Obama's space vision eliminates human space flight
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Obama's space vision eliminates human space flight
http://www.space.com/news/obama-nasa-space...ons-100128.html
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'>No Moon Trips: Obama's Space Vision a 'Paradigm Shift'
By Clara Moskowitz
SPACE.com Staff Writer
posted: 28 January 2010
03:07 pm ET
This story was updated at 5:41 p.m. ET.
President Obama's plan for America's space program, according to early reports, represents a fundamental shift for human spaceflight, some experts say.
The reports suggest the Obama administration intends to move toward relying on commercially-built spacecraft, rather than NASA's own vehicles, to carry humans to low-Earth orbit. The plan would also involve extending the International Space Station's lifetime and abandoning current plans to send astronauts on moon missions by 2020.
"This is definitely a paradigm shift in the way the country will go about its space program," said John Logsdon, a space policy expert and professor emeritus at George Washington University in Washington, D.C.
A spokesperson for NASA's Constellation program overseeing the moon mission work at the Johnson Space Center in Houston told SPACE.com that it would be premature to make any comments on the agency's future until after NASA's spending goals are announced next Monday in Washington, D.C.
Boost to the private sector
The new reliance on the commercial spaceflight industry to take over the duty of ferrying humans back and forth from the space station is particularly significant, experts say.
On Wednesday, a senior White House official told two Florida newspapers (Florida Today and the Orlando Sentinel) that the administration would ask for an additional $6 billion over the next five years to help private companies develop this capability. So far, no commercial company has ever independently launched humans into orbit in its own spacecraft.
"The $6 billion shows that they are very serious about making it a successful and safe program," said Brett Alexander, president of the Commercial Spaceflight Federation, a private industry group. "I think what they're putting in place is bold and exciting. Bringing commercial and private [companies] into it will reinvigorate human spaceflight."
Alexander said he's confident that industry can rise to the challenge and meet this new task, and others agree.
"I think the commercial outfits ought to be given a chance to succeed," said Leroy Chiao, former NASA astronaut and member of a blue-ribbon panel President Obama put together last year to review NASA's plans. "The technology to get into low-Earth orbit has been around for almost 50 years — it's nothing particularly new."
In fact, the Obama administration's plan is seen by some as following closely one of the possible paths put forward by the panel, which was headed by Norman Augustine, a retired Lockheed Martin chief executive.
The committee found that NASA was severely underfunded to accomplish its vision of replacing its space shuttle fleet with new Orion vehicles and Ares rockets. It also suggested that relying on commercially built spacecraft would allow NASA to focus on more ambitious human spaceflight missions, like expeditions to a nearby asteroid or the moons of Mars.
Sharp critics
Not everyone agrees with the new plan, though. Former NASA administrator Michael Griffin, now an eminent scholar at the University of Alabama, Huntsville, sharply criticized the decision, questioning whether a commercial vehicle will be ready to carry humans to the station anytime soon.
"Today we have in orbit a $75 billion International Space Station, a product of the treasure and effort of 15 nations, and the president is recommending that we hold its future utility and, indeed, its very existence hostage to fortune, hostage to the hope that presently nonexistent commercial spaceflight capability can be brought into being in a timely way, following the retirement of the Space Shuttle," Griffin said in a statement.
And others are unhappy that the Obama space plan would potentially cause the loss of many NASA jobs if the business of launching humans into space is handed over to the private sector after the space shuttles retire.
"For Florida it would be devastating in the short term," Roger Handberg, a political scientist at the University of Central Florida who has written extensively on space policy. "If NASA goes into relative decline or suspension of manned launches, we're going to be in a hole.
Florida senator Bill Nelson (D-Orlando) has also come out against the plan, and other politicians from states that would lose jobs are also likely to fight the proposal. President Obama intends to officially announce his plans for space when he submits his federal 2011 budget request Monday, which will include his request for NASA funding.
Some say to wait until then to judge the plan.
"Most of what we're reading in the media right now are rumors and I think we really would do a disservice to ourselves if we jumped to conclusions," Chiao said.
What about the moon?
One of the major questions about the new plan is what will happen to the goal of returning people to the moon. Opinion is split on whether or not Obama plans to completely scrap the Constellation program, which is NASA's current vision for space exploration. Under the program, work has already begun to design a new rocket, Ares I, and crew capsule, Orion, to carry astronauts to the moon and beyond. The first test launch of that booster went off successfully in October 2009.
"I think it would be premature to say that Constellation is going to end," Chiao told SPACE.com. "What I think would be more probable is that there would be some variation on current plans."
But others take a dimmer view.
"Constellation is dead," Logsdon said. Yet he emphasized that that doesn't mean America won't go back to the moon. It just won't go back on the schedule and vision laid out by President Bush in 2004.
"The 'vision' to return to the moon that has been guiding NASA since 2004 was always an inadequately funded fantasy," said Joan Johnson-Freese, chair of the Department of National Security Studies at the Naval War College in Newport, R. I. "One of the goals of the Obama space plan appears to be to give NASA the opportunity to build and use enduring hardware — rather than an impulsive and unrealistic return-to-the-moon on a shoestring plan."
While the shift in policy may take some adjusting to, some are hopeful that it will allow America to retain its leadership as a space-faring nation.
"Any large organization doesn't necessarily like change so it's not surprising that people are concerned and worried," Chiao said.
"But change always brings opportunity. I'm cautiously optimistic."
* President Obama to Propose Abandoning NASA's Moon Plan
* Video Show - NASA's Vision for Humans in Space
* Just 5 Missions Left for NASA's Space Shuttles</div>
More on the new goals of the space program here.
I don't know what to think of this.
Plans to send people to the moon, asteroids, and to Mars are all abandoned.
Manned spaceflight is of great importance to the United States. NASA's former plan of developing the Constellation program (Orion crew capsule, Aries I rocket, Aries V rocket, and Altair lunar lander) is canceled after spending over 9 billion dollars on the program. The first Aries I rocket prototype was recently launched, it's that far along in development.
The Constellation program was a step backwards for us right from the beginning. It's a capsule very similar to how we use to do things in the 60's. On the other hand, it was going to be cheaper to launch than the space shuttle and have the ability to go beyond low Earth orbit, which is a good thing.
Privatization of space is a GREAT thing. The company SpaceX is very close to being fully operational with their Falcon 9 rocket and Dragon crew/cargo capsule. It's currently a long and very expensive process to human rate a launch vehicle because currently safety has to be very close to 100%, which is difficult when you're riding an explosion into outer space. There is no guarantee at all that the Falcon 9 could even be human rated ever.
The problem will be if private industry fails to create suitable launch vehicles. If that's the case, the US will not be launching humans into space in the foreseeable future. Currently we can buy rides from Russia using their Soyuz rocket and crew capsules. Russia is sure to jack up the price when our current contract runs out, knowing that we have no other choice but to use them. If the Constellation program was continued and developed alongside the private launch programs we would have redundancy which makes us more flexible. If one launch vehicle has a problem that requires attention (something is found to be unsafe and modifications are needed) we would have a second option to use in the meantime. That would eliminate long periods of being unable to launch such as we had after the loss of the Space Shuttle Columbia.
Manned spaceflight is expensive, and so are all shuttle flights. One good thing is that under Obama's new plan we are sure to be able to do better science and unmanned robotic missions. We will learn more overall. There needs to be a balance between manned and robotic missions in my opinion that has not been maintained recently.
I am hopeful that NASA will not fully abandon the heavy lift Aries V rocket and will continue to work towards the truly difficult goals of sending people to the Moon, Mars, and beyond. I think America needs a lofty goal to strive towards. China already has plans to send people to the moon in the late 2020's. I think that'll be a big blow to our collective ego if we can't even put people into orbit at that time.
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'>No Moon Trips: Obama's Space Vision a 'Paradigm Shift'
By Clara Moskowitz
SPACE.com Staff Writer
posted: 28 January 2010
03:07 pm ET
This story was updated at 5:41 p.m. ET.
President Obama's plan for America's space program, according to early reports, represents a fundamental shift for human spaceflight, some experts say.
The reports suggest the Obama administration intends to move toward relying on commercially-built spacecraft, rather than NASA's own vehicles, to carry humans to low-Earth orbit. The plan would also involve extending the International Space Station's lifetime and abandoning current plans to send astronauts on moon missions by 2020.
"This is definitely a paradigm shift in the way the country will go about its space program," said John Logsdon, a space policy expert and professor emeritus at George Washington University in Washington, D.C.
A spokesperson for NASA's Constellation program overseeing the moon mission work at the Johnson Space Center in Houston told SPACE.com that it would be premature to make any comments on the agency's future until after NASA's spending goals are announced next Monday in Washington, D.C.
Boost to the private sector
The new reliance on the commercial spaceflight industry to take over the duty of ferrying humans back and forth from the space station is particularly significant, experts say.
On Wednesday, a senior White House official told two Florida newspapers (Florida Today and the Orlando Sentinel) that the administration would ask for an additional $6 billion over the next five years to help private companies develop this capability. So far, no commercial company has ever independently launched humans into orbit in its own spacecraft.
"The $6 billion shows that they are very serious about making it a successful and safe program," said Brett Alexander, president of the Commercial Spaceflight Federation, a private industry group. "I think what they're putting in place is bold and exciting. Bringing commercial and private [companies] into it will reinvigorate human spaceflight."
Alexander said he's confident that industry can rise to the challenge and meet this new task, and others agree.
"I think the commercial outfits ought to be given a chance to succeed," said Leroy Chiao, former NASA astronaut and member of a blue-ribbon panel President Obama put together last year to review NASA's plans. "The technology to get into low-Earth orbit has been around for almost 50 years — it's nothing particularly new."
In fact, the Obama administration's plan is seen by some as following closely one of the possible paths put forward by the panel, which was headed by Norman Augustine, a retired Lockheed Martin chief executive.
The committee found that NASA was severely underfunded to accomplish its vision of replacing its space shuttle fleet with new Orion vehicles and Ares rockets. It also suggested that relying on commercially built spacecraft would allow NASA to focus on more ambitious human spaceflight missions, like expeditions to a nearby asteroid or the moons of Mars.
Sharp critics
Not everyone agrees with the new plan, though. Former NASA administrator Michael Griffin, now an eminent scholar at the University of Alabama, Huntsville, sharply criticized the decision, questioning whether a commercial vehicle will be ready to carry humans to the station anytime soon.
"Today we have in orbit a $75 billion International Space Station, a product of the treasure and effort of 15 nations, and the president is recommending that we hold its future utility and, indeed, its very existence hostage to fortune, hostage to the hope that presently nonexistent commercial spaceflight capability can be brought into being in a timely way, following the retirement of the Space Shuttle," Griffin said in a statement.
And others are unhappy that the Obama space plan would potentially cause the loss of many NASA jobs if the business of launching humans into space is handed over to the private sector after the space shuttles retire.
"For Florida it would be devastating in the short term," Roger Handberg, a political scientist at the University of Central Florida who has written extensively on space policy. "If NASA goes into relative decline or suspension of manned launches, we're going to be in a hole.
Florida senator Bill Nelson (D-Orlando) has also come out against the plan, and other politicians from states that would lose jobs are also likely to fight the proposal. President Obama intends to officially announce his plans for space when he submits his federal 2011 budget request Monday, which will include his request for NASA funding.
Some say to wait until then to judge the plan.
"Most of what we're reading in the media right now are rumors and I think we really would do a disservice to ourselves if we jumped to conclusions," Chiao said.
What about the moon?
One of the major questions about the new plan is what will happen to the goal of returning people to the moon. Opinion is split on whether or not Obama plans to completely scrap the Constellation program, which is NASA's current vision for space exploration. Under the program, work has already begun to design a new rocket, Ares I, and crew capsule, Orion, to carry astronauts to the moon and beyond. The first test launch of that booster went off successfully in October 2009.
"I think it would be premature to say that Constellation is going to end," Chiao told SPACE.com. "What I think would be more probable is that there would be some variation on current plans."
But others take a dimmer view.
"Constellation is dead," Logsdon said. Yet he emphasized that that doesn't mean America won't go back to the moon. It just won't go back on the schedule and vision laid out by President Bush in 2004.
"The 'vision' to return to the moon that has been guiding NASA since 2004 was always an inadequately funded fantasy," said Joan Johnson-Freese, chair of the Department of National Security Studies at the Naval War College in Newport, R. I. "One of the goals of the Obama space plan appears to be to give NASA the opportunity to build and use enduring hardware — rather than an impulsive and unrealistic return-to-the-moon on a shoestring plan."
While the shift in policy may take some adjusting to, some are hopeful that it will allow America to retain its leadership as a space-faring nation.
"Any large organization doesn't necessarily like change so it's not surprising that people are concerned and worried," Chiao said.
"But change always brings opportunity. I'm cautiously optimistic."
* President Obama to Propose Abandoning NASA's Moon Plan
* Video Show - NASA's Vision for Humans in Space
* Just 5 Missions Left for NASA's Space Shuttles</div>
More on the new goals of the space program here.
I don't know what to think of this.
Plans to send people to the moon, asteroids, and to Mars are all abandoned.
Manned spaceflight is of great importance to the United States. NASA's former plan of developing the Constellation program (Orion crew capsule, Aries I rocket, Aries V rocket, and Altair lunar lander) is canceled after spending over 9 billion dollars on the program. The first Aries I rocket prototype was recently launched, it's that far along in development.
The Constellation program was a step backwards for us right from the beginning. It's a capsule very similar to how we use to do things in the 60's. On the other hand, it was going to be cheaper to launch than the space shuttle and have the ability to go beyond low Earth orbit, which is a good thing.
Privatization of space is a GREAT thing. The company SpaceX is very close to being fully operational with their Falcon 9 rocket and Dragon crew/cargo capsule. It's currently a long and very expensive process to human rate a launch vehicle because currently safety has to be very close to 100%, which is difficult when you're riding an explosion into outer space. There is no guarantee at all that the Falcon 9 could even be human rated ever.
The problem will be if private industry fails to create suitable launch vehicles. If that's the case, the US will not be launching humans into space in the foreseeable future. Currently we can buy rides from Russia using their Soyuz rocket and crew capsules. Russia is sure to jack up the price when our current contract runs out, knowing that we have no other choice but to use them. If the Constellation program was continued and developed alongside the private launch programs we would have redundancy which makes us more flexible. If one launch vehicle has a problem that requires attention (something is found to be unsafe and modifications are needed) we would have a second option to use in the meantime. That would eliminate long periods of being unable to launch such as we had after the loss of the Space Shuttle Columbia.
Manned spaceflight is expensive, and so are all shuttle flights. One good thing is that under Obama's new plan we are sure to be able to do better science and unmanned robotic missions. We will learn more overall. There needs to be a balance between manned and robotic missions in my opinion that has not been maintained recently.
I am hopeful that NASA will not fully abandon the heavy lift Aries V rocket and will continue to work towards the truly difficult goals of sending people to the Moon, Mars, and beyond. I think America needs a lofty goal to strive towards. China already has plans to send people to the moon in the late 2020's. I think that'll be a big blow to our collective ego if we can't even put people into orbit at that time.
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Not to discredit human kind, but I really don't see why you need to put people into space. There's really nothing that man can do in space that a robot can't. Remote space operations are way cheaper. You need to recycle water and oxygen for human's in space, as well as bring enough nourishment and fuel for a return trip. The costs of launching all that weight and equipment is phenomenal. I think reverting to cheaper methods would mean more accessibility to space and more gained in the long run.
Don't get me wrong, before I die I would love to go to space, and being on the Moon would be amazing. Imagine looking up into the sky and seeing the Earth looming overhead. That would just be amazing. Also, I agree it's pointless, but for multiple political and ego based reasons, I don't want the Chinese running around on the Moon while we just sit back.
I'm not an astrophysicist by any means and my knowledge of space is really limited to Astronomy 101 and the Discovery Channel, but I have to wonder what all those billions of dollars have really done for us. Have we really gained that much knowledge and gained that much benefit for the human race? My naive instincts tell me no. I'd really rather see a lot of that money going else where.
http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/bill_sto..._and_space.html
This guy wants to go to the Moon to start a mining operation and basically turn the Moon into a fueling station for spacecraft. He dreams of a mission with only enough fuel to get to the Moon and replacing that weight with equipment and supplies to remain sustainable on the Moon. I don't know how likely that is but if he's looking for volunteers, I sure as hell would sign up haha.
Good post Floyd.
Don't get me wrong, before I die I would love to go to space, and being on the Moon would be amazing. Imagine looking up into the sky and seeing the Earth looming overhead. That would just be amazing. Also, I agree it's pointless, but for multiple political and ego based reasons, I don't want the Chinese running around on the Moon while we just sit back.
I'm not an astrophysicist by any means and my knowledge of space is really limited to Astronomy 101 and the Discovery Channel, but I have to wonder what all those billions of dollars have really done for us. Have we really gained that much knowledge and gained that much benefit for the human race? My naive instincts tell me no. I'd really rather see a lot of that money going else where.
http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/bill_sto..._and_space.html
This guy wants to go to the Moon to start a mining operation and basically turn the Moon into a fueling station for spacecraft. He dreams of a mission with only enough fuel to get to the Moon and replacing that weight with equipment and supplies to remain sustainable on the Moon. I don't know how likely that is but if he's looking for volunteers, I sure as hell would sign up haha.
Good post Floyd.
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I agree with most of that.
The original goal was to go to the moon in the 60's (done), then move on to Mars and beyond. By this point in time we were intended to have moved on and not only explored Mars and other relatively nearby planetary bodies, but to have significant sustained colonies on them.
Any project that sits stagnant for 40 years and costs billions of dollars is not a good project. Has the money invested been worthwhile? I think it has. A lot of things in our daily life would not have been developed if not for our continuance of the space program. Was the money spent effectively, by no means.
Private industry has already done a lot in space, even though it doesn't seem like it on paper. Bigelow has launched two inflatable habitation modules with the full near term intention of creating a space motel. The two modules are up there right now gathering useful data on how well a number of new technologies work in practice. Scaled Composites (partnered with Virgin Galactic) has finished their SpaceShip Two prototype and intends to start taking paying passengers into space (non-orbital) by early next year and has hundreds of deposits on flights. John Carmack's (Founder of id Software of Doom fame) space company Armadillo Aerospace won a lunar lander challenge by building a fully functional lunar lander. A lot of progress is being made, and it's cheap and efficient progress compared to anything that the government would be able to get done.
As far as the reason to keep spending tons of money on space, there are economic gains to be made, but the big reason is purely for exploration and the advancement of mankind. That goal has faltered severely. Consider that your cell phone has more computing power now than all of Houston's control center had during the Apollo program. We should have progressed much further than we have by this point.
Regarding NASA's budget and it's best use of money, there is a good article here putting NASA's budget in perspective. The article is from 2007, for 2010 NASA's budget is 18.686 Billion. The 2010 total federal budget is 3.591 trillion vs. 2.784 trillion in 2007. In 2007 NASA spending was 0.58% of the federal budget, in 2010 it's 0.52% of the federal budget. That's for NASA's entire budget, robotic and manned. In 2007 for every dollar spent on NASA 98 dollars were spent on social programs by the federal government.
To compare, in 1966 at the height of the Apollo program spending NASA had 5.5% of the total federal budget, which would be 197.5 billion if NASA had 5.5% of today's budget. At less than 10% of that amount it's not hard to see why progress is creeping along. Space exploration is one of the things that genuinely takes large amounts of money to get things done by anyone's standard. The Department of Defense gets 40 times the amount NASA gets (2007 numbers). The DoD gets more than the next fifteen biggest military spenders put together, most of which are our allies. For example, one B-2 Stealth bomber costs $2.2 billion. Building the Space Shuttle Endeavour to replace Challenger after it exploded in 1986 was 1.7 billion (about 3.35 billion in today's dollars). We have 20 B-2's (one crashed of the 21 built). Five shuttles have been built, of which 3 remain.
That video looks interesting, I will watch it after I post this.
As far as mining the moon for fuel, it's a good idea but not a great idea. It will take more looking, but mining asteroids instead of the moon means that there will be zero launch penalty. It's a lot easier to launch from the moon than from Earth, but it still takes a lot of energy. Refueling from an asteroid (or more likely from a space station refinery supplied by robotic mining operations on several asteroids) would result in a massive cost savings. Eventually, mining asteroids could also allow for craft production in space, so that all you have to do is launch humans and whichever parts and supplies would be necessary for their mission that couldn't be produced from the materials available.
I'm a huge space nerd I guess, I follow this stuff constantly. I really hope to get to Florida to watch one of the remaining 5 shuttle launches before they're decommissioned.
The original goal was to go to the moon in the 60's (done), then move on to Mars and beyond. By this point in time we were intended to have moved on and not only explored Mars and other relatively nearby planetary bodies, but to have significant sustained colonies on them.
Any project that sits stagnant for 40 years and costs billions of dollars is not a good project. Has the money invested been worthwhile? I think it has. A lot of things in our daily life would not have been developed if not for our continuance of the space program. Was the money spent effectively, by no means.
Private industry has already done a lot in space, even though it doesn't seem like it on paper. Bigelow has launched two inflatable habitation modules with the full near term intention of creating a space motel. The two modules are up there right now gathering useful data on how well a number of new technologies work in practice. Scaled Composites (partnered with Virgin Galactic) has finished their SpaceShip Two prototype and intends to start taking paying passengers into space (non-orbital) by early next year and has hundreds of deposits on flights. John Carmack's (Founder of id Software of Doom fame) space company Armadillo Aerospace won a lunar lander challenge by building a fully functional lunar lander. A lot of progress is being made, and it's cheap and efficient progress compared to anything that the government would be able to get done.
As far as the reason to keep spending tons of money on space, there are economic gains to be made, but the big reason is purely for exploration and the advancement of mankind. That goal has faltered severely. Consider that your cell phone has more computing power now than all of Houston's control center had during the Apollo program. We should have progressed much further than we have by this point.
Regarding NASA's budget and it's best use of money, there is a good article here putting NASA's budget in perspective. The article is from 2007, for 2010 NASA's budget is 18.686 Billion. The 2010 total federal budget is 3.591 trillion vs. 2.784 trillion in 2007. In 2007 NASA spending was 0.58% of the federal budget, in 2010 it's 0.52% of the federal budget. That's for NASA's entire budget, robotic and manned. In 2007 for every dollar spent on NASA 98 dollars were spent on social programs by the federal government.
To compare, in 1966 at the height of the Apollo program spending NASA had 5.5% of the total federal budget, which would be 197.5 billion if NASA had 5.5% of today's budget. At less than 10% of that amount it's not hard to see why progress is creeping along. Space exploration is one of the things that genuinely takes large amounts of money to get things done by anyone's standard. The Department of Defense gets 40 times the amount NASA gets (2007 numbers). The DoD gets more than the next fifteen biggest military spenders put together, most of which are our allies. For example, one B-2 Stealth bomber costs $2.2 billion. Building the Space Shuttle Endeavour to replace Challenger after it exploded in 1986 was 1.7 billion (about 3.35 billion in today's dollars). We have 20 B-2's (one crashed of the 21 built). Five shuttles have been built, of which 3 remain.
That video looks interesting, I will watch it after I post this.
As far as mining the moon for fuel, it's a good idea but not a great idea. It will take more looking, but mining asteroids instead of the moon means that there will be zero launch penalty. It's a lot easier to launch from the moon than from Earth, but it still takes a lot of energy. Refueling from an asteroid (or more likely from a space station refinery supplied by robotic mining operations on several asteroids) would result in a massive cost savings. Eventually, mining asteroids could also allow for craft production in space, so that all you have to do is launch humans and whichever parts and supplies would be necessary for their mission that couldn't be produced from the materials available.
I'm a huge space nerd I guess, I follow this stuff constantly. I really hope to get to Florida to watch one of the remaining 5 shuttle launches before they're decommissioned.
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I'm a big space nerd too, I guess I just don't take the time to read up on it. I think I should more often. I love just looking at the stars and dreaming about what it would be like.
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You should bookmark Space.com and check it out sometimes. I only read what's interesting to me.
After looking into the 2011+ plans for NASA overall while there are things I don't like I think it's a good vision and will probably be a good thing in the long run.
<a href="http://www.nasa.gov/pdf/420990main_FY_201_%20Budget_Overview_1_Feb_2010.pd f" target="_blank">
PDF presentation of the direction change and budget</a>
NASA Chief Bolden's comments on the change
After looking into the 2011+ plans for NASA overall while there are things I don't like I think it's a good vision and will probably be a good thing in the long run.
<a href="http://www.nasa.gov/pdf/420990main_FY_201_%20Budget_Overview_1_Feb_2010.pd f" target="_blank">
PDF presentation of the direction change and budget</a>
NASA Chief Bolden's comments on the change