Newt Gingrich on the Moon

[kamaz]

Republican presidential contender Newt Gingrich called on Wednesday for a base on the moon and an expanded federal purse for prize money to stimulate private-sector space projects.

"By the end of my second term, we will have the first permanent base on the moon and it will be American," Gingrich said.

"We will have commercial near-Earth activities that include science, tourism and manufacturing, because it is in our interest to acquire so much experience in space that we clearly have a capacity that the Chinese and the Russians will never come anywhere close to matching," he said

Gingrich said he wanted to spend 10 percent of NASA's $18 billion budget on prize money for competitions that spur innovation and technological breakthroughs in space.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/...80P05K20120126

Finally.

[swampyankee]

The prize money may work for NEO activities, where there is currently money to be made. It won't work to promote exploration farther out. For my logic, see http://www.bautforum.com/showthread....-is-fallacious

I can also see the prize money being a great source of political patronage. "Ooh, we like him. Let's give him all the money!"

[hush36]

Ah newt, if only what you said had ANY chance of actually happening.. I'd vote for you from here, Europe.

[Winner]

Nothing but empty nationalistic boasting meant to mobilize a certain segment of the Republican electorate. All American presidents have made similar pronouncements since Apollo, and we know what came from them - nothing.

[NEOWatcher]

I heard part of one of the speeches where he likened it to Charles Lindbergh and that he did it only for the prize money.

The prize money was much more than what it cost someone to do the flight. So there was definitely an incentive there.

SpaceX won prize money, but the incentive was to build a business.

What I would like to know is what kind of business can someone build by spending possibly $100B to win about $9B. (assuming 5 years of development) That's $91B a business needs to invest in the project. You'll need lots of future flights to make up for that difference.

[IsaacKuo]

NEOWatcher's point gets to the crux of the problem with financial prize incentives. Either the prize is large enough that it costs more than doing it directly, or it relies upon the contestants being financially reckless.

Back to the original topic:

I may disagree with Newt Gingrich on almost everything--including details of this speech--but I share his level of visceral passion for the space program. This is something lacking in all of the other Presidential candidates, including the one who I support.

[jfribrg]

I really don't listen to campaign rhetoric, unless it is from one of the few politicians with a track record of doing what they say they will do. Given the forum rules, that's about all that I can say on that subject. When a person who is in a position to actually do something about space travel, and that person talks specifics about how these things will be accomplished given the current financial and political constraints, then I'll start taking notice. Even then I may or may not agree with the agenda.

[djellison]

Finally.

Finally what? There's no money. It's not going to happen.

[Buttercup]

I'll bet his 2nd ex-wife would like to send him there. Sans helmet...

[IsaacKuo]

I'll bet his 2nd ex-wife would like to send him there. Sans helmet...

Hmm...interesting conundrum. He can certainly generate enough hot air to survive if he opens his mouth, but can he do so with his mouth shut?

[Noclevername]

...but can he do so with his mouth shut?

Something we'll never know.

[Swift]

I wonder if the fact that the next primary is Florida and Florida has a lot of NASA employees and contractors is part of the reason for the timing of this speech? Just wondering...

[kamaz]

Well, let's look at how realistic his plan is. This is a technical forum after all

Moon base means a Moon landing, so Newt's plan is essentially Moon by 2020, or, more likely, Moon by 20 July 2019 for propaganda reasons. So that's 6.5 years after assuming office. No way this can be done using the private sector. That would require Apollo-style, NASA-led effort.

As the adage goes, we need a Booster, a Capsule and a Lander. Money for the Booster (SLS) and Capsule (Orion CEV) is already appropriated. In fact, wiki page on SLS says that unmanned SLS/CEV lunar flyby is projected December 2017. That's 18 months before the cutoff date, and it could probably be shortened by 6-12 months. So we need a lander. Since SLS/CEV is essentially CxP hardware, then the logical move is to resurrect Altair LSAM.

This, I believe is the crucial point here. If he's elected and wants to do this, he has to restart Altair; if he won't, it means he is not serious.

Now, the problem here is that there is no money for Altair. Worse yet: this program would require developing Altair in parallel with SLS/CEV, which is exactly the thing that present administration wanted to avoid. (The whole Flexible Path idea; do the asteroid mission which does not require a lander, and then build a lander). At the same time, he wants to give 10% of NASA money for prizes. So a logical thing to do, would be to cut NASA science and R&D (basically, anything that is not directly related to the Moon and can get axed, gets axed) and use that money for Altair. And surface systems. (Although I believe CxP managed to build some of these before they were closed.) The weak point here is getting the Congress to change appropriations. On the other hand, an average voter has no idea what NASA really does, while a Moon base is something tangible, so he could get support for this idea.

And there's another elephant in the room, which is the ISS. Because of international obligations, he would have to keep the ISS flying until 2020. So that means doing the Moon program in parallel with keeping ISS afloat. That's what even the Constellation wanted to avoid, by downing the ISS in 2016, to free money for the Moon! But 2016 ISS deorbit is no longer an option.

Bottom line: I believe this could be pulled, but it would wreak massive havoc in other NASA projects.

[NEOWatcher]

I wonder if the fact that the next primary is Florida and Florida has a lot of NASA employees and contractors is part of the reason for the timing of this speech? Just wondering...

What? Do you mean that a politician is wording his campain for each state? Never...

[IsaacKuo]

I wonder if the fact that the next primary is Florida and Florida has a lot of NASA employees and contractors is part of the reason for the timing of this speech? Just wondering...

No, it's pure coincidence. It's also pure coincidence that this speech was given just down the road from Kennedy Space Center.

[Rhaedas]

Didn't someone (Russia?) just recently open up discussions on a international joint plan to form a base on the Moon? Maybe I was dreaming it...but just like the ISS (even with its problems), that's the most feasible way to get something like this rolling any time in the near future. Have the countries invest in the research and development to aid the private industry to get the infrastructure working.

Once we do that, I'm all for the topic...Newt going to the Moon.

[jfribrg]

I think we should just attach a very low thrust booster to the ISS and move it to lunar orbit.

[tusenfem]

Let's keep the discussion on the plans, and let's not go into political gibes.

[Jim]

Well, let's look at how realistic his plan is. This is a technical forum after all

Yes, it is. And that's an appropriate discussion here, including how politics in general will affect it.

But, please, nothing directly political, including especially personal remarks about a candidate.

[Jim]

Bottom line: I believe this could be pulled, but it would wreak massive havoc in other NASA projects.

The alternative is to increase NASA's budget, and that really ain't gonna happen!

Too many folks with hands on the budget have said for too long that NASA is wasteful. While adding a lunar program such as this would generate more jobs than anything since the last lunar program, getting past that "NASA=waste" paradigm would be problematic.

So, it's cut other programs. Which would really be a waste.

[Ara Pacis]

The alternative is to increase NASA's budget, and that really ain't gonna happen!

Too many folks with hands on the budget have said for too long that NASA is wasteful. While adding a lunar program such as this would generate more jobs than anything since the last lunar program, getting past that "NASA=waste" paradigm would be problematic.

So, it's cut other programs. Which would really be a waste.

Not necessarily. The current crop of candidates are seeking a separation from recent past presidents from their party, so they may count on a belief that their vision/actions are different, hence NASA would no longer equal waste if they are the ones punching numbers into a calculator. Also, with military spending trending down, this is an opportunity for a candidate to continue routing spending to some of the same companies for other projects, with the additional claim that it's still for a strong defense since it prevents brain drain and technological atrophy. It's all in the spin.

[djellison]

Well, let's look at how realistic his plan is. This is a technical forum after all

Money for the Booster (SLS) and Capsule (Orion CEV) is already appropriated.

And no one seriously believes that they can be done to time or budget. The budget is spread too thin to do this properly.

To do this...realistically...you would have to double NASA's budget.

That's never going to happen. Period.

[R.A.F.]

I wonder if the fact that the next primary is Florida and Florida has a lot of NASA employees and contractors is part of the reason for the timing of this speech? Just wondering...

Politicians, by definition, say things they "think" the voting public "want" to hear...


Hope that isn't too "political".

[kamaz]

To do this...realistically...you would have to double NASA's budget.

Not necessarily. In the Mars thread I linked a talk by Zubrin http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d9J7H...feature=relmfu where he points out that, inflation-adjusted, NASA budget today is roughly the same as in 1960s. It is a smaller fraction of GDP, but that's because the GDP has grown. So a space program has actually become more affordable not less. It's politically unaffordable to increase NASA budget at the moment, but it's not like it would break the US economy. Besides, as Ara Pacis noted, NASA and DoD cash goes to the same contractors anyway, so such move could be made without upseting the (already proverbial) Utah representatives.

In the same talk, Zubrin also noted that the difference between 1960s and now is that today NASA lacks focus. In 1960s NASA was doing the Moon shot, while today NASA does everything but the kitchen sink, so to speak. You don't have to double the budget to get money for the Moon base, you can simply kill off some projects and take their money for your pet idea. We've seen that happen before. Although I agree that this would be bad.

And then there is an issue of NASA bureaucracy which causes enormous waste. Suffice to say, that after Elon built Falcon 9 for $390M, a NASA study revealed that NASA would need between $1.7B and $4B to do the same http://aerospaceblog.wordpress.com/2...nasa-a-lesson/ . So that basically means that NASA development process is so wasteful, that it could use between 5 and 10 times improvement in effectiveness. Which means, that 2-fold effectiveness improvement -- which would have the same effect as doubling the budget -- is perfectly achievable.

Given the political constraints, I believe that increasing the NASA budget is out of question. Killing other projects to pay for the new Moon shot requires approval from the Legislative. However, changing the way NASA works (i.e. decreasing bureaucracy) is perfectly within the competences of the Executive. Gingrich is already on record making statements to this effect. To wit:

“Let me take a radical example,” he said. “If we decided to human-rate the Atlas 5, how long would take take?” Mark Bitterman of United Launch Alliance noted that those efforts were ongoing as part of ULA’s Commercial Crew Development award and the company projected it would take three to five years. “But I’m asking a different question,” Gingrich responded, saying he wanted to know how long it would take if it was just an engineering problem. “I want to relentlessly adopt the model of World War Two, where we learned to fly B-26′s off aircraft carriers in a matter of months because we had no choice.” Bitterman suggested that, based on that model, human-rating effort could be “accelerated significantly.”

http://www.spacepolitics.com/2012/01...-space-speech/ (emphasis mine)

I was initially thinking that Newt's idea is pure lunacy (pun intended), but on closer examination, I maintain that this stunt is possible to pull off if done right.

[Glom]

Not necessarily. The current crop of candidates are seeking a separation from recent past presidents from their party, so they may count on a belief that their vision/actions are different, hence NASA would no longer equal waste if they are the ones punching numbers into a calculator. Also, with military spending trending down, this is an opportunity for a candidate to continue routing spending to some of the same companies for other projects, with the additional claim that it's still for a strong defense since it prevents brain drain and technological atrophy. It's all in the spin.

Given that the previous president launched his own Vision for Space Exploration, I don't see how making their own will see a change from the past. Every president wants their own vision. The next one then changes the vision. Establishing cross party support would be a good first step to avoiding any implemented vision from being changed with the White House tenancy, although even with continuity of party, there is still a risk since the presidency is about the individual as much as the party and the individual might want his own stamp on the space program.

Moon Base Gingrich does have a ring to it though.

[William Thompson]

I was just going to start a thread like this.

I see lots of benefits to a perm base on the moon. There were books written about this topic, right?

How about energy? Collect solar power and send it to earth via microwave !

And the raw materials to build a solar energy farm are already on the moon: Silica, Titanium...

[kamaz]

And no one seriously believes that they [SLS & CEV] can be done to time or budget.

I'd appreciate the source for that. The schedule in the Wiki article is taken from this article on NSF: http://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2011/...21-years-away/ which says:

SLS-1 will debut the vehicle in a 2.5 configuration, utilizing three Space Shuttle Main Engines (SSMEs) – otherwise known as RS-25Ds, donated by the Shuttle fleet – on an 8.4m diameter “External Tank” core, stretching 212 feet in length, with five segment Solid Rocket Boosters (SRBs). It will also sport a 5m “kick stage” – which sources claim is a man rated version of the Boeing Delta IV upper stage.

So SLS-1 (through SLS-6, when they run out of SSMEs) is essentially going to be built from repurposed, vintage Shuttle hardware. Projecting that we need six years from today to do so strikes me as very conservative (not to mention pessimistic).

[Glom]

Heard a tweet about Gingrich's proposal being illegal under the Outer Space Treaty.

[newpapyrus]

Well, let's look at how realistic his plan is. This is a technical forum after all

Moon base means a Moon landing, so Newt's plan is essentially Moon by 2020, or, more likely, Moon by 20 July 2019 for propaganda reasons. So that's 6.5 years after assuming office. No way this can be done using the private sector. That would require Apollo-style, NASA-led effort.

As the adage goes, we need a Booster, a Capsule and a Lander. Money for the Booster (SLS) and Capsule (Orion CEV) is already appropriated. In fact, wiki page on SLS says that unmanned SLS/CEV lunar flyby is projected December 2017. That's 18 months before the cutoff date, and it could probably be shortened by 6-12 months. So we need a lander. Since SLS/CEV is essentially CxP hardware, then the logical move is to resurrect Altair LSAM.

This, I believe is the crucial point here. If he's elected and wants to do this, he has to restart Altair; if he won't, it means he is not serious.

Now, the problem here is that there is no money for Altair. Worse yet: this program would require developing Altair in parallel with SLS/CEV, which is exactly the thing that present administration wanted to avoid. (The whole Flexible Path idea; do the asteroid mission which does not require a lander, and then build a lander). At the same time, he wants to give 10% of NASA money for prizes. So a logical thing to do, would be to cut NASA science and R&D (basically, anything that is not directly related to the Moon and can get axed, gets axed) and use that money for Altair. And surface systems. (Although I believe CxP managed to build some of these before they were closed.) The weak point here is getting the Congress to change appropriations. On the other hand, an average voter has no idea what NASA really does, while a Moon base is something tangible, so he could get support for this idea.

And there's another elephant in the room, which is the ISS. Because of international obligations, he would have to keep the ISS flying until 2020. So that means doing the Moon program in parallel with keeping ISS afloat. That's what even the Constellation wanted to avoid, by downing the ISS in 2016, to free money for the Moon! But 2016 ISS deorbit is no longer an option.

Bottom line: I believe this could be pulled, but it would wreak massive havoc in other NASA projects.

1. An Altair would probably cost about $12 billion to develop or about $1.7 billion a year over 7 years. And full funding would probably have to start at least by 2014. However, an Altair derived single stage vehicle that could eventually use lunar LOX/LH2 could be nearly half the price since NASA would only have to develop a single vehicle instead of two (LOX/LH2 descent stage and a hypergolically fueled ascent stage). But if we assume this vehicle cost about $8 billion to develop then the cost per year could be about $1.1 billion per year over 7 years.

2. Obama raised the ISS budget from $2 billion a year to nearly $3 billion. I'd reduce ISS funding back to $2 billion a year once Altair development begins. If we turn over more control of the ISS to our partners, we could possibly reduce our ISS funding even further. But we should finally end the ISS program by 2020 so that we can fully fund the lunar base program.

3. You still have to have funding for lunar base modules, nuclear or photovoltaic power plants, ice mining machines, development, etc. But these shouldn't be too hard to develop quickly and can be funded over a 3 or 4 year period after full development funding for the MPCV is completed in 2016 or 2017 and the SLS core stage is completed in 2017 or 2018.

Marcel F. Williams

[IsaacKuo]

I'd appreciate the source for that. The schedule in the Wiki article is taken from this article on NSF: http://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2011/...21-years-away/ which says:

SLS-1 will debut the vehicle in a 2.5 configuration, utilizing three Space Shuttle Main Engines (SSMEs) – otherwise known as RS-25Ds, donated by the Shuttle fleet – on an 8.4m diameter “External Tank” core, stretching 212 feet in length, with five segment Solid Rocket Boosters (SRBs). It will also sport a 5m “kick stage” – which sources claim is a man rated version of the Boeing Delta IV upper stage.

So SLS-1 (through SLS-6, when they run out of SSMEs) is essentially going to be built from repurposed, vintage Shuttle hardware. Projecting that we need six years from today to do so strikes me as very conservative (not to mention pessimistic).

For interesting definitions of vintage Shuttle hardware. The ET is stretched 212 feet, and the SRBs are the infamous 5 segment SRBs. That still haven't flown. But which ATK doubled down on by scrapping the 4 segment production capabilities and daring anyone to scrap 5 segment.

Unfortunately, it's now impossible to go with the vintage Shuttle hardware approach. ATK has made sure of that by burning the bridges on the less expensive faster option.