achieve a commercial orbital vehicle."
The company said NASA's support would "accelerate" the development of a reusable crew transportation system. "We are very pleased to continue working with NASA on development of our Crew Transportation System, and appreciate the confidence NASA places in Blue Origin," the company's program manager, Rob Meyerson, said in an emailed statement.
Sierra Nevada Corp.
An artist's conception shows Sierra Nevada's Dream Chaser near a space station docking port.
Sierra Nevada Corp.: Sierra Nevada received $20 million during CCDev1 and is getting $80 million in CCDev2 to continue development of its Dream Chaser space plane, which is based on the HL-20 lifting-body design that NASA pioneered back in the 1980s. The concept was revived by high-tech entrepreneur Jim Benson at SpaceDev and inherited by Sierra Nevada when it acquired SpaceDev in 2008. (Benson had left SpaceDev two years earlier and came up with a different spaceship concept, but he passed away in 2008 before he could get very far with the idea.)
Sierra Nevada's top corporate officers are in the public eye far less than Jeff Bezos. After all, Bezos is still the head of a publicly traded company, but CEO Fatih Ozmen and his wife, company president and chief financial officer Eren Ozmen don't have much reason to go public. Three years ago, a story about Sierra Nevada in the Las Vegas Sun called Fatih Ozmen a "mystery man."
The Ozmens started out as employees at Sierra Nevada and acquired the Nevada-based company in 1994. Since then, Sierra Nevada has grown into a big-time defense contractor with 29 locations in 15 states. Inc. magazine listed its 2009 revenue at just under a billion dollars.
Sierra Nevada's website lists numerous awards, including recognition as "the top woman-owned company demonstrating excellence in applying innovative IT solutions to the federal government." But the company has also experienced the occasional hiccup, such as recent questions over the development of an imaging pod for the Air Force, called Gorgon Stare.
The company's agreement with NASA lists 11 partners, including Boeing, United Launch Alliance, United Space Alliance, Aerojet, Draper Lab, NASA's Langley Research Center, AdamWorks, SAS, the University of Colorado, the U.S. component of Canada's MDA robotics company and Virgin Galactic (which is working with Sierra Nevada on "global marketing, sales and commercial operation" of the orbital Dream Chaser).
SpaceX
An artist's conception shows SpaceX's Draco thruster engines firing to separate the Dragon spacecraft from the Falcon 9 second stage. Side-mounted thrusters could be used as a launch abort system and landing system.
SpaceX: This California-based company, founded by high-tech entrepreneur Elon Musk in 2002, has notched a surprising number of space successes lately, including last December's launch-to-splashdown test of its Falcon 9 rocket and Dragon cargo capsule. NASA is supporting the development of the Falcon-Dragon system with $278 million under a separate program for cargo craft development, known as Commercial Orbital Transport Services or COTS. If SpaceX hits its marks, it will be in line for $1.6 billion worth of NASA contracts to deliver cargo to the International Space Station.
Musk has said it would take $1 billion and three years of work to adapt the Falcon-Dragon system to carry crew, primarily because of the expense of developing an emergency launch abort system. This week, he said the $75 million in CCDev2 money would put SpaceX on track to meet that schedule.
"The award will accelerate our efforts to develop the next generation of rockets and spacecraft for human transportation," Musk said in a statement. "With NASA's support, SpaceX will be ready to fly its first manned mission in 2014."
Musk has made no secret of his long-term goal: to open the way for colonizing Mars and turn humanity into a multiplanet species. This week's statement referred slyly to those ambitions by noting that SpaceX's thruster system would "provide the capability for Dragon to land almost anywhere on Earth or another planet with pinpoint accuracy, overcoming the limitation of a winged architecture that works only in Earth's atmosphere."
A couple of years ago, Musk said that he invested $100 million of his fortune in SpaceX — but there have been more recent indications that the spigot has been turned down on his personal cash flow. SpaceX recently reported raising $50 million in additional funds, and Musk said an initial public offering may take place next year. Last year, there were a flurry of reports about Musk's financial straits, which led him to discuss the situation candidly in the Huffington Post.
SpaceX's agreement with NASA says the $75 million would accelerate crew-transport development by 50 percent compared to an internally funded baseline. So what does that say about SpaceX's investment? That figure is blacked out in the agreement posted online, but if time is money, that might imply SpaceX is bringing $75 million of its own to the project. The section listing SpaceX's partners and institutional investors is also blacked out, but the company notes that it works in "close collaboration with four NASA centers and eight leading aerospace companies."
Boeing
Boeing's CST-100 craft approaches the International Space Station in an artist's concept.
The Boeing Co.: This aerospace giant is something of an outlier. It's publicly traded, and has been involved in the U.S. space effort for decades. Among other things, Boeing served as the prime contractor for construction of the International Space Station. Billings' knock against Boeing was that with $3.3 billion in profit for 2010, the company didn't need a government "subsidy" for its spaceship-building operation.
However, Boeing's John Elbon repeatedly said in the run-up to the CCDev2 announcement that NASA had to serve as the anchor customer for the company's proposed CST-100 crew capsule. Without NASA support, the financial underpinnings of the project just didn't stand up. The $92.3 million in CCDev2 money, added to the $18 million from CCDev1, will keep Boeing on track to have the capsule ready for flight by 2015.
"By the end of CCDev2, our design will be firmed up and we'll have it synced up with NASA requirements so we understand our vehicle will meet those requirements," Boeing's John Elbon told reporters.
Boeing's go-ahead is also good news for Robert Bigelow, whose aerospace company has already put up two inflatable test modules into orbit on Russian spacecraft. Bigelow Aerospace is hoping that the CST-100 — perhaps launched on an Atlas 5, Delta 4 or Falcon 9 — can bring paying passengers to its future private-sector space stations as well as to the government-supported International Space Station.
In addition to Bigelow, Boeing's agreement with NASA lists Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne, Airborne Systems, ILC Dover, Spincraft, XCOR Aerospace, United Space Alliance and ARES Corp. as teammates and investors. Boeing also notes its agreements with Bigelow, Space Adventures and an additional blacked-out entity "to increase market growth."
Orbital Sciences Corp.
Orbital Sciences' Prometheus space plane, shown in this artist's conception, was one of the proposals that NASA passed up. Orbital is now reportedly planning to mothball the concept.
What separated the winners and losers: NASA has now released the full list of companies proposing CCDev2 spaceship projects, plus short rundowns on why particular proposals were chosen or eliminated. It's fascinating reading for space geeks.
The also-rans included alphaSpaces, Andrews Space, ATK Aerospace Systems, Excalibur Almaz, ILC Dover, Innovative Space Propulsion Systems, KT Engineering, Oceaneering International, Orbital Outfitters, Orbital Sciences Corp., Orbital Space Transport, Paragon Space Development Corp., PlanetSpace, Spacedesign Corp., TGV Rockets, Transformational Space Corp. (a.k.a. t/Space), United Launch Alliance and United Space Alliance.
Philip McAlister, acting director of NASA Headquarters' Commercial Spaceflight Development program, said Boeing and SpaceX were clear standouts from the rest of the pack. "They were the only ones to receive 'very high' confidence ratings, which I consider significant," he wrote.
ATK, Excalibur Almaz and United Launch Alliance were among the finalists, but McAlister said Excalibur Almaz was eliminated due to low ratings, especially on business considerations. He opted not to go with ATK and United Launch Alliance in part because of their lack of linkage to a crew-carrying vehicle. Those two companies were proposing only to build launch vehicles, and McAlister put somewhat less weight on that side of the equation.
"Within the U.S. industrial base, there is considerable launch vehicle development expertise, as many companies have successfully developed new launch vehicles over the last few decades," he explained. "In contrast, no U.S. company has successfully developed a crew-carrying spacecraft in over 30 years."
In other words, not since the space shuttle ... unless you count the private-sector SpaceShipOne rocket plane, which made three suborbital space trips in 2004.
Lockheed Martin
Lockheed Martin's Space Operations Simulation Center in Colorado can simulate on-orbit docking maneuvers using mockups of the Orion spce capsule, left, and the International Space Station.
So what's next? The CCDev2 covers the development timeline through May 2012, but NASA is looking for another $850 million to cover the third phase of the program, CCDev3. Being a CCDev2 winner doesn't guarantee that you'll get CCDev3 funding, and it's possible that a company not receiving money in one phase of the program could be funded for a future phase. For example, SpaceX didn't receive any funding in CCDev1 but was awarded $75 million in CCDev2.
The agreements with NASA spell out milestones that must be met in order to receive incremental payments. It's not guaranteed that all the companies will meet all the milestones. For example, Rocketplane Kistler was awarded up to $207 million from COTS, NASA's cargo spacecraft development program, but the company couldn't reach its investment target and was cut off after receiving $32.1 million for hitting earlier milestones.
If the CCDev process is successful, NASA should be able to choose from new U.S.-built spaceships for launching astronauts to the International Space Station in the 2014-2015 time frame. In the meantime, the space agency will have to rely on Russia's Soyuz spacecraft for crew transport. NASA expects to begin sending cargo up to the International Space Station on remote-controlled craft provided by SpaceX and Orbital Sciences Corp. as early as next year.
Separately, NASA is also funding Lockheed Martin's work of the Orion crew capsule, which is currently envisioned as a NASA-operated emergency crew escape vehicle. Such capsules would be launched to the space station without a crew, thus minimizing the flight risk.
The Orion may well turn into the multipurpose crew vehicle that Congress wants NASA to develop for trips beyond Earth orbit. Congress has set aside $1.2 billion in the current fiscal year for the Orion-based crew vehicle, plus $1.8 billion for a heavy-lift rocket capable of putting 130 tons of payload into orbit. Lawmakers want to see that mission accomplished by 2016, but NASA isn't sure the job can be done.
Even if the beyond-Earth space transport system is ready by 2016, NASA is expected to use commercial transports to get astronauts to and from the space station. Using a heavy-lifter to send astronauts to low Earth orbit would be like using a semi to get from one end of town to the other. It's better to call a taxi ... which is exactly what NASA plans to do once its commercial "space taxis" are ready to fly.
More on the space race:
- NewSpace Journal: Orbital may wind down commercial crew effort
- Aviation Week: Five vehicles vie to succeed space shuttle
- The Register: Millionaire's private spaceship 'can land on Mars'
- NewSpace Journal: Paul Allen considering new space projects
- Much, much more from RLV and Space Transport News
If you're a Second Life user, please join me at the StellaNova Amphitheater on Saturday at 1 p.m. ET (10 a.m. PT/SLT) for "From the Shuttle to Mars," a talk about the post-shuttle era presented by the Meta Institute for Computational Astrophysics. If you miss the talk, you'll still be able to listen to the full hourlong podcast via MICA's audio archives. (You'll also find links to the archived podcasts from my three previous MICA talks.)
Join the Cosmic Log community by clicking the "like" button on our Facebook page or by following msnbc.com science editor Alan Boyle as b0yle on Twitter. To learn more about my book on Pluto and the search for planets, check out the website for "The Case for Pluto."
Leave a Comment:
"With NASA's support, SpaceX will be ready to fly its first manned mission in 2014."
Sweet music to my ears.
Excellent article Alan
mob_barley: I agree, excellent and informative article. I have enough faith in NASA's engineers and inspectors [or overseers] that no company will be allowed to put an inferior design into space, endangering astronauts in the name of winning a contract. Years ago it was said of J. Edgar Hoover that he commented about his agents, "you can't buy them or corrupt them", or something similar. My impression of NASA is like that.
Agreed, nice article! It really captures how and why the commercial sector, with relatively small incentives being provided through the NASA COTS program, is keeping progress alive and well in space.
With a robust supply chain in low earth orbit, NASA will be freed up to successfully push the envelope beyond earth-orbit, and do more groundbreaking science and exploration.
The contrast is especially interesting between SpaceX (scraping together funding, public and private, for a $1 billion investment manrating Falcon9/Dragon) vs. Boeing (an old and reliable aerospace contractor with billions in existing profits, not as willing to bet the house so to speak).
Why do you think Boeing gets the largest share of COTS 2 (at $92 million)? How does their CST-100 capsule work, or add value, in conjuction with Dragon and Orion if all three succeed?
...I may be answering my own question here, but is it that the CST-100 would be the primary spacecraft for the EELV: Delta IV and Atlas V? (Is Atlas V more likely due to lower development costs to manrate?)
"Capitalist Pigs In SPA-A-A-A-aaaaace...."
And the socialist minded again looks to cast free citizens exercising their Creator given liberties as something to be envious of. D&*n it Americans, where is your love of rugged individualism and support for the can-do success stories?
"hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars are going to ventures that are headed up by folks who already have hundreds of millions of dollars."
This shows a *SHOCKING* lack of economic understanding and sophistication. Most "captains of industry" worth is directly evaluated from the estimated market value of their company. Not "cash in hand".
In an "economic battle", and make no mistake that the world's "global economy" is a battlefield, the best run companies are going to be key in any nations success.
Look at history, and it shows that individuals are by far the source of most great success stories. And it *DOES NOT* support the socialist point of view that a "government committee" is going to behave in a morally superior or better way than individuals do.
In fact the mega massacres and super financial disasters of the 20th century show where it leads.
Soothfast -
Are you Lisa Billings from GWU?
"Boeing served as the prime contractor for construction of the International Space Station"....that one sentance says more than meets the eye......I am skeptical a bit, all we need is the politicians to make this a battlefront issue and all the funding could disappear....I am happy that the system is open, so if someone is worty of cdev3 funding, cdev2 money won't of been a prerequisite. With the accent on manned capability, it would be nice if more than one (even more than four for that matter) commercial space companies were able to deliver NASA scientist and technicians to the space station and other bases of activity that may well be within NASA's future. I am certain that there are more innovative americans with a drive to jump into the space race, as well I am convince there are plenty of russian engineers sitting around with more than just napkin sketches in front of them, a boost for our space technology companies into this arena has already spurred others, and once NASA is underway (we'll see, it should of been underway first, then shuttle phased out....for a set of congresses that is continually putting the cart before the horse, well, we'll see), yea, once nasa is underway, then other companies on other soils are going to say "me too", "me too"....I dare say the brits deserve it, I would never underestimate bae's abilities, nor many of their competitors...scary to think of, maybe haliburton as a foriegn, space competent, international conglomerate...(that is scary enough to make sure it ain't so even now!)....with all the french nuk technology, it would be a bit premature to think they won't ever pair with someone and push the lid open on fission powered space somethings....quo vadis?
I am weary to the idea of corporations getting a foothold in space. Its like all the sci-fi movies being made a reality with the corrupt mega-corporations running everything with titanium-lined fists that silence everything. Thats a pretty scary thought considering how much comapanies can get away with on just the planet. Outer Space has A LOT more space to dump evidence of wrongdoing..
....in space....no one can hear you blow the whistle.
Yes, but on the flip-side the government changes it's mind every 4 - 8 years on what direction NASA needs to go in. At least the corporations will have some consistency to achieve some longer term goals.
Oh yea, history has shown governments do *SO* much better. As if just the previous century there weren't numerous massacres and stupendous economic disasters leading millions into crushing poverty, suffering, horror.
Socialist propaganda is so ready for everyone to forget it's previous super catastrophes to sucker another generation of weak minded magical thinking society engineering control freaks.
I would like to point out that quite frequently it is the corporations working hand in hand with the government that cause the biggest catastrophes. I'm not nearly as worried about ethical problems in space. Aside from financial shananigans, I can't really see how anyone could "control" space.
Off the top of my head, how did corporations contribute to the catastrophes in North Korea? USSR? Cambodia (Khmer Rouge )? Even China holds absolute authority over any corporate activities inside it's borders of the few non-state owned businesses.
You have no idea the meaning of the words you spew.
Well, most American corporate abuses are done while the government turns a blind eye to the events. As to words that I "spew", the OP was referring to corporations' ethical abuses, not governments. My comment was referring to corporate abuses, such as the deregulation that led to the financial crash, exploitation of workers in the 19th century, enviromental abuses that took place until the last few decades, and the list goes on. All were done while the government turned a blind eye to the things taking place. Perhaps you would benefit from some remedial reading comprehension courses which would help you avoid making a fool out of yourself by spewing asanine remarks. Perhaps in your 100% laissez faire fantasy world, you would gleefully toil away with no workers rights and live in a company owned house and you could buy things from the company store with their corporate monopoly money, all the while sleeping well at night knowing that the government had no hand in you complete subjegation. Hate to break it to you, but government does have its uses sometimes.
It is naive to believe that only in America do people commit abuses ("corporate" is just the people running it), and it is even more naive to think that the people in the government do not themselves commit abuses. In fact American tradition is to keep government to a minimum as people in government are far more dangerous as they have the ability to "legalize" their abuses and direct the full force of it's institutions into self destructive activities.
I have seen very little congressional testimony that implicates elements of "deregulation" as a factor. That is not to say I am fully supportive of certain areas of deregulation. Deregulation as the Boogie Man is popular with certain sociopolitical special interest groups.
Any useful discussion of what happened when the real-estate bubble burst must include an interaction between:
Development of non-depository financial entities that were not covered by regulations normally associated with banks (coined by some as the "shadow" banking system) that became the primary source of liquidity for the economy.
Government policy in directing Fannie+Freddie to purchase all manner of marginal mortgages and making them available in bulk to firms that created "securitization" credit instruments that spread the danger far and wide.
Rating agencies that showed a shocking lack of sophistication or understanding of what it was that they were assigning AAA ratings to. And their lack of properly evaluating a formula developed by David X. Li: "a piece of financial technology that allowed hugely complex risks to be modeled with more ease and accuracy than ever before." Essentially they came to the conclusion that there was "no way hundreds of homeowners would all default on their loans at the same time." Fools.
I find it especially upsetting that people from rating agencies haven't been prosecuted for gross negligence, because ultimately they were the ones with the moral onus to protect the "people".
I believe the custom following ad hominem attacks is to say "you loose".
*shrug*
You have clearly voiced your disdain of government, espousing repeatedly that it is at fault for all sorts of bad things through out history(which it is). You also strongly imply that private enterprise can do no wrong and is at the core of all the great sucesses of recent history. Therefore, it is safe to assume that you hold to the belief that a pure laissez faire system would be superior to the "socialism" of the USA. You post about how Fannie and Freddie caused the collapse. However, it is easy to find sources that point to deregulation being at the root of the problem as well, which only reinforces my earlier statement. Both dereulgation and the government(Fannie and Freddie), acting together, were behind the problem. To sum up, you are in fact the one who began engaging in ad hominem attacks. You took a statement that said corporations and governments working together cause problems, and attacked the poster as "socialist" while completely disregarding the statement as utterly meritless based on your own personal beliefs. That is the definition of an ad hominem attack! I believe that someone who makes ad hominem attacks insulting someone for making one against him is called a hypocrite of the first order.
I am glad that these companies got these awards, though it is disappointing that NASA chose not to take up United Space Alliance on their offer to keep two shuttles flying.
L242, I think your worries are misplaced. Compare it to corporations getting a foothold in, say, the computer industry — an event that actually happened about 40 years ago, and now we're all so used to the computer revolution that we no longer even think about it, even as we use our low-cost, ultra-powerful supercomputers (by even 1980 standards) to hold heated discussions on the Internet.
In the same way, space as run by government agencies is still in the "someday we may have computers small enough to fit in a room and costing less than a million dollars" stage. If you want to get beyond that and see some real progress — enough that regular folks like us can actually GO someday — then we need to get commercial industry involved (and the more competition there is, the better!).
Hmmm. You are right there Joe. Thanks for this nice discussion. ;)
I'm for all this. It's an excellent article that summarizes the competing concepts. I would really like to see a space system, booster and spacecraft, that takes us beyond near earth orbit. One that would allow us to go back to the Moon and from there on to other objectives, such as Mars. I think we could build a space habitat on the moon and set up a launch site to launch missions to Mars and other destinations to be determined (TBD).
One can only imagine how many jobs such a program would provide.
Just my opinion folks.
Gapster
We should have been scratching H3 off the moon, and mining pitchblende + Chrome-moly out of the asteroids + shipping it to Earth by mass driver 30 years ago. We should have billions of square kilometers of solar cells at all the LeGrange points and over the poles, beaming energy to us by microwave or low-intensity laser. We should be growing million-mile carbon atoms in orbit + have at least one elevator up by now. The Space Shuttle 2 should have a Mach 25 scramjet. My Explorer should have a fusion/catalytic motor + FLY. Instead we're about to go back to a CAPSULE. Maybe. If some evil awful nasty corporation comes up with it. Because the Obozo Nation boned what little space program was left.
With the population closing on 8 billion like it's some kind of contest + the world getting stupider by the day (radical Islam's demand for stone-age ignorance in place of enlightened faith, the Great Welfare State that was America), the Human Race wil die gasping in its own filth.
Re those horrible corporations; get used to it. They're our only hope of getting there. With gas just passing 4 bucks a gallon and a 20 years supply within our own borders that the previously mentioned corp-owned politicians won't let us touch, who do you think runs the show NOW?
This is simply good business for the businesses. People need to remember that the space program that started in the 60's generated billions and billions of dollars for the country. The new technologies that we take for granted today were spun off from it. The corporations know this and will be able to cash in the similar technology advances that will be made in the future. After all they are putting up part of the capital, and the "intellectual knowledge" of the future will belong to them.
Awarding gov't money to ngo combines to assist them in creating a variety of space exploration capabilities is essential in getting more people, more brains, involved in the next century of space travel. This is just the beginning. We are still in the 'kindergarden era' of ExTer efforts to reach and colonize the rest of our solar system. The return on investment may in fact be far off in future years, but the vast trove of minerals 'out there' plus the technologies that will be developed to extract and make use of them will provide us Earthlings with endless probabilities for peace and prosperity. "To the future and beyond!" (buzz lightyear)
This country had the greatest and most successful space program in the history of humankind - the space shuttle. Thanks to these geniuses in Washington, that successful program was trashed, never to become resurrected again without re-inventing the wheel. Currently, our astronauts have to depend on "third rate" Soviet era spacecraft for transportation to the space station. What a disgrace. And now, taxpayers are supposed to "subsidize" rich individuals to entice them to develop "commercial spacecraft" ???? What complete nonsense. The 5 successful shuttle missions to service the Hubble Space Telescope and the discoveries made by the Hubble Telescope about the universe justify every cent of taxpayer money spent on the space shuttle program. Why should taxpayers pay anything to the private space industry ? Can they come up with anything on their own that will compare with Hubble or the space shuttle??? No, because space discovery and exploration is too capital intensive for any one private company or consortium of companies to fund. It takes the resources of a large and well leveraged national economy to pay for such an expensive program. Let the private sector cover their own spacecraft development costs and Washington will soon see how stupid and ignorant their idea about commercial space development is. Congress and the President have shown a complete lack of intelligence and vision on this one! What a bunch of morons!
I agree with Brokenarrow. Any sucessful space program needs long-term plans and goals. With the government at NASA's reigns, it's like trying to change horses in the middle of the stream. Maybe private enterpise can set a 20-30 year plan and stick to it, and we can finally get somewhere.
Now if we can just point out to Big Oil that Titan has more oil on it than Earth has water, maybe they'll fund ( pun intended ) a way to go & get it.
And, before my Fantasy Lobe shuts down from cigarettes, steak and beer consumption this weekend, I'd like to see a low-gravity-well Supply and Prep Station established on the Moon. One that parts, supplies and components can be shuttled to from Earth for re-supply and construction/repair (see Ben Bova's "Welcome to Moonbase").
A 100% recyclable lift system from Earth's gravity-well. Maybe a horizontal take-off, multi-stage piggy-back system. Like the 747/Space Shuttle, or the B-52/X-15 set-up, only launching a piloted sub-orbital booster craft that carries a Space Plane like Dream Chaser or such. Airplane gets it to 70-80,000 feet - Booster Craft gets it to 150-200,000 feet - Space Plane gets into LEO and/or beyond. All 3 craft land back on Earth afterward and can be re-used. No waste ='s lower cost per kg. of weight, and landing on runways eliminates the expense of a water landing/recovery/transportation operation, and makes for a faster turn-around time.
A Permanent Space Station at one of the Lagrange points. The ISS has only a few years of life-expectancy left.
No more Reality Shows on TV.
And other stuff. But thanks for letting me rant a bit.
;-)