Bush wants new expeditions to the Moon and Mars. Good idea?

Great Debates
41

I also remember the moon landings in 1969. My folks couldn’t afford a TV, so we went to a neighbors house (he was the only person in our entire area with a TV) and sat around eatting and celebrating with most of the entire neighborhood. We were dirt poor, and there were no hispanics in the space program, but we were still proud to be Americans (even those folks that WEREN’T Americans in the room…and there were quite a few of those).

I think there have always been folks content to sit back, to not push things, not to explore. Sometimes a great nation though has to push such things, even if there aren’t ANY practical benifits…just to show they ARE a great nation. And I think that there are a lot of benifits not only to America but to the world for the US to do great things in space.

My only concern is that this will either A) Come to naught, as other ‘plans’ have or B) Simply be another One Off mission, another flags and foot prints photo OP that doesn’t get us anywhere over all but looks great. If this is a REAL long term committment to space and exploration, a real vision and program with legs that will continue steadily, then hell…I’d even vote for Bush for that and I can’t stand the guy.

-XT

42

Well, I agree with your comments but would modify it to say that “The current manned program at NASA is a mess.” The unmanned program is doing great. And, in some sense I think you are right that things could use some shaking up, although I would prefer to see the shakeup involve shifting money out of the ISS and shuttle and into unmanned stuff…with money left over to either shift to other science within NASA or shift out of NASA to other places. I suppose having some sort of low-grade program to study the future issues for manned flight is justifiable…But, I don’t think there should be a go-ahead unless a strong case can be made for it. At the very least, it should not be deceptively sold as doing important science…If you want to sell it as PR (even PR for science and technology) and just exploration in the sense of climbing Everest, that is fine…at least it’s honest. But, the problem is that NASA has been reduced to pretending that they are doing lots of important science in the manned program and then they just end up looking stupid when the science is debunked as being marginal at best.

43

Priam: I think your news source got it wrong. The plan is to:

[ul]
[li]Immediately begin diverting funds from other, conflicting missions to the new effort. Things like the Orbital Space Plane, Space Shuttle life extension programs, etc., can be shut down now, which will divert about 2 billion a year to the new program. This money would be used to begin financing development of a new Crew Excursion Vehicle, which is a multi-purpose capsule which will carry 6-8 astronauts on missions to orbit, the moon, the Lagrange points, Mars, “and beyond”.[/li][li]Give NASA another billion dollars over five years to help fund the new project.[/li][li]Finish the ISS assembly by 2010[/li][li]Scrap the shuttle once that’s done[/li][li]Once those two programs are killed, that frees up another 6 billion a year, which will also be diverted into programs to create the CEV and the moon hardware.[/li][li]Fly the first robotic ‘scouting’ missions to the moon by 2008. These missions would be in support of an eventual manned landing - looking for landing sites, useful minerals, water, whatever they think they need to choose a viable place to start a moonbase.[/li][li]Begin flying the CEV by 2014, I suppose on missions to the ISS and LEO at first.[/li][li]Start manned missions to the moon by 2015-2020, of ‘increasing duration’. There was no talk of a permanent manned presence in the short-term - just ever-increasing stays. I would imagine each mission would leave more material at the moonbase, gradually building it up.[/li][li]Plan other missions beyond that. Mars was mentioned (by 2030), plus other destinations beyond.[/li][/ul]

Is this a reasonable plan? By my calculation, funding for this project amounts to 12 billion by 2010, and another 80 billion over the next ten years after. That’s a pretty big sum, but in constant dollars it’s not as much as the Apollo program cost. This is much more ambitious than Apollo, so either NASA had better get more efficient, or hope that new technologies will lower the cost.

The big problem I can see so far is that the timetable is too long. 2030 to Mars? That’s what, 7 Presidential administrations from now? What are the odds that the political will will be there over that period of time?

This is exactly how the ISS went into the weeds early on. Its original grand vision was trimmed repeatedly. Component designs had to be thrown away repeatedly at great cost as the mission kept changing. Eventually, it got so expensive that it had to be scaled way back and become next to useless.

I can see it now - NASA will spend billions designing the moon program from Bush’s vision. Then another president will come along and announce that priorities have changed, and the program has to mutate. Can’t afford a ship big enough for 6-8 people, so now it’s going to be a 3 person ship. Of course, politicians don’t understand that a change like that means you should start designing from scratch. And the moonbase design which relied on 6 people to operate it has to be redesigned. Billions wasted. Then another presidential campaign will make an issue out of NASA’s ‘waste’, and the program will be scrapped or scaled back to a ‘flags and footprints’ one-shot mission just so we can say it was a ‘success’.

None of the details are set in stone yet, and Bush has set up a commission to do feasibility studies. Hopefully, they’ll recognize this problem and design the program to have short-term milestones that have value outside the context of the larger mission. One step at a time, with each step being self-sustaining.

Something interesting in this program is that without the Shuttle, the U.S. will be without any manned capability at all for about four years, and without the shuttle I bellieve there are a number of missions that cannot fly at all, such as the Webb telescope and some military missions. I wonder what the implications of this are? If NASA abandons Low Earth Orbit, does that open the door for private heavy-lift rockets? That might be a positive development.

44

I got the idea from his speech today that the CEV would replace the shuttle as well. Probably not a good idea.

I don’t think he really wants to do it. He wants me to vote for him.

See above.

45

I’m as pro-space as anyone, but there’s a smart way and a dumb way to go about it. The dumb way is to keep doing what we’ve been doing, infrequently lighting expensive candle after expensive candle with little to no return. The smart way is to build a long-term highway to space we can use day-in and day-out to see some real return on investment. Now, we’ve had to do it the dumb way up 'til now, but we’re close enough to the smart way that delaying super-expensive projects like going to the moon and Mars are worth it in the massive savings gained by moving to the smart way.

That said, I think there’s about zero chance of these proposals going anywhere anyway and we’ll just continue more or less as we have been.

46

Sam, that’s the achilles heel I see in this rigamarole – it seems with this proposal that we’re abandoning US LEO capability almost entirely. That seems like a big mistake. Sure, the Shuttle was far too expensive to continue to live, but we need some sort of LEO capability that’s less than Saturn sized. Giving up all LEO to a) the US military, b) other countries seems like a huge mistake. I’d love to see LEO end up privatized and NASA can concentrate on exploration, but I don’t see enough (US) players available to fill the gap. Am I missing something?

47

There are lots of U.S. rockets that can get to LEO. The U.S. has Delta, Atlas, and Titan rockets. NASA flies them, as well as the military. Note that almost all the interplanetary probes launched by NASA rode into space on these rockets.

What will be missing will be U.S. man-rated rockets and certain types of heavy lift that the Shuttle can do. But those can be farmed out to Arianespace or even Russia.

I was thinking mostly about things like spy satellites that the U.S. would not be willing to subcontract out to another country. But I forgot about the new generation EELV rockets.

Still, NASA getting out of at least some of its LEO activities should open the door to private firms expanding their rocket programs. That’s a good thing. NASA goes back to doing what it does best - pushing the boundaries of exploration and research. It’s about time they stopped flying that expensive truck and crowding out private investment in space.

48

Well, I feel better now. Here’s a copy of the press release from Whitehouse.gov

[quote]

B. Space Exploration Beyond Low Earth Orbit

The Moon
[ul]
[li]Undertake lunar exploration activities to enable sustained human and robotic exploration of Mars and more distant destinations in the solar system; [/li]Starting no later than 2008, initiate a series of robotic missions to the Moon to prepare for and support future human exploration activities;

[li]Conduct the first extended human expedition to the lunar surface as early as 2015, but no later than the year 2020; and [/li]
[li]Use lunar exploration activities to further science, and to develop and test new approaches, technologies, and systems, including use of lunar and other space resources, to support sustained human space exploration to Mars and other destinations. [/li]**Mars and Other Destinations **
[list]
[li]Conduct robotic exploration of Mars to search for evidence of life, to understand the history of the solar system, and to prepare for future human exploration; [/li]
[li]Conduct robotic exploration across the solar system for scientific purposes and to support human exploration. In particular, explore Jupiter’s moons, asteroids and other bodies to search for evidence of life, to understand the history of the solar system, and to search for resources; [/li]
[li]Conduct advanced telescope searches for Earth-like planets and habitable environments around other stars; [/li]
[li]Develop and demonstrate power generation, propulsion, life support, and other key capabilities required to support more distant, more capable, and/or longer duration human and robotic exploration of Mars and other destinations; and Conduct human expeditions to Mars after acquiring adequate knowledge about the planet using robotic missions and after successfully demonstrating sustained human exploration missions to the Moon. [/li][/ul]

Looking at that list, I realize that this new ‘vision’ is a lot broader than “Moon to Mars”. He’s got emphasis on space telescopes, robotic vehicles, missions to Jupiter and other planets, advanced propulsions, etc.

In other words, it looks a lot less like a specific ‘mission’, and more of a general re-focusing - NASA gets a funding boost, gets out of the space truck and space station servicing business, and takes all of that freed money and pumps it into exploration and science of all types. There is a big goal of getting back to moon, but only in the context of the larger exploration mission.

I think I like this plan. I wish it could be more aggressive, but with the budget the way it is, keeping it smaller in the early years and self-financing is probably the only way to get this through Congress.

I also like this:

Looks to me like the plan is: Commercialize LEO operations, and see how much of it you can get developed in private industry. Take the government’s money from that, and move it into exploration. Along the way, once private industry has money to be made flying to the space station and doing other commercial tasks, we should get some serious R&D money flowing into space research.

49

Here’s an interesting graph of NASA’s funding priorities for the next 20 years:

NASA Funding Chart

Under Bush’s plan, funding for space exploration goes way up. And not just into the Crew Exploration Vehicle, but all the exploration missions - robotic missions to the outer planets, space telescopes, etc. Funding for the ISS actually goes up until 2017.

Basically, it looks like what will happen is that Shuttle money will go almost equally into the moon mission and space science in general. Then as the CEV investment tapers off, that money all moves into exploration. After that, the ISS money starts moving into exploration as well.

This is about far more than just shooting for the moon. This really is just a shift in NASA towards true space exploration rather than LEO maintenance and engineering. Something I’ve been advocating for a long time.

50

By a “long-term highway to space,” are you referring to a space elevator or beanstalk? That’s the only way I can think of to reach orbit, that doesn’t involve lighting an “expensive candle.”

51

My objection to carbon nanotube cables is that they have yet to be used in more typical applications like suspension bridges, Ottis elevators or even emergency brake cables. Until we can manage those small miracles the idea of hoisting 40 tonnes to orbit on a ribbon of soot is right out to lunch.

In short this comes down to the role of NASA. Is it simply a science agency or is it an agency to helps us exploit space. I vote exploitation first science second.

52

I hope that Bush’s initiiative has more lasting power than that of his father. I’ve always been a space enthusiast, being 12 at the time of Apollo 11. I’m not sure we have a lot left to learn from low Earth orbit missions, even a space buff like myself thought more than once “How many stinking times do we need to send peoplie in space to study the effects of zero gravity?” Sending people in space to launch satellites has always seemed nuts to me. The justification for the shuttle program has always in my view been shaky at best. In the light of two major failures, we really need to examine alternate ways to get people and payloads into space and also get people back safely. Splashdowns may not be as elegant a solution, but at least we never lost anyone doing it.

A base on the moon would be a great thing. My ideal would be to have an observatory just on the far side to block out the brightness of the earth but close enough to the near side to be able to relay data to a transmitter on the near side. Building even a small community in a vacuum would be enough of a technical challenge to keep us busy for a generation.

Manned missions to Mars I don’t see in the cards in my lifetime. The sheer distances involved plus landing on a planetary surface with an atmosphere plus taking enough fuel to launch from Mars would be a monumental technical hurdle. This would be like asking the shuttle to land and then take off again without help from the ground. I think resources would be far better spent to develop a new generation of rovers, perhaps nuclear powered, that would not be constrained to the equatorial regions of Mars as the present ones are. Sending back physical samples from the Martian surface would be far easier and cheaper when you wouldn’t have the burden of carrying not only the people but all their life support supplies.

Return to the moon? Sure, sign me up. Venture to Mars? Not yet.

53

How about repairing Hubble?

The concept is inexpensive, reusable quick turnaround.
No, it hasn’t worked for the last two.

Use a satellite like some of the Apollo missions.

Gotta have somebody to clear the air bags out of the way. :slight_smile:

54

Yeah, the repair of Hubble was in my opinion the best use ever of the shuttle. But when they went up to merely launch a communication satellite, I had to say “huh”?

I don’t think I’d characterize shuttle missions as inexpensive.

Yeah, I thought of lunar satellite relays too. But you would either need enough of them to assure that a satellite was always available or store data for transmitting when the satellite reappears. If you’re aiming for 24/7 live connection with a base on the far side of the moon, I’d think the lunar ground relay to a point on the near side would be easier.

55

I posted: No, it hasn’t worked for the last two.

56

My mistake, then. I wasn’t sure if by the “last two” you meant the last two factors or the last two missions or what.

57

BrainGlutton: I was referring to the space elevator I mentioned in my first post.

Grey: I don’t know the economics, but you may not see carbon nanotubes do any of those things any time soon for simple cost-benefit reasons. I imagine nanotube alternatives are still going to be more expensive than steel and if steel does the job on those, why change? I could see some previously impossibly huge suspension bridges using them if needed, but don’t really know that there’s a demand for that. I get the feeling from this article that it’s more likely we’ll see them used as high-strength fabrics first.

In the end, though, if using nanotubes for those applications is a necessary precursor to a space elevator, I think it still behooves us to pour more resources into nanotube research so we can do those things and get us that much closer to making a space elevator a reality. The payoff in accessing space virtually at will is awesome to contemplate, not to mention the many other uses nanotubes offer.

Finally, I have to disagree with you on the role of NASA. It should be a science agency and leave the exploitation to private companies.

58

Well, that was certainly nice but I wonderi if it was very cost-effective. I have to wonder whether for the cost of the shuttles, we would have been able to just build another Hubble and send it up more cheaply than using the shuttle for repairs.

To give you some numbers here, the Hubble apparently cost $1.5 billion to build. Each Space Shuttle flight is claimed by NASA to cost $450 million. (I say “claimed” because I recall Bob Park criticizing NASA for coming up with a cost per shuttle flight that was significantly lower than the total cost of the shuttle program each year divided by the number of flights per year…They liked to give something that was some sort of marginal cost rather than a cost that absorbed a share of the fixed costs.) So, while it was certainly cheaper to use the shuttle for repairs once we had it, it would be hard to justify the shuttle program on the basis of this one-time event of being able to fix the Hubble.

Oh…And here to round things out is what Bob Park had to say last February about what he calls the “Hubble repair myth”:

Ouch!!!

Oh, and as for the cost per shuttle flight, it seems that the number above from NASA wasn’t their most dishonest one but was still short of the mark. [url=]Here again is Bob Park from way back in 1993:

59

I was not planning on being in this discussion, but I was looking for what kind of life may be on mars, when I stumbled into this article from Space Daily:

http://www.spacedaily.com/news/nasa-04c.html

60

Nothing has changed. There’s no bait and switch here. This was always the administration’s plan. Retire the shuttle, get out of the ISS, and divert that money into exploration (NOT just a moon base and Mars, either. ALL exploration, including robotic missions, telescopes, etc.)

The only change to the Bush proposal from the first time I heard of it was that original reports said that NASA was going to get a budget increase of 5% per year. That later got changed to 1 billion over 5 years, which is about 1/3 as much.

Rather than read second-hand reports about what might happen, why not go to the source? Earlier in the thread I posted a link to NASA’s proposed budget out until FY2020. It makes it very clear where the money is being re-allocated. Mostly, from the Shuttle, and then later from ISS. All that money, plus the additional billion or so, all goes into exploration. Of that, the actual moon vehicle development only accounts for about 1/3. The rest of it goes into things like the Jupiter Icy Moons Orbiter and other exploration missions.