About 20 years ago, there was a concept for a mass space tourism SSTO by the "Japanese Rocket Society" called "Kankoh-maru." The ultra-high launch volume of "tens of flights per day," carrying 50 passengers each, was calculated to result in a price of $20,000 per passenger. This is kind of like the high volume (thousands of people per year) that Elon Musk expects for Mars colonization, except it's only for people who want to view the beauty of Earth from low Earth orbit, and maybe go to a space hotel. It was never built, probably because Japan was going through economic problems following the 1980s bubble, but who else would invest the time and money in developing a rocket with airline-like operations?
I happen to be rather young, but the thought that I was alive in a time before The Open Directory Project existed completely baffles me - how on earth did people exercise their human right to freedom of information before that? How did anybody find where anybody else was? How did the global financial system work for crying out loud? I have no conception of an internet free world. Technology induced culture change is rapid and you never realise it when you're living in it. The same will happen to space.
I'm just not sure what to accept more: the miraculous space future of extreme launch cost reduction and Mars colonization (like what is always being speculated about on the SpaceX boards here), or the "reality" of "low flight rates," "low demand," and spaceflight that is always going to be expensive.Try to read this thread (debate) starting from here. One poster (Nibb31) is a prominent believer in the latter philosophy.
Elon and Google appear to be making a major effort to crack the payload end of the equation in case you haven't heard.They plan on launching a huge constellation of LEO Sats for Internet access.
(a lot of commercial RLV concepts failed because the massive satellite constellations that were conceived in the 90s didn't materialize, but SpaceX is planning on solving that as well)
but what if this is a yet another bubble with promises that fail to deliver?
I'm just not sure what to accept more: the miraculous space future of extreme launch cost reduction and Mars colonization (like what is always being speculated about on the SpaceX boards here), or the "reality" of "low flight rates," "low demand," and spaceflight that is always going to be expensive.Try to read this thread (debate) starting from here. One poster (Nibb31) is an insistent believer in the latter.
All said what's different now is the billionaires. Heinlein's "The Man Who Sold The Moon" Future History come to pass. Musk with SpaceX. Google's investing. SpaceX's attempts at reusability have caused a paradigm shift. Look at ULAs next gen recovery plan. And the Europeans as well. Things are changing as someone will be successful crashing costs to LEO access. Maybe a bad choice of verbs.
Re-usability is en vogue, all the rage, etc., but since the last Shuttle no one has as-yet recovered anything! If/when it occurs, I don't see it making a substantial price difference.
Remember I'm saying all this as a space geek - viewing the world as it is and not as I might wish it to be.
I was 12 at the beginning of the Space Age and saw hope blossom into the Apollo landings and the great manned spaceflight desertification that followed. Stuck in LEO for decades post Apollo. Then the DC-X and Roton false dawn of the 90s. SpaceShipOne then the over a decade hiatus.All said what's different now is the billionaires. Heinlein's "The Man Who Sold The Moon" Future History come to pass. Musk with SpaceX. Google's investing. SpaceX's attempts at reusability have caused a paradigm shift. Look at ULAs next gen recovery plan. And the Europeans as well.
-snip-SpaceX is trying its own unique version, but even if it works still won't recover the entire launch vehicle and still won't do recovery on most missions (the ones beyond LEO that really pay). I'm an optimist on future space flight, but it isn't a Bonestell future that I expect. - Ed Kyle
Only Shuttle realized some of those plans, but it didn't pay. SpaceX is trying its own unique version, but even if it works still won't recover the entire launch vehicle and still won't do recovery on most missions (the ones beyond LEO that really pay). I'm an optimist on future space flight, but it isn't a Bonestell future that I expect. - Ed Kyle
I'm going to buck the trend here and say that though we all space enthusiasts, we are missing the forest for the trees, and reading this thread convinces me even further that's the case.It's all about the money, finances and human motivation...not the technology. In the long history of technology and humanity, the effect of technology has always been to free us from prior burdens and allow us to expand our horizons into other endeavors or do things more efficiently. The result is that we need ever fewer people to do the same job. Look at the world around you - its filled with examples. 15,000 tons tankers and manned engine rooms? Not today - 100K plus and automated engine rooms. Don't need all those people. Family farms? Nah - large 'commercial' farms and practice because they can produce the same crop far cheaper. Assembly lines? Nah - robotics and automation do away with much of the former touch labor (not all but a significant portion) Now we are at the cusp with vehicle operations. Truck drivers? Train engineers? Nah - cheaper and safer to do it with perceptive automation. Again - the end result is we don't need the people.Now lets look the larger impact. The unfortunate truth is we have a huge population surplus now (educational, technological etc) that is simply not needed or involved in the production of wealth. The question isn't whether we can get into space - the question is what the heck are we going to do with all the people in the financial/social/technology evolutionary pressure cooker of the west. (BTW they all vote - remember that)Less of an issue of you are in Africa and still worried about daily survival and subsistence farming.. you need the hands. I haven't seen any vision or answer yet - the short term answer for some is treat the symptom - ever greater dependence on government and wealth redistribution. This will fail - as government simple redistributes wealth - it doesn't create it. This is also why the rolls of social programs will continue to grow without check in the short term. Paying homage to the electorate is also far more important to all politicians than any space vision. How then to create enough wealth to do it all? How to grow your economy while taking care of all of its members AND move into space? Free market economics used to self regulate this, and it still does to a degree. We can see that in the transfer of manufacturing to lower cost locations like China. The human cost of labor there is far cheaper than even the most minimal of western subsistence costs. This is the bigger question...you will never garner more resources for space as long as this portion of the voting base displays unlimited growth. Their concerns are terrestrial...and they will vote accordingly. So my vision for the future is, unfortunately, not much different than the present. We will have some focused exploration, but I see no imperative for more. Fiscal pressures in an evolving society will see to that. How to escape? I see only one alternative financially and that's reduction of energy costs. 70% of the cost of modern goods is the energy required to manufacture it...not human labor. We talk about reducing the cost of access to space. If we are to solve the bigger problem - grow the economies to the point of supporting sustained efforts in space and increasing wealth, we have to attack the energy cost and issues closer to home. Remember I'm saying all this as a space geek - viewing the world as it is and not as I might wish it to be.
We are not certain what will happen in the spaceflight industry in a couple of years, let alone decades. The major things that have yet to be realized are manned Mars landings and the major reduction of costs for space access. People have various expectations for what will happen, ranging from the optimistic to the pessimistic.Some people believe that in a few decades, SpaceX will be successful in revolutionizing launch by not throwing away the launch hardware, thus reducing prices by at least half, or maybe reducing it by an order of magnitude or even more. Some expect that the first Mars mission will happen some time in the late 2020s, and it will not be delayed. Robert Zubrin expects Mars Direct to have its first mission in 10 years if people would just start working on it now. SpaceX's Mars Colonial Transport would be fully operational by the middle of the 21st century, and there will be enough demand for thousands of people to pay $500,000 a ticket to move to the Red Planet. An entire colony of people living together, some of them growing crops, or having babies.Others argue that reusability will not be worth it due to low "flight rates" (i.e. not enough amortization for maintenance and development), and there won't be enough demand for those markets (a lot of commercial RLV concepts failed because the massive satellite constellations that were conceived in the 90s didn't materialize, but SpaceX is planning on solving that as well). Many times, the satellite can also cost more than the launcher itself, so will the launch market be elastic enough? Other revolutionary concepts such as space elevators will also have to deal with that. The phrase "chicken-and-egg" might get mentioned in these types of discussions (i.e. high flight rates are necessary for reusable launchers, and vice versa).There might be the demand for mass space tourism, but we don't know if it will be just a flash in the pan for only a few millionaires. About 20 years ago, there was a concept for a mass space tourism SSTO by the "Japanese Rocket Society" called "Kankoh-maru." The ultra-high launch volume of "tens of flights per day," carrying 50 passengers each, was calculated to result in a price of $20,000 per passenger. This is kind of like the high volume (thousands of people per year) that Elon Musk expects for Mars colonization, except it's only for people who want to view the beauty of Earth from low Earth orbit, and maybe go to a space hotel. It was never built, probably because Japan was going through economic problems following the 1980s bubble, but who else would invest the time and money in developing a rocket with airline-like operations? Will SpaceX be successful in doing just that, or will it end up like Kankoh-maru - just a pipe dream? What if it gets built, but no one comes?Solar power satellites? Japan is planning on building them, but Elon Musk thinks that the energy loss during transmission will make it impractical.
This brings us to the tremendous cost of launching stuff into space. Todays cost for putting stuff into geosynchronous orbit is about $20,000 per kilogram of launched material. We have a history of hope and optimism that launch costs will plummet in the future. So far, that has not really happened, and rising energy prices are not going to help drive costs ever-lower. Meanwhile, the U.S. space program appears to be scaling back.In 1999, NASA initiated a $22 million study investigating the feasibility of space-based solar power. Among their conclusions was that launch costs would need to come down to $100200 per kg to make space-based solar power economically competitive. It is hard to imagine accomplishing a factor-of-100 reduction in launch costs.
Quote from: warddw on 06/11/2015 07:11 pmI'm going to buck the trend here and say that though we all space enthusiasts, we are missing the forest for the trees, and reading this thread convinces me even further that's the case.It's all about the money, finances and human motivation...not the technology. In the long history of technology and humanity, the effect of technology has always been to free us from prior burdens and allow us to expand our horizons into other endeavors or do things more efficiently. The result is that we need ever fewer people to do the same job. Look at the world around you - its filled with examples. 15,000 tons tankers and manned engine rooms? Not today - 100K plus and automated engine rooms. Don't need all those people. Family farms? Nah - large 'commercial' farms and practice because they can produce the same crop far cheaper. Assembly lines? Nah - robotics and automation do away with much of the former touch labor (not all but a significant portion) Now we are at the cusp with vehicle operations. Truck drivers? Train engineers? Nah - cheaper and safer to do it with perceptive automation. Again - the end result is we don't need the people.Now lets look the larger impact. The unfortunate truth is we have a huge population surplus now (educational, technological etc) that is simply not needed or involved in the production of wealth. The question isn't whether we can get into space - the question is what the heck are we going to do with all the people in the financial/social/technology evolutionary pressure cooker of the west. (BTW they all vote - remember that)Less of an issue of you are in Africa and still worried about daily survival and subsistence farming.. you need the hands. I haven't seen any vision or answer yet - the short term answer for some is treat the symptom - ever greater dependence on government and wealth redistribution. This will fail - as government simple redistributes wealth - it doesn't create it. This is also why the rolls of social programs will continue to grow without check in the short term. Paying homage to the electorate is also far more important to all politicians than any space vision. How then to create enough wealth to do it all? How to grow your economy while taking care of all of its members AND move into space? Free market economics used to self regulate this, and it still does to a degree. We can see that in the transfer of manufacturing to lower cost locations like China. The human cost of labor there is far cheaper than even the most minimal of western subsistence costs. This is the bigger question...you will never garner more resources for space as long as this portion of the voting base displays unlimited growth. Their concerns are terrestrial...and they will vote accordingly. So my vision for the future is, unfortunately, not much different than the present. We will have some focused exploration, but I see no imperative for more. Fiscal pressures in an evolving society will see to that. How to escape? I see only one alternative financially and that's reduction of energy costs. 70% of the cost of modern goods is the energy required to manufacture it...not human labor. We talk about reducing the cost of access to space. If we are to solve the bigger problem - grow the economies to the point of supporting sustained efforts in space and increasing wealth, we have to attack the energy cost and issues closer to home. Remember I'm saying all this as a space geek - viewing the world as it is and not as I might wish it to be. It has everything to do with technology. Without it we are not substantially better off than animals.
Factories will move to Africa once China and India get caught up with the west and their labor costs increase. Then there is really nowhere else for them to move to but automation. Eventually there will be shorter work weeks and already is to some extent. The way I see space exploration is it will go to people like Musk and Bezos. It will be private and not much public support. Eventually fossil fuels will be replaced with algae or even manufactured from sea water and air using cheap electricity once fusion is mastered or enough solar/wind/geothermal power is produced cheaper. Energy efficiency is about double what it was in the mid 1970's. Home heating/water heating is cheaper and more efficient. Vehicles get higher gas mileage. That is continuing to improve. Space costs will have to come down with re-usable rockets, no question about it if we are to continue space exploration. Also at some point the moon and Mars will have to be mined for rare earths and things earth that would cost more to obtain. Man will have to expand into the solar system.
Quote from: Pipcard on 06/09/2015 04:58 pmAbout 20 years ago, there was a concept for a mass space tourism SSTO by the "Japanese Rocket Society" called "Kankoh-maru." The ultra-high launch volume of "tens of flights per day," carrying 50 passengers each, was calculated to result in a price of $20,000 per passenger. This is kind of like the high volume (thousands of people per year) that Elon Musk expects for Mars colonization, except it's only for people who want to view the beauty of Earth from low Earth orbit, and maybe go to a space hotel. It was never built, probably because Japan was going through economic problems following the 1980s bubble, but who else would invest the time and money in developing a rocket with airline-like operations? I remember readaing somewhere, that design of Kankoh-maru was accepted to be preliminary, without the proper mass fraction. They hoped that future progress would solve the issue. There were many other SSTO designs that time, but nobody considers them realistic today. Technological over-optimism is probably one of the reasons of the frustrations.
But what about just the idea of the Kankoh-maru, hundreds of thousands or even millions of passengers per year to hotels in low Earth orbit (lets say they use something like a super-Dragon with 50 passengers), compared to the idea of the MCT, tens of thousands of passengers per year all the way to Mars? Are they plausible in the next few decades?According to , we should've had space hotels five years ago.(I remember seeing that Kankoh-maru/modified Shuttle launch clip on a documentary titled "Future Living 2025" on the (Discovery) Science Channel but I can't find it anywhere now. Does anyone else remember seeing such a documentary?)
It's not about whether it will be possible to put 50 passengers on a 50-tonne vehicle launched by an FH; what I'm asking about is the ability of a private organization to fund a mass orbital space tourism or space colonization effort (tens of thousands of people a year like Kankoh Maru or MCT), and whether there will be enough demand from paying customers to make such an effort practical.How do we go to that from our current situation: about a dozen people that go to the ISS every year?
"We are not certain what will happen in the spaceflight industry in a couple of years, let alone decades."About a decade ago when one looked at the space industry things were much more certain. There existed the shuttle and a number of expendable launch systems. There was nothing on the horizon that promised any real changes to the space industry. For the foreseeable future most things were going to remain the same..
Yeah, and the problem in both cases was no-one actually flying anything.
There's a huge cubesat buzz too, but at least some of those are actually flying too.