On March 23rd I posted a diary on the 8 year anniversary of the de-orbit of Mir and offered a few thoughts on MirCorp and the documentary Orphans of Apollo.
Earlier today, at Jeff Foust's Space Politics blog I was struck by a sudden inspiration and posted this (as part of a larger comment):
I believe the Obama Administration would be open to re-visiting the political decisions that sank MirCorp.
And since many of those decisions are processed through the State Department maybe someone should ask Lori Garver to give a copy of the "Orphans of Apollo" DVD to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
The more I think about this, the stronger I feel about it.
It all started when I visited Rand Simberg's site and saw a post that quoted this excerpt from a Space Politics comment:
There’s a good analysis in comments over at Space Politics about the COTS-D situation (comment by "TANSTAAFL" at 9:32 this morning):
SpaceX clearly over-reached with their lobbying campaign on Capitol Hill in the last year. I believe that Elon’s large ego is getting in the way — going up on the Hill and (in effect) saying "Just give me the money and I will eliminate the gap" was not an effective message strategy.
Not even the advocates of COTS-D want to just hand Elon the market. He gave the opponents ammunition, and lost many of his allies. It was an ill-advised strategy.
If Elon had lobbied, instead, for a COTS-D initiative that would fund many competitors, it probably would have had a different result.
In reality, there are multiple "real" competitors. Boeing bid COTS-D in the last competition. SpaceDev (now owned by Sierra Nevada) has a COTS-D concept. There is at least one serious, credible (and well funded) COTS-D competitor that is not publicly known. Under the right circumstances, even tSpace and Rocketplane Kistler could re-emerge if NASA seriously funded COTS-D.
IMO, if this nation is serious about substantially reducing "The Gap", we could (and should) have a COTS-D competition with 4-5 winners. This nation should adopt a portfolio investment approach to diversify risk, and to increase competition and innovation.
Very interesting, and I agree that is SpaceX is seen as the ONLY potential COTS-D winner then it will be difficult for Congress to fund a COT-D competition. Why not just procure from SpaceX? But that - of course - defeats the principles supposedly underlying COTS in the first place.
But there is a more important issue in play, IMHO, and I expressed it like this:
The need for access to the International Space Station doesn’t generate sufficient demand for launch services to justify or support 4 or 5 COTS-D winners.
Suppose we do have 4 or 5 COTS-D competitors and they all produce viable systems? ISS cannot absorb that much lift capacity. We need a non-NASA destination in LEO exactly as was intended by Mir Corp.
As I explained further (at simberg's site):
COTS-D is a great program, but it isn’t paradigm shattering. If NASA is the end customer (and source of funding), it isn’t NewSpace, its merely smarter procurement.
and this . . .
COTS-D can indeed provide a "starter motor" to turn the engine over but only a private sector source of demand for Earth-to-LEO lift can keep the engine running once it catches. Driving a car down the road by using the starter motor but with an empty tank of gas won’t be very helpful.
Perhaps NASA can prime the pump with COTS-D or a LEO propellant depot however that would only provide a starter motor (to mix metaphors) and therefore we need a non-NASA destination for human spaceflight, as I stated here:
The rumors that Michael Griffin castigated Lockheed for even talking to Bigelow about a private sector Atlas V based crew taxi annoy me almost as much as Ares 1 does.
I remain persuaded of the thesis expressed in my prior Daily Kos diary suggesting an orbital sports arena -- such a facility would jump-start NewSpace Earth-to-LEO efforts far more effectively than COTS-D combined with a NASA-centric fuel depot.
Today, with a new President (Barack Obama) and the initiation of a second Augustine Commission to review NASA's human spaceflight program, the time could be opportune to push for change with respect to political attitudes towards a privately owned space station that could jump start demand for lower cost access to LEO.
Check out this You Tube for background on the original MirCorp effort: