Will Bridenstine Reboot The Vision For Space Exploration?
A Pioneering NASA Administrator, Air & Space
“These three “Pioneering Doctrines” embrace a bold statement of purpose for NASA: to extend our reach with machines and people beyond low Earth orbit, into deep space and to the objects of the Solar System. Under such a charter, the mission of the agency becomes nothing less than the opening up of the entire space frontier to exploration, use and development. This was one of the original purposes behind the Vision for Space Exploration in 2004, a goal that got lost in bureaucratic make-work minutiae of objectives and roadmaps. By maintaining and holding firm to a clear vision of space development beyond low Earth orbit, NASA can push the envelope while at the same time offering practical value for its cost.”
It’s not a bad agenda, as long as it doesn’t involve cuts to planetary science or the robotic science missions. Spudis of course loves it because he thinks it will re-direct the human spaceflight program to setting up a moon base (and I sympathize with that aim, especially since there are other countries’ space programs that are interested in human lunar presences).
That said, I am worried that he’ll try and cut valuable robotic science missions for this. Congress does not appear inclined to give NASA any more funding, and SLS is already eating up whatever money for human spaceflight isn’t being spent on ISS and the bone they throw to the commercial crew companies.
Vision reboot? Sounds promising to me. But this time – I hope it would be done with pragmatism and clear-thinking…
The original vision as put forth was a series of sound ideas and comprised a strategy and plan. The next step was to figure out how best to implement so that industry and commerce could partner with the government, so that the system was designed to be robust, and relatively inexpensive to use and to grow. Constellation was none of those things. Constellation was an attempt to put boots back on the moon with a system that was not too dissimilar from Apollo. NASA, Griffin and the Constellation managers should have learned the Apollo lesson-it was too expensive and ultimately unsupportable. So if they want to reinstate the vision, they better figure out what that means.
Yeah it wasn’t a bad blueprint and template. The implementation was absolutely FUBAR – and that screw up is entirely NASA’s fault, cant blame politics. In fact, VSE was the best soft pitch ever thrown them for hitting it out of the park.
It was never implemented at all. O’Keefe was offered his “dream job” the only job he was willing to leave NASA for and by coincidence was in the same state who’s NASA center Michoud would have been turned into a ghost town under the VSE. So the congress got rid of him and brought in their new congressional hatchet man, Griffin, and he sliced and diced the VSE’s no new rockets into not one new rocket . but TWO ..
And the congressional porkonauts got their new gravy train…
I disagree on ‘never implemented’. I think the initial industry collaboration kicked off by Steidle was actually decent progress. Slower than many would have liked, but it resulted in solid proposals, almost a industry wide consensus how to go about things and good formation of alliances to start the implementation.
Yep. The industry does support expendable hardware.
Yes but the proposales came to nothing. Griffin ended all that .. O’Keefe was not planing on an Ares I and V ..
Griffin immediately called for “The 60 day Study” – with that Griffin determined that EELV’s were both to expensive and not safe. That study became the foundations for the ESAS. That changed the entire VSE.
The VSE failed because of 3 flaws introduced at the last minute by the 2000s Congress:
1) “return to the moon by 2020” 2) “in preparation for human exploration to Mars and other destinations” 3) “NASA does not plan to develop new LV capabilities except where critical NASA needs are not met by commercial or military systems”
1- deadline killed all tech development 2- lunar technology has nothing in common with Mars or other destinations ( Shielding for GCR, bone loss (1/3 vs milli-g), landing heavy objects on Mars or asteroids )
3- ESAS dictated “need” for HLV and FOUR new engine development programs (J2X, 5-seg solids, SSME to RS68 to SSME, liq stap-ons).
When one considers that 80%+ of payload is dirt cheap class D propellant for NASAs missions, and the US and world has excess launch capacity, it is beyond comprehension, that moving the crew to the top with solids on an expendable LV, folks still proclaim: ” by discarding the Shuttle in favor of comm. crew’ we lost capability and saved nothing.” O.M.G. Ares I could not get of the f&$#&%^$ ground because of LAS mass increases due to solids, and NO ONE would launch a 10mT, 1B+ capsule on a 100mT, 1B+ LV, when the alternatives are cheaper and have demonstrated reliability with common configurations.
NASA purpose is to solve the Space Grand Challenges with #1 Economic Access to Space and #2 Long Duration In-Space Travel and then to Explore. So lets ‘take 3 days’ with a 3B/yr expendable rocket 10X more expensive than alternatives to go ‘mooning’, when all the resources came from asteroids not in gravity wells.
Reduce the costs of the LEO satellite constellation by consolidating and increasing the flight rate of reuseable LVs ‘that can land on water’.
SLS and Orion–the gifts that keep on giving.
“For future, sustainable exploration programs, NASA requires cost-effective vehicles that may be reused, have systems that could be applied to more than one destination, and are highly reliable and need only small ground crews. NASA plans to invest in a number of new approaches to exploration, such as robotic networks, modular systems, pre-positioned propellants, advanced power and propulsion, and in-space assembly, that could enable these kinds of vehicles.”
I agree on points 1 & 2 but not this:
“3) “NASA does not plan to develop new LV capabilities except where critical NASA needs are not met by commercial or military systems””
That was exactly about tech development, Just not NASA’s. The intent of the VSE and “The Commercial Space Act 1998” that paved the way for what the VSE called for, was once again the Executive branch trying to move NASA (and the congressional members from space states) away from design development and operations of launch vehicles.
The Bush Administration planned to retire the shuttle, put a down and dirty capsule on an existing EELV and then retire it once commercial crew started.
I truly believe we would have seen work start on a Nautilus-X system but the ESAS killed moving in that direction.
Look at what the VSE stated and tell me if you see a disposable capsule and two disposable rockets, the ARIES I & V “Apollo on steroids” or the Nautilus X
“In the days of the Apollo program, human exploration systems employed expendable, single-use vehicles requiring large ground crews and careful monitoring. For future, sustainable exploration programs, NASA requires cost-effective vehicles that may be reused, have systems that could be applied to more than one destination, and are highly reliable and need only small ground crews. NASA plans to invest in a number of new approaches to exploration, such as robotic networks, modular systems, pre-positioned propellants, advanced power and propulsion, and in-space assembly, that could enable these kinds of vehicles.”
https://www.nasa.gov/pdf/55…
You say that a deadline killed all tech development. Actually it was going to develop tech, but technology more in tuned to a Nautilus-X than a capsule and launch system.
What else the VSE call for? The Jupiter Icy Moons Orbiter
“JIMO was to have a large number of revolutionary features. Throughout its main voyage to the Jupiter moons, it was to be propelled by an ion propulsion system via either the High Power Electric Propulsion or NEXIS engine, and powered by a small fission reactor. A Brayton power conversion system would convert reactor heat into electricity. Providing a thousand times the electrical output of conventional solar- or radioisotope thermoelectric generator (RTG)-based power systems, the reactor was expected to open up opportunities like flying a full scale ice-penetrating radar system and providing a strong, high-bandwidth data transmitter.
Using electric propulsion (8 ion engines, plus Hall thrusters of varying sizes) would make it possible to go into and leave orbits around the moons of Jupiter, creating more thorough observation and mapping windows than exist for current spacecraft, which must make short fly-by maneuvers because of limited fuel for maneuvering.
The design called for the reactor to be positioned in the tip of the spacecraft behind a strong radiation shield protecting sensitive spacecraft equipment. The reactor would only be powered up once the probe was well out of Earth orbit, so that the amount of radionuclides that must be launched into orbit is minimized. This configuration is thought to be less risky than the RTGs used on previous missions to the outer Solar System.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wi…
This was immediately shut down by Congress through their newly appointed hatchet man Griffin. This was a true enabler for moving towards a Nautilus-X type “vehicles” as was stated in that quote I put in from the VSE.
One of the key enabler programs to make JIMO work was Project Prometheus.
“Project Prometheus/Project Promethian was established in 2003 by NASA to develop nuclear-powered systems for long-duration space missions. This was NASA’s first serious foray into nuclear spacecraft propulsion since the cancellation of the SNTP project in 1995. The project was cancelled in 2005.[1] Its budget shrank from $252.6 million in 2005 [2] to only $100 million in 2006, $90 million of which was for closeout costs on cancelled contracts.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wi…
You see THAT was the real technology enabler that was going to take the traditional NASA as a launch operator off the table. Space Based, reusable, modular designed, serviced by fuel depots and be applied to multiple destinations .. or .. The Flexiable Path
The Vision for Space Exploration called for no new rockets for NASA. As long as that boondoggle money pit, the SLS/Orion are sucking all the oxygen and funding out of the room you can not have the VSE.
But how will we keep the hungry wolves in Congress from tearing apart and devouring the budget for any cohesive space strategy, siphoning off the funds and turning the vision into a jobs program for their districts?