Space Access Update #128 9/15/11
Copyright 2011 by Space Access Society
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(This will be shorter and
hastier than we’d like; things are moving fast.)
Impossibly high NASA system development
costs are the heart of the matter.
We will ignore for the moment
the arguments over whether the old-line NASA human spaceflight establishment is
at this point capable of putting together an effective exploration program at any cost. The indisputable fact is that their costs for
making the attempt have risen to unsupportable levels.
A NASA study last spring
applied government project-cost estimating models to a recent commercial
booster development. The result was a
cost estimate for the same booster done the established NASA way of ten times
the actual commercial development cost.
This study also looked at the effect of a hypothetical streamlined
version of traditional NASA system development methods, and came up with a cost
estimate of “only” three or four times the actual commercial cost.
Note that these extreme cost
ratios came from the type of tools used to come up with initial NASA project
cost estimates. In another recent study,
the GAO found that a dozen or so recent high profile NASA development projects
actually cost on average over fifty percent higher than their initial
estimates.
In other words, NASA major
project development costs in recent years demonstrably ran roughly fifteen
times higher than equivalent commercial project costs. Even with a streamlined “modified”
version of traditional NASA procurement practices, costs still would run as
much as six times the commercial equivalents.
In the current fiscal
climate, this is a big problem for those of us who’d like to see NASA doing
useful space exploration and technology development. It’s apparently not at all a problem for
those who see NASA primarily as a hometown jobs program. But that’s a short-term outlook – in the long
term, the ongoing expensive lack of results will inevitably bring NASA
down. Ultimately, the real choice is, a
new reformed NASA with a new and very different way of doing business, or no
NASA at all.
SLS
NASA HQ just gave in to
prolonged Congressional pressure and announced a vehicle configuration for the
SLS “Senate Launch System” heavy-lift launch vehicle project. The project will be run under traditional
NASA practices; the cost multiplier over doing the job commercially will thus
presumably start out on the rough order of fifteen times as expensive.
Note we said, start out. We see indications that the NASA
organizational dysfunction that causes that huge cost multiplier is not a
constant, but rather has been growing in recent years. We thoroughly expect that SLS project cost
will grow and schedule stretch, just as Constellation program costs and
schedule did.
We predict that at some
point, it will be as obvious that SLS will never fly usefully as it was obvious
that Constellation was going nowhere, and SLS too will be expensively
cancelled. We hope that SLS will go away
before it’s wasted even more scarce dollars (and impacted even more actual
useful NASA projects) than Constellation – but we wouldn’t bet on it at this
point.
Commercial Crew
Back in July, when the
Commercial Crew Program announced that they planned to abandon the previous
successful COTS/CCDev project approach
(non-traditional Space Act Agreements where NASA had strong insight and
influence, but NOT control, over commercial developers) for a new, somewhat
streamlined version of traditional NASA procurement that would give NASA
control over commercial project details.
CCP management have stated
that they must do it this way, because their lawyers told them they have
to. In July they were asked repeatedly
for the detailed legal brief from their lawyers, and also for the requirements
they gave their lawyers that led to that brief.
Months later, as best we know they still haven’t answered either
question. We hope someone asks them
again in the short-notice CCP briefing happening tomorrow, and we hope that
this time CCP management provides real answers.
We suspect that won’t happen
though, because our best guess is that the reason NASA’s lawyers told CCP
management they have to dump the SAA’s that had been working
well, in favor of a variant of traditional NASA (high cost) procurement, was
because CCP management first told NASA’s lawyers “we must control the
details”.
It’s an obvious circular
argument, given both halves: “Our lawyers told us we have to use contracts
that let us control all the details, because we told our lawyers it’s a
requirement that we control all the details.”
All of which misses the basic
fact that *by their own admission* NASA costs for “modified,
streamlined” versions of their normal procurement process are still up to
six times equivalent commercial costs.
COTS, and CCDev
till now, succeeded because their non-traditional Space Act Agreement contracts
*prevented NASA from imposing their normal procurement practices*, and allowed
the commercial partners to get things done at far lower commercial cost levels.
If CCP management gets away
with abandoning what’s been working and switching to modified traditional
procurement, all the arguments over whether the results will actually be any better
or safer are moot. There will be no
results, because *the money isn’t there.*
The Senate appropriators
reportedly just came back with $500m for CCP next year, somewhat more than the
House, but still far less than the NASA request. $500m may be just barely enough to support
multiple competing commercial crew projects – if done under the old
arrangements.
Under anything like
traditional NASA procurement practice, $500m will barely pay for the
viewgraphs. If CCP management goes ahead
with their current approach, they will be effectively killing the program,
absent money miraculously raining from the skies.
It is in the strong interest
of this country to have multiple viable commercial orbital passenger transport
services. We hope that all concerned
will recognize the budget-climate implications:
That the only practical and affordable alternative now (regardless of
the understandable old-line NASA organizational compulsion to control every
detail of any potential astronaut carrier) is to stick to the existing
successful project model.
Project insight, yes. Project influence, very much so, with NASA as
the effective anchor-tenant customer.
Project oversight, no – there simply isn’t enough money to pay the known
huge costs of traditional close NASA project oversight.
Safety will inevitably be
cited – but it is not inherently obvious that NASA’s traditional process will
produce any safety improvement at all over the commercial/FAA process now
coming together, let alone enough improvement to justify the many times higher
NASA costs.
Human spaceflight will remain
a risky business for a long time no matter who is in charge, the industry and
FAA, or NASA. The only way it will
become completely safe in our lifetimes is if it is made so expensive that we
no longer do it at all. NASA getting
their way on changing how CCDev is run may ultimately
produce exactly that result.
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Space Access Society’s sole
purpose is to promote radical reductions in the cost of reaching space.
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Space Access Society
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“Reach low orbit and you’re halfway to anywhere in the Solar System”
– Robert A. Heinlein
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