Commercialized SLS

[Jim]

Even at $1bn a year theres a lot of money to be made.
If
the engine section gets reused, 
the core tanks reach orbit and become habitats or printer ink,
the upper stage gets refuelled aces style,
and the fairings might as well be reused or integrated in a giant habitat payload,
The SLS becomes into a dream rocket.
 And only a commercial company can push hard enough. Though it seems that it takes a private company with high ambitions, rather than a giant public corporate.

That is simple wrong.  There is no money to be made.
This is not just Boeing involved.  NG/ATK make the solids.  AJR makes the SSMEs,  MSFC makes payload fitting, Jacobs does the launch ops and a new contractor will do fairings.  It can't be commercialized unless somebody is willing to take over all of these tasks.  Guess what, nobody is.  NASA isn't' going to have the money to fly it enough and there are no other users.

Commercial operator can't contract with others? Since when?

where did I say that?

[Chris Bergin]

Boeing looked at it, in the event SLS was cancelled by NASA (paid-for HLV, probably a deal over the billions Boeing would be owed in contract cancellations).

They decided there wasn't enough profit in such a venture.

[SWGlassPit]

Boeing looked at it, in the event SLS was cancelled by NASA (paid-for HLV, probably a deal over the billions Boeing would be owed in contract cancellations).

They decided there wasn't enough profit in such a venture.

As would anyone else who goes into business to make money.  Aerospace engineering isn't (by and large) a charity. 

[dror]

https://arstechnica.com/science/2021/10/nasa-wants-to-buy-sls-rockets-at-half-price-fly-them-into-the-2050s/
by Eric Berger - Oct 27, 2021 3:10pm

NASA sees itself as the "anchor tenant" of the launch system and procuring one crewed flight per year for the next decade or longer. Where appropriate, the agency said, industry will "market" the large launch vehicle to other customers, including the science community and other government and non-government entities.

NASA says it wants to transition ownership of rocket production and ground services to the private industry. In return, this private contractor should build and launch the SLS at a substantial savings of 50 percent or more off of the current industry "baseline per flight cost."

So I guess that wasn't such a crazy idea after all

[ioncloud9]

https://arstechnica.com/science/2021/10/nasa-wants-to-buy-sls-rockets-at-half-price-fly-them-into-the-2050s/
by Eric Berger - Oct 27, 2021 3:10pm

NASA sees itself as the "anchor tenant" of the launch system and procuring one crewed flight per year for the next decade or longer. Where appropriate, the agency said, industry will "market" the large launch vehicle to other customers, including the science community and other government and non-government entities.

NASA says it wants to transition ownership of rocket production and ground services to the private industry. In return, this private contractor should build and launch the SLS at a substantial savings of 50 percent or more off of the current industry "baseline per flight cost."

So I guess that wasn't such a crazy idea after all

I think their estimated cost savings is highly unrealistic. For one, there is zero commercial market for SLS. So, not only with the government be its "anchor tenant," it will be its only tenant. With more reusable rockets and Starship coming online in the next few years, there will never be a commercial market for this rocket. Ever.


So not only will they need to continue producing SLS the same as always, but they will need to add on their guaranteed profit margin to it. Government outsourcing of a monopoly service is never going to result in significant cost savings. If the service is kept to the same standards, its going to result in cost increases. At the same time, depending on how the contract is written, it might be easier for the government to discontinue using this rocket since it will be "commercially produced and maintained" instead of being the in-house rocket.

[VSECOTSPE]

The RFI is for a privatization effort, not commercialization.  Two different things.

[jadebenn]

-snip-

The existence of United Space Alliance alongside Shuttle would hew against your reasoning.

[DreamyPickle]

Many people have criticized SLS for high costs and argued for cancellation but the politics of that are impossible. I think privatizing the program is the first step towards making cancellation possible since it would fall under "NASA saving costs" instead of "NASA firing people".

It is also possible that some non-NASA customers are found. There are users who want to avoid SpaceX for strategic reasons but a commercial SLS would still struggle against New Glenn or other new entrants. New Glenn might be delayed for a very long time and performance to high-energy trajectories is terrible.

Having the "second HSL provider" be the "second SLS customer" is a very intriguing possibility. Both the Blue Origin and Dynetics proposals would benefit from SLS capabilities. Cost would be very high but might be covered by NASA for purposes of "redundance" and Congress would be very happy with this.

[libra]

Boeing looked at it, in the event SLS was cancelled by NASA (paid-for HLV, probably a deal over the billions Boeing would be owed in contract cancellations).

They decided there wasn't enough profit in such a venture.

Well I'm reminded of South Park Gnomes that stole underpants and tried to make a profit.

[dror]

The RFI is for a privatization effort, not commercialization.  Two different things.

Can you please explain me the difference? I really don't know

[Coastal Ron]

The RFI is for a privatization effort, not commercialization.  Two different things.

Can you please explain me the difference? I really don't know

Dictionaries are your friend... 

Privatization is the transfer of a business, industry, or service from public to private ownership and control.

Commercialization is the process of managing or running something principally for financial gain.

What NASA is proposing is to transfer the SLS from public ownership to private ownership. And sure, the private owners will be able to sell SLS launch services as a commercial offering (for financial gain of course), but they are only able to do that through the privatization of the SLS.

[spacenut]

Privatization might force Boeing to cut costs or abandon it altogether and opt for something less expensive. 

[VSECOTSPE]

The RFI is for a privatization effort, not commercialization.  Two different things.

Can you please explain me the difference? I really don't know

CR explained privatization above.  It’s moving assets from government ownership to private ownership.  Electric utilities, water utilities, various airlines, certain railways, even certain industries, etc. are classic examples.

In this context, commercialization is fulfilling a government need thru commercial providers.  Municipal waste is a classic example.  Decades ago, your garbageman was a city employee.  Today your garbageman is an employee of a waste management company contracted by your city to collect your garbage.  Those same waste management companies are commercial in that they provide the same function to non-government customers like apartment buildings, office buildings, industry, etc.

Government things like SLS are privatized.  Government needs like ISS transport are commercialized.

[Commercialization can also refer to taking a government invention and finding commercial applications for it.  Government Lab invents Doohickey and sells the patent to Companies A, B, and C so they can incorporate Doohickey in Products X, Y, and Z.  This also happens at NASA field centers but isn’t applicable to this discussion.]

To be specific, what that RFI outlines is only partial privatization of SLS, at best.  NASA would still retain ownership of the facilities that support SLS, which means that SLS would not be fully privatized, only partially privatized.  In fact, the RFI also makes reference to Government-Owned-Contractor-Operated (or GOCO) models, which isn’t privatization at all.  It’s just having a contractor take over day-to-day management of a government facility.  JPL and the DOE labs are run under GOCO models.

A step towards full privatization, partial privatization, or a GOCO is contract consolidation.  Rebadging personnel under fewer or one organization can reduce overhead and redundancies.  NASA did this with STS contracts through United Space Alliance (USA).  Contract consolidation will probably be an element (maybe the only substantive element) of industry responses to this RFI.

At the end of the day, whether it’s full privatization, partial privatization, a GOCO, contract consolidation, or something else, it really comes down to reducing workforce costs.  Governments use these models because their hands are usually too tied when it comes to managing personnel because of parochial political interests, regulations and rules, unions, etc.  The more governments can push hire/fire decision making down to private managers, the more flexibility there is to shrink the workforce, reduce benefits, improve demographics, consolidate overhead, etc.

Hope this helps.

[woods170]

<snip>

Hope this helps.

Thank you for your most informative post. Very helpfull.

[jadebenn]

-snip-

Good summary. It's a little bit more interesting in that they're also being allowed to pursue the possibility of non-NASA business, but that's a bonus, not the raison d'etre.

[DanClemmensen]

-snip-

Good summary. It's a little bit more interesting in that they're also being allowed to pursue the possibility of non-NASA business, but that's a bonus, not the raison d'etre.

Please do not take this as a hostile question, because I am genuinely looking for an answer.  If both Starship and SLS become operational, then what for what missions is SLS to be preferred for purely technical reasons? (not cost, political, legislative, or "SpaceX is evil" reasons).

[AstroWare]

-snip-

Good summary. It's a little bit more interesting in that they're also being allowed to pursue the possibility of non-NASA business, but that's a bonus, not the raison d'etre.

Please do not take this as a hostile question, because I am genuinely looking for an answer.  If both Starship and SLS become operational, then what for what missions is SLS to be preferred for purely technical reasons? (not cost, political, legislative, or "SpaceX is evil" reasons).

Limiting Starship to official shown variants (cargo/tanker/crew) and excluding expendable missions

And SLS to officially shown variants (Orion/Orion+CMP/8.4m Cargo/10m Cargo)

Some ideas:

(1) Orion. Could starship be an alternative to Orion? Sure. Could a modified starship launch Orion? Perhaps. But Orion is designed to work with SLS and this would prefer SLS I'd cost was no issue.

(2) Certain Space station module designs (for example to the gateway) can be cheaper/simpler/smaller/safer if they are designed without any propulsion or power generation systems. If they can hitch a ride with Orion as Co-manifested payloads, they can be delivered direct to station. Could starship be modified to deliver modules? Perhaps. But no shown variants are immediately capable IMO.

(3) Certain high energy planetary missions. Starship is also capable of BEO launches, but the missions become more complex ( for example requiring refueling). If cost was no concern, many would prefer the less complex launcher.

(4) payloads that are larger than 9m in diameter. What is larger than starship, but small enough for SLS? IDK. But if it existed it would prefer SLS's larger optional fairing. Could Starship be modified for larger payloads? Sure. But see premise.

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[Avatar2Go]

NASA is hoping that privatization will incentivize industry to both market SLS, and to exploit any potential cost savings under the pressure of competition.  Also as with all products, unit cost is reduced with greater production.

In the extreme case that there is no market interest and no savings possible, then the main benefit to NASA will be divestment of management and production responsibilities.

In the opposite extreme case that there is a market for sustained biannual flights of SLS, as well as savings driven by industry, then the additional benefit to NASA (2 over 1) would be 50% cost reduction, with an absolute value perhaps between $500M and $1B per launch.

As with all things, neither extreme is likely and the outcome will fall somewhere in between.  It will be interesting to follow this and see where it goes.  It opens up potential for SLS, but the extent to which that potential will be embraced by industry and the marketplace, remains to be seen.

[su27k]

-snip-

Good summary. It's a little bit more interesting in that they're also being allowed to pursue the possibility of non-NASA business, but that's a bonus, not the raison d'etre.

Please do not take this as a hostile question, because I am genuinely looking for an answer.  If both Starship and SLS become operational, then what for what missions is SLS to be preferred for purely technical reasons? (not cost, political, legislative, or "SpaceX is evil" reasons).

Limiting Starship to official shown variants (cargo/tanker/crew) and excluding expendable missions

And SLS to officially shown variants (Orion/Orion+CMP/8.4m Cargo/10m Cargo)

Some ideas:

(1) Orion. Could starship be an alternative to Orion? Sure. Could a modified starship launch Orion? Perhaps. But Orion is designed to work with SLS and this would prefer SLS I'd cost was no issue.

(2) Certain Space station module designs (for example to the gateway) can be cheaper/simpler/smaller/safer if they are designed without any propulsion or power generation systems. If they can hitch a ride with Orion as Co-manifested payloads, they can be delivered direct to station. Could starship be modified to deliver modules? Perhaps. But no shown variants are immediately capable IMO.

(3) Certain high energy planetary missions. Starship is also capable of BEO launches, but the missions become more complex ( for example requiring refueling). If cost was no concern, many would prefer the less complex launcher.

(4) payloads that are larger than 9m in diameter. What is larger than starship, but small enough for SLS? IDK. But if it existed it would prefer SLS's larger optional fairing. Could Starship be modified for larger payloads? Sure. But see premise.

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1, 3, 4 is why I think there will be an expendable version of Starship, especially considering they're planning to fly several expendable missions from the start. For #2 you just need a space tug, it doesn't have to be provided by SpaceX, there're several commercial tugs/satellite servicing vehicles in development.

[AstroWare]

-snip-

Good summary. It's a little bit more interesting in that they're also being allowed to pursue the possibility of non-NASA business, but that's a bonus, not the raison d'etre.

Please do not take this as a hostile question, because I am genuinely looking for an answer.  If both Starship and SLS become operational, then what for what missions is SLS to be preferred for purely technical reasons? (not cost, political, legislative, or "SpaceX is evil" reasons).

Limiting Starship to official shown variants (cargo/tanker/crew) and excluding expendable missions

And SLS to officially shown variants (Orion/Orion+CMP/8.4m Cargo/10m Cargo)

Some ideas:

(1) Orion. Could starship be an alternative to Orion? Sure. Could a modified starship launch Orion? Perhaps. But Orion is designed to work with SLS and this would prefer SLS I'd cost was no issue.

(2) Certain Space station module designs (for example to the gateway) can be cheaper/simpler/smaller/safer if they are designed without any propulsion or power generation systems. If they can hitch a ride with Orion as Co-manifested payloads, they can be delivered direct to station. Could starship be modified to deliver modules? Perhaps. But no shown variants are immediately capable IMO.

(3) Certain high energy planetary missions. Starship is also capable of BEO launches, but the missions become more complex ( for example requiring refueling). If cost was no concern, many would prefer the less complex launcher.

(4) payloads that are larger than 9m in diameter. What is larger than starship, but small enough for SLS? IDK. But if it existed it would prefer SLS's larger optional fairing. Could Starship be modified for larger payloads? Sure. But see premise.

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1, 3, 4 is why I think there will be an expendable version of Starship, especially considering they're planning to fly several expendable missions from the start. For #2 you just need a space tug, it doesn't have to be provided by SpaceX, there're several commercial tugs/satellite servicing vehicles in development.

Absolutely agree. Although I'm not aware of any current tugs capable of moving an ISS size module from earth orbit to the gateway. Orion happened to be a large, convenient tug

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