Category Archives: Economics

Business, Economics, Political Commentary, Space

Return Of Falcon Heavy

5 Comments

Eric Berger wonders if it was a mistake.

As he notes, it was just overtaken by events.

But this is a fundamental flaw in how NASA does planetary missions:

And yet the Falcon Heavy has not spurred the development of a rash of new science missions. NASA simply has not set up the science community to take advantage of a low-cost, heavy lift rocket, said Casey Dreier, space policy director for The Planetary Society. “The incentive is just not there for scientists,” he said.

Primarily, mission planners and scientists are concerned about keeping the cost of the spacecraft down, and controlling its mass. The decision on a launch vehicle is typically left to NASA and its Launch Services Program. The Falcon Heavy really has not been around long enough to shift that calculus. Dreier said there is a chance that the larger Starship vehicle—which will dramatically change mass and volume constraints for science missions—could eventually change how NASA selects science missions.

I think that in general they would be much better off if the program manager was simply allowed to choose their own launch system as part of the program within their budget, rather than having to work within the constraints of the one chosen for them by NASA. And of course, it would have paid off much sooner in the case of Europa, because no sane program manager would have chosen SLS for it, if they had to pay for it.

Business, Economics, Education, Health, History, Space, Space Education, Space History, Space Science, Technology and Society

ASCEND

I’ve been to many AIAA space conferences over the decades, but this was my first attendance to the new format called ASCEND, in Las Vegas, and I have to say that it’s a huge improvement over the traditional ones. In my experience, the large AIAA conferences on space have traditionally been overwhelming in terms of the number of papers presented, and the high number of them being presented simultaneously, often with very low attendance at any particular one.

ASCEND was in comparison much more focused, with fewer, but higher-quality presentations, and much less frustration at having to miss events due to inability to be multiple places at once. There were also ample breaks from sessions to provide valuable networking opportunities, which has always been one of the more important reasons for in-person attendance.

While there were fewer presentations, there was no reduction in the scope of topics covered. As always, this was not merely a technical conference, but a conference on all aspects of what it is going to take to advance humanity into the solar system, with sessions on: space law; the economics of spaceflight; space transportation; space investment; space history; sustainability in terms of orbital debris and situation space awareness, utilization of in-situ resources for transportation, life support, and space manufacturing; space medicine; space assembly for telescopes and perhaps solar-power satellites; and even sociology for future space inhabitants.

The attendees ranged from students to seasoned industry professionals, not just from the US, but many other countries, with many opportunities for interaction between generations and nations. I applaud the AIAA for creating such an exciting and useful venue for those interested in moving humanity and life off its home planet.