I was suppose to be in DC this week, helping to sell President Obama's new ambitious human space program. Yes, thats right, it is human, it is ambitious, and its very cool. Unfortunately, the weather didn't cooperate. That has me rather annoyed
In addition, I am getting rather sick and tired of the teabaggers (or the space equivalent to teabaggers) that have invaded some of the space blogs (and there are a ton). So, instead, I thought I'd tell you why I support the new NASA plan (although I will admit it is a work in progress).
First, the thing people tend to forget is that Space is a place, not a program, and spaceflight doesn't begin and end with Neil Armstrong, John Glenn, ISS, and The Space Shuttle. Its a place full of resources, some physical, some sociological. And the problem is we don't have access to those resources. And the past 40 years have not really opened up space. We need to have a better space policy, one whose purpose is about opening space up to society, so that it can use the resources of space to make this a better world, both on planet and off.
Ironically, this starts with Bush, and like more than a few things related to Bush, the idea wasn't necessarily bad, the implementation was horrible. The original goals of the Vision for Space Exploration were quite honorable, and agreeable. From VSE
- Implement a sustained and affordable human and robotic program to explore the solar system and beyond;
- Extend human presence across the solar system, starting with a human return to the Moon by the year 2020, in preparation for human exploration of Mars and other destinations;
- Develop the innovative technologies, knowledge, and infrastructures both to explore and to support decisions about the destinations for human exploration; and
- Promote international and commercial participation in exploration to further U.S. scientific, security, and economic interests.
The problem was, the resulting program, Constellation, failed to meet a number of these points - it wasn't sustainable, or affordable, and it cut the robotic program. It wasn't really going to extend human presence across the solar system. It cut way back on new, innovative technologies, and it did nothing to really encourage international or commercial participation. In fact, it created a gap in human spaceflight capabilities, first 2 years, and then 4 years, and now its up to 7 years. The big problem with it was that it always assumed more money was coming, and more money never came.
Its this total failure in implementation that makes me oppose Constellation, Ares I, Orion, and Ares V.
A BETTER WAY
There is a better way to open space. Back during the early days of aviation, the NACA (National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics - predecessor to NASA), partnered with early aviation industry. They helped to develop technology, standards, and numerous other things (if you are in engineering, you may have heard of the NACA duct, or NACA airfoil, or NACA cowling). That, plus things like the Kelly Air Mail Act, helped to create the the US Aviation industry, which is a very impressive industry. Back then, you had multiple companies, both established and new, working with NACA and the federal government.
Today, we are in a similar situation - established companies (Boeing, United Launch Alliance) and new companies (SpaceX, Sierra Nevada Corporation) are currently pursuing human spaceflight. If we put the right policies in place, we can get industry to spend its own money on doing human spaceflight as well. This means we can have more people working on lowering costs, increasing safety, and it gives us the ability to send our astronauts out exploring. Above all, it creates new industries, which creates more jobs for less federal spending (and efficiency is a good thing, even when it comes to money)
ISS: THE LINCHPIN
The key piece to doing this is the International Space Station. In an ideal world, it might not look like it does, but we aren't in an ideal world, and as a rule, the closer hardware is to operational reality, the more trustworthy its data is. And if its hardware that operates permanently in space, or long term in space, its worth A DAMN LOT (particularly when you've spent $100 Billion on it).
ISS is unique in a number of respects - there is of course the fact that it has access to the environment of space. But also, its status as a national lab means that a variety of users can do activities there - Government scientists, University Researchers, private industry, and the like can all utilize ISS. And there are some definite ways available for widespread use of ISS, from full on scientific investigations, to markets like space tourism.
Unfortunately, Constellation crippled ISS, in a number of ways. First, it doesn't provide access to ISS, both manned and unmanned (and this is key). Second, a lot of the funding for science had been transferred over to Constellation (thus, when people said ISS doesn't do science, they were correct, but that wasn't inherent in the design of ISS). This also impacted the number of available researchers for microgravity. Finally, it ended ISS just after it was completed.
Obama's budget reverse this decision - he funds not only the continued existence of the station, but also restores funding for utilizing the station for research, both for science, and also advanced space tech R&D. However, there is something missing, which is regular, routine, reliable and Low cost station access. This is REQUIRED for the success of ISS (more on this in a moment).
I will add that there are some risks involved in making ISS the vanguard of space policy - if something major goes wrong on a technical level, we are back to square one (IE it suffers from being a single point failure). Also, there is the potential for ISS to forever be subsidized by the federal government.
However, in the case of the first issue, the simple fact is that we currently have a lot of single point failures within the US human spaceflight program - the biggest being funding for doing things in space. If we can get a redundant funding mechanism for space (IE private markets) we can see to it that more stations go up (and its worth noting that the first MANNED Bigelow Station is scheduled to go up in 2014). As for the second issue, I think we should make it the policy to take the next few years, and make a long term effort to figure out how to get ISS to pay for itself. If we can't do it by 2020, then there is something fundamentally different about space.
ISS ACCESS
Whether you like it or not, shuttle is coming to an end, very soon. When it does, there is only 1 way for humans to access ISS, and all of the mechanisms to bring cargo to ISS are non-American. We need a US capability to access ISS, both cargo and crew.
Orion was suppose to be this, with a backup for cargo in the form of COTS. However, Orion doesn't arrive in time to provide access to the station. Further, in many ways, the Orion capsule is the wrong vehicle to bring astronauts to ISS, for a number of reason.
This means that we are totally dependent upon the Russians, particularly for human access. So those arguing for Orion, are missing the point - its not Orion vs Commercial Crew - Its Commercial Crew vs Russia. Those promoting Orion are subsidizing Russia. And this brings up the obvious question
SHOULD WE BE MORE CONCERNED ABOUT PROTECTING RUSSIAN COMPANIES THAN AMERICAN COMPANIES?
COMMERCIAL CREW TO ISS
The Augustine Committe, when it considered Commercial crew options, determined that around $2.5 Billion was necessary to bring 2 commercial crew vehicles to operation. The Obama budget begins a process to fund a Commercial Crew program to a tune of $6 Billion dollars. This allows us to bring in multiple providers, include older companies (Boeing, United Launch Alliance, Lockheed Martin) and new companies (SpaceX, Orbital Science Corporation, Sierra Nevada Corporation) to develop multiple rockets and multiple spacecraft. Thus, the program can act as its own backup (I mean, its not like Boeing lacks history here - they were the prime contractors for the International Space Station).
This gives us a good mix of hardware. For rockets, we have the Atlas V and Delta IV already flying, and both the Taurus 2 and the Falcon 9 are currently being developed. On the spacecraft side, we have the Dreamchaser, The Dragon, The Cygnus, and the Orion-lite.
Also, NASA gains additional financial leverage from the private industry, because now private industry will invest some of its own money into the development process. It also provides a better check on the industry, because it doesn't allow for unlimited cost overruns (unlike the current program). Instead, the companies only get paid when they deliver working hardware, or when they deliver the required service. And the companies have to absorb internally the cost overruns. This is because it moves space away from the cost-plus contracts, to pure fixed price contracts.
Ultimately, a viable spaceflight industry will deliver multiple, safe, and affordable spaceships.
Opening up the Solar System
Fundamentally, despite all the discussion about technical problems, and even programmatic problems that Constellation faced (and, as far as the technical problem, I have no doubt given enough time and money they were solvable) the true problem with Constellation was that there was no organic mechanism that led us to a spacefaring future. It assumed that we could recreate Apollo, and then build a spacefaring society out of that. And thats why it always assumed more money than it ever got, and why, it went only with existing technology. I have no doubt that we can recreate Apollo, but if we can't sustain it, long term, then why do it? What we need is something that will ensure we, as a society (not just a government but a society) are willing to spend significantly more on human spaceflight than the $8-9 Billion NASA gets for it.
Obama's proposal will allow that. First, it will develop new technology, that has the potential to be game changing technology, such that the costs will be dramatically lowered. Examples of this technology include
- In space Propellant storage
- Inflatable modules
- VASIMR
- Advanced Earth to LEO propulsion
- Advanced in space propulsion (like VASIMR)
- Closed Loop life support
And this is only the tip of the iceberg. Much of this technology has progressed to the point where it needs to go to full flight testing. We've passed the point where its simply mathematics and computer models, and we need to bend real metal, and put it in space. Of course, doing this takes money, which is why Obama put a substantial chunk of money into the R&D program.
Obama's proposal also also works on the sustainability front, by pushing new industries, that can then find new users. Industries like space tourism, Private Sector and university sector and government sponsored R&D, and space manufacturing, just to name a few.
Jeff Greason, president of XCOR and a member of the Augustine Committee put it best:
NASA's Future
As terrible as it is to say, we wasted a significant amount of time and money going with Constellation for so long, and we inspired people's hopes and dreams. Losing Constellation has been seen as missing the moon (although its not), and quite a few people now fear for their jobs.
But the problems of Constellation are too great - as was said during the Augustine committee hearings, we are repeating a number of the mistakes we made during shuttle and station and Apollo. And unfortunately, as was also pointed out during the Augustine meetings, if we suddenly had a working Constellation tomorrow morning, we'd have to cancel it because we couldn't afford it.
We need to leverage already existing systems, like the Atlas V and Delta IV, develop game changing R&D, and get the private sector to increase its spending on human spaceflight.
And this is why I support Obama's NASA budget.
Because we didn't lose the moon - we now can go back to the moon, and beyond the moon, at the same time.
In the coming days, I'll be providing diaries about people/groups who have come out in support of the Obama budget, and also the coming shuttle replacements.