The GAO has released a report on Hubble servicing costs:

At our request, NASA prepared an estimate of the funding needed for a shuttle servicing mission to the Hubble. NASA estimates the cost at between $1.7 billion to $2.4 billion. However, documentary support for portions of the estimate is insufficient.

What a surprise.

NASA, an agency that has already internally decided that it isn't going to use Shuttle to save the Hubble, comes up with an outrageously high cost number to do so in order to help justify its decision, but doesn't substantiate it.

This number is simply incredible. I'll bet they're using a cost per flight of between half a billion and a billion dollars (which is the average cost, but isn't the appropriate number to use when estimating the mission cost, which should be the marginal cost--between one hundred and two hundred million). I'll also bet that they're including the cost of Hubble replacement hardware that has already been built and paid for. I'll also bet that getting the basis for this "estimate" from NASA will be like pulling teeth from an unanaesthetized elephant on crank.

The only costs that need to be compared are the cost of developing the robotics necessary to do this mission without Shuttle (already estimated to be hundreds of millions, if not over a billion), the cost of any modifications necessary to allow the equipment originally designed to be serviced by astronauts to be instead replaced by the aforesaid "robot" (which is really not a robot, but a teloperator, and which will up costs even more), to the cost of launching another Shuttle mission, training the crew, and using the equipment already designed and built to do so. I would truly be shocked if any honest analysis would indicate that the Shuttle mission isn't the cheapest way to go.

[Via NASA Watch]

It is odd to see NASA pushing a non-human oriented repair mission.

One thing that puzzles me is why teleoperations adds to the cost of the mission. The "robotics" budget would seem to suck that up or at least dominate.

My thoughts exactly Rand, they are puffing the numbers.

I bet if NASA doesn't fly the shuttle mission to Hubble, only about $400 million of that $2.4 billion will be saved. Hubble replacement hardware is already built and the shuttle overhead won't disappear.

What is perplexing is why NASA would *not* want to fly the shuttle repair mission? The CAIB guidelines and O'Keefe's decision were essentialy "not invented here" at NASA. You'd think that flying it would be popular with both GSFC and JSC.

Whenever I read about the Hubble being left to rot I wonder why the governments of the peoples of the world cant organise a whip round to save it .
The HST is , after all , one of the pinnacles of human achievement.
I recall a recent, well funded, international effort to save the leaning tower of Pisa.
(curiously, isomorphous to Hubble)

I've said it before: neither a robotic nor a manned mission will be sent to fix Hubble. Instead, NASA will make several false starts on both ideas, procrastinating until Hubble becomes completely uncontrollable and eventually reenters the atmosphere on its own.

This is a decision that should have been finalized in mid-February of 2003.

Would all of you interested gentlemen forgive a spectator's unschooled opinion that the entire foofaraw over the Hubble hullabaloo is proof of NASA taking advantage of an opportunity to excite the public by feigning a threat to what, at least from what I can determine, is one of the least controversial government programs of the past couple of decades? I have never once met someone who badmouths Hubble. Might this not be a case of the bureaucrats engaging in a game of chicken with the elected representatives of the people?

"Give us the money or the telescope gets it!"

> What is perplexing is why NASA would *not* want to fly the shuttle repair mission? The CAIB guidelines
> and O'Keefe's decision were essentialy "not invented here" at NASA. You'd think that flying it would be
> popular with both GSFC and JSC.

The current mythos says that "we" (NASA) are stuck in Low Earth Orbit and "we" (NASA) need to go some place better.

Fixing Hubble does not "get NASA out of LEO," so it has low priority.

Why not let it die and hurry up the schedule for JWST instead ?

Quote: "Hubble... is one of the least controversial government programs of the past couple of decades?"

When Hubble was first launched there were several problems with it. One being that the primary mirror, the one biggests thing that makes a telescope - a telescope, was built incorrectly. NASA got a lot of flak over that blunder in the early nineties as it followed shortly after the Shuttle return to flight from the Challenger tragedy. When NASA went back and installed a set of corrective optics and replaced a faulty power supply system it wasn't so much the awesome pictures that were returned that impressed everyone. It was the fact that NASA was at least somewhat capable of getting their S together and putting the Shuttle and the Shuttle crew to the approximate use that it was originally intended for. The Shuttle, despite all its quirks, does have awesome on orbit construction and repair capabilities. So, what went from one of their greatest blunders turned into a great triumph.

I'm with "Hefty" on this. Hubble was a black eye for NASA, and reasonably so. Later, it turned out to be a swan transformed from the ugly duckling.

I understand some value for keeping Hubble, but I never have understood the Hullabaloo to keep it flying. As Mr. Wright points out, it's a LOE project. I'm sure there is a real issue for the scientist that use the Hubble data for employment. But for the rest of the public, it just seems a nostalgic issue.

I do think NASA should service Hubble. Not because it is Hubble, but because we can easily do it. I don't understand the knee-jerk reaction that after 113 missions with 2 failures, the idea is we can't successfully fly unless it is to the ISS. That's just a political decision.

The purpose of the shuttle has been to employ NASA's standing army, not to achieve anything in particular in space. Indeed, it's kept the rice bowls filled without accomplishing all that much else for the last two decades. After Columbia HST wasn't needed to justify the shuttle's remaining operations, so it shouldn't be a surprise that any more missions to it were scratched.

A program intended to actually do astronomy would have been launching multiple telescopes on expendable boosters, not employing shuttle's PR-worthy but (considered as a whole) uneconomical servicing capabilities. It's also not clear that astronomy itself is a national priority on a scale that would have justified HST (or the expendable-launched equivalents) by itself.

kert, you said:

Why not let it die and hurry up the schedule for JWST instead ?

The JWST doesn't cover any UV spectrum while Hubble does. Also, I believe there's sufficient demand to easily cover two space telescopes. Finally, we have a false dilemma. We can have both telescopes. Just send a Space Shuttle up and repair the telescope and accelerate the developement and launch of the JWST.

Neuroto,

I think you have it right. Hubble is being held hostage. It's pretty obvious that somethings going on when the only mission of value that the Shuttle can perform is being blocked on the grounds of "safety".

However, to add some controversy to the origins of Hubble, I think the telescope was deliberately designed to be the perfect hostage from the begining. It has a huge dependency on the Shuttle. First, the shuttle appears to be the only thing in the NASA arsenal that could launch Hubble. Second, the needed repair missions have justified a number of additional Shuttle launches.

"Also, I believe there's sufficient demand to easily cover two space telescopes. Finally, we have a false dilemma."
Im not sure we do.
First, from what i understand the fate of Hubble depends very little directly on its scientific merits. Ultimately all the hype, publicity and politics surrounding it will force a solution that has little to do with its actual value.
Second, JWST and Hubble are basically competing for the very same slice of limited space science budget.
Of course two telescopes are better ( for for people who are interested in what they can provide ), but there are fiscal realities and JWST option could simply be a sane compromise.
Its politically very hard for anyone to say simply "let Hubble die" now after all the publicity, without providing some sort of compensation. Accelerating JWST substantially could be it.

As for lack of UV spectrum, *shrug*. Wait for better days, when theres more practical transportation means in service, and launch dozens of telescopes ?

>>launch dozens of telescopes ?

Oh, and in sync with general VSE goals and pacing, promise to put a couple on the far side on the moon say .. in 2020 ?

The quoted price number seemed very high to me too, so I went digging into the report. I found a few things of note, mostly garnered from the file's pages 8 and 9:

- the cost of merely doing the mission as envisioned prior to the Columbia accident is around $700 million
- the additional cost of developing and implementing shuttle inspection and repair which does NOT use ISS is around $300 million
- the additional cost of developing and preparing a rescue mission which does NOT use ISS is around $300 million

All of that made sense to me (if you want to follow CAIB recommendations to a tee), but it only adds up to $1300 million. There is an ambiguous 'delay shuttle phase out' item that is estimated to cost between $400 and $1000 million dollars. In my quick review of the document, I never found out what that was for and why it was so much. I don't think the GAO knew either.

That ambiguous item bothers me. It looks bad; it almost seems as if it was added to make a shuttle servicing mission look comparable to the robotic servicing mission costs. But without knowing the details... I can't say.

I disagree with any notion that suggests the only mission of value for the Space Shuttle is HST. ISS will fail if the Shuttle is unable for its maintenance. Progress modules simply are not large enough to carry replacement ORUs to ISS. It would be foolishly dismissive to say that ISS is useless science yet HST is useful science. Answering the questions of the universe is very important, but the utility of that knowledge is not that valuable compared to the science onboard the ISS.

I don't think that the science being done on ISS is worth the cost of ISS, even if it were completed. Of course, I think that "science" is a weak reed on which to defend manned space programs anyway.

Gavin Mendeck,

You said, "All of that made sense to me (if you want to follow CAIB
recommendations to a tee), but it only adds up to $1300 million.
There is an ambiguous 'delay shuttle phase out' item that is
estimated to cost between $400 and $1000 million dollars. In my
quick review of the document, I never found out what that was for
and why it was so much."

I'm not sure, I'm certainly no expert, but I believe I know what this
is about.

As several people have pointed out here there's a large expenditure
every year in simply having the shuttles whether they are actually
launched or not. Most of that money goes to pay the salaries of
the many people needed to support the shuttles.

The day it's determined we no longer need the shuttles that standing
expenditure can be rapidly wound down and that money can be freed up
for other purposes. Since the shuttles consume roughly one-third of
NASA's budget it's a great deal of money.

In fact the president's space initiative, which is really an initiative
to go back to the moon and establish a more permanent presence there,
depends on cancelling the shuttle. Hardly any new money has been budgeted
for that effort; the funding is all to come from the money freed up
by cancelling the shuttle.

Every day the retirement of the shuttles is delayed also pushes back
the moon effort another day.

So why not shut the shuttles down today?

Because we need the shuttles to finish the international space station;
because we'd be breaking our word to our international partners if we didn't
complete it; and perhaps because after having gone this far it wouldn't
make sense not to complete it.

So how many shuttle flights will that take?

From memory it's about 20 to 24 missions.

And how many years will that take?

Well, if we imagine five missions a year, that's five years plus. A hubble
repair mission will then add at least a fifth of a year. Therefore in
calculating the cost of the hubble repair mission we should add in the
cost of maintaining the standing army needed simply to have the shuttles,
which is, I think, normally left out, because after all it's a constant.
But in this case, since our goal is to terminate the program, it's not.

I do not find the estimate of $400 to $1 billion for 'delay shuttle
phase out' unreasonable. Particularly if it turns out a Hubble repair
mission would be a rush job meaning that one of the three shuttles
might have to be pulled out of international space station build sequence
and wait to some extent for the repair mission to be ready.

If on top of this we really impose the requirement that the Hubble repair
mission be able to repair itself in the event of wing damage similar
to what happened to Columbia then it simply becomes impossible. It won't
take $300 million to do that; it will take a heck of a lot more. That
may have seemed a reasonable estimate back when GAO wrote the report but
we know better now.

perhaps because after having gone this far it wouldn't make sense not to complete it.

This is the fallacy of sunk costs rearing its ugly head.

IMO, the benefit of operating the ISS is so low that it wouldn't be worth doing even if the entire thing were to magically appear in orbit, complete in all respects, for free. In other words, there's no point at which your argument would be correct.

As for breaking international commitments: given the tremendous cost of those commitments (they enable the entrenched interests to hold on to projects that should die), making future international cooperation in space more difficult is a benefit, not a cost.

Mark,

Good points. I should have done the math and realize that that 'phase out' cost is similar to 1/4 of the annual shuttle budget... basically, adding 3 more months to the program since you're flying a mission that's not going to the ISS.