Rep. Rohrabacher seems a little confused. About 1:22, he goes on about how "the mission to Mars" is unaffordable, but the "mission to the Moon" is affordable. But he seems to be confusing sending humans to Mars with sending robots to the moon.
Quote from: Proponent on 09/18/2017 01:42 pmRep. Rohrabacher seems a little confused. About 1:22, he goes on about how "the mission to Mars" is unaffordable, but the "mission to the Moon" is affordable. But he seems to be confusing sending humans to Mars with sending robots to the moon.He's not confused at all, he's just opining on the correct direction for human spaceflight, like usual. Considering that Blue Origin was there pitching Lunar COTS while trying to stay on-topic, it's good that someone talked about it.
Is Lunar COTS being used as a generic term or is it this?http://lunarcots.com/and is that the same as https://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/atoms/files/aiaa2015-4408zunigalunarcotspaper.pdf ?I have been a fan of this for a long time, specifically a "robotic lunar colony" (I also suggested COLTS before I heard the term "lunar COTS" but it never stuck )There was also some Spudis scheme involving initially unmanned. I remember it came out afterwards.Anyway, my plan was:* NASA spends some fixed sum eg $0.25b/year to buy commercial cargo soft-landed on the moon. It just gets the maximum kg it can at the price. Hopefully kg/year goes up over time.* NASA does not specify or pay for payloads. Instead it has a panel that awards the cargo space to the best and most useful self-funded projects contributing to a "robotic lunar colony".* Why would companies or universities create payloads for free? A combination of reasons. (a) For the prestige (b) because they are doing relevant tech development anyway (c) because they have their own scientific goal or commercial scheme but could not afford the initial hurdle of transportation to begin it. These reasons could all end up being superior to companies who produce payloads just to match government specifications, with no ulterior goal.To me, the definition of a robotic colony is obvious but it confused some people. It is doing the same things as a human colony but with teleoperated robots, ie science, prospecting, power generation, ISRU, manufacturing... not all at once but as projects get added or upgraded. Eventually either humans get added or we develop clanking replicators. The direction depends on where technology advances fastest. In any case, with a fixed yearly sum and an unknown time period the moon would eventually become part of the sphere of human industrial activity.