NASA FY 2019 Budget Hints: ISS Lifespan To Be Limited (Update)
Keith’s uodate: Excerpt from OMB FY 2019 Budget Plan for NASA
“Passback provides $10,013.1 million for the Human Exploration and Operations Mission Directorate. Within this funding level, and consistent with the outyear guidance provided in the passback’s front matter section, the HEOMD guidance is intended to support the following strategic human space exploration objectives:
– Pursuing a cislunar campaign that will establish U.S. preeminence to, and around, and on the Moon;
– Engaging non-traditional U.S. industrial partners and sectors in the space program;
– Using innovative approaches to combine lunar robotics, a cislunar presence, and human sorties possibilities, involving commercial and international participation to enhance U.S. leadership;
– Ending direct federal government support of the ISS by 2025 and transitioning to commercial provision of low Earth orbit (LEO) capabilities;
– Achieving an early milestone in human space exploration by launching the Power Propulsion Element in 2022 using a commercial launch vehicle;
– Supporting public-private partnerships that enable transportation services and landers to the moon by the early 2020s (See Science Passback for more details and …”
Did NASA Deliver The ISS Transition Plan To Congress Required By Law? Update: No, earlier post
“Keith’s 11 Dec update: I did not hear back from NASA so I sent a second request. Stephanie Schierholz at NASA HQ PAO just sent this reply to my second request: “NASA is keeping Congress apprised as to the progress of the ISS Transition Report and plans to provide this report to the Committee as soon as possible. Please reach out to the Committee about obtaining a copy of the report once it is submitted.”
Keith’s note: It will be interesting to see what happens when Congress gets wind of OMB’s ISS plans since NASA never delivered the ISS Transition plan required by law – the plan that explains how NASA intends to end its use of ISS.
|
|
|
|
|
|
It’s difficult to see any private sector business that would justify the $3.5 billion it costs each year to run ISS the NASA way. It makes about as much sense as privatizing the Shuttle would have been.
That cost could go down with commercial resupply and commercial crew, but maybe not enough. The things they’ve learned on ISS about efficiency aboard an orbiting science platform will be useful for future commercially funded stations, but could ISS be configured to be useful on a commercial model? I keep thinking about when they said that adding one additional crew person would double the time spent on science. That kind of logistics doesn’t sound too me like an affordable business model.
The problem will be getting replacement parts. These will come from the same government contractors that provided the originals, so the cost will likely be quite high. As in, “Oh, your X system is out and you really need that for human operation of ISS? Well, that’ll be $200 million to replace it.”
Unless the contractors are nice enough to provide such parts at a reasonable price (i.e. their actual cost plus a small profit).
To be fair, many (most?) of those parts are custom and not in much demand. They have to leave equipment idle for years, so it’s available on demand, or setting things up all over again each time. That’s inevitably going to be expensive.
Can you go into a little more detail on this? Are we talking about machinst-type equipment? What sort of facilities are needed that can’t be turned to more mundane tasks between thrse special events?
It depends on the nature of the parts, and I was thinking of a bunch of things. Any one might sound small, but collectively they add up.
For mechanical parts, you need all sorts of jugs, spacers, things to hold pieces in place during assembly, etc. It might be nice to think people keep those in a clearly-labeled storeroom, but I wouldn’t count on it. Machine tools aren’t trivial to set up, and for simple parts, that might take as long as the actual machining itself.
Electronics have their own issues, and potentially the component you used five years ago isn’t available anymore. An essentially identical one probably is, but that’s definitely going to require some retesting and possibly some modifications to the design.
Testing itself is an issue, since many of the standard tests (e.g. vibration or thermal) have detailed test procedures and are computer controlled. If the test facilities have been upgraded, you probably get to rewrite the procedures and the computer scripts.
Even memory hurts. Things can be done in the right or the wrong order. I once saw a building going up next to the one I worked in. Lots of glass windows with decorative metal shades and sills on the outside. When I saw them putting in the glass first, I thought one slip on the outside decorations would mean breaking and replacing glass. Which is exactly what happened. The same sort of thing applies to flight hardware. But people don’t write down those details; they are just more efficient when they do the same job the second time. Unless the second time is five years later; in that case, they’ve probably forgotten.
I guess that’s my point. Doing the same thing after five or more years is, in many ways, like starting over from scratch. You can, in principle, do enough documentation and keep enough equipment set up to do that particular job. But that isn’t without expenses of its own, and won’t happen unless you expect you will be asked to build another one after many years.
Maybe.
Remember, this will not be exclusive military contracting. Once the market is big enough, then competition puts downward pressure on oft replaced spare parts.
Unless the purchasing company also contracts the supplier for support (I think I read that Bigelow includes support fees in the contract) and spares are rolled into that somehow. Businesses would have to work those overhead costs into their business plans and see if the numbers line up before going forward. If the plan doesn’t fly, then neither does the hardware.
Given the ISS is too expensive to operate if we want to build a deep space gateway; to space/planetary science; and send humans beyond LEO, how is paying for deep space gateway not going to impinge on space/planetary science budgets and human missions (including possible habitats) beyond LEO? My inclination is to think that deep space gateway will be more expensive and would require more international partners than we have now with the ISS.
The deep space voyager was envisioned to test that the hardware and crew through demonstrated reliability that it would operate and survive the long duration trip to Mars. L2 is the ideal location to stage since one can recapture most of delta v.
‘voyager’ however is not a ‘station’, and 3 day trips is not 3 to 6 month long journeys in the proper environment.
The gateway has become a self licking ice cream cone to create a horrible architecture to retain SLS and Orion at the expense of pretty much everything else to go ‘mooning’.
Perhaps some water will be left on Mars once shuttle derived is finally retired, but if you want to explore, head to the asteroids. 😉
ISS isn’t really the problem, IMHO. SLS/Orion, on the other hand, is a huge budgetary problem. SLS is far too expensive and will fly far too infrequently to be counted on for beyond LEO transportation. But the administration and Congress seem determined to keep the SLS pork flowing for years to come.
All this handwringing will only result in wrung hands! Keep in mind that 2025 is two (2) presidential and four (4) election cycles from now, and anything can happen, both technology-wise and economy/budget/politics-wise! Commercial space will continue to expand, one way or another. If U.S, commercial interests don’t do it, someone else will. Hopefully, eventually, Congress will figure out that “because we’ve already spent this much money, we have to keep spending more on SLS/Orion and the ‘Gateway’ program” just won’t cut it! (They won’t even give the launch vehicle an imaginative name…like Uranus…watch your pronunciation!) What we really need to do, whether sponsored by the Gov’t, commercial enterprise or a combination, is establish a permanent, manned research station ON THE LUNAR SURFACE, where we can get data on the effects of REDUCED gravity on human physiology, learn how to do ISRU in a practical demonstration prior to heading for Mars.
But my crystal ball is black and has three finger holes drilled in it, so my guess is about as good as anyone else’s as to what will happen.
Ad Luna! Ad Ares! AD ASTRA!
It would be nice to see some serious hardware and effort for lunar missions. https://denniswingo.wordpre…
7 years isn’t a long time, especially given how slowly NASA and the government move. Heck, you just might burn up a year or two waiting for the government/NASA to put out a contract for bid.
Agreed. Where was SpaceX and Blue Origin seven years ago?
I remember where Bigelow was…they were waiting for SpaceX and Blue Origin. 😉
“anything can happen”
Or, more likely, nothing.
2025 sounds like enough time for replacement technology, if there are enough billionaire dollars ready and waiting to throw at it the first day Commercial Crew comes online. What is Bigelow’s lead time? Is it two or three years like the orbital launch lead time? Which Bigelow station design can go to LEO on an FH? How much does that station module cost to buy and support? When will the follow-on launchers with more throw weight than FH come online? FH has missions lined up and hasn’t even flown yet, is this kind of “hopeful lead” the model for Bigelow modules? The answers to these questions will spell out the fate of the ISS in 2025.
Remember, the BA330 is modular. You could put 3 units up on 3 Atlas V flights and have a station with the same volume that would support a dozen astronauts for less than half what it costs each year to just run the ISS.
Keep in mind that just as the Space Shuttle was the best in 1970’s technology, the ISS is the best in 1980’s so it shouldn’t surprise folks its too expensive for business to run.
Now what you could do with the FH is put a B330 in the orbit planned for the DSG, then use the FH to send Dragons to it. The cost would probably be less then the RFIs and all the planning meetings NASA will be holding over the next few years on the DSG and it could probably be in lunar orbit before NASA even finish the design of the DSG.
I’m no expert, but it also seems like researchers might spend a lot less time swimming through cramped tunnels in a station made of Bigelow modules.
Also, fewer modules of larger size might be easier to power, heat, and aerate.
Here, here. We are guilty of thinking too small. Except for Mr. Musk, who thinks that a rocket large enough to go where we want, and in a modicum of comfort, is just the ticket.
What a concept.
Not really. The BA-330 would have much less rack-space than an equivalent ISS module like Destiny. It will have more empty space, and more soft storage for waste, but much less usable space and equipment. And none of Bigelow’s proposals show any understanding of the power requirements of a proper space-station. ISS is already considered under-powered.
Anyway, one year to setup business models and the design details (probably happening in backrooms right now), two to three years for construction and launch lead time (2020-2021), launch, one year in-orbit setup and commissioning (2021-2022) then start of operations and three years to test and refine the business models (2024-2025). A little bit tight, but like I said, it all depends on interest by deep-pocket entrepreneurs . It would be nice to get into Gen 2, millionaire investment level buy-in costs, and letting the ISS fall into disuse naturally, before de-orbiting it in 2028.
Wow. Just about everything ever suggested that was logical for NASA to do to afford what they said they wanted to do. Nothing Congress wants, but with the tax cut they might have to approve.
Popular Mechanics is reporting that there was a recent planning meeting in Japan by the ISS partners on the DSG as a replacement for the ISS. Guess the ISS is on the way out.
http://www.popularmechanics…
This Was a Huge Week for the NASA-Russia Lunar Space Station and the Future of Spaceflight
By Anatoly Zak
Jan 23, 2018
“Top NASA officials and their partners in the International Space Station program gathered in Tokyo this past Friday and Monday, Popular Mechanics has learned, for behind-closed-doors talks on the next big step in human spaceflight: the lunar orbiting station.”
I’m becoming convinced that humans are just delusional about the future of the species. All this talk about “human permanence” on the Moon or Mars is just ridiculous. First, there is the issue of the radiation environment. ISS is below the Earth’s Van Allen Belts and thus protected from most radiation. Why does everyone ignore the data from MSL’s RAD instrument? Humans reach a maximum exposure limit in less than three years outside the Earth’s magnetic field (neither the Moon, nor Mars, has a protective magnetic field). Not to mention Solar Particle Events. Any exposure increases your cancer risk. Second, since the ISS SSBRP centrifuge was never built, we have no idea what the gravity levels on the Moon or Mars do to living things. Is it enough to counter the known negative effects of microgravity? We simply don’t know. Face it, we have one biosphere that can support human life, and we are destroying it. We as a species should have one priority, investing in the research necessary to ensure a sustainable long term human presence ON EARTH!
Danridge Cole, Dr. Isaac Asimov and Dr. Gerald O’Neill showed the solutions to those issues decades ago, proper shielding and artificial gravity. NASA is the one insisting on doing it the hard way.
Science fiction has all the answers! Show me the deployable technology.
You do know that only Dr. Asimov wrote science fiction as well as science fact? As for the answers, they have been presented for years in conference proceedings and journals, the ASCE Earth and Space Conferences for example has been publishing papers on those topics for years.
Radiation is easily handled with shielding, you just need to provide enough of it. And centrifugal force provides artificial gravity. Indeed, its possible to make artificial habitats in space that are far safer and suitable for humans than on Earth, habitats that build on a trend that has existed since the Neolithic of making humans less dependent on the natural environment. Unfortunately NASA ignores this trend instead of building on it.
So show me the money and I will show you the deployable technology. The problem is not that there is no technical solutions, but that NASA has no real interest in human settlement of space and so ignores them. They are only focused on space science. That has always been the core problem of NASA.
A point you’ve mde previously, and just as relevant here. I’d point out that stating such an interest amounts to stating a long-term goal; that’s the real roadblock.
Meanwhile, ISS chiefly provides a billable destination, an important but over-looked benefit.
At the moment radiation protection requires mass. But staying underground devalues the Lunar experience. Nevertheless, radiation exposure is less of a problem on the moon, where shielding material is readily available and half the sky is blocked by the terrain, than it would be in lunar orbit.
I’m not sure how much staying underground would devalue the experience. Spending eight hours outside, a couple times a week and the rest of the time underground would reduce exposure by a factor of 10.5 Let’s see. As someone noted, a three-year Mars mission hits career limits for exposure. Most of that is in deep space, and on the surface of the Moon, half of that flux is blocked by the Moon itself. That means someone wouldn’t hit the current career limits for 63 years. That doesn’t seem like a problem.
Does that devalue the experience? Well, there is a terrestrial example right outside my window. Many people who live here in Boulder consider the proximity (skiing, rock climbing, hiking, etc.) to the mountains to be a big part of the value of living here. But most of the city itself and the eastern half of the county (where most people live and work) is, topographically, not too different from Kansas. The value isn’t living in the mountains; its being able to go up there on a frequent basis. So I’m not sure the “value” of living on the Moon would be devalued by only going outside twice a week.
That’s the personal or esthetic value. If the value were scientific research, two days a week of field geology might sound thin. On the other time, terrestrial field geologists don’t spend 40% of their work time in the field. And geologists can do field work in caves.
So, it is estimated you would need the mass of Half Dome in Yosemite to shield a spacecraft from Cosmic Ray exposure. “easily handled”? A giant spinning habitat deep underground on the Moon or Mars? No problem!
That’s completely absurd. Just plain, brute force mass to shield against radiation would require a huge mass, but “the mass of Half Dome”? Do you have any idea what you’re talking about? I’ve seen various estimates, and I can’t recall any, even the most extreme, suggesting more than a few hundred grams per cubic centimeter. That’s less than one meter of rock. Last time I checked, Half Dome was quite a bit larger than that.
Um, did you see how a new chamber was discovered in the Great Pyrimid by detecting the Cosmic Rays going all the way thru it?
Actually, I did see that story. But you are making a tremendous mistake. You are confusing a very low flux of particles, which can be detected by very sensitive instruments, with a dangerous flux of particles. Medical X rays are an example of how wrong that is. The flux is easily detectable, otherwise they would be pointless. The risk from exposure, although nonzero, is quite low. So low that X rays are a major health benefit.
The “maximum exposure” to radiation isn’t any real sort of maximum. It’s the official career limit for astronauts, based on a more-or-less arbitrary criteria of a 3% increased risk of fatal cancer later in life. One very clear way to mitigate this, and one which is a subject of active medical research, is treatment of cancer. The official 3% doesn’t include treatable, non-fatal cancer later in life.
You make it sound so arbitrary. The truth is we have no idea of what Cosmic Ray exposure does to living things. The astronaut limits are all based on studies of “regular” radiation like X-rays and gammas, not Cosmic Ray exposure. The studies done at Brookhaven with HZEs are limited, and do not reflect the multi-species and multi-directional nature of the real environment. To those that think the surface of a planet or topology will protect you, look up “neutron backscatter”. Here is a fact: we do not currently have the knowledge or technology for long term survival of humans outside Earth’s biosphere.
That, in itself is a bit arbitrary. We don’t know, and I agree there are many uncertainties, does not mean we “do not have the knowledge or technology.” We “don’t know” means we don’t know. We may have that technology; we may not. We don’t know does not mean it is automatically impossible, which is what you seem to be saying.
And, if that 3% limit and the implied career dose isn’t arbitrary, how would you describe it?
In any case, the exposure limits are based on pretty conservative estimates of the things we don’t know, so the odds are it is less of a problem that the current limits suggest. And I’m quite familiar with neutron and other sorts of backscatter. The backscattered energy flux is less than the incident flux (that’s just conservation of energy) and in most cases, it’s less by orders of magnitude.
Okay, I suppose it is remotely possible that having gold and iron nuclei flying thru your brains could be good for you. Sorry, I’m such a smart aleck. The standard assumption is that the Quality Factor for Cosmic Rays is more than 1.
Gold? Last time I checked, the large majority of cosmic ray ions were at or below the mass of iron.
In any case, the estimates for astronaut dose don’t assume a factor of one for cosmic rays. The uncertainty is whether it’s five, 10, 20 or what. The usual estimates use conservative, high values.
Very interesting point by NasaWatch that without a confirmed admin, OMB drives the NASA budget. I get that Senators Rubio and Nelson prefer someone else. But in effect they are choosing Mick Mulvaney at OMB over Bridenstine. I doubt that we will see Trump appoint, and the Senate approve, a different NASA head in Trump’s first term.
I can hardly wait to see the business analysis of the commercial crew and cargo programs if ISS ends in 2024 – the crew systems won’t even fly until 2020 at best! Based on that fantastic “commercial” business model, I’m sure investors will race to fund an expensive, decades long lunar program or an ISS Commercialization plan by a President with historic low approval ratings – sounds like a recipe to give up something substantive for vaporware.
The ISS is highly modular in construction, and individual components, racks and modules can be replaced. Bigelow modules can be added without the need for thier own power, stabilization, stationkeeping, docking and other services. If the DSG is in lunar orbit logistics will be considerably more expensive and, as with ISS, we will face the challange of showing that human presence provides practical benefits at a location where the cost will be considerably higher than at ISS.With ISS the ability of the human crew to maintain and upgrade the instrumentation for Earth and space observation, and to support tourism, were reasonable justifications. We probably should not cancel ISS to “free up” money for DSG until we have decided what we are going to do at DSG that makes it so much more valuable than ISS.