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Sequestration, SLS, and Commercial Space

By Keith Cowing
NASA Watch
May 9, 2013
Filed under , , ,

Continued Sequestration Will Short-Circuit SLS, Aviation Week
“Mikulski and Shelby consider that budget request inadequate, particularly in the funding for the heavy-lift Space Launch System (SLS) that is intended to take humans beyond low Earth orbit. NASA wants $820 million to keep at least two competitors in the running for a commercial route to the International Space Station, but many lawmakers would like to see $300 million of that transferred into the $1.385 billion SLS request for fiscal 2014.”

NASA Watch founder, Explorers Club Fellow, ex-NASA, Away Teams, Journalist, Space & Astrobiology, Lapsed climber.

8 responses to “Sequestration, SLS, and Commercial Space”

  1. muomega0 says:
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    “There is a whole shelf-full of studies, going back decades, that
    conclude the best way to move humans beyond low Earth orbit is with a
    heavy-lifter like the SLS. Alternate methods—smaller launchers and
    in-space refueling depots, for example—fly in the face of the lessons
    learned with the dangerous and time-consuming process of building the
    ISS in orbit, and would require new technologies that will cost even
    more money and time. Instead, NASA has decided it wants $105 million in
    new funding to begin work on an asteroid-capture mission that would give
    a focus for near-term human exploration beyond low Earth orbit
    (AW&ST April 29, p. 36).”

    The 2005 ESAS study had the goal to eliminate all 3-launch solutions due to a flawed reliability study. All those studies, if one chooses to read them, were *HLV options only* and they excluded depot centric architectures.

    Separate internal NASA studies concluded the exact opposite, reported
    here on NASA Watch: depot technologies can provide Low Cost Reliable
    Access to Space.
    http://nasawatch.com/archiv
    http://www.spaceref.com/new

    NASA is not building 1,000,000 lb space stations. Exploration is 100,000 kg lunar missions to 450,000 kg Mars missions that are at least 70% propellant. Electric propulsion can reduce the propellant mass for remaining 30% mission payload mass to its destination.

    Perhaps sequestration is exactly what is needed for SLS?

    • Steve Whitfield says:
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      I don’t think it’s safe to generalize since, in general, the more massive a payload is the less likely it is to fit within the fairing of any LV, including on SLS. If we’d had a SLS or Saturn V to build the ISS with, I don’t think it would have been assembled any differently than it was. And if you wanted to build something larger in size, even in a single dimension, then again SLS or Saturn V wouldn’t have gained you anything.

      Whether we’re looking at the LV end or the lander/station end of things, the “best” solution for any component is entirely dependent on the case by case program requirements details.

      • muomega0 says:
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        Each of the hardware pieces of the lunar or mars architectures can fit on existing launch vehicles. When one sees weights that do not fit it is usually because it includes the propellant, or multiple pieces of hardware are combined.

        Combing elements is a great way to have some mission appear to be too heavy for the existing fleet and therefore “must be required to launch on a HLV”.

        Staging is key to reduce costs and offloading propellant is the best way to stage exploration missions. Mass examples below.

        Notice that AR&D safety drove the less than 3 launch solution during ESAS. Further, black zones were used to exclude EELV.


        The second issue is average annual mass to orbit is the key driver for launch vehicles. Two lunar sorties missions like Apollo is 2X 120,000 kg. A simple rule of thumb is to divide the mass per year by 10 to size a LV, so for a single LV its size should be 24,000 kg. Mars is 450,000 kg, but it can only occur every other year, so 22,500 kg, about the same size.

        Now consider that the US already has access to Atlas/Delta/Falcon so even for the robust program of ESAS, there is no need for an HLV.


        The third issue is relating mass and volume for high ISP LOX/LH2.

        Liquid Hydrogen is volume limited and even though the mixture ratio is ~6:1 LOX:LH2 by mass, the hydrogen tank has a greater volume than the LOX tank. So it make no sense to use a launch vehicle that can lift a significant mass for something that is volume limited. The good news is that a 7m fairing can be included in the existing fleet and this is more than adequate for mission(s) below 500 mT/year. Again, no HLV 8.4 to 10m fairing required.

        For example, see figure 2 and size of the LH2/LOX tanks from this link:
        http://www.ulalaunch.com/si
        —-
        Lunar and Mars Mass Examples

        Exploration missions are quite different from ISS hardware builds since over 70% of the mass is propellant in the chemical architecture approach.

        so for the lunar hardware:
        Crew capsule 10,000 kg vs Apollo 6, 000 kg)

        Service module 30,000 kg vs (Apollo 23,000 kg, and the Fuel and Oxydizer weighed 18,500 kg, only ~4500kg hardware) .http://history.nasa.gov/alsj/a17/A…

        For the Mars mission, the transhab is about 28,000 kg that includes 13,000 kg of food for a one year trip!

        The mars propulsion modules are about 85% propellant and 15% structure and can be launched empty and filled on orbit to significantly reduce costs.

        • Steve Whitfield says:
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          Each of the hardware pieces of the lunar or mars architectures can fit on existing launch vehicles.

          I can only assume that you’re talking about mission plans from previous studies. Since there are no current mission plans for either the Moon or Mars, I don’t really see how we can make the statement above.

          I think we’re talking at cross purposes here. We appear to agree that a SLS or Saturn V sized LV is not needed. And I’ve tried to take it one step further by saying that if you wanted to launch something that was physically too large in one or more dimensions, they wouldn’t do the job anyhow. I had two reasons for adding that: 1) I’ve seen some people suggesting that you could launch an entire space station, intact, on SLS or and LV with similar mass capacity; and 2) there seems to still be people who are opposed to in space “construction.” I think these two ideas are going to have to be tossed out if we hope to create a livable environment.

          Unless we want to live in tin cans or inflatables that are too small to be your total environment, we have to reject all of the historical mission plans and plan a better way. I don’t think I could ever get used to sleeping in a “place” where I can touch the ceiling while standing on the floor.

          Also consider common equipment that will be needed on site that is far too large to be launched or landed in complete form. As examples: Air/hydrogen/oxygen storage tanks; mass driver rails; distillation/cracking towers; etc. These, and many more, are items that will have to be manufactured in pieces that will fit in a payload fairing, survive a landing at your destination, and then be precision assembled on site.

          We could go on for pages and hours with similar considerations, but it all always comes down to the same thing: until we decide exactly what we’re going to be doing at our destination, in great detail, and determine all of the equipment and processes necessary to make it happen, we can not say what our program requirements are. And without that, talking about which LVs to use is kind of pointless.

          We need up to date plans, and plans which incorporate certain essential paradigm shifts from what’s been kicked around since Apollo. von Braun had certain key things right — things like EOR rendezvous and assembly, and multiple specialized landing craft — but a lot of other things have changed over the decades which aren’t being considered in the 1960’s-type planetary mission plans that NASA and others are still advocating.

  2. Steve Whitfield says:
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    I wonder how many more times Mikulski can use the word “quagmire” in public before it becomes a standing joke tied to her name.

    As we’ve seen before, to Mikulski and Shelby, NASA = SLS, and everything else NASA does is expendable in order to feed the hungry monster called SLS.

  3. Mader Levap says:
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    Isn’t “transferring” from commmercial to SLS (or the other way around) illegal? I vaguely remember there were wording to that effect.

    • Steve Whitfield says:
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      As I read it, and as examples illustrate going all the way back to James Webb and NERVA, NASA can not transfer funds between programs, except for programs/projects paid for entirely out of a directorate’s meager discretionary funds. Congress, on the other hand, can manipulate the money any way they see fit, as long as they do it with legislation that passes with a legal majority. This is one of the reasons why legislation is always only ever added, never deleted or revised.

  4. Anonymous says:
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    Well, adding to the SLS fray… I’m reading Dennis Wingo’s book “Moon Rush” on chapter discussing earth to moon travel outlining infrastructure that is not depended on a monster rocket. “Minimize point designs of elements in support of specific space mission objectives and maximize modularity, reusability and commonality of elements across many missions, enterprises and organizations.”

    Where,
    point design = huge rocket

    I admit I’m one of those in paradigm thinking only way to go back to moon is with a Saturn V size rocket (because that what was done before). These PDFs (written before Columbia tragedy and VSE) shows not all at NASA and Arsenal Space think a BFR is needed.

    PDF Executive Summary 10/2/2001 slides
    http://spacecraft.ssl.umd.e

    Orbital Aggregation & Space Infrastructure Systems (OASIS) paper, Oct 2002,
    http://web.mit.edu/spacearc