10-Year Plan

> >It makes absolutely no difference to the market for commercial
> >space settlement that there is $50 billion in commercial satellite
> >activity, since there seems to be $0 crossover.
> >
> It may do if there is a cost pressure. Currently there is none. It's a
> bit of a perverse market really.

Huh? Ariane vs. SeaLaunch vs. Proton vs. Atlas sees no cost pressure?
Telco companies see no cost pressure????

> >[...]
> Less. Tito paid about $15 million. The rocket only costs $5 million.

I wasn't referring to Tito. Anyway, if the Russians make that much
profit, how come they're always short of money? All the competitive
launch vehicles for multi-ton satellite launches that I've heard
about seem to be in the $20 million + range - up to $100 million
for the American vehicles. And of course $250 million for the shuttle.

> >[...]
> No, no. Low tech. Nothing high ISP or particularly cutting edge. In fact
> the opposite.
> We could do this in 3 years. There's nothing magical.

If you could do this in 3 years, go right ahead; there's a 10's of
billion dollar launch market just waiting for your innovation to
undercut all the other competitors out there. AT&T operated its
own line of ships for many years that ran undersea cables
at about $600 million a pop. Even if Boeing and LockMart aren't
interested in your innovation, there's a ton of other companies
that need those launch services that really do have the cash.
Worldcom just blew through about $10 billion in fake accounting;
surely there's room to develop and launch your miracle vehicle
where companies have that kind of cash floating around?

>
> >Now launch costs do improve with time; probably we can expect
> >somewhere around 20% per year. Some of the "rocket-plane" concepts
> >like XCOR or Armadillo Aero may be able to dramatically cut costs
> >and improve reliability a few years down the road - but right now
> >those guys aren't even close to X-prize contention, so that's
> >pure speculation what it's really going to cost.
> >
> No. I've seen plans for MCD. Also I've run my own cost models for a two
> stager. I've had
> some go as low as ~200/kg. Reusability is key. But not partial
> reusability. Not reusing
> something that would be cheaper to replace. I believe that SSTO is a red
> herring with
> current tech; it quite possibly precludes reusability in fact.
>
> And Armadillo just announced they are going for it. So, wrong again.

I said they weren't even close to X-prize contention. Close, to me,
means more than just an announcement - where are their FAA certifications?
Where are the detailed designs? When exactly will they have a prototype
flying and ready to test? There are 21 X-prize "teams" right now - see

http://www.xprize.org/teams/teams.html

Personally I love the rocketplane designs, and what they're trying
to accomplish. But getting the X prize just means reaching a certain
altitude - there's no velocity requirement, and that's really
a much bigger problem; and where silly things like high ISP
make the difference between 5% payload and 0.1% payload. Anyway,
when one of these teams actually launches a prototype, then it's
definitely time to get interested. My guess? 2005 before somebody
makes a full attempt; 2006 before somebody wins the prize. And
way beyond 2013 before this translates into lower cost to orbit.
But I'd be happy to be proved wrong....

>
> > [...transorbital.net...]
> >
> Why should I in the UK contribute money to an American firm? I see no
> evidence that they
> are cutting launch costs.

Oh, so now we're nationalistic? If it matters to you, Richard Perry,
on the TransOrbital board of directors, and actively involved in
the project, is a UK citizen. See:
http://www.transorbital.net/PressReleases/press000926.html
At least one other participant, that I know of, is from New Zealand.
It's an international project, though the company is US-based.

>And I have attended conferences with my own
> money with an aim
> to cut launch costs.

I've attended conferences too. As far as I can tell, the money I spent
went to airlines, hotels, and rental car companies. I don't think
a single cent went anywhere near a company that is working to
develop space infrastructure.

If your goal is cheaper access to space, then spend your money
there at least - invest in a micro-sat, find a project you
can join to purchase launch services (TransOrbital is at least
doing that, using the Ukrainian Dnipr vehicle for the first time).
Or invest venture capital in a company that you think can dramatically
reduce those costs.

The big issue is money - so put it on the table. "Show me the money"
as the movie says.

By the way, I am not associated with TransOrbital except through
having met one of their people (Paul Blase) and sent them a bit
of my money as a contribution - it just irritates me that so
many people whine about NASA and the state of the launch industry
and space development without contributing anything to the
fundamental problem - lack of financial resources. If you
don't like TransOrbital, invest in Jim Benson's SpaceDev, or
SpaceHab, or one of the other small space-settlement-oriented
companies. But come on - for $16.95, can you really go wrong?

>
> >>>however; all that's needed are a
> >>>few well-regulated monopolies...
> >>>
> >>No that must not occur. Monopolies are nearly always inefficient.
> >>
> >Yes, but they are also effective.
> >
> What are you smoking? 500 million per launch is anything but effective.

NASA isn't a commercial monopoly; that's not what I was referring to.

> > Which may be more important right now.
> >There's a reason we have patents
> >
> Yeah so corporations can use them to squelch competition and maintain
> monopolies. Very useful.
>

The argument of the pharmaceutical companies in favor of patents is really
unassailable - if they didn't have guaranteed monopoly profits
for some period of time, they would never be able to do the hundreds
of millions of dollars worth of R&D it takes to bring a new
drug to market. No monopoly, no R&D investment, no new drugs.

"Monopoly" in this sense is really just a recognition of a certain
kind of property right. One of the primary reasons for a lack
of private investment in space, both R&D and infrastructure, is that there
is no property rights regime. Other than for telecommunications,
for which there actually is (or was) substantial investment.

While this may contradict your pre-determined ideological biases,
there are really only three choices here: (1) Increased direct
government spending on space, (2) New monopoly grants by government
to private entities to promote space development, or (3) waiting
many more decades for things to start happening.

Arthur