Transterrestrial Musings

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"I've thought this for a long time, which is one reason that I don't devote much (unpaid) time or energy in trying to change the agency or its plans, or even in critiquing them."

I thought you have previously stated that you do subcontract work for Boeing and NASA. So you're not part of the alt-space movement that is actually trying to fix things, by your own admission.

Posted by William Berger at December 4, 2005 07:04 AM

Is there some reason that I can't do both, William? I didn't say I do it full time (I can even chew gum will doing both...)

Posted by Rand Simberg at December 4, 2005 07:16 AM

I'll probably add this to the article but I just wanted to be clear that I'm suggesting that we ignore the Architecture, not all of NASA. I'm still amazed at how LARGE NASA is these days.

There are very useful bits of NASA that aren't directly part of the Architecture or the Shuttle's standing army. If your business can figure out how to navigate NASA by tweaking tiny bits here and there, great! But if it requires radical changes to the numbers, types and districts of its employees then I'm doubtful that's a place to be putting alot of effort.

Posted by Michael Mealling at December 4, 2005 09:55 AM

While I agree with the sentiment that Michael is pointing out here, one does need to take into account competitors that are trying to incorporate the Architecture into their business plan. As the flameout at Beal Aerospace shows, it is hard to compete against those who are getting government funds to pay for R&D.

Though I've noticed that many of the alt.space companies that are becoming successful are those pursuing defense dollars like Airlaunch has.

Personally, I have tried to make business cases to attempt to do business ith NASA during my day job and while I have seen some success, it is nowhere near the amount of success for winning as pursuing space dollars in other places such as DARPA, the AFRL and the DoD in general. As far as NASA is concerned, around my work JPL is often referred to as "Just Pay Lockheed" as 50% of all it business goes there, 25% Ball Aerospace and the rest gets divied up. Recently space news came out with an article on NASA contractors (in print version 2 weeks ago) and if you add up all of Boeing and Lockheed's subsidiaries in their chart, you see that about 47% of all contract dollars go to those 2 companies alone!

Anyhow, I am diverging from the original post but I strongly feel that one should always know the competition and take their source of income into account in one's business plan.

Posted by Ryan Zelnio at December 4, 2005 11:42 AM

The television ratings from someone beating NASA to the Moon could be huge, if marketed by true marketing professionals. A private sector company could sell that coverage at market rates. Bring along an Indian national and a Brazilian natioanl and sell TV coverage there, also.

That becomes the functional equivalent of a taxpayer funded prize.

SpaceDev says they need $12 billion to return to the Moon. Well then, "Go for it" and sign up Nike as the first sponsor. A proposed new slogan for SpaceDev: We intend to "Just Do It"

Posted by Bill White at December 4, 2005 11:49 AM

"Is there some reason that I can't do both?"

Nope. One has to eat. But the title of your post is "Time to Give up on NASA," and you say you don't devote much unpaid time to NASA or its plans. I just note that there are a lot of people who _do_ try to fix things.

Posted by William Berger at December 4, 2005 12:08 PM

Ignoring the Architecture is a silly and counter productive suggestion. As Ryan suggests, there are quite a few companies which see it as an opportunity rather than something to be ignored because it's politically incorrect.

Posted by Mark R. Whittington at December 4, 2005 01:41 PM

Ryan,
I think there is a big difference between incorporating bits of the existing Architecture in your plan and attempting to change the Architecture entirely to meet your view of what it should be.

Posted by Michael Mealling at December 4, 2005 01:50 PM

So, in that case, Michael, what exactly do you mean by "ignore" the Architecture? It seems to me that if some companies see it as an opportunity, they should pursue that opportunity.

Posted by Mark R. Whittington at December 4, 2005 01:55 PM

Mark,
There's a big difference between wrapping part of your business plan around commercial crew/cargo (COTS) so NASA can afford the rest of the Architecture and spending your time trying to change the fundamental nature of the Architecture itself.

I know you won't agree but what I'm getting at is that a large number of us think that the Architecture is a really poor way realizing the Vision. What we would have liked to have seen was more commercial and more infrastructure. That would have meant that more than a handful of companies would have seen it as a more reliable opportunity. But this is the Architecture the political process has given us. Sure, a few companies can take advantage of it and I strongly enocurage people getting what they can out of it. But at this point attempting to change it to get more is what's futil and IMHO, a waste of time.

Is that more clear?

Posted by Michael Mealling at December 4, 2005 02:15 PM

So, Micheal, do you reject the notion of taking advantage of the Architecture (as has been suggested by Michael Griffin) by offering services that enhance and improve it, like orbiting fuel depots or providing goods and services to a lunar base? I need to be clear on this, since I regard the word "ignore" as having an exact meaning.

Posted by Mark R. Whittington at December 4, 2005 02:19 PM

Umm... I'm not sure if you saw my previous response or not. I'm going to assume not because I thought I was fairly clear. What I'm suggesting is that people ignore the rather large flaws in the Architecture and IF (and that's a really really big IF) things like orbital fuel depots actually do come to pass then great, take advantage of them. I think that companies like t/space and CSI are doing the exact right thing. But the periodic spasm of "redesign the Architecture to launch this or that on this other launcher and use EELV for that other thing and you'll save X amount of money" is what's a waste of time.

NASA's realization of the Vision will always be flawed becase it will always be hostage to the requirement for it to be a jobs program. In spite of that Griffin has been able to sell COTS and Centennial Challenges. And people should take advantage of those. But no one should expect NASA to do much beyond that.

The Architecture is going to use shuttle derived hardware, it is going to keep paying that standing army, and it is not going to do what it takes to aggresively build a cis-lunar economy. So just ignore the Apollo 2.0-esque bits, take advantage of what you can, and move on.

Posted by Michael Mealling at December 4, 2005 03:22 PM

But the title of your post is "Time to Give up on NASA," and you say you don't devote much unpaid time to NASA or its plans. I just note that there are a lot of people who _do_ try to fix things.

William, I am still missing your point, assuming that you actually have one. First you accuse me of not being part of the alt-space movement, because I sometimes do work for NASA and some of the large space companies. Now you're implying that I don't try to fix things. I in fact do, but I focus on fixing things that are fixable. NASA's current architecture plans are not.

Posted by Rand Simberg at December 4, 2005 04:17 PM

Michael,

I agree with what you are saying I think. I don't think its productive at this point to change the Architecture but it is very constructive to see how working within the Architecture can further one's own business plan.

The viewpoint I am looking at here is that the COTS plan is really just AAS (Assured Access to Space) updated. The smart companies here will look to grab some R&D $$s to further develop their own business plans, just as some did with AAS. I have a strong suspicion that many of the same players who will be at the COTS industry day this Thursday will be the same as those who were at AAS, with the addition of a few more alt.space companies. Just like AAS, I also think the big boys will get most the COTS money with maybe $100 mil out of the $500 mil divied out to some alt.spacers.

Posted by Ryan Zelnio at December 4, 2005 04:33 PM

William,

I have to take some offense that one cannot both work for/with a big company while at the same time be interested in expanding commercial presence in space. Like it or not, the biggest commercial influence on NASA comes from the big boys. These guys are not inherently evil and the are quite frequently required in their contracts to dole out some of the work to small businesses which many of the smarter alt.space companies go after. I firmly believe that by working with these big companies and influencing their mangement, one can weild much more power than influencing some manager at a NASA field center who will just promptly be ignored by upper management at NASA headquarters.

Who do you think a Senator will be more likely to listen to, an alt.space CEO with 50-100 employees, a field manager at Johnson Space Center, or a VP of Business Development at Northrup?

And as someone who is involved with bizdev at a larger company, I can tell you firsthand that companies like Futron and Frost & Sullivan and others who collect industry statistics do wield a lot of influence. That is why we pay them to perform "independent" studies.

Posted by Ryan Zelnio at December 4, 2005 04:53 PM

Michael writes:

The Architecture is going to use shuttle derived hardware, it is going to keep paying that standing army, and it is not going to do what it takes to aggresively build a cis-lunar economy. So just ignore the Apollo 2.0-esque bits, take advantage of what you can, and move on.

Given the political realities, perhaps the best Griffin can do is stay out of the way of alt-space to LEO. As far out of the way as possible.

Given the cost to launch a big CEV on a 5 segment RSRM plus big upper stage = IF = alt-space flies a cheap crew taxi it will be a no brainer to persuade Congress to buy SpaceDev or t/Space for carrying crew to LEO. CEV is so expensive compared to the alt-space ideas, it cannot compete which (perhaps perversely) is a very good thing.

$5 million per seat on Gump's CVX or $50-70 million per seat on CEV? Even Congress isn't that stupid if t/Space has flown successfully.

Now, if ESAS had attempted the HL-20 on an expendable whoever "won" the CEV fly off would have a monopoly on NASA business. Remember Joint Strike Fighter? That was the paradigm Steidle was after.

Now, if NASA refuses favor SpaceDev or t/Space for the crew taxi role (and CEV + CLV is such a terrible choice for the crew taxi role) NASA does not interfere with the commercial market place.

= = =

And, as I have posted before, even if six (6) honest-to-God shiny new SSTO RLV spaceplaces appeared by magic at some airstrip in the Mojave (and were capable of $500 per pound to LEO) we still need something very much like CEV for the LEO to low lunr orbit leg of a moon mission.

= = =

Unless we find a revenue source other than tax dollars there never will be a cis-lunar economy.

If we do find a revenue source other than tax dollars, what NASA does or doesn't do isn't really all that relevant.

Posted by Bill White at December 4, 2005 07:27 PM

Michael, I'm glad to see you clarifying your position. There is, I think, a very wide gulf between "ignore the Architecture" and "just ignore the Apollo 2.0-esque bits, take advantage of what you can, and move on." Mind, I'm a little confused at what the objection is. Is the Architecture too much like Apollo or too much like the shuttle? You seem to be taking both positions. Also, I have to disagree that the Architecture maintains the shuttle standing army. Most of that is necessary to turn around the shuttle orbiter, which goes away in 2010. Griffin himself has maintained that the Architecture will take less people. Is he wrong about that? If so, why?

Posted by Mark R. Whittington at December 4, 2005 09:08 PM

> And, as I have posted before, even if six (6) honest-to-God shiny new SSTO RLV spaceplaces appeared by
> magic at some airstrip in the Mojave (and were capable of $500 per pound to LEO) we still need something
> very much like CEV for the LEO to low lunr orbit leg of a moon mission.

There is no reason why a LEO-LLO vehicle needs to be "very much like CEV" (a vehicle designed to go from Earth to LEO and return.

Unless, of course, you have the subsidiary goal of maximizing expense.

Posted by Edward Wright at December 4, 2005 10:56 PM

> So, Micheal, do you reject the notion of taking advantage of the Architecture (as has been suggested
> by Michael Griffin) by offering services that enhance and improve it, like orbiting fuel depots or
> providing goods and services to a lunar base?

Griffin has not offered to buy anything from an orbiting fuel depot. Again, you're embellishing the facts. If Griffin were to do buy propellent from an orbiting depot, he would not need to build Shuttle-derived heavy lifters, which are allegedly being developed because orbital refueling is too difficult/expensive.

> Most of that is necessary to turn around the shuttle orbiter, which goes away in 2010. Griffin
> himself has maintained that the Architecture will take less people. Is he wrong about that?
> If so, why?

Because Griffin is contradicting himself. He has also stated his goal is to maintain the Shuttle workforce. You can't maintain employment and reduce it at the same time.

The idea that a heavy lifter will be cheap if you don't have to turn the orbiter is naive. The Saturn V didn't have a winged orbiter, but it required an enormous workforce.

Posted by Edward Wright at December 4, 2005 11:43 PM

I believe Griffin _has_ indicated in speeches that he will use a fuel depot if one [magically?] becomes available, but that in the meantime he must rely on heavy-lift and assume that a fuel depot will not materialize.

About Griffin contradicting himself: No offense, but this is an example of where engineer-types tend to go wrong in analyzing and predicting behavior. Politicians (and that's what Griffin de facto is) don't operate in a transparent decision-tree, if-then manner: they contradict themselves _all the time_, constantly, continuously, while looking you straight in the eye from start to finish. They adjust their goals on the fly as options collapse to reality. That's politics. Guile, deception, misdirection, disinformation etc. are the basic tools of the trade.

I think Griffin really does want to make the NASA workforce smaller and more efficient. So I imagine that what he wants to do is make the other big players think he's going to maintain a good chunk, at least, of the army. He'll rif small numbers here and there. Later, the other players will get used to the idea of a smaller army. Rif a few more. Et cetera. He's moving toward his "Trident" model, slowly, noticeably but not too alarmingly. Meanwhile, he tells _us_ he'd like to decimate the army--but of course he only intends to trim it as much as politically possible, which is nowhere near decimation. Playing both sides of the aisle: that's life in the big city.

Michael has exactly the right idea, which is Gary Hudson's approach with t/space and airlaunch: Private capital just doesn't exist yet, so use tax money to build the business to the point where private capital becomes attainable. At the same time, maintain the culture--DON'T let the government turn your business into a Blomart subcontractor.

Posted by Patrick at December 5, 2005 09:02 AM

Patrik,
When I'm being generous to Griffin I often think that's his game. He's setting up processes who's outcome isn't readily apparent but that will eventually lead to the standing army being irrelevant (they may still be paid but doing so in semi-retirement). But my concern with that political strategy is what happens after '08. If the Republican Party keeps the Whitehouse there is a chance that new President might want a new Administrator. But if the Whitehouse goes to someone like Hillary then all of Mike's plans go out the window. That's the problem with plans like that, they're multi-administration and that's _really_ hard to do.

Posted by Michael Mealling at December 5, 2005 09:56 AM

Re Hillary in 08, optimistic version, with some assumptions, and substituting two specific companies for all of alt.space:

By November 2008, Spacex will have proven its ability to launch EELV-class payloads for a small fraction of blomart prices. This is major, super-critical for alt.space--without a _conventional-looking_ alt.space booster, alt.space capsules don't have a chance in hell of attracting capital. Also, t/space will have developed its CXV with NASA funding for a couple years, so there will be a fairly mature, low-risk capsule to put on top of a Falcon 9, and hopefully they will have been able to develop their airlaunch carrier as well. Musk has also indicated he'd like to develop his own spacecraft, too, and he certainly will have the necessary wherewithal if his boosters work as advertised.

If Hillary comes in, she will do the typical Democrat thing, which is: keep NASA alive and fat, but don't give it a reason to live or exercise. So VSE is dead.

BUT, again typically, she won't kill ISS. With the by-then demonstrated or at least highly likely ability of alt.space to maintain ISS far more cheaply than NASA, there will be political pressure to keep that option open as an insurance policy. I think most congresspeople will be smart enough to see that as reasonable (i.e., at least nominally advantageous politically).

Also, much more capital will be flowing into alt.space, primarily because of the highly visible success of Spacex, secondarily because of t/space's (assumed) success with Quickreach and NASA funding of its CXV on the resume'. This non-trivial flow of money and the attendant publicity will have a synergistic effect politically, too. So we're back to your scenario, where an alt.space industry can develop no matter what NASA does.

Posted by Patrick at December 5, 2005 10:27 AM

> And, as I have posted before, even if six (6) honest-to-God shiny
>new SSTO RLV spaceplaces appeared by magic at some airstrip in the
>Mojave (and were capable of $500 per pound to LEO) we still need
>something very much like CEV for the LEO to low lunr orbit leg of a
>moon mission.

Why?

Studies for DC-X showed if you could refuel it in orbit, it could do LEo to Lunar surface, then back to earth surface with a few mods. So I see no obvious reason to assume you couldn't do that in the future with something more reusable then teh Apollo'ish, near full expendable, design NASA is currently pushing?

Posted by Kelly Starks at December 5, 2005 11:03 AM

Studies for DC-X showed if you could refuel it in orbit, it could do LEO to Lunar surface, then back to earth surface with a few mods.

Heat shielding for one. Moon to Earth velocities are higher than LEO re-entry.

And where does DC-X get its lunar landing legs? Are they re-useable lunar landing legs?

A vessel capable of LEO to LLO and return needs more capacity for crew accomodations than are needed for a taxi ride, Earth to LEO. Adding lunar capability to your DC-X creeps up your mass, undermining the Earth-to-LEO efficiency.

CEV is a camel (a horse designed by committee to be lunar capable and Earth-to-LEO capable) and that means alt-space should get moving on the pure Earth-to-LEO as soon as possible. But Griffin needs that camel just in case alt-space drops the ball.

And NASA should NOT run a selection committee as to which alt-space SSTO RLV is best or give money to Company A at the detriment of Company B to build that low cost RLV.

= = =

Given the mass fraction issues for Earth-to-LEO leaving as much hardware "up there" for re-use over and over is just good economics. Throwing away an LSAM or landing legs is worse than littering the Atlantic with hardware because it costs so much more to get an LSAM to LLO.

A re-useable LEO-LLO/EML-1 system and a re-useable LLO/EML-1 to lunar surface system means your Earth-to-LEO crew taxi can be tiny and cramped like CVX, thus cheap. But that requires lunar LOX production, which is ESSENTIAL to any cis-lunar economy, IMHO.

If ESAS gives us a re-useable LSAM and lunar LOX capability by the early 2020s, the choice of Earth-to-LEO launch vehicle will transfer by default to whatever system is cheapest.

Not by a NASA selection committee but by the free market.

= = =

I believe a true cis-lunar economy needs an EML-1 depot. But I want the private sector, not NASA, to build it.

Posted by Bill White at December 5, 2005 12:02 PM

> I believe Griffin _has_ indicated in speeches that he will use a fuel depot
> if one [magically?] becomes available,

If Griffin believes an orbital fuel dump requires "magic," that's part of the problem.

If he thinks his ESAS architecture would be able to make effective use of such a fuel dump, that's another part of the problem.

> About Griffin contradicting himself: No offense, but this is an
> example of where engineer-types tend to go wrong in analyzing and
> predicting behavior. Politicians (and that's what Griffin de facto
> is) don't operate in a transparent decision-tree, if-then manner...
> They adjust their goals on the fly as options collapse to reality. That's
> politics. Guile, deception, misdirection, disinformation etc. are the
> basic tools of the trade.

Except that Griffin was supposedly appointed *because* he was an engineer, not a politician. Even if he is a politician, the Bill Clinton is not the only model for politicians (or arguably the best).

I'm still waiting for a coherent explanation of how Griffin is going to reduce the Shuttle workforce while building Shuttle-derived vehicles that require that workforce. That really does require "magic."

As for the idea that Griffin really has some secret plan he's not telling us about, that has the same problem as most conspiracy theories. Occam's Razor says the simplest explanation is usually the best, and in this case, the simplest explanation is that Griffin means what he says and believes it makes sense.

Posted by Edward Wright at December 5, 2005 04:05 PM

>> Studies for DC-X showed if you could refuel it in orbit, it could do LEO
>> to Lunar surface, then back to earth surface with a few mods.

> Heat shielding for one. Moon to Earth velocities are higher than LEO re-entry.

A LEO-LLO vehicle (which is what you were talking about) does not need to have heat shielding. It does not need to reenter the atmosphere (although it might do so for aerobraking). One the other hand, Delta Clipper (which is what Kelly meant -- DC-X was a mistake) would have had heat shielding for reentry.

> And where does DC-X get its lunar landing legs? Are they re-useable lunar landing legs?

Er, the same place the Reusable Lunar Lander that you think Griffin's building will get its reusable landing legs? Building reusable landing gear is not an insurmountable problem, Bill.

> A vessel capable of LEO to LLO and return needs more capacity for crew
> accomodations than are needed for a taxi ride, Earth to LEO.

Why does it "need" that? Lunar Gemini would have had the same crew accomodations as LEO Gemini. Furthermore, Gemini astronauts never got spacesick, because they had no room to move around. Apollo astronauts did.

Apart from allowing the crew to get space sickness, what great advantage is there to having larger accomodations for the LEO-to-LLO trip?

> CEV is a camel (a horse designed by committee to be lunar capable and
> Earth-to-LEO capable) and that means alt-space should get moving on the
> pure Earth-to-LEO as soon as possible. But Griffin needs that camel
> just in case alt-space drops the ball.

Again, Bill, your argument presumes that private enterprise can drop the ball but government won't. Why isn't ESAS using NASP, VentureStar, X-34, X-37, or X-38, to name just a few of the "balls" NASA has tried to build over the years?

> And NASA should NOT run a selection committee as to which alt-space SSTO RLV
> is best or give money to Company A at the detriment of Company B to build
> that low cost RLV.

But you do want NASA to run a selection to decide which expendable rockets and capsules are best and give money to Boeing, Lockheed, Thiokol at the expense of everyone else.

> Given the mass fraction issues for Earth-to-LEO leaving as much hardware
> "up there" for re-use over and over is just good economics.

Which is an excellent argument against building a CEV that travels all the way to the Moon and returns to Earth. Yet, you want the taxpayers to spend $10 billion to do that.

You still haven't explained why, apart from your belief that private enterprise may drop the ball and government never does.

> If ESAS gives us a re-useable LSAM and lunar LOX capability by the early 2020s,
> the choice of Earth-to-LEO launch vehicle will transfer by default to whatever
> system is cheapest.

No, the choice will be limited to those vehicles that can lift a 23-ton capsule. By deliberately making CEV so large it can only be launched on a NASA-unique vehicle, you are closing off future options.

And no, no one is going to develop a reusable Saturn-class vehicle any time in the near future. You don't start by building 747s as your first aircraft.

> Throwing away an LSAM or landing legs is worse than littering the Atlantic
> with hardware because it costs so much more to get an LSAM to LLO.

But it doesn't *have* to cost that much. That's the result of the pigheaded insistance on using superexpensive HLVs, not a law of nature.

Posted by Edward Wright at December 5, 2005 04:50 PM

Ed, I'm disappointed in the architecture too, but your Occam's Razor also suggests Griffin is seriously intelligent, highly educated, interested in long-term space development, and doing what he can with what he's given in the position he's in. If he returns your calls, please give him my best regards along with your plan for NASA.

Posted by Patrick at December 7, 2005 12:00 PM

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