Space Access Update is Space Access Society's when-there's-news publication. Space Access Society's goal is to promote affordable access to space for all, period. We believe in concentrating our limited resources at whatever point looks like yielding maximum progress toward this goal.
For the moment, our main focus is on supporting the government's "SSRT" (Single Stage Rocket Technology) program, DC-X and its recently funded followon, SX-2. Space Access Update is thus for the moment largely about the technology and politics of DC-X and SX-2, though we also cover the subject of reusable SSTO (Single Stage To Orbit) policy in general.
We anticipate a change of focus soon if all goes well. Once SX-2 startup is (with your help!) assured, we plan to begin working on establishment of a healthy second X-rocket development track at NASA, and on getting development of suitable engines started for the fully reusable orbital transports that should come after SX-2 and NASA's X-rocket.
With luck and hard work, we should see fully reusable SSTO testbeds flying to orbit toward the end of this decade, with production ships a-building shortly thereafter. Join us and help us make this happen.
Henry Vanderbilt, Editor, Space Access Update
[For more info on Space Access Society or on the DC-X/SSTO video we have for sale, write us at 4855 E Warner Rd #24-150, Phoenix AZ 85044, or email hvanderbilt@bix.com. Please forgive any delay in our reply; we're a couple weeks behind in answering non life-or-death email right now.]
You probably recall from SAU #35 that the US House of Representatives has approved $100 million for USAF's proposed SX-2 high-speed reusable rocket testbed, in their version of next year's Defense Department (DOD) funding Authorization bill.
The next major hurdle for FY'95 SX-2 funding is the Senate Armed Services Committee (SASC) DOD Authorization markup, taking place this coming week. The key event for SX-2 will be next Tuesday afternoon, June 7th, when Senator Jeff Bingaman's Defense Technology subcommittee does a preliminary mark of its sections of the Senate FY'95 DOD Authorization bill.
SX-2 funding is a relatively small item in the DOD Authorization. If it is added by Senator Bingaman's subcommittee, it will likely sail through intact. Conversely, if it isn't added at the subcommittee level, it's much less likely to be added by the full SASC, and extremely unlikely to be added by amendment when the full Senate considers the bill.
The full SASC is scheduled to mark up (modify) the FY'95 DOD Authorization two days later, Thursday June 9th. Debate, amendment, and approval by the full Senate should follow in the next couple of weeks.
While there are some strong SSTO supporters on SASC, last year support for SSTO was much weaker in the Senate than in the House. If the Senate can be persuaded to match the House SX-2 funding language, inclusion in the final FY'95 DOD budget is very likely, subject to agreement of the Appropriations committees. If the Senate leaves SSTO out of their DOD Authorization, however, things will be dicey, at best going down to the wire again as they did last year.
The headline is the story -- things have been hopping on the SX-2 and NASA SSTO fronts, and we've had very little time to ferret out details on DC-X reflight progress. The scheduled date for DC-X's first flight since funding ran out last October is Saturday, June 11th, and we hear things are on track, pending the ground engine test firing scheduled this coming Tuesday. More on this when we know more.
There is a consensus emerging that reusable SSTO is the long-term answer to current US problems with slow, expensive, unreliable space launch. But there are huge differences of approach among the various SSTO supporters, and there are of course anti-SSTO holdouts still in positions where they can block progress.
Bear with us while we lay out in detail the course of action we advocate as the best way to get our nation affordable space access as fast and cheap as possible. It'll help you understand the policy background that follows.
Space Access Society's overall strategy is to push government experimental SSTO testbeds, while avoiding like the plague any government built-and- flown "Shuttle II" operational SSTO projects. Government transportation monopolies do not have a good historical record.
The idea behind pushing flight testbeds is to increase our experience with practical, fieldable SSTO technology, thus reducing development costs for future operational SSTO transports. At the same time, the flight demos will increase private investor confidence in SSTO technology, thus increasing the amount of money they'd be willing to risk on it.
When dropping development costs and rising investor confidence meet, we should start seeing commercial SSTO developments. We're already surprisingly close -- a recent pan-aerospace-industry launch market survey based on very conservative assumptions found that a small SSTO fleet would make money if it could be built for $2 billion. Meanwhile, Boeing, Lockheed, and McDonnell-Douglas all have said more or less officially that each could develop such a fleet for about $6 billion. The private SSTO investment gap is down to a factor of three, even without discounting for conservative numbers. More important, the gap is narrowing steadily.
SAS is of the opinion that developing and flying an SX-2 class demonstrator will narrow that gap a lot more, and that a fully-orbital followon X-ship will almost certainly close it, enabling a commercial SSTO market explosion starting around the year 2000 that could rival the jet airliner boom of the sixties.
This depends, of course, on there being no major government disincentives to investment in commercial SSTO's, one example of such being a major government project to build and fly their own one-size-fits-all SSTO fleet. No investor in his right mind would go up against competition like that, and absent a pressing national emergency, SAS would oppose any such government SSTO monopoly project.
SAS's preferred option is pretty well known; we'd like to see the people that put together DC-X given a chance to follow it up immediately with the SX-2. "Space Experimental 2" would have as its sole purpose learning how to fly as high as possible and as fast as possible on the available money, "scaring the hell out of orbit" as someone put it last fall, with a fully reusable vehicle.
The people that managed DC-X, alas, are US Air Force officers and were working for SDIO at the time DC-X got underway. This is causing political problems.
We're persisting despite these problems, because we still think that DOD offers the best near-term prospects of getting a followon to DC-X done fast and cheap. The experienced management is ready to mave at the Air Force's Phillips Lab, the USAF already has a proven organizational setup called an ATD (Advanced Technology Demonstrator) project, the SX-2 RFP (Request For Proposals) has been ready for months, and we've built considerable support for funding in Congress's DOD oversight committees. DC-X was built for less than $70 million over less than two years, giving some confidence in estimates of $300 million over three years for SX-2.
Military R&D is supposed to be focusing more on "dual use" military/civilian technologies in the post Cold War era, and SSTO is about as dual use as they come. SX-2 is a completely legitimate use of DOD resources to advance both the military and economic security of the country.
We mentioned political problems earlier. Our largest single problem seems to be a gentleman named John Deutch, the Assistant Secretary of Defense who runs research and acquisitions for the Pentagon. Release of the existing $35 million appropriated for SX-2 startup last year has repeatedly hit a stone wall in his office. We see no point in speculating on the reasons for his opposition -- no man is ever the villain of his own story, and Mr. Deutch undoubtedly believes he's serving his country best by opposing DOD SX-2. We, of course, disagree on that point.
Judging purely by the persistance (and often downright ingenuity) of his opposition over the last year, it seems unlikely to us that he's going to change his mind on his own. We expect that what's needed is a political decision at a higher level to go ahead with DOD SX-2, from Secretary of Defense Perry or from the White House. Our working assumption is that at some point the Administration will take note of the level of Congressional support for this project, and make such a decision.
On another front, we're faced with a significant new opportunity. Alas, this is an opportunity that comes with significant dangers. NASA has officially decided that SSTO is practical, and they want to do it too.
Now in the larger scheme of things, it is a major step forward that NASA, which is after all by law the nations's space agency, is now interested in SSTO. We applaud their conversion, and we stand ready to work in support of funding for any project they initiate that advances cheap space access.
The problem with all this, of course, is that in space matters, NASA is the proverbial 800-pound gorrilla. With the best of intentions, they can end up crowding others out of the cage, and frankly, NASA's past reputation is not good in these matters. We understand that Administrator Goldin is making changes, and we hear that he is not opposed to SX-2 going ahead in DOD while NASA gets its own SSTO efforts underway. Indeed we hear that he will have NASA cooperate with DOD on SSTO where it makes sense to do so.
Nevertheless, we get nervous when we read quotes from people a couple levels under Goldin to the effect that DOD SX-2 funding is somehow a declaration of war on NASA. (Space News, May 23-29, page 25, "Congress, NASA Dueling Over Reusable Rocket Management") That sounds far too much like an attack on a perceived rival's funding from NASA's bad old days. It may be a while before Administrator Goldin's views on SSTO cooperation filter down to all levels.
In the best of all possible worlds, what we at SAS would like to see is for SX-2 to get an immediate go-ahead so suborbital flights can begin in 1997. This will yield a wealth of practical experience, faster and cheaper than any alternative, as the DC-X team is proven, in place and ready to go now.
Meanwhile, NASA would take over (as already planned, see SAU #35) DC-X when this summer's tests are over, embarking on a program of progressive upgrades and flight tests over the next few years. This would let NASA do useful field testing of potential SSTO components, while also building up their experience base with small-crew fast-turnaround reusable rocket flight ops.
NASA would also begin gearing up now for a '97 go-ahead decision on a fully orbital X-2000 SSTO demonstrator, the natural followon to the SX-2, with first flight to orbit right around the turn of the century. There are a lot of potential SSTO subsystems that NASA could usefully look into over the next few years, improved engines in particular, with the ongoing results fed cooperatively into NASA's DC-X-A program, into the SX-2 effort, and into the X-2000 preliminary design process. SX-2 experience would also feed back into NASA, with the result being an extremely solid foundation for a decision on orbital X-2000 come '97.
One benefit of this approach is that overall SSTO funding will never be that high, since SX-2 will likely peak in '96, while X-2000 will begin ramping up the year after. The overall DC-X-A/SX-2/X-2000 package offers the US an outstanding technological return, for a relatively low ongoing cost, with risk broken up into a series of small, easily monitorable three-year steps.
We'd really like to see it happen this way. With goodwill and cooperation from DOD and NASA, we think it is politically feasible, and there's very little doubt it would be good for the country.
Meanwhile, there's the Administration to ponder. They will, after all, have a lot to say about what does and doesn't happen next. The draft OSTP report of a month back is far from their final word on launch policy -- there apparently is a lot more internal give-and-take to go before Clinton and/or Gore announce the new overall national space policy in a speech this coming July 20th, the 25th anniversary of the first Moon landing.
About all we know at this point is that the new policy is unlikely to include any big-budget new project starts. We can hope that it will take account of Congressional support for DOD SX-2; as we pointed out in previous weeks, if Apollo could get to the Moon with the help of people who learned their trade building missiles for Nazi Germany, surely we can stand to get cheap space access with the help of people who learned their trade trying to defend the United States of America.
Persuading the Senate to match the House's $100 million for SX-2 would immensely improve our chances of actually getting SX-2 when the dust settles. Senator Bingaman's SASC DT Subcommittee markup this coming Tuesday afternoon (June 7th) is key, as is support in the full SASC to preserve any pro SX-2 language that makes it in during the subcommittee mark.
Call or fax any of these Senators from your state, especially any of them marked as being on Bingaman's Defense Technology Subcommittee. If there's no Senator on the list from your state, call or fax Nunn and Thurmond, chairman of the full SASC and senior Republican member respectively.
The deadline is pretty much Tuesday morning east coast time, as the markup begins in the afternoon. Try to get to them Monday if you can.
If you call, tell whoever answers that you're calling about the Defense Authorization markup. They may pass you on to someone else at that point, or they may take the call themselves. Tell them you support matching the House's $100 million funding for the SSRT (Single Stage Rocket technology) project. If they want to know more, fill them in as best you can; otherwise thank them for their time and ring off.
If you fax, state your basic point (you support matching the House's $100 million for SSRT "SX-2" in the FY'95 DOD Authorization) at the start. Go on to tell them a bit about the project and why you think it's important, if you feel like writing more. Keep it under a page, though, and above all keep it polite.
-- Senate Armed Services Committee (SASC) --
("Senator XYZ", office#, "Washington DC 20510" will get mail to them.)
(Senators marked with a "*" are on Bingaman's subcommittee)
Name office# phone fax (AC 202)
Sam Nunn (D-GA) SASC Chair SD-303 224-3521 224-0072
Strom Thurmond (R-SC) RRM SR-217 224-5972 224-1300
James Exon (D-NE) SH-528 224-4224 224-5213
John McCain (R-AZ) SR-111 224-2235 224-8938
Richard C. Shelby (D-AL) SH-509 224-5744 224-3416
* William S. Cohen (R-ME) SH-322 224-2523 224-2693
* Edward M. Kennedy (D-MA) SR-315 224-4543 224-2417
* Carl Levin (D-MI) SR-459 224-6221 224-1388
* Dan Coats (R-IN) SR-404 224-5623 224-1966
* Trent Lott (R-MS) SR-487 224-6253 224-2262
* Bob Smith (R-NH) SD-332 224-2841 224-1353
* Jeff Bingaman (D-NM) SH-110 224-5521 224-1810
John Glenn (D-OH) SH-503 224-3353 224-7983
John Warner (R-VA) SR-225 224-2023 224-6295
* Joseph I. Lieberman (D-CT) SH-316 224-4041 224-9750
* Bob Graham (D-FL) SH-524 224-3041 224-6843
* Dirk Kempthorne (D-ID) SD-367 224-6142 224-5893
* Lauch Faircloth (R-NC) SH-702 224-3154 224-7406
* Charles S. Robb (D-VA) SR-493 224-4024 224-8689
* Robert C. Byrd (D-WV) SH-311 224-3954 224-8070
Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX) SH-703 224-5922 224-0776
We would appreciate feedback, both on the above fax numbers (not all are
current) and on any indications you may get as to which Senators already
support SSTO. Thanks!
Henry Vanderbilt "Reach low orbit and you're halfway to anywhere
Space Access Society in the Solar System."
4855 E Warner Rd #24-150 - Robert A. Heinlein
Phoenix, AZ 85044
602 431-9283 voice/fax "You can't get there from here."
(hvanderbilt@bix.com) - Anonymous
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