The SLS and the Case for a Reusable Lunar Lander

NASA  OTV with  single stage reusable lunar lander (credit NASA)

by Marcel Williams

In 2009, President Obama inherited an annual  manned spaceflight related budget from the previous administration of approximately $8.4 billion. Approximately $3 billion was for operating the Space Shuttle. Another $2 billion was for the ISS program. And an additional $3.4 billion was for the future Constellation program with primary funding going towards the development of the Orion manned spacecraft and  the Ares I  launch vehicle. Further increases in  Orion and Ares I funding were set to occur after the end of the Shuttle program.  But significant funding for the core vehicle of the Ares V heavy lift vehicle,  its upper stage, and for the Altair lunar lander weren't set to occur until after Orion and Ares I development was completed  and the  ISS program had come to an end.     

A year later, of course, the Obama administration canceled the Constellation program and, surprisingly,  NASA's efforts to return to the Moon. Instead, the Obama administration  decided to extend the life of the ISS program at least until  2020 while also deciding to fund the private development of private commercial manned space vehicles  for accessing LEO and the ISS.  Long term beyond LEO goals were set by the administration for a manned spaceflight to a NEO asteroid in the mid 2020s and an orbital mission to Mars  in the 2030s. But no vehicles were to be immediately financed and developed for such ventures.  President Obama's decision still left NASA with a few billion dollars of unused manned spaceflight related funds which the President decided to utilize in research on future heavy lift vehicles and  for solving the problems of manned beyond LEO space travel.

Democrat and Republican advocates of NASA's manned space program, however,  were stunned by the President's decision to  terminate the Constellation program and to cancel NASA's efforts to return to the Moon.  And they defiantly passed legislation for the immediate funding of a heavy lift vehicle (SLS) and for the continued development of the Orion spacecraft (MPCV).

Space Launch System crew vehicle and cargo vehicle

The Orion (MPCV) program is now scheduled for an unmanned test of its Command Module  in 2014 aboard a Delta IV heavy. And the unmanned test of the  SLS heavy lift vehicle  plus the MPCV with its European developed  Service Module  is scheduled to occur  before the end of 2017.

But  how and when the SLS and MPCV will be used for manned beyond LEO missions is far more ambiguous. While some in Congress still argue for manned lunar missions and even a lunar base, the White House continues to argue for an-- anything but the Moon policy.

While the current administration is trying to keep Americans from returning to the Moon, other nations are focusing on the lunar surface's vast resources and even its strategic position around the Earth.  China, of course, has recently launched its first robotic attempt to explore the surface of the Moon and has repeatedly stated its long term intentions of sending people to the Moon and to establish a permanent Chinese presence on the lunar surface for the exploitation of lunar resources. Russia and a few other nations also appear to be focusing on sending humans to the surface of the Moon. 

The Obama administration has countered criticism of  its anti-lunar stance by arguing that manned lunar missions would inhibit NASA's ability to eventually send humans to Mars. However, many NASA scientist have argued that a fuel producing lunar outpost could be an essential  key to eventually getting humans to the surface of Mars. China appears to have a similar perspective.

But  can NASA realistically  establish a permanent human presence on the surface of the Moon and, eventually, on Mars under the political constraints of its current manned spaceflight budget?  Was the $8.4 billion a year manned spaceflight related budget that President Obama originally inherited from the previous administration enough to get the job done over then next 25 years?

The SLS/MPCV program is currently being funded at about $3 billion a year. However, the Service Module of the MPCV is now being funded and  developed by the European space agency. An additional $300 million dollars is being used for SLS ground systems development. So what is currently being spent by NASA on the SLS/MPCV program is close to what was being spent on the Constellation program when President Obama came into office. But now, of course,  there's no longer the financial burden of a $3 billion a year Space Shuttle program.

The Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) has estimated that the cost of developing the two stage Altair lunar lander at approximately $12 billion. But NASA director Charlie Bolden estimates the cost of developing a lunar landing vehicle at approximately $8 to $10 billion. It took six years for NASA and its private vendors to develop the lunar module that took Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin to the lunar surface in 1969.  If we assume a 7 year development time for the next manned landing vehicle then the annual cost of funding such a vehicle  should range between $1.1 billion to 1.7 billion a year. That would raise the manned spaceflight related budget from a range of $4.4 billion to up to $5 billion annually.

However, the CSIS had estimated the development cost of a lunar outpost at approximately  $17 billion. Over a ten year period of development and deployment, that would mean an additional $1.7 billion in annual funding. That would raise the NASA manned spaceflight related budget to perhaps $6.1 yo $6.7 billion a year. However, once the lunar outpost is established, the CSIS estimated that the annual recurring cost would be $7.35 billion annual-- if lunar resources are not utilized. Of course, one of the principal reasons for returning to the Moon is to utilize and even export lunar resources for water, air, and rocket fuel in order to reduce the cost of space travel.

 So with an $8.4 billion a year manned spaceflight budget, it appears that NASA would have plenty of funds to return to the Moon even if they used the rather expensive Constellation architecture. 

But NASA is still running a very expensive LEO program in the form of the ISS and Commercial Crew development. Combined, these two programs cost nearly $3.4 billion a year. At less than $400 million a year, the Commercial Crew program is probably being seriously underfunded. But some in Congress are still talking about extending the life of the $3 billion a year ISS program beyond 2020-- all the way to 2028.

So its not a question as to whether NASA can afford a beyond LEO program. $8.4 billion appears to be more than enough funding. But its pretty obvious that  NASA  can't afford a big beyond LEO program plus a big LEO program-- unless it receives a nearly $2 billion increase in its annual manned spaceflight related budget? And Congress, of course, is in no mood to increase the NASA budget during a time of huge budget deficits-- especially as long as the direction of NASA's beyond LEO program remains in ambiguity.

President Obama only has a few more years left in office, however. And by the time the first SLS heavy lift vehicle is being tested for its first flight in 2017, a new president will be in  office.  So the next president will  inherit a manned space program with a new heavy lift vehicle cable of placing more than 70 to 105 tonnes into low Earth orbit when it is fully operational and will also be capable of placing at least 30 tonnes practically anywhere within cis-lunar space. But future astronauts will still be restricted to orbital space unless an extraterrestrial landing vehicle is developed.

The United States currently has a President at the lowest point in his national popularity who also   appears to have very little interest in manned space travel.  So the time may be right for Congress to take the lead again with bipartisan Democratic and Republican support in order to start seriously fund an extraterrestrial landing vehicle (ETLV) for the SLS  by 2015.

Funding could come from either an increase in the NASA budget in 2015 or a decrease in funding for other NASA projects. For instance, since a test launch of the MPCV Command Module will be launched into orbit in 2014 and NASA is no  longer required to fund the development of the MPCV Service Module which is being developed by the Europeans, perhaps substantial cuts in the Command Module development could occur after 2014. The ISS program is also an internationally funded program. If NASA cut ISS funding back to 2009 levels ($2 billion a year) in 2015,  a billion dollars could be placed into funding lunar lander development. 

NASA reusable lunar lander concept on the Moon (Credit NASA)

Lockheed-Martin recently concluded that lunar lander development  cost and recurring cost could be substantially reduced if a reusable single staged vehicle were developed instead of a two staged vehicle due to reduced vehicle mass, reductions in vehicle components, and reduced vehicle complexity. NASA reached a similar conclusion back in the late 1980s when JPL proposed its own single stage LOX/LH2 lunar landing vehicle.

Such an ETLV should be a reusable single staged vehicle capable of landing not only on the lunar surface but also on the surface of the Martian moons: Phobos and Deimos and maybe even on the surface of Mars if a ballute or hyper cone are added along with a heat shield. Such a vehicle should also be capable of utilizing extraterrestrial fuel resources on the Moon, the moons of Mars, and on the surface of Mars.

Here, I introduce a  lunar  vehicle concept  that I've toyed around with for the last couple of years that's  specifically designed to take advantage of the large  8.4 to 10 meter SLS cargo fairing. I call this notional crew vehicle, the ETLV-2. And I will elaborate upon the specifics of this vehicle concept, and its cargo, orbital transfer, and fuel depot vehicle variants, in future post.

NASA single stage reusable lander, Altair two stage expendable lunar lander, and the ETLV-2 single stage reusable lander 

But basically, the crew version of the ETLV-2 concept  utilizes just two common bulkhead cryotanks each capable of storing up to 14 tonnes of LOX/LH2 fuel. The crew cabin and the twin airlocks are both derived from fuel tank technology, having the same diameter as the fuel tanks  in order to further reduce vehicle development cost and recurring cost. So a standard cryotank  diameter somewhere between 2.5 to 3 meters would have to be firmly established before the vehicle went into development and eventual production.  

Four RL-10 derived CECE (Common Extensible Cryogenic Engine) engines would enhance vehicle safety with engine out capability and would be capable of up to 50 restarts. This should enable the vehicle to be used for at least 10 round trips from the Earth-Moon Lagrange points to the lunar surface which should further reduce recurring cost. Recurring cost could be reduced even  further if the engines could eventually be replaced as suggest by Spudis and Lavoie in their lunar architecture concept. A throttle capability ranging from 104% of thrust down to just 5.6%, should allow the  CECE engines to enable the ETLV-2 to take off and land on celestial worlds as large as Mars or as small as the moons of Mars.

Utilizing Integrated Vehicle Fluid (IVF) technology currently being developed by the ULA, some ullage gases could be used for attitude control. And with NASA emerging cryocooler technology,  ullage gases could be re-liquified, eliminating any significant  boil-off of hydrogen and oxygen. The cryotank derived crew habitat would have three floor levels and would be capable of accommodating at least six to eight  crew members plus the life support systems. The twin cryotank derived airlocks allows more room within the cabin while allowing astronauts to leave the vehicle without having to decompress and then re-pressurize the crew cabin.  

When fully manned and fueled, the ETLV-2 should weigh less than 37 tonnes and be capable of  departing from EML1 to land on the Moon and then return  EML1 on a single fueling, and vice versa, once the ETLV-2 can be refueled with cryogenic hydrogen and oxygen manufactured on the lunar surface. The addition of an ETLV-2 derived reusable OTV (Orbital Transfer Vehicles) with an aerobraker that could travel between LEO and L1, could also give private Commercial Crew vehicle passengers flown to LEO easy access-- all the way to the surface of the Moon. I will discuss this architectural possibility in a future post.

 Marcel F. Williams
© 2013 MuOmega Enterprises


References:

Lunar Lander Conceptual Design (NASA Johnson Space Center & Eagle Engineering)

http://www.nss.org/settlement/moon/library/LB2-114-LanderConceptualDesign.pdf


Lunar Lander Configurations Incorporating Accessibility, Mobility, and Centaur Cryogenic Propulsion Experience

http://www.ulalaunch.com/site/docs/publications/LunarLanderConfigurationsIncorporatingAccessibility20067284.pdf

SLS Dual Use Upper Stage (DUUS) Opportunities

http://ntrs.nasa.gov/search.jsp?R=20130013953


The Space Launch System Capabilities with a New Large Upper Stage(The Boeing Company)

http://arc.aiaa.org/doi/abs/10.2514/6.2013-5421


Mission and Implementation of an Affordable Lunar Return (Spudis and Lavoie )

http://www.spudislunarresources.com/Papers/Affordable_Lunar_Base.pdf

CECE (Common Extensible Cryogenic Engine)

http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/imagegallery/image_feature_1709_prt.htm


An Integrated Vehicle Propulsion and Power System for Long Duration Cryogenic Spaceflight (ULA)
http://www.ulalaunch.com/site/docs/publications/Integrated%20Vehicle%20Propulsion%20and%20Power%20System%20for%20Long%20Duration%20Cyrogenic%20Spaceflight%202011.pdf


Large-Scale Demonstration of Liquid Hydrogen Storage with Zero Boiloff for In-Space Applications (NASA) 2010

http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/20110004377_2011003898.pdf


Conquering Cis-Lunar Space with Shuttle and ULA Derived Technologies

http://newpapyrusmagazine.blogspot.com/2001/07/conquering-cis-lunar-space-with-ula-and.html


How Should Congress Respond to Obama's Manned Spaceflight Budget?

http://newpapyrusmagazine.blogspot.com/2010/04/how-congress-should-respond-to-obamas.html

South Park's View of Obama's NASA Plan

The President, British Petroleum, and the Synthetic Fuel Economy

by Marcel F. Williams

In the President's speech last night about the BP Gulf Coast environmental crisis and the petroleum industry, he said the following:

"I am happy to look at other ideas and approaches from either party –- as long they seriously tackle our addiction to fossil fuels. Some have suggested raising efficiency standards in our buildings like we did in our cars and trucks. Some believe we should set standards to ensure that more of our electricity comes from wind and solar power. Others wonder why the energy industry only spends a fraction of what the high-tech industry does on research and development -– and want to rapidly boost our investments in such research and development.
All of these approaches have merit, and deserve a fair hearing in the months ahead. But the one approach I will not accept is inaction."

We've already known how to convert urban and rural biowaste (garbage) into gasoline, diesel fuel, and jet fuel for decades. Such local resources could replace nearly 20% of our petroleum needs and provide jobs practically everywhere where garbage is produced (that's every city, town, and farm in America).

But biowaste conversion to liquid fuels waste 80% of its total carbon content. If you added hydrogen to the mix produced from clean electricity from nuclear and hydroelectric power plants, nearly 100% of our transportation and industrial hydrocarbon chemical needs could be met. Once we starting using fuel efficient plug-in-hybrid vehicles and fuel cells, the US could actually become a major exporter of clean carbon neutral fuels.

Obviously, we're not going to replace petroleum overnight, but we can start the transition if the President and the Congress would simply-- mandate-- that at least 10% of all gasoline, diesel fuel, and jet fuel sold in the US be derived from carbon neutral resources by 2020, 50% by 2030, and 90% by 2040. And any of these fuels sold in the US that does not reach these percentages should be slapped with a heavy carbon tax.

To me, its that simple!

Daily Kos New Papyrus Poll

Nuclear Synfuel Economy
http://newpapyrusmagazine.blogspot.com/2008/01/nuclear-synfuel-economy.html

Synfuels and the Price of Oil
http://newpapyrusmagazine.blogspot.com/1999/01/synfuels-and-price-of-oil.html

Gasoline from Air and Water
http://newpapyrusmagazine.blogspot.com/2008/11/gasoline-from-air-and-water_24.html

Obama Seeking New Ideas on Energy and Climate
http://dotearth.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/06/15/obama-seeking-new-ideas-on-energy-and-climate/

Navy Looks to Biofuel to Power Fleets
http://newpapyrusmagazine.blogspot.com/2010/05/navy-looks-to-biofuel-to-power-fleets.html

Boeing's New HLV Concept could be the DC-3 of Manned Rocket Boosters

by Marcel F. Williams

On December 17th 1935, the Douglas Aircraft Company introduced an new airplane that revolutionized commercial air travel in America and around the world, the DC-3. Before the introduction of the DC-3, transcontinental flights entailed short range flights in smaller aircraft during the day combined with rail travel during the night. The DC-3, on the other hand, was able to cross the American continent completely by air with just three fueling stops and could take passengers from one coastline to the other in less than 18 hours. More than 16,000 DC-3s were built during its history. And 400 DC-3s are still in operation today!

Boeing Phantom Works has introduced a new shuttle derived heavy lift concept that is very similar to the DIRECT concept. An inline 8.4 meter in diameter core vehicle is used with either SSME (space shuttle main engines) or RS-68 engines. But instead of using the existing 4-segment SRBs (solid rocket boosters), there vehicle would use the 5-segment SRBs that are currently being developed for the Ares I rocket, a program that President Obama intends to terminate. However, unlike the DIRECT concept, Boeing has also proposed utilizing the inline booster without the SRBs as a crew only vehicle. Coupled with a manned space capsule and a stretched SM (service module), there would be no upper stage. And this would require the service module to perform the 2nd stage burn in order to achieve orbit.

NASA has recently (May 3rd) issued a request for information regarding potential heavy lift architectures that could be utilized by both NASA and commercial industries. Boeing's new heavy lift concept would seem to meet that criteria. With the SRBs and an upper stage, the core stage could be used by NASA or the DOD to lift up to 113 tons into low Earth orbit or send up to 45 tons to TLI (translunar injection). A dual launch scenario could transport up to 87 tons to TLI, a substantial increase over the 65 tons sent to TLI using the Ares I/V architecture.

But, additionally, without the SRBs and the upper stage, the LOX/LH2 core booster could be used by NASA, the military, or a private commercial company to transport up to 20 metric tons into orbit when utilizing a stretched SM (service module) to perform the second stage burn to achieve orbit. Such a hydrogen-oxygen fueled single stage booster could provide NASA and private industry with the simplest, safest, and most environmentally benign manned space rocket ever invented. And such a vehicle could usher in a new wave of space tourism!

There are polls that suggest that there may be thousands of wealthy individuals that would be willing to pay $20 million or more to fly into space to a space station. If such polls are even close to being accurate then manned launches for space tourism could greatly exceed government commissioned manned spaceflights to orbit with possible annual demands for space launches in the hundreds.

Such a high level of traffic into space would require the manufacturing of several hundred rocket engines every year. And such a high demand for rocket engines could introduce the serial mass production of rocket engines into US industries. Economies of mass production could substantially reduce the cost of rocket engines in the US. And polls have shown that lowering the cost of space travel would increase the demand for space tourism even higher!

A NASA heavy lift vehicle based on the same core vehicle would of course greatly benefit from the lower cost due to the high demand for the core booster by private industry. Eventually, the low cost of the core vehicle might become so attractive that NASA might contemplate replacing the SRBs with two additional core vehicles for heavy lift launches in a configuration similar to what is seen with the Delta IV heavy. This would be similar to one of the National Launch System (NLS) proposals of the 1990s.

It is also interesting that Boeing Phantom Works also produces the unmanned reusable X-37 experimental spaceplane for the US military which is currently in orbit after being launched into orbit by the ULA on top of an Atlas V rocket. Although the X-37 weighs about 5 metric tons, it has the basic Space Shuttle configuration. It uses a Rocketdyne AR-2/3 rocket engine, fuelled by JP-8 jet fuel and hydrogen peroxide. If Boeing decided to build a larger-- man rated-- version of the X-37, it could be the perfect compliment for the shuttle derived core vehicle also proposed by Boeing.


So America might retire one winged space vehicle, the space shuttle, while introducing a new winged manned space vehicle that can be used by NASA, the military, and private commercial industry. And a new era of manned space travel for government and private industry will have begun!

References and Links

1. Heavy Lift Launch Vehicles with Existing Propulsion Systems (Boeing Phantom Works)

2. Ambitious Ares Test Flight Proposed for HLV Demostration

3. NASA Heavy Lift and Propulsion Trade Study

4. X-37 Orbital Test Vehicle

5. Boeing X-37

6. Space Commercialization and the Lunar Lotto

7. National Launch System

8. DIRECT

Ares vs the Sidemount and the Augustine Commission

by Marcel F. Williams

During Space Shuttle manager John Shannon's presentation of the Side-mount Shuttle (SD-HLV) concept to the Augustine Committee, he showed the committee figures that indicated that a SD-HLV with an EDS (Earth Departure Stage) could place approximately 39 tonnes of net payload into lunar orbit per launch. However, just a week later, a subsequent, more thoroughly analyzed NASA study, indicated that up to 47.8 tonnes of net payload could be placed into lunar orbit per SD-HLV launch with an EDS.

Unfortunately, in the Augustine commission's final report, a SD-HLV architecture that could only deliver 39 tonnes to lunar orbit was presented to the President. And this lower mass estimate led to the following conclusion by the committee:

"Among the other notable differences between the Ares V family and the more-directly Shuttle-derived launcher family is the mission-launch reliability. Since the latter requires three launches for each planned Constellation lunar mission,there would be a somewhat lower reliability in any given time window than would be provided by the Ares V, which only would require two launches in the same time window."

• Single launch plus EDS stage
• Net payload to lunar orbit:
• 47.8 tonnes
• Net payload to LEO:
• 100.8 tonnes
• Maximum Altair lunar lander mass:
• 47.8 tonnes
• Maximum Orion mass plus EDS payload to lunar orbit:
• 22 tonne Orion plus 25.8 tonnes of EDS net payload
  

Credit NASA

This is clearly an erroneous conclusion by the Augustine Committee since a single SD-HLV/EDS launch can deliver a full sized Altair vehicle (45 tonnes plus) to lunar orbit, while a second SD-HLV/EDS launch could deliver an Orion vehicle plus at least an equal mass of additional payload to lunar orbit. So if anything, a two launch SD-HLV scenario (47.8 tonnes plus 47.8 tonnes) would exceed the two launch Ares I/V scenario (22 tonnes plus 49 tonnes) in total mass delivered to lunar orbit. In fact, a single SD-HLV/EDS launch could, in theory, deliver a 22 tonne Orion vehicle into lunar orbit plus a 25 tonne lunar landing vehicle (more than 50% more massive than the 16 tonne lunar module of the Apollo era).

• Ares I/V dual launch configuration to lunar orbit

• 22 tonne Orion plus up to 49 tonne Altair lunar landing mass
  
• Ares I
  
• 25 tonnes to LEO
• Ares V:
• 188 tonnes to LEO

Credit NASA

NASA also concluded that an SD-HLV plus EDS stage could be developed in just 66 months at an estimated cost of $9.4B which is dramatically lower than NASA's estimated cost for the development of the Ares I/V which they conclude would cost over $30 billion. (Neither of these figures include the developmental cost of the Orion and Altair vehicles.)

The committee also made an obvious conclusion about the SD-HLV concept vs. the inline shuttle derived concept (DIRECT):

"While the Committee did not examine the technical trade between the side-mount and inline variants in detail, it observes that the side-mount variant is considered an in-herently less safe arrangement if crew are to be carried, and is more limited in its growth potential. "

However, they also noted the following:

"Historically, vehicles with heritage derived from prior demonstrated systems have shown greater reliability in early usage than newly developed systems. The process of converting an established cargo launcher into a human-rated launcher results in improved reliability, as was demonstrated in the early U.S. human spaceflight programs where modified ICBMs were employed as launch systems. History has shown that the early flight period is of much higher risk than would be expected later in flight history."

The Augustine Commission declared the current Space Shuttle as the most reliable U.S. heavy-lift vehicle ever built, judging the Titan HLV and Delta IV heavy as less reliable heavy lift vehicles. Since the DIRECT concept's Jupiter rocket would be a brand new booster, this would make the DIRECT Jupiter rocket a less reliable launch vehicle than the SD-HLV-- at least in its early stages. The DIRECT concept also requires 18 new technological developmental starts while the SD-HLV requires only 8; Ares I/V requires 35 total developmental starts.

If the Obama administration wisely decides to terminate the development of the Ares I/V configuration in favor of the SD-HLV-- while also adding $3 billion additional dollars to the NASA annual budget, NASA should have enough money to continue Space Shuttle flights until the Orion CEV and SD-HLV are ready for flight. NASA is currently spending more than $3.5 billion on Constellation development programs; that should be plenty for the Orion and related program integration and operations development. And the additional $3 billion a year should be plenty of money to develop the SD-HLV ($6.9 billion), EDS ($2.5 billion), and Altair ($4.2 billion) over the next 6 years. Plus any delays and additional cost in developing this space architecture could be easily met by the annual $6.5 billion NASA budget solely dedicate towards developing the SD-HLV, EDS, Orion, and Altair. That's up to $32.5 billion in additional funds if it takes NASA all the way to 2020 to finish the new space architecture. Once the new launch architecture is completed and the Space Shuttle program finally retired and we're back on the Moon setting up permanent modular settlements, NASA is going to have several billion dollars a year in surplus funding on its hands-- perhaps to utilize in developing the next space architecture to get us to Mars!

Links and References

1. NASA Sidemount Shuttle Report June 25, 2009
http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/space/orl-alternative-rocket-pdf,0,7079469.htmlpage

2. NASA Sidemount Shuttle Report June 17, 2009
http://www.nasa.gov/pdf/361842main_15%20-%20Augustine%20Sidemount%20Final.pdf

3. Augustine Commission Final Report
http://www.nasa.gov/pdf/396093main_HSF_Cmte_FinalReport.pdf

4. Daily Kos Poll (Which nation will be first to establish a permanent base on the Moon?)
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2009/11/8/802191/-Ares-vs-the-Sidemount-and-the-Augustine-Commission

Obama's NASA Decision

by Marcel F. Williams

The Review of U.S. Human Space Flight Plans Committee (the Augustine Commission) recently concluded that NASA's Constellation return to the Moon program is running $50 billion over the current budget through the year 2020. They also concluded that cheaper alternatives such as the NASA's Side-mount shuttle and the DIRECT concept would also exceed NASA's budget by at least $20 billion to $30 billion.

So it appears that the Augustine commission will recommend a $3 billion dollar increase to NASA's annual budget if the US is to return to the Moon or a termination of the Moon program in order to stay within NASA's current $17 billion dollar a year budget.

So what should President Obama do?

At the height of the Apollo program, the NASA budget reached $33 billion a year in today's dollars, nearly twice as large as NASA current budget. NASA's $17 billion annual budget represents less 0.6% of the total Federal budget while the US Federal government is spending nearly a trillion dollars annually on defense related purposes. So a $3 billion annual increase to the NASA budget would be extremely tiny relative to the overall Federal budget.

I believe that President Obama needs to raise the NASA budget while also choosing the fastest and the cheapest return to the Moon architecture. That's why President Obama needs to raise the annual NASA budget by at least $3 billion while choosing NASA's SD-HLV (Side-mount shuttle) concept in order to return to the Moon to set up a permanently manned lunar facility.

Terminating funding for the Ares 1 combined with a $3 billion annual increase should give NASA an extra $4 billion dollars a year to work with without immediately terminating the current Space Shuttle program or the ISS.

At least $700 million of that should go to finance the development the Orion (CEV) over the next 5 years which is currently being funded at nearly $1.4 billion a year. That would raise Orion funding to $2.1 billion a year over the next 5 years.

NASA has preliminarily estimated that the cost of developing the SD-HLV vehicles should cost $6.6 billion and could be ready for full testing in 4 and a half years. So 1.5 billion a year over the next 5 years should be more than enough to develop the SD-HLV vehicles.

That leaves another 1.8 billion a year to immediately start funding the development of the Altair lunar landing vehicle over the next 5 or 6 years so that America could be ready to return to the Moon by 2016. Why wait until 2020 to return to the Moon when the shuttle derived heavy lift vehicles could be ready by 2015 or 2016?

Additional funds for the development of the Moon program could be garnered by terminating the Space Shuttle program and US ISS involvement a year or more before the Orion-HLV and Altair-HLV space craft are ready. That would be $5 billion in additional funds if both the Shuttle and the ISS were terminated a year early and $10 billion if they were terminated two years early.

2016 should also be a time when NASA should have plenty of extra funds from both the termination of the Space Shuttle and ISS programs and from the completion of the Orion, Altair, and SD-HLV development programs: plenty of money for a continuously growing lunar base program and beyond.

The US space program has always been the ultimate symbol of America's scientific and technological achievement. And NASA has contributed far more to the economic wealth of the US than it has consumed. The expansion of humans into the rest of the solar system is essential to the long term survival our species and towards the continued economic growth of human civilization. That's why President Barack Obama needs to strongly commit the US towards leading that expansion of humanity into the New Frontier.

1. Augustine Commission
http://newpapyrusmagazine.blogspot.com/2009/08/augustine-commission-recommends-that.html

2. NASAs-Ares-Alternative:-The-Side-mount-Shuttle

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2009/7/16/753191/-NASAs-Ares-Alternative:-The-Side-mount-Shuttle

3. Robots could build a base on the Moon

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2009/5/19/733423/-Robots-Could-Build-a-Base-on-the-Moon

© Marcel F. Williams
New Papyrus