LIVE: Congressional Hearings into Obama's NASA Budget FY2011 - Feb 24-25 Part 2

[vt_hokie]

Under the new plan hasn't NASA given money already this month to a winged RLV project?  I know from many of your posts that you very much like winged vehicles--I'm surprised you're not jumping for joy about this.

Sierra Nevada's DreamChaser is getting $20 million for the next fiscal year as I recall.  Obviously, that's peanuts in terms of s/c development money - enough to do some preliminary design work I guess.  So, realistically, what are we looking at?  At least a couple of years of design work, followed by several more years of development and testing, assuming much higher funding becomes available?  Assuming that everything goes smoothly, and for the first time in history a new spacecraft development program doesn't hit any snags, delays, or cost overruns, how soon could DreamChaser be operational?  5 years?  And what are the odds of an upstart company successfully developing such a vehicle - even one based on the HL-20 - with no significant problems along the way? 

And where is the money to man-rate the Atlas V, which DreamChaser is counting on if it's ever to make it into orbit?

Now, if DreamChaser had been awarded $200 million rather than $20 million, maybe I'd be a little more optimistic about it being a serious program.  Heck, even that would be peanuts!  Taxpayers spent, what, $1.2 billion on the suborbital X-33 demonstrator that never even got near completion?

[Bill White]

@ Jon Goff

I believe Ross Tierney when he posts that above a certain level of mass launched through TLI, a Jupiter based lunar campaign can be done at a lower cost per kilogram delivered to the lunar surface than can be achieved using Atlas V or Delta IVH.

Ross also writes that below that same threshold, EELV is less expensive per kilogram delivered to the lunar surface than with EELV. Therefore this is a bean counting conclusion, not an ideological conclusion.

He has asserted that these numbers have been documented by state of the art engineering cost analysis tools.

I believe Ross and I assert there is nothing "cargo cultish" about it.

Not to mention payload fairing concerns and my belief that Holdren's plan will result in all this nice new proposed R&D being stripped from NASA's future budget as soon as the workforce is let go and the infrastructure dismantled.

As in "bait & switch"

Anyway, one recent example here:

Re: DIRECT best Political compromise
« Reply #246 on: 02/24/2010 04:17 PM »
   
Reply with quote
clb22,
Understood, and I agree completely with the principle of what your saying.   My point of contention is really that I believe you are drawing the line too high.   So let me try to define that as simply as I can:

This is all about Lifecycle Costs.   Lifecycle Costs are dominated (about 80:20 ratio) by Annual Recurring Operational Costs.   Operationally, the cross-over point where Jupiter becomes lower cost compared to EELV comes at a launch rate of approximately ~300mT per year (+/- 15mT).   Thus...

If your mission requirements are above that point, then SD-HLV is the more cost effective option.

If your mission requirements are lower, then EELV is your better option.

The only remaining question is "how much do we need?"

Ross.

[dbhyslop]

Sierra Nevada's DreamChaser is getting $20 million for the next fiscal year as I recall.  Obviously, that's peanuts in terms of s/c development money - enough to do some preliminary design work I guess.  So, realistically, what are we looking at?  At least a couple of years of design work, followed by several more years of development and testing, assuming much higher funding becomes available?  Assuming that everything goes smoothly, and for the first time in history a new spacecraft development program doesn't hit any snags, delays, or cost overruns, how soon could DreamChaser be operational?  5 years?  And what are the odds of an upstart company successfully developing such a vehicle - even one based on the HL-20 - with no significant problems along the way? 

And where is the money to man-rate the Atlas V, which DreamChaser is counting on if it's ever to make it into orbit?

Now, if DreamChaser had been awarded $200 million rather than $20 million, maybe I'd be a little more optimistic about it being a serious program.

It won more of the CCDEV money than Boeing did.  If they meet the milestones I'm sure there's a lot more to come.  NASA couldn't really award $200m on the day they announced their radical new budget, even if they wanted to.

I think you have to admit a winged spaceplane is a lot more realistic now than it was under POR or any other Orion-based future.

I'm not worried about anyone forgetting to man-rate Atlas V since it seems like everyone and their brother is now trying to build a manned payload for it.

[nooneofconsequence]

7th grade school kids[/b], not adults.
Bolden' remark was that he didn't want 7th graders thinking about Mars and that kids that age are not interested in the rockets. He's wrong! For kids that age it is literally *all about the rocket*.

It may now be about rovers or scientists - given kids I speak to.

They don't bring up the Shuttle. They do ask about launch/reentry/spaceflight ...

Times change.

The poster below says it all. Can you even picture the adventure going on in his head? Calculus will never grip him like that.

The images change. The vehicles change. The motivations stay the same.

Right now the metaphor for connecting with average kids is video games.
The metaphor is fighters, not LV's, or trucks (Shuttles).

My interactions with secondary school kids tell me that NASA affects them more broadly than before - the LV is not the focus. Other things are.

And with advanced interest ones, intern programs, science fairs, competitions, special interest groups ...  kids here are more driven than ever into science and engineering about space. The inspiration they desire is grounded in the reality of HSF that will be around by the time they can get their hands on it.

Some I've met at the Mars Society are remarkable in that they understand how immature we are in spaceflight capability. They are savvy enough to be afraid of a technology roadmap to nowhere.

Irregardless of your opinion of what future you'd most like, these kids would most desire everyone to keep from dead ends in any plan that goes forward.

Be advised that 9B of Cx resulting in one very limited test did not inspire these kids - many told me they saw it as a meaningless diversion.

Unsurprisingly, they are all interested in Mars as the true objective as its another world. They worry that, like ISS going in LEO circles, we could end up in endless diversions.

[yg1968]

Nice side-step
No, he *absolutely* was talking about 7th grade kids not caring about the rockets.
He said:

they don't care about the launch vehicles

He was talking about the kids and he said it in the context of what does and does not inspire kids. There is no mistaking what he said. It was so clearly stated that it's not even open to misinterpretation. You might want to "spin" it, the same way politicians spin an unpleasant truth, but that would be beneath you; and you're better than that.

Face it; he said a stupid thing.

Chuck!!  I absolutely agree he said a stupid thing.  What I'm saying is that if he were in the room he'd agree he said a stupid thing, too and admit he meant to say what I said, precisely because it would be the most sensible thing for a person in his position to say.

Do you believe in your heart that Bolden doesn't think that 7th graders like rocket ships?  If there's one thing that people of every nationality and creed on this Earth can probably agree to, it's that 7th graders like rocket ships.  It would be utterly bizarre for someone who commanded a rocket ship to think otherwise, but it would be slightly less bizarre if he said something silly to the contrary under pressure.  Am I interpreting what he said in this situation--sure, but I think it makes sense given the context.

Dan

I understood it the same way you did. You have to put the sentence in the context of what Bolden was saying. A rocket is cool whether it's commercial or NASA's. Bolden speaks quickly and will sometimes fumble some of his words. I wouldn't read anything else into it.

[Namechange User]

The gap has nothing to do with HLVs.  You can get to orbit quite well with vehicles a lot smaller than HLVs.  You can even do exploration this side of Phobos without HLVs.  HLVs are at best a means to an end, not an end in itself.  What I care about are the ends: space settlement, exploration, and space commercialization.  If an HLV has a part to play in reaching those ends at some point down the road, that's fine, and in fact this plan allows you to retain the capability you need to turn that option on when you're actually closer to needing it.

But this HLV fetish so many have here seems to border on a cargo cult mentality.

~Jon

And what are we to get to orbit on?  Soyuz...sure that's the right strategy. 

What are we to do exploration with?  Last I checked there is no plan for that.....just R&D, which is ironic given the person I'm replying to.

This "plan" allows for anything and everything, because there is absolutely no definition to it. 

[CessnaDriver]

The "plan" is fatal. It is beyond obvious that the testimony today was extremely critical from the experts up there today.

Only the former CNN journalist was glowing.
Sorry Miles, but you were way out of your league up there.


It's not going to get any better. The consensus is only going to grow against it.

[Namechange User]

Mike Snyder for President!

Concur!!

[jongoff]

And what are we to get to orbit on?  Soyuz...sure that's the right strategy.

Well, there's also that whole commercial crew investment that the Obama budget proposal was going to put $6B on.  But really, I don't see any realistic plan that doesn't involve at least some gap where American astronauts are flying on Soyuz for a few years while a new system (public or private) hopefully comes on line.  This could've been avoided by funding commercial crew and cargo sooner and more aggressively, but unfortunately we didn't make that choice then so we're stuck with the reality we live in now.

What are we to do exploration with?  Last I checked there is no plan for that.....just R&D, which is ironic given the person I'm replying to.

It depends a lot on what your initial exploration targets are, and how you're willing to go about them.  There *are* ways to do realistic and useful exploration in cislunar space and even out to some of the nearer NEOs based on the tools that the commercial crew and cargo efforts and the technology demonstration efforts will likely have online in the next five years if the funding actually occurs.

HLVs *might* be needed down the road, but there's a ton you can do just as well without them.

This "plan" allows for anything and everything, because there is absolutely no definition to it. 

There's actually a lot of details in it, if you're willing to look.  Sure, it doesn't say "Go to destination X by date Y", but it does give details like:

1. Specific lists of technologies and technology areas they would like to see demonstrated.
2. Rough timelines for when they would like to see those demonstrated by (all the tech demo stuff is explicitly targeting demonstration within 5 years according to several of the budget documents).
3. Budget guidelines for the size range of these demonstration missions at various maturity levels
4. Rough timelines for when commercial crew capabilities are targetted for coming online

etc.

And there are efforts underway throughout the research side of NASA to put even more specifics to each of these technology dev/demo focuses, providing more details on whats, whens, and hows.

Absolutely no details there.  Absolutely vague.  Nothing but flying on Soyuzes as far as the eye can see...

~Jon

[Namechange User]

on SDLV one is lucky to get to 4x Russian levels. Not a good argument for doing SDLV. So Ross - have them do Jupiter to compete with ULA? 

Seriously yes you can do a lot better than Russia/China, but only if you challenge structural issues. You are not going to do that with a govt program.

You got to be a fool to believe that anyone is going to use DIRECT as anything other than an argument to get back to funding POR - bait and switch. Let's not go down the Ares road again.

Vitter is bitter about not doing so.

That arguement is silly and someone who does not understand the bigger picture and assumes because someone arbitrarily calls it "commercial" that it is better and cheaper. 

Fact:  government is mainly an oversight function in Shuttle today and does not "turn wrenches", etc in that world.  While NASA is present, if you eliminated them, it would not make that big of a difference.  There are other ways to reduce costs through other efficienties.

[Namechange User]

And what are we to get to orbit on?  Soyuz...sure that's the right strategy.

Well, there's also that whole commercial crew investment that the Obama budget proposal was going to put $6B on.  But really, I don't see any realistic plan that doesn't involve at least some gap where American astronauts are flying on Soyuz for a few years while a new system (public or private) hopefully comes on line.  This could've been avoided by funding commercial crew and cargo sooner and more aggressively, but unfortunately we didn't make that choice then so we're stuck with the reality we live in now.

What are we to do exploration with?  Last I checked there is no plan for that.....just R&D, which is ironic given the person I'm replying to.

It depends a lot on what your initial exploration targets are, and how you're willing to go about them.  There *are* ways to do realistic and useful exploration in cislunar space and even out to some of the nearer NEOs based on the tools that the commercial crew and cargo efforts and the technology demonstration efforts will likely have online in the next five years if the funding actually occurs.

HLVs *might* be needed down the road, but there's a ton you can do just as well without them.

This "plan" allows for anything and everything, because there is absolutely no definition to it. 

There's actually a lot of details in it, if you're willing to look.  Sure, it doesn't say "Go to destination X by date Y", but it does give details like:

1. Specific lists of technologies and technology areas they would like to see demonstrated.
2. Rough timelines for when they would like to see those demonstrated by (all the tech demo stuff is explicitly targeting demonstration within 5 years according to several of the budget documents).
3. Budget guidelines for the size range of these demonstration missions at various maturity levels
4. Rough timelines for when commercial crew capabilities are targetted for coming online

etc.

And there are efforts underway throughout the research side of NASA to put even more specifics to each of these technology dev/demo focuses, providing more details on whats, whens, and hows.

Absolutely no details there.  Absolutely vague.  Nothing but flying on Soyuzes as far as the eye can see...

~Jon

No, we are not stuck.  We have a vehicle.

Commercial, at best, is 3-4 years away for crew.  The current "plan" is not a plan and hopes and assumes with zero contingency.

As for the rest, I hate to say this Jon but that is simply looking through rose colored glasses.  General lists, not really what I would call specific, of when maybe we would like to see technologies developed but then having no definitive plan to use them is a strategic mistake.  Does Microsoft just research how to make Windows better or do they plan to actually use it in there next version?  Take your pick of any company and feel free to use the same analogy. 

[DigitalMan]

They got money NOW that has to be spent by this coming October.  (the funds were from the $50 million stimulus).

Under the new plan hasn't NASA given money already this month to a winged RLV project?  I know from many of your posts that you very much like winged vehicles--I'm surprised you're not jumping for joy about this.

Sierra Nevada's DreamChaser is getting $20 million for the next fiscal year as I recall.  Obviously, that's peanuts in terms of s/c development money - enough to do some preliminary design work I guess.  So, realistically, what are we looking at?  At least a couple of years of design work, followed by several more years of development and testing, assuming much higher funding becomes available?  Assuming that everything goes smoothly, and for the first time in history a new spacecraft development program doesn't hit any snags, delays, or cost overruns, how soon could DreamChaser be operational?  5 years?  And what are the odds of an upstart company successfully developing such a vehicle - even one based on the HL-20 - with no significant problems along the way? 

And where is the money to man-rate the Atlas V, which DreamChaser is counting on if it's ever to make it into orbit?

Now, if DreamChaser had been awarded $200 million rather than $20 million, maybe I'd be a little more optimistic about it being a serious program.  Heck, even that would be peanuts!  Taxpayers spent, what, $1.2 billion on the suborbital X-33 demonstrator that never even got near completion?

[jkumpire]

Bolden is simply a mouthpiece for Obama's plan and Obama's plan kills shuttle. He was never going to go against Obama's plan.

Chris you know better! VSE ended shuttle at 2010.

Agreed.

Too much grandstanding (all around) in the hearings, as usual for Congress. I heard a lot of quoting JFK without suggesting that we spend 4% of the budget as was done at the peak of Apollo.

It's constantly mentioned that a large impediment to shuttle extension is the cost of restarting many of the assembly lines that have been shut down. I don't recall seeing specific numbers - are we talking $10M? $100M? More? Any links (public or L2) would be appreciated.

Extending shuttle to meet commercial at the other side is great in principle, but as always money matters.

The 4% quote is meaningless. The Federal budget is so many times larger as a percentage of GDP now than it was then that number has no meaning. The pie is so much bigger now than it once was that money is not really the issue, it is one's vision of the future that matters.

This is a decision based first on the political will of the leadership to do something. Or do nothing of any significance. Or end something of significance.

 

[Robotbeat]

You guys, we _need_ this new technology R&D. No matter if you support Constellation, Shuttle extension, whatever. These new tech demos are absolutely essential for us really doing solid exploration work. And NO, it is not just "pie-in-the-sky." Remember ion propulsion? Really pie in the sky? Well, Deep Space-1 demonstrated that it works. That made the Dawn mission possible, a probe which will orbit two different dwarf planets (which we've never seen up close before and could be the targets of future manned missions after Mars) and is on its way right now.

A large-scale electric propulsion demonstrator could do the same thing for manned deep space missions. Same for propellant depots, large ultralight structures (for large radiators for nuclear electric power or for large solar arrays), advanced closed-loop life support, etc. These would be demonstrated very quickly, within 5 years, allowing them to basically be used for any new PoR having graduated many technology readiness levels (TRLs). These sorts of tech demos are even bigger scale and more applicable to manned spaceflight than the New Millennium space tech demo missions that were canceled for the sake of Constellation funding.

How can you denigrate tech development like this? Bolden is right that we need to develop this technology before we can go to Mars. If setting a firm goal means we avoid any technologies that aren't at TRL 9, then we shouldn't set a firm goal.*

*_{I think that we CAN set a firm goal while still waiting for development of technologies to be matured. I'd love Obama and Congress to come out and say: "We are going to Mars by 2025 and this is the way we are going to do it, the three parallel tech development paths we must take, and the $15 billion extra annual funding. By extending the Shuttle until 2015, any Shuttle jobs will remain intact as we transition to full commercial-to-LEO." But this is not likely to happen "in this economy."}

[jongoff]

No, we are not stuck.  We have a vehicle.

True, but a vehicle that at best can be strung out for another few years max, and only at extreme expense.  If you stretched it out to the max you could do without restarting the production lines all the way, you'd be talking about 3-4 extra flights over 5 years at the cost of around $12-13B.  Ie about $2B/flight.  And that isn't without risk.

I honestly think there are better balances of cost vs. risk that could be done than trying to keep Shuttle limping along for another five years.  For instance, if shuttle-class upmass is the big concern, my favorite proposed solution was the ULA Payload Bay Fairing.  The system is pretty low technical risk, with almost all of the technolgies at TRL 9, could provide shuttle-class upmass, and could probably be flying within a short period of time (since it doesn't need a new launcher, and can reuse a lot of systems from other projects).  I'd rather see a slight 1-2 flight shuttle stretchout and extra funding for something like this than trying to keep Shuttle going for another several years at such high costs.

Commercial, at best, is 3-4 years away for crew.  The current "plan" is not a plan and hopes and assumes with zero contingency.

It has a lot more contingency than the old plan did.  If it got funded, you would likely have at least three or four potential crew and cargo launch systems, on at least three different launchers (Boeing capsule and/or Dreamchaser on Atlas V, Cygnus on Taurus II, Dragon on Falcon 9).  Sure, it's possible that every single one of those could fail, but even if you assign a low success rate for each of them once you start talking that level of redundancy, the odds of them all failing seems pretty low.

As for the rest, I hate to say this Jon but that is simply looking through rose colored glasses.  General lists, not really what I would call specific, of when maybe we would like to see technologies developed but then having no definitive plan to use them is a strategic mistake.

Believe what you will.  From the limited amount I've seen of the various roadmapping activities going on at NASA it's getting a lot more thought than you seem to think. 

~Jon

[jongoff]

The 4% quote is meaningless. The Federal budget is so many times larger as a percentage of GDP now than it was then that number has no meaning. The pie is so much bigger now than it once was that money is not really the issue, it is one's vision of the future that matters.

This is a decision based first on the political will of the leadership to do something. Or do nothing of any significance. Or end something of significance.

I've been hearing this line of thought (that NASA's budget is such a small part of the overall federal pie that adding huge amounts to it shouldn't be a problem) for literally half of my life.  I even remember writing a "persuasive writing" paper on just this topic for my freshman English class back in 96.  Between this argument and $5 you *might* be able to get lunch somewhere.

Even though NASA is only 0.6% or whatever of the federal budget, the problem is that most people still think it's 10-20% or more of the budget.  And that in spite of over a decade and a half of space people trying to "educate" the public on this matter.  If Obama tried to boost the NASA budget anywhere near the amount that would be necessary to recreate the situation that enabled Apollo, he'd be politically crucified by his enemies in Congress.  Even a $3B increase like what the A-com wanted would've exposed him (and by extension NASA) to all sorts of political attacks at a time when he couldn't afford it.  No, he's not going to sacrifice himself to enable aerospace engineers to relive their 1960s glory days.  If people heard that Obama was going to say double the HSF budget (about what would be required to enable a "within this decade" return to the Moon), they would think he was increasing the federal budget by 10, 20 or more.

Even if they're dead wrong, that doesn't really matter.  The damage can easily be done long before the truth has a chance to even put on its shoes.

People who think Obama could've just added $3B to the NASA budget without repercussions are living in a fantasy world.

~Jon

[nooneofconsequence]

on SDLV one is lucky to get to 4x Russian levels. Not a good argument for doing SDLV. So Ross - have them do Jupiter to compete with ULA? 

Seriously yes you can do a lot better than Russia/China, but only if you challenge structural issues. You are not going to do that with a govt program.

You got to be a fool to believe that anyone is going to use DIRECT as anything other than an argument to get back to funding POR - bait and switch. Let's not go down the Ares road again.

Vitter is bitter about not doing so.

That arguement is silly and someone who does not understand the bigger picture and assumes because someone arbitrarily calls it "commercial" that it is better and cheaper. 

Fact:  government is mainly an oversight function in Shuttle today and does not "turn wrenches", etc in that world.  While NASA is present, if you eliminated them, it would not make that big of a difference.  There are other ways to reduce costs through other efficienties.

Your putting your words in my mouth - yuck! Tastes awful.

Has nothing to do with "commercial being better" or "wrenches".

I can't believe you are this experienced and yet naive as to the difference between competitively bid multiple commercial and govt developed. It is more likely this is merely slander to cloud the issue.
Hope it makes you feel good.

Govt bid/management/development can deny realities and lock out competition - Ares I project kept an operational Delta IVH from being considered for a similar role. 

Paying 9B for a capability you've had for years is an incredible waste.

Multiple commercial can keep each other in check.

[mmeijeri]

Ross also writes that below that same threshold, EELV is less expensive per kilogram delivered to the lunar surface than with EELV. Therefore this is a bean counting conclusion, not an ideological conclusion.

It's ridiculous not to compare to EELV Phase 1.

[William Barton]

The 4% quote is meaningless. The Federal budget is so many times larger as a percentage of GDP now than it was then that number has no meaning. The pie is so much bigger now than it once was that money is not really the issue, it is one's vision of the future that matters.

This is a decision based first on the political will of the leadership to do something. Or do nothing of any significance. Or end something of significance.

I've been hearing this line of thought (that NASA's budget is such a small part of the overall federal pie that adding huge amounts to it shouldn't be a problem) for literally half of my life.  I even remember writing a "persuasive writing" paper on just this topic for my freshman English class back in 96.  Between this argument and $5 you *might* be able to get lunch somewhere.

Even though NASA is only 0.6% or whatever of the federal budget, the problem is that most people still think it's 10-20% or more of the budget.  And that in spite of over a decade and a half of space people trying to "educate" the public on this matter.  If Obama tried to boost the NASA budget anywhere near the amount that would be necessary to recreate the situation that enabled Apollo, he'd be politically crucified by his enemies in Congress.  Even a $3B increase like what the A-com wanted would've exposed him (and by extension NASA) to all sorts of political attacks at a time when he couldn't afford it.  No, he's not going to sacrifice himself to enable aerospace engineers to relive their 1960s glory days.  If people heard that Obama was going to say double the HSF budget (about what would be required to enable a "within this decade" return to the Moon), they would think he was increasing the federal budget by 10, 20 or more.

Even if they're dead wrong, that doesn't really matter.  The damage can easily be done long before the truth has a chance to even put on its shoes.

People who think Obama could've just added $3B to the NASA budget without repercussions are living in a fantasy world.

~Jon

For whatever reason, people can't get the real budget numbers through there heads. I suspect it's because of a feature I've seen in many people: when you confront them with facts that run counter to whatever fantasy most appeals to them, they say, "That doesn't make sense!" And then, even in the face of proof, they go back to believing in their fantasy.

Here and elsewhere, recently, I've gone through the exercise of demonstrating the US education budget is over 50 times larger than the NASA budget (over $1trl vs. less than $20bln) and it never penetrates. People just start making up excuses for why that should be so. But it was always true. As far back as 1970, I was encountering people who would not believe NASA wasn't consuming more money than healthcare, education, and all entitlement programs combined. When I demonstrated, with a real budget document provided by a then-trusted source (the Washington Post) that the DoD budget and the HEW* budget were about equal, and that both were many, many times NASA's budget, the puzzled response was, "No, there's obviously something wrong here. We must be missing something, because that can't be right." In other words, their desired outcome trumped reality. That may simply be human nature.

My favorite Pushkin quote, as always: "The falsehood that exalts we cherish more than meaner truths that are a thousand strong."

* HEW was an old cabinet post, now broken to multiple departments, that stood for Health, Education, and Welfare. I was sorry to see it go, because I thought it helped to see all the money for it piled in one place.

[clb22]

Old plan: HLV by 2020.
New plan: HLV by 2030.

En contraire:
Old plan: no funding at all for HLV until 2015, HLV ready in the 2020s
New plan: up to 3bn funding for an HLV to 2015, HLV maybe before 2020