Privatization, ISS and so on
Alexander Sheppard
enough to post as a seperate message.
rpou...@yahoo.com (Rich Pournelle) wrote in message news:<619c2c5a.04012...@posting.google.com>...
> Is the ISS another Concorde or Space Shuttle that will never survive
> outside captivity (government subsidies)? Or is the ISS like DARPANET
> in the early days - a government resource that can be privatized to
> start an industry? I have heard the ISS is mostly very old technology
> for things like life support because NASA would only let the Russians
> use proven technology.
>
> Assuming you had low cost to orbit through mass ELVs or some sort of
> RLV how much would it cost to keep the ISS running? How much could you
> make off things like long-duration microgravity and tourism? Can you
> make a case that the number will ever add up?
It doesn't make sense to keep ISS running, because the design
structure is inherently flawed, maybe among other reasons. In fact,
the design structure is absolutely ridiculous.
I think it should be understood that corporations, contractors I mean,
have been doing the work on all these wildly inefficient projects; of
course they've been supported with government money, but it is not
primarily NASA's staff that does the work, at least on the big
projects.
It really hasn't been understood, quite purposefully in my view, that
a big function of NASA is to support industry--in other words,
corporate welfare. That is the reason for what they call "pork".
The corporate-government partnership is how the US has developed the
large majority of its important technical innovations in the last 50
years. Especially through the military.
To a large extent long-term research doesn't happen without government
subsidy. There are a lot of ideologues who want to privatize
everything, but nobody will ever do it, because it becomes obvious
that it would cause economic collapse.
I find it rather odd, just to note, the whole "privatization" idea. In
NASA's case this would apparently just mean ceasing government
subsidy. Apparently, we are going to go into space faster if there is
$15 billion less money going toward space projects in this country.
You really have to be a fanatic to believe such nonsense.
Joe Strout
alexande...@hotmail.com (Alexander Sheppard) wrote:
> I find it rather odd, just to note, the whole "privatization" idea. In
> NASA's case this would apparently just mean ceasing government
> subsidy. Apparently, we are going to go into space faster if there is
> $15 billion less money going toward space projects in this country.
> You really have to be a fanatic to believe such nonsense.
No, you have to be weak on real arguments to set up such a straw-man.
:) Here is the straw-man:
> Apparently, we are going to go into space faster if there is
> $15 billion less money going toward space projects in this country.
...which of course, is pretty much nonsense. But it has nothing to do
with the privatization idea, which holds that if the government would
quit impeding commercial progress (through subsidized monopolies,
unreasonable regulations, etc.), then private industry would pour far
more than $15B into space projects in this country, and accomplish far
more for each dollar spent.
,------------------------------------------------------------------.
| Joseph J. Strout Check out the Mac Web Directory: |
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Alexander Sheppard
> In article <35b6b360.04020...@posting.google.com>,
> alexande...@hotmail.com (Alexander Sheppard) wrote:
>
> > I find it rather odd, just to note, the whole "privatization" idea. In
> > NASA's case this would apparently just mean ceasing government
> > subsidy. Apparently, we are going to go into space faster if there is
> > $15 billion less money going toward space projects in this country.
> > You really have to be a fanatic to believe such nonsense.
>
> No, you have to be weak on real arguments to set up such a straw-man.
> :) Here is the straw-man:
>
> > Apparently, we are going to go into space faster if there is
> > $15 billion less money going toward space projects in this country.
>
> ...which of course, is pretty much nonsense. But it has nothing to do
> with the privatization idea, which holds that if the government would
> quit impeding commercial progress (through subsidized monopolies,
> unreasonable regulations, etc.), then private industry would pour far
> more than $15B into space projects in this country, and accomplish far
> more for each dollar spent.
This is something that a number of people have said before, and I
really don't understand it. I mean, here you've this vast government
apparatus, and they are handing out contracts and grants and all this
stuff, and people are saying, you take all that away, and somehow the
efficient guys are suddenly going to wake up and say, wait, now it is
time to do this?
I certainly agree there is a lot of corruption but it seems like the
logical solution is to purge the corruption, not destroy the whole
system. Then I think you'd end up with nothing at all. An inefficient,
corrupt space program is better than no space program. I tend to
conclude this kind of "privatization" idea is just totally suicidal. I
don't think it is really worth debunking in itself, because ruling
elites know very well it would cause economic collapse, and won't let
that occur. But I think it does tend to provide ideological cover for
real corrupt practices that need to be gotten rid of, in other words,
corporate welfare (how far you can proceed in that direction depends
on the external political situation). When they talk privatization,
they mean spilling NASA funds into Lockheed's pocket, for bullshit
like the X-33. That's privatization in the real world. It's just that
type of thing that needs to be gotten rid of--we need to restore
NASA's power to boss around these giant corporations. Otherwise the
corporations will simply leech the system dry, at the expense of
useful long-term projects. Observe the last 30 years.
There are a lot of external political things I could say about this,
but I suppose I'll just keep it in the context of a limited space
enthusiast movement for now.
John Schilling
>Joe Strout <j...@strout.net> wrote in message news:<joe-1B70F7.1...@comcast.ash.giganews.com>...
>> > Apparently, we are going to go into space faster if there is
>> > $15 billion less money going toward space projects in this country.
>> ...which of course, is pretty much nonsense. But it has nothing to do
>> with the privatization idea, which holds that if the government would
>> quit impeding commercial progress (through subsidized monopolies,
>> unreasonable regulations, etc.), then private industry would pour far
>> more than $15B into space projects in this country, and accomplish far
>> more for each dollar spent.
>This is something that a number of people have said before, and I
>really don't understand it. I mean, here you've this vast government
>apparatus, and they are handing out contracts and grants and all this
>stuff, and people are saying, you take all that away, and somehow the
>efficient guys are suddenly going to wake up and say, wait, now it is
>time to do this?
Some of the efficient guys have been saying that for a while now.
But all the economic efficiency in the world, won't close your business
plan if you are competing against a tax-subsidized monopoly. Consider,
by analogy, the case of public vs. private schools. So long as public
schools exist, freely available to everyone and paid for by taxes paid
by everyone (whether they use the public schools or not), private schools
are a niche market. Eliminate public schooling outright (note: this is
an economic thought experiment, *not* an actual proposal) and you will
find a lot more private schools and a lot more money in the private-school
industry.
Not to the extent of complete replacement of the present public school
systems - some parents would rather pocket the windfall, and figure
eighteen years of watching television is just fine for preparing their
kids to collect their welfare checks. But neither would it simply be
a matter of the existing private schools continuing without change or
expansion while nobody exploits the opportunies presented by a suddenly
underserved market.
OK, I cheated a bit by pointing the analogy at an industry with rather
less demand elasticity than spaceflight. But you get the idea.
>I certainly agree there is a lot of corruption but it seems like the
>logical solution is to purge the corruption, not destroy the whole
>system.
But there isn't a lot of corruption in NASA and friends. The problem,
is the massive inefficiency, which is not the same thing. Indeed, much
of the inefficiency stems from anticorruption measures. Things like
civil service tenure, mandatory competitive bidding, etc. A NASA where
the corrupt program manager could collect megabucks in bribes and kickbacks
from his preferred contractors, but could be thrown out on the street if
he didn't successfully meet the program goals, schedule, and budget,
might well be preferable to the present version, or even to the wholly
corruption-free NASA that the present rules strive to create.
Corruption, we can purge from the system if necessary. Inefficiency,
isn't a contaminant in the plumbing but is intrinsic to the structure.
There is no purge for it.
--
*John Schilling * "Anything worth doing, *
*Member:AIAA,NRA,ACLU,SAS,LP * is worth doing for money" *
*Chief Scientist & General Partner * -13th Rule of Acquisition *
*White Elephant Research, LLC * "There is no substitute *
*schi...@spock.usc.edu * for success" *
*661-951-9107 or 661-275-6795 * -58th Rule of Acquisition *
Jason Donahue
"John Schilling" <schi...@spock.usc.edu> wrote in message
news:bvmq9k$s3d$1...@spock.usc.edu...
The problem I see with this idea, though, is that, for private enterprise to
want to do something, there has to be a market for it. In other words, the
only way they'll drop money into a project is if they expect to get more
money back than they put in.
Where's the profit in space? Well, we have communications satellites,
ranging from telephone, to TV, XM Radio, etc. GPS navigation is another.
Beyond that, though? I could see power generation, either those big solar
power stations or He3 from the Moon fueling fusion plants. There's also the
whole mining thing, in the form of stripping asteroids, etc.
What about manned missions? Or those wonderful robotic probes like Galileo,
or the Hubble Space Telescope, or the Voyagers, etc.? Where's the profit in
them? Oh, sure, there's the tremendous amount of knowledge we gain, yes.
But, I'm referring to financial profits. Remember, that's what private
industry needs in order to invest in projects.
>
> >I certainly agree there is a lot of corruption but it seems like the
> >logical solution is to purge the corruption, not destroy the whole
> >system.
>
> But there isn't a lot of corruption in NASA and friends. The problem,
> is the massive inefficiency, which is not the same thing. Indeed, much
> of the inefficiency stems from anticorruption measures. Things like
> civil service tenure, mandatory competitive bidding, etc. A NASA where
> the corrupt program manager could collect megabucks in bribes and
kickbacks
> from his preferred contractors, but could be thrown out on the street if
> he didn't successfully meet the program goals, schedule, and budget,
> might well be preferable to the present version, or even to the wholly
> corruption-free NASA that the present rules strive to create.
>
> Corruption, we can purge from the system if necessary. Inefficiency,
> isn't a contaminant in the plumbing but is intrinsic to the structure.
> There is no purge for it.
>
I agree and disagree. I'm stunned and amazed I'm about to argue this, but
efficiency isn't all it's cracked up to be, at least in this case.
Turning things over completely to private enterprise, as I mentioned above,
means corporations will run lean budgets to accomplish their goals, but
those goals will only be those that'll turn a tidy profit. Pure science and
exploration won't be terribly profitable. Hell, in the short term, they
won't be profitable at all. The only way they'd make any of the money back
is with spinoff technologies, which, again, won't be profitable in the
short-term.
Like it or not, there are certain projects that're best left in the hands of
government, not because the government knows best, but because it (ideally)
represents the collective goals, ideals, and desires of the people...
...which brings me to my next point. You could fund space exploration
through taxes, and have private firms do all the work. Problem, then, is
you need someone to oversee the corporations, and to decide and work out
what it is we want them to do. How is that different from NASA?
--Jason
Joe Strout
"Jason Donahue" <jdonahue-nospam-@websown-nospam-.com> wrote:
> The problem I see with this idea, though, is that, for private enterprise to
> want to do something, there has to be a market for it. In other words, the
> only way they'll drop money into a project is if they expect to get more
> money back than they put in.
True.
> Where's the profit in space? Well, we have communications satellites,
> ranging from telephone, to TV, XM Radio, etc. GPS navigation is another.
> Beyond that, though?
Surely you can't have been hanging around in this newsgroup for long if
you haven't heard the answers already. Tourism is probably the big one,
and fortunately, also the easiest to enter (since there is a substantial
market even for small suborbital flights). But of course there are
other kinds of satellite delivery, too -- for example, scientific
satellites. The government can be a customer even if it's not a launch
provider.
> What about manned missions? Or those wonderful robotic probes like Galileo,
> or the Hubble Space Telescope, or the Voyagers, etc.? Where's the profit in
> them?
Manned missions: I assume you're thinking about science here. Well,
when there is a robust tourist industry, no doubt some of the "tourists"
will be scientists, doing research rather than snapping photos for the
grandkids. Robotic probes: they can be launched by commercial launchers
just like communications satellites. The funding would ultimately come
from some government agency, but the profit would go to the launcher.
> Turning things over completely to private enterprise, as I mentioned above,
> means corporations will run lean budgets to accomplish their goals, but
> those goals will only be those that'll turn a tidy profit. Pure science and
> exploration won't be terribly profitable. Hell, in the short term, they
> won't be profitable at all.
And that's OK. Pure science and exploration, which isn't important
enough to be funded at its true cost, can wait until those costs come
down. And the costs *will* come down if we can get some health & vigor
into the industry (as recently seems to be happening, and further
privatization might assist).
> Like it or not, there are certain projects that're best left in the hands of
> government, not because the government knows best, but because it (ideally)
> represents the collective goals, ideals, and desires of the people...
Sure. But there's no reason those projects should interfere with a
vibrant industry.
> ...which brings me to my next point. You could fund space exploration
> through taxes, and have private firms do all the work. Problem, then, is
> you need someone to oversee the corporations, and to decide and work out
> what it is we want them to do. How is that different from NASA?
Superficially, not much. The problem is the way NASA chooses winning
companies and technologies.
Jason Donahue
> In article <101ueik...@corp.supernews.com>,
> "Jason Donahue" <jdonahue-nospam-@websown-nospam-.com> wrote:
>
> > The problem I see with this idea, though, is that, for private
enterprise to
> > want to do something, there has to be a market for it. In other words,
the
> > only way they'll drop money into a project is if they expect to get more
> > money back than they put in.
>
> True.
>
> > Where's the profit in space? Well, we have communications satellites,
> > ranging from telephone, to TV, XM Radio, etc. GPS navigation is
another.
> > Beyond that, though?
>
> Surely you can't have been hanging around in this newsgroup for long if
> you haven't heard the answers already. Tourism is probably the big one,
> and fortunately, also the easiest to enter (since there is a substantial
> market even for small suborbital flights). But of course there are
> other kinds of satellite delivery, too -- for example, scientific
> satellites. The government can be a customer even if it's not a launch
> provider.
>
You are correct - I haven't been around this group for terribly long.
However, I've certainly heard the space tourism approach. I wholeheartedly
agree that it's certainly a good way to make money in space - I'm sure
Russia made bank on Tito's flight, and suborbital flights could prove a
fantastic money-maker.
But, at the same time, I'm also talking about science and exploration, as
you note below. There really isn't a profit there.
> > What about manned missions? Or those wonderful robotic probes like
Galileo,
> > or the Hubble Space Telescope, or the Voyagers, etc.? Where's the
profit in
> > them?
>
> Manned missions: I assume you're thinking about science here. Well,
> when there is a robust tourist industry, no doubt some of the "tourists"
> will be scientists, doing research rather than snapping photos for the
> grandkids. Robotic probes: they can be launched by commercial launchers
> just like communications satellites. The funding would ultimately come
> from some government agency, but the profit would go to the launcher.
>
But, again, we're not talking about pushing out our boundaries, are we? I
see no sign of people going anywhere beyond LEO, or *maybe* the Moon, going
this route.
> > Turning things over completely to private enterprise, as I mentioned
above,
> > means corporations will run lean budgets to accomplish their goals, but
> > those goals will only be those that'll turn a tidy profit. Pure science
and
> > exploration won't be terribly profitable. Hell, in the short term, they
> > won't be profitable at all.
>
> And that's OK. Pure science and exploration, which isn't important
> enough to be funded at its true cost, can wait until those costs come
> down. And the costs *will* come down if we can get some health & vigor
> into the industry (as recently seems to be happening, and further
> privatization might assist).
>
I think you're off on this, actually. I'd expect to see manned exploration
stagnate, should we go this route. Robotic exploration, perhaps, would do
well.
> > Like it or not, there are certain projects that're best left in the
hands of
> > government, not because the government knows best, but because it
(ideally)
> > represents the collective goals, ideals, and desires of the people...
>
> Sure. But there's no reason those projects should interfere with a
> vibrant industry.
>
Agreed. However, that wasn't what I was addressing. I was addressing those
who say that space exploration should *only* be handled by private
enterprise, and that government should stay the hell out of it. It's a
refrain I'm hearing sung more and more these days.
> > ...which brings me to my next point. You could fund space exploration
> > through taxes, and have private firms do all the work. Problem, then,
is
> > you need someone to oversee the corporations, and to decide and work out
> > what it is we want them to do. How is that different from NASA?
>
> Superficially, not much. The problem is the way NASA chooses winning
> companies and technologies.
>
Could you expand on that?
--Jason
Alexander Sheppard
> But all the economic efficiency in the world, won't close your business
> plan if you are competing against a tax-subsidized monopoly. Consider,
> by analogy, the case of public vs. private schools. So long as public
> schools exist, freely available to everyone and paid for by taxes paid
> by everyone (whether they use the public schools or not), private schools
> are a niche market. Eliminate public schooling outright (note: this is
> an economic thought experiment, *not* an actual proposal) and you will
> find a lot more private schools and a lot more money in the private-school
> industry.
>
> Not to the extent of complete replacement of the present public school
> systems - some parents would rather pocket the windfall, and figure
> eighteen years of watching television is just fine for preparing their
> kids to collect their welfare checks. But neither would it simply be
> a matter of the existing private schools continuing without change or
> expansion while nobody exploits the opportunies presented by a suddenly
> underserved market.
>
>
> OK, I cheated a bit by pointing the analogy at an industry with rather
> less demand elasticity than spaceflight. But you get the idea.
I think that might be pretty important.
> But there isn't a lot of corruption in NASA and friends. The problem,
> is the massive inefficiency, which is not the same thing. Indeed, much
> of the inefficiency stems from anticorruption measures. Things like
> civil service tenure, mandatory competitive bidding, etc. A NASA where
> the corrupt program manager could collect megabucks in bribes and kickbacks
> from his preferred contractors, but could be thrown out on the street if
> he didn't successfully meet the program goals, schedule, and budget,
> might well be preferable to the present version, or even to the wholly
> corruption-free NASA that the present rules strive to create.
I don't mean necessarily corruption as in companies stealing from
NASA, although I'm betting that this does happen from time to time,
since it certainly does happen in the DoD--there are stories, if you
listen closely enough, about billions of dollars simply vanishing from
the books, and never being accounted for (I invite you to research
this rather astounding assertion for yourself).
Anyway, what I'm more refering to is a corrupt structure--legal
corruption. A big purpose of NASA, right from the Apollo years, has
been to work with private industry, essentially to beef them up. I
mean, you can find administrators saying, we have to work closely with
private industry, all the way back to Apollo. I don't think anybody
has ever said the role should be to compete with private industry. If
anybody ever said that, even hinted at that, I think they'd be thrown
out in a minute. This is borne out by the facts. NASA's staff doesn't
do most of the work. Lockheed, Boeing, and cousins do it, at least on
the big projects. In fact they do the vast majority of the work. And
they make a huge amount from it--not nearly as much as from the
military, but still a huge sum in ordinary terms.
This is how space work has been done--in fact, it is how essentially
all high tech R&D work has been done in the past 50 years on projects
incapable of making a short term profit (that point is in my view very
important). Historically the biggest donor has been the military. I
wonder, do you think they are inefficient? Often the military is the
sole government organization to escape the criticism of privatizers.
Alexander Sheppard
> The problem I see with this idea, though, is that, for private enterprise to
> want to do something, there has to be a market for it. In other words, the
> only way they'll drop money into a project is if they expect to get more
> money back than they put in.
>
> Where's the profit in space? Well, we have communications satellites,
> ranging from telephone, to TV, XM Radio, etc. GPS navigation is another.
> Beyond that, though? I could see power generation, either those big solar
> power stations or He3 from the Moon fueling fusion plants. There's also the
> whole mining thing, in the form of stripping asteroids, etc.
This is a problem that has been recognized for a long time by those in
industry. The "free market" apparently does not work without extensive
state subsidy. In the United States, a lot of the subsidy that has
supported the kind of long term, unprofitable-in-the-short-term stuff
that you're discussing has come from the military, and from companies
which wouldn't be profitable if not for the military (you read about
how the military has assisted Boeing the Wall Street Journal, they've
run a bunch of articles about it in the past several months). Some of
it has also come from things like NSF and NIH, though I don't know too
much about those. Meanwhile in places like Europe and Japan, they do
it largely through non-military, civilian avenues, which are in many
ways more efficient.
Henry Spencer
Jason Donahue <jdonahue-nospam-@websown-nospam-.com> wrote:
>or the Hubble Space Telescope, or the Voyagers, etc.? Where's the profit in
>them? Oh, sure, there's the tremendous amount of knowledge we gain, yes.
>But, I'm referring to financial profits. Remember, that's what private
>industry needs in order to invest in projects.
Price a Mars expedition low enough that the National Geographic Society
can afford it, and they will pay the profit-making company to do it. Not
*everybody* insists on profits; there are non-profit corporations, and
they routinely buy services from more ordinary corporations.
>...which brings me to my next point. You could fund space exploration
>through taxes, and have private firms do all the work. Problem, then, is
>you need someone to oversee the corporations, and to decide and work out
>what it is we want them to do. How is that different from NASA?
How many people do you need to "oversee" your local grocery store? Its
owners may oversee it, but the *customers* don't, with the possible
exception of occasional inspections for things like sanitation.
Much of the problem with NASA is precisely that it sees its staff as the
lords of spaceflight and its contractors as indentured servants. This is
not anything resembling a normal business relationship. NASA does all the
initial design work, makes all the major decisions, supervises all the
detail work, supplies the crews, and calls the shots. The key to becoming
a NASA contractor is not making better products at lower prices, but
divining what size of bolt NASA has decided to use to hold the armrests on
the crew couches, and "proposing" exactly that size in your bid.
As I've noted before, if the government wants to put Americans back on the
Moon and is willing to spend (say) ten billion to make it happen, much the
most effective way is to simply announce that the next hundred Americans
to walk on the Moon will each be given $100M. It will be the biggest
stampede you've ever seen, and nobody will have to "oversee" anybody.
More mundanely, consider having NASA announce that starting in 2010, each
year it will buy 20 round-trip tickets to the Moon from the lowest bidder,
bids not to exceed $50M/ticket. If concerned about safety, stipulate that
each year, one of those tickets will be used to fly a randomly-selected
senior executive of the spaceline, refusal being grounds for cancellation
of the contract.
--
MOST launched 30 June; science observations running | Henry Spencer
since Oct; first surprises seen; papers pending. | he...@spsystems.net
Jon Berndt
> ...
> I mean, you can find administrators saying, we have to work closely with
> private industry, all the way back to Apollo. I don't think anybody
> has ever said the role should be to compete with private industry. If
> anybody ever said that, even hinted at that, I think they'd be thrown
> out in a minute. This is borne out by the facts. NASA's staff doesn't
> do most of the work. Lockheed, Boeing, and cousins do it, at least on
> the big projects. In fact they do the vast majority of the work. And
> they make a huge amount from it--not nearly as much as from the
> military, but still a huge sum in ordinary terms.
So ... are you saying that if NASA itself did the work (i.e. hired bunches
of engineers, built the infrastructure to construct spacecraft, built the
tooling, bought the machines, etc. - i.e. did *everything* the contractors
are now paid to do - then laid off the workforce when the work was done)
that it would get done cheaper? Lots cheaper? The meaning is: how high do
you think the profit margin is on these projects?
Jon
Jon Berndt
> Much of the problem with NASA is precisely that it sees its staff as the
> lords of spaceflight and its contractors as indentured servants. This is
> not anything resembling a normal business relationship. NASA does all the
> initial design work, makes all the major decisions, supervises all the
> detail work, supplies the crews, and calls the shots. The key to becoming
> a NASA contractor is not making better products at lower prices, but
> divining what size of bolt NASA has decided to use to hold the armrests on
> the crew couches, and "proposing" exactly that size in your bid.
That's one of the worst and most disingenuous generalizations I've seen. It
could very well be true in some cases, but not in my experience.
> As I've noted before, if the government wants to put Americans back on the
> Moon and is willing to spend (say) ten billion to make it happen, much the
> most effective way is to simply announce that the next hundred Americans
> to walk on the Moon will each be given $100M. It will be the biggest
> stampede you've ever seen, and nobody will have to "oversee" anybody.
A nice fiction, but considering that Boeing, Airbus, etc. spend several
billion each on crafting new subsonic, atmospheric airliners - once enough
customers have already been lined up - I have a hard time buying this story.
A hundred million wouldn't even cover a big booster launch. Am I missing
your point?
Jon
Rand Simberg
Berndt" <j...@at.hal-pc-dot.org> made the phosphor on my monitor glow
in such a way as to indicate that:
>> As I've noted before, if the government wants to put Americans back on the
>> Moon and is willing to spend (say) ten billion to make it happen, much the
>> most effective way is to simply announce that the next hundred Americans
>> to walk on the Moon will each be given $100M. It will be the biggest
>> stampede you've ever seen, and nobody will have to "oversee" anybody.
>
>A nice fiction, but considering that Boeing, Airbus, etc. spend several
>billion each on crafting new subsonic, atmospheric airliners - once enough
>customers have already been lined up - I have a hard time buying this story.
>A hundred million wouldn't even cover a big booster launch. Am I missing
>your point?
Apparently. There's a huge difference in cost in building something
that has to be certified by the FAA for public transport, and
something built to deliver adventurous individuals to the moon.
Jon Berndt
> Berndt" <j...@at.hal-pc-dot.org> made the phosphor on my monitor glow
> >
> >A nice fiction, but considering that Boeing, Airbus, etc. spend several
> >billion each on crafting new subsonic, atmospheric airliners - once
enough
> >customers have already been lined up - I have a hard time buying this
story.
> >A hundred million wouldn't even cover a big booster launch. Am I missing
> >your point?
>
> Apparently. There's a huge difference in cost in building something
> that has to be certified by the FAA for public transport, and
> something built to deliver adventurous individuals to the moon.
And $100 million is supposed to be a carrot here? How much has Rutan spent
just to get supersonic and a few tens of miles up?
Jon
Rand Simberg
>> >A hundred million wouldn't even cover a big booster launch. Am I missing
>> >your point?
>>
>> Apparently. There's a huge difference in cost in building something
>> that has to be certified by the FAA for public transport, and
>> something built to deliver adventurous individuals to the moon.
>
>And $100 million is supposed to be a carrot here? How much has Rutan spent
>just to get supersonic and a few tens of miles up?
About twenty six million so far, so rumor has it.
I don't think that a hundred million would be sufficient today, but in
a few years, after LEO costs have been reduced with
hundred-million-dollar prizes, it would be perfecly adequate.
Jon Berndt
> On Fri, 13 Feb 2004 07:51:16 -0600, in a place far, far away, "Jon
> Berndt" <j...@at.hal-pc-dot.org> made the phosphor on my monitor glow
> in such a way as to indicate that:
>
> >And $100 million is supposed to be a carrot here? How much has Rutan
spent
> >just to get supersonic and a few tens of miles up?
>
> About twenty six million so far, so rumor has it.
>
> I don't think that a hundred million would be sufficient today, but in
> a few years, after LEO costs have been reduced with
> hundred-million-dollar prizes, it would be perfecly adequate.
One can hope ...
Jon
Alexander Sheppard
> of engineers, built the infrastructure to construct spacecraft, built the
> tooling, bought the machines, etc. - i.e. did *everything* the contractors
> are now paid to do - then laid off the workforce when the work was done)
> that it would get done cheaper? Lots cheaper? The meaning is: how high do
> you think the profit margin is on these projects?
Oh, I think if you simply eliminated the profit margin you probably
wouldn't make huge strides in reducing cost. I definitely don't want
NASA doing everything the contractors are now paid to do--because much
of what they are now paid to do is completely unnecessary, very
inefficient, and exists in large part to keep them alive. In my view
the biggest savings would come as a result of eliminating these
worthless activities, which include the Shuttle and the ISS, probably
as well as some field centers and many other more minor things.
Alex Terrell
Henry said $100 million per person. Now if I were the first
corporation to put a man on the moon under this contract, I'd also be
favourite to the second, third etc. Economies of scale mean one
corporation would put 90 men on the moon, and a second would put 10.
Just like Intel and AMD.
Alex Terrell
> As I've noted before, if the government wants to put Americans back on the
> Moon and is willing to spend (say) ten billion to make it happen, much the
> most effective way is to simply announce that the next hundred Americans
> to walk on the Moon will each be given $100M. It will be the biggest
> stampede you've ever seen, and nobody will have to "oversee" anybody.
>
> More mundanely, consider having NASA announce that starting in 2010, each
> year it will buy 20 round-trip tickets to the Moon from the lowest bidder,
> bids not to exceed $50M/ticket. If concerned about safety, stipulate that
> each year, one of those tickets will be used to fly a randomly-selected
> senior executive of the spaceline, refusal being grounds for cancellation
> of the contract.
More mundanely yet, if NASA wants to put 10 tons on the moon every
three months, that needs about 75 tons in LEO each time . So they put
out a contract for this amount for the next 2-3 years, and make it
clear that this will continue. Then:
- Boeing will offer 3 times 8 Delta IV-H at about $100 million a pop
(compared to current list price of $250 million)
- Arianespace and LM will offer something similar
- Some smart guy will take over the shuttle production and offer 8
Shuttle C launches
Meanwhile, Mr Musk and Kistler will have no problem funding their next
genration rockets.
Later, NASA can extend the contract to be 20 tons in Lunar orbit. Then
Tethers Unlimited will be able to fund a rotovator / bolo; and so on.
Michael Walsh
Rand Simberg wrote:
I keep reading these assumptions but so far there has been no
evidence to back this up. I do note that you didn't mention which
way the huge difference cost went.
Considering the differences in required technology and admitting
there is additional cost required for certification is still hard to
see how building from scratch and heading for the moon either
enough times or in a quite large vehicle is going to come out
cheaper than the $10 billion mentioned.
Mike Walsh
Michael Walsh
Rand Simberg wrote:
> On Fri, 13 Feb 2004 07:51:16 -0600, in a place far, far away, "Jon
> Berndt" <j...@at.hal-pc-dot.org> made the phosphor on my monitor glow
> in such a way as to indicate that:
>
> >> >A hundred million wouldn't even cover a big booster launch. Am I missing
> >> >your point?
> >>
> >> Apparently. There's a huge difference in cost in building something
> >> that has to be certified by the FAA for public transport, and
> >> something built to deliver adventurous individuals to the moon.
> >
> >And $100 million is supposed to be a carrot here? How much has Rutan spent
> >just to get supersonic and a few tens of miles up?
> About twenty six million so far, so rumor has it.
In a way Rutan is the "NASA" of the X-Prize contenders. He has built a
unique combination of vehicles. I don't know if he has any plans for
Spaceship 1, but "White Knight" might very well have other possible
applications.
For a low cost approach Armadillo Aerospace looks as if it really cuts
cost to the bone, but they might have been better off on a time scale
proposition to buy an engine. I can see them having a wealth of
H2O2 engine experience at the end of 2004 and looking for something
to do with it.
> I don't think that a hundred million would be sufficient today, but in
> a few years, after LEO costs have been reduced with
> hundred-million-dollar prizes, it would be perfecly adequate.
If someone comes up with a $100 million prize and a suitably long
term to qualify for it then someone might be willing to risk a few
hundred million because of the possibility of going on from there
to real productive work in space.
One of the objection to accepting the low hundreds of millions of
dollars I have seen quoted by private entrepeneurs is that they don't
publically face up to the costs of actually running the enterprise.
They don't have to for some (not all) of the people in this newsgroup
who seem to believe it is just the cost of additional propellants.
Mike Walsh
Rand Simberg
alexande...@hotmail.com (Alexander Sheppard) made the phosphor
on my monitor glow in such a way as to indicate that:
>> So ... are you saying that if NASA itself did the work (i.e. hired bunches
>> of engineers, built the infrastructure to construct spacecraft, built the
>> tooling, bought the machines, etc. - i.e. did *everything* the contractors
>> are now paid to do - then laid off the workforce when the work was done)
>> that it would get done cheaper? Lots cheaper? The meaning is: how high do
>> you think the profit margin is on these projects?
>
>Oh, I think if you simply eliminated the profit margin you probably
>wouldn't make huge strides in reducing cost.
Yes, you might reduce it by a vast seven percent or so...